Celebrate Family Conference | Past speakers and celebrants

Past speakers and celebrants

Over the years, Celebrate has been blessed with a wide variety of teaching from many inspirational speakers, Lord Alton, Fr. Pat Collins, Patti Mansfield, Damian Stayne, Sr. Maria Natella, David Wells, John Vaughan-Neil, Michelle Moran, David Matthews, Ulf Ekman, Rob Clarke and Fr. Chris Thomas to name but a few. Speakers also come from the Celebrate leadership team, Charles and Sue Whitehead, David Payne and Jenny Baker. We have had a number of Bishops attend and each of them have spoken positively about their experiences of Celebrate.

Bishop Malcolm McMahon: “I very much enjoyed Celebrate once again. It ticked all the boxes for me, and it was relaxing, spiritually refreshing and an opportunity to make new friends and to renew old friendships. It made the Risen Lord present to so many people. Celebrate is something all Catholics would enjoy and feel spiritually and physically re-created!”

Bishop Christopher Budd: “One feature of the gathering that has always impressed me is the availability of speakers encouraging us to reflect seriously over the meaning of our faith…Since 1994 I have had the pleasure of attending the Celebrate Gathering. During that time it has become a part of my celebration of Easter. This stems, very much, from the good spirit which seems to enable formation of community and from the context of the Resurrection of the Lord. It has been a particular joy to see the large number of families who come to enjoy this event.”

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor: “Since 1994, the annual Celebrate Family Conference, which I visited in 2003, has been a great encouragement to adults, young people, and children of all ages, with its emphasis on good, practical Christian teaching, celebration, services and fun. I am delighted that the new Celebrate weekends will make the Celebrate experience available to many more people in the local parishes, and will join with you in praying for their success.”

Archbishop Mark Coleridge: We have received teaching from all over the world with speakers who have come from as far as Australia including Archbishop Mark Coleridge.

Fr. Christopher Jamison

Fr. Christopher Jamison past Abbot of Worth came to Celebrate in 2009 and presented his vision for places of silence before it was filmed for TV!

Listen to the talk by Fr. Christopher Jamison:

Fr. Christopher Jamison

Speakers from other churches

Rev. Jim Graham, J.John, Nicky Gumbel and Bishop Sandy Millar

A key area of the Celebrate vision is to work towards continued unity between denominations and so we are delighted that we have hosted many speakers from other churches, Rev. Jim Graham, J.John, Nicky Gumbel and Bishop Sandy Millar have over the years come to Celebrate.

Listen to the talk by Rev. Jim Graham:

Rev. Jim Graham