Meet Brave Beekeeper Gracie! A very brief glimpse into this intricate role

 Honey (proper and pure)  is one of those amazing foods, which can be described as a miracle food. It is a wonderful aid for many ailments, as it has antiseptic properties. There are many different honeys - including wild, Manuka (from New Zealand) and organic. The best honey to eat for allergies, is the one in your own area. The taste of honey depends on the pollen which the bees collect - heather honey, for example has a particular taste.

So I was delighted to meet Gracie, who does beekeeping, as one of her many outside activities, as part of her role as an estate manager for a large establishment in Sussex.

I went to see Gracie in March 2025 - she has been a bee keeper for a few years and incredibly - during her training, she was attacked by half a hive, and was stung 30 times through her bee suit! Many would have given up (I would!), but this strong Polish lady persevered. It was newsworthy enough to go into a bee keeping magazine.

I asked Gracie what got her into Beekeeping.

She said that as a trained gardener for 18 years, and  running a complex estate, comprising of both wild and formal walled gardens, a kitchen garden and even hens, it was a natural progression to try her hand at bee keeping. The location was ideal for it and she promptly enrolled on a year long course, run by the High Weald Bee Keeper's Association - aka HWBKA.

I was amazed at how complex this subject is - I always thought one just bought a nice wooden hive and plonked it in one's garden - and got someone to put some bees in. Gracie sighed, and explained that  that's what some novices do - and they run into many problems, finally calling for help from experienced bee keepers.

Gracie says Bees are clever - they don't travel far from the original hive - 3 miles at most. The female 'scout' bees look for suitable places to live. Around three quarters of the hive will swarm  with their queen bee to a new location. The remaining worker bees stay in the original hive and look after baby bees, and will need another queen. Only 1 queen per hive - and it is well known that if there is more than 1 queen in a hive - they will fight each other viciously to the death - they even have a battle, or rather, beecry! Nature can be so cruel.

The queen's function is to lay eggs and once the queen is 'chosen' as a tiny speck in its little hexagon compartment, it is fed royal jelly until adulthood.

When you see a swarm of bees, they are seeking a new home. They are full of food, having emptied the hive of its stores. 

The drones are male and their only function is to mate the queen - then they die. At the end of the season - August, the worker bees can be seen dragging the drones by their wings and throwing them out of the hive! They are no longer required, besides, the worker bees need to clean up the hive.

The queen will be full of eggs, which lasts 2-3 years, and the worker bees guard her. The queen gives out different 'scents' known as pheromones. Only bees understand what they mean!

Gracie took me to the office which has all the bee equipment and she showed me how a wooden bee hive is assembled, and how she makes the wooden trays, which slot in vertically into the large box. She starts the season with 4 hives, and can end up with 12 - which helps prevent the bees from swarming further afield. The key is to judge carefully when to split a hive. If they are left they will swarm away.

With regard to the workload, Gracie inspects the hives every 6 days for 1-2 hours.  The making of the frames takes 1-2 hours. Honey is harvested in August - when the trays are taken out and the beeswax removed - then the honeycomb is placed in a big steel spinning container, where the combs are spun by hand. She told me that her husband will help with the spinning - being a long 3 hours! Cleaning the bee equipment is time consuming. The wax is saved to make candles, which Gracie also makes.

The other problem can be dealing with the parasitic mites called Varroa. August is when bees are treated for this.

Gracie can see I'm flabbergasted by all the intricacies of bees and bee keeping, and tells me breezily - that there is so much more to learn - and indeed - she hands me her course file, with more technical information. 

I feel I have seen just a glimpse of this amazing process and I think bee keepers do this job as a labour of love - it seems to be a vocation. It certainly isn't the 'romance' of just plonking a pretty wooden hive in one's garden and just letting the bees get on with it. And the other amazing fact - one bee produces just 1 teaspoon of honey! That’s a lot of bees for a jar of honey.

1 bee is alive for about 4-6 weeks only. They die of exhaustion.

A beautifully clean tray ready to go into the beehive

The trays are placed upright in the hive 

The slot at the bottom of the hive has a removable  wooden insert - this prevents unwanted guests such as mice  from entering the hive.

Why I won’t attend non Church Weddings any more

 I have noticed a growth in non Church weddings, even if the couple are baptised Catholics/Christians.

There seems to be a trend of having 2 separate events, a small registry office ceremony, followed a few weeks later by another ceremony in a non religious venue, whereby the couple make up some vows, or they get their close friends to draw up a list of vows, to say in front of the seated guests. These can be in amazing and beautiful places.

For baptised Catholics, these are non valid marriages, as they leave Almighty God out of their marriage. This means they miss out on sanctifying grace. Of course, there is an easy remedy, and the couple can always con-validate their marriage in a Catholic Church. By missing out on sanctifying grace, the couple deny themselves of supernatural helps from God. After all marriage can be difficult at times and the couples need as much help as possible.

For most of my adult life, this hasn’t been a problem for me - I usually go to the non religious weddings, and enjoy the party afterwards.

However, this is becoming increasingly difficult and I made a New Year’s resolution in 2025, that I would try and stop attending non religious weddings. 

God is the author of marriage - he made Adam and Eve, and the Holy Bible says they are married. 

When you attend a wedding, you are saying you agree with the marriage.

But if you go to a marriage of baptised Catholics/Christians, and they leave God out (God is banned from registry office ceremonies) - it’s not OK me to attend, knowing that the marriage is not valid in the eyes of the Church. How can I agree with something fake or sham?

I’m sure this will seem offensive to some, but I think registry office weddings are offensive to God - our maker, and author of marriage.

I don’t know if these Catholics think about what they are doing when they leave God out of their marriages, but it strikes me as an insult to their maker.

The venue isn’t the problem, it’s the fact of leaving God out of the marriage.

November is the month to pray for the souls in Purgatory! It is our duty!

 We have duties towards our dead relations and friends. November is dedicated to the holy souls in Purgatory.

First - we must bury and NOT  burn our loved ones (ie cremation). This has always been Catholic teaching until the Catholic Church was taken over by freemasons at the Second Vatican Council. 

This respect for the body has always been church doctrine - the dead people's souls are eternally alive,, even if they are in Hell, Heaven or Purgatory. The pagans, 1000s of years ago used to burn the dead. When the Catholic Church started on Pentecost in AD 33, this practice of burning the dead was condemned by the Church. 

We are duty bound to pray for the souls in Purgatory. How do we know who is and who isn't in Purgatory? We don't know - so it helps to pray for someone and add "if it benefits so and so"

The souls in Hell can never escape, so prayers are wasted on them - as they are wasted on souls already in Heaven. However - no prayers are wasted - as they will go towards the souls in Purgatory who need prayers the most.

The good news is that - if our prayers help a soul from Purgatory into Heaven - that soul will be able to help us in turn!

I find it most alarming that people cremate their loved ones and then this hideous fashion of scattering ashes in random places. This is so sad. How will future generations visit their dead relations if the ashes have been scattered?! They will soon be forgotten as there is no grave to visit - let alone a headstone with their name on!

It's a useful exercise to write down the names of all your dead relations and friends on paper and refer to it every now and then. It's a custom in Catholic Churches to write down all the names and give to the priest - who will put them on the altar.

Decluttering and Tidying Services in South East England

INTRODUCING DomMary’s Decluttering & Tidying Services.

 I have been a declutterer ever since I can remember, since childhood. It’s a pleasure rather than a chore.

Recently I decluttered my aunt’s wardrobes and drawers. She was very happy to find items she had forgotten she had, and she was very happy to give away clothes she no longer liked. Luckily her sister and another niece took some items before they were sent to the charity shop.

My mother is moving house and I have spent several sessions decluttering all the rooms, so that she doesn’t pack unwanted items for the new home. 

Once an area is declutterred, I then clean the area before putting the wanted items back.

I am based near Heathfield, East Sussex and I cover parts of Kent and West Sussex. Part of my  service includes taking your unwanted items to charity shops and/or the dump. I can also advise on how to sell items via Facebook and EBay. I have an antiques diploma so I can also advise on saleable items.

If you would like more information, prices and references please contact me via email - domstemp@gmail.com

October is the month of the Holy Rosary! Pray it!

 October is traditionally the month of the Holy Rosary.

Pope Leo 13th (1810-1903) wrote 11 encyclicals on the rosary. Why?

He said there were 3 errors at the time.

1 - A distaste for the ordinary life of physical labour had crept into society. The working man was becoming discontent with his lot.

2 - A repugnance for any type of suffering, instead of having a supernatural outlook and 'offering it up'. When one offers up suffering of any kind, it becomes less burdensome, as God uses that suffering to do good elsewhere. 

3 - The loss of people thinking about Heaven, and the loss of the supernatural. 

He saw that man was no longer content with life - and society was collapsing. This was over 100 years ago! He said society was becoming spoilt, and children expected their parents to indulge them all the time!

People were beginning to be influenced by Marxist atheistic communism. In the 1890s he said that people were chasing false gods of this world - and becoming like the pagans, who were addicted to worldly things. Ironically the pagans did have a supernatural outlook, and regarded life as a journey to something supernatural. The pagans had a thirst for eternal life. The pope said that society in the 19th century was worse than the pagans!

So with all these modern problems, the pope was exhorting people to pray  the Rosary. The rosary is the remedy to help all types of situations.

The Joyful mysteries help us to cope with our state of life.

The Sorrowful mysteries teach us how to suffer in union with Our Lord.

The Glorious mysteries help us to strive for Heaven.

The Rosary doesn't take long. Start with a decade and gradually increase it to the full rosary - 5 decades. Eventually increase this to all 3 rosaries - 15 decades. One rosary takes around 15 minutes. Surely people have 15 minutes to pray the Rosary. If you count the hours of how much rubbish TV, sport etc - you have time to say the Rosary! The television is a horrible distraction.

The pope was wanting families to pray the rosary together.

Pope Pius XI also wrote about the Rosary in 1937.

Pope Pius XII wrote about the Rosary in 1951

If you search for  "Rosary Encyclicals" you will find much more on this most important of prayers.

My First Novel - Catholic themes

This is my first novel - which is set in the 1980s until the 2020s. It’s mainly about family life and the difficulties of mixed marriages where one of the parties is Catholic. 

It’s available in paperback and kindle.

Link below

 https://www.amazon.co.uk/HUMAN-BONDAGE-Digital-Age/dp/1962840425/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?crid=LWS3XTGZ4F0H&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.O4OIH_7U-yO_gNcUIsCn-g.6GFvlDIAyQO3-kxrVklOgh8vXQfMf7CCBxT2XH1j6xQ&dib_tag=se&keywords=dominie+mary+stemp&nsdOptOutParam=true&qid=1727420438&sprefix=dominie+%2Caps%2C99&sr=8-1

The Latin Mass/Old Rite Mass is the only valid Mass in the UK. And that's if the priest is validly ordained in the first place!

 I was baptised in Blackheath in the Old Rite Latin Mass.

 It was during a time of growing upheaval in the Catholic Church - when the Second Vatican Council was underway, and the  conciliar eruption was simmering like a volcano, waiting to explode onto the world - the eruption began in earnest after the close of the Council on 8th December 1965, 3 years after it started. The church had been well and truly infiltrated by freemasons right up to the highest levels of the church, including pope John 23rd. Freemasonry was always banned in the Church - under pain of excommunication. The nuns at my mother's school in Shaftesbury told the girls that the freemasons get the devil out of the box. That's very apt.

One of the disastrous results of this heinous council was the change to the ancient Mass, from Latin to the vernacular. This was under the guise of making the mass more attractive to Protestants and other denominations. Of course, during the Reformation - the Church of England changed the Latin mass to the vernacular, and the modern mass is akin to the protestant church service. The Latin Mass never went away during the Reformation, it went underground and brave priests were hunted down and martyred if they were caught saying the ancient Mass. That's why there are priest holes in country houses.

Back to the modern council - the Latin Mass went from Latin to the vernacular in around 1969.

My mother describes the changes as - 

'One Sunday we had Latin Mass, and the following Sunday we had guitars".

A handful of brave cardinals did not accept the New Mass - and one of them was the late Archbishop Lefebvre. He refused the say the new mass, as he said it was protestant, and probably invalid. He started the Society of St Pius X, which was to preserve the ancient rite of the Mass. 

Around about the same time as the modern 'mass' was in force, pope Paul 6th decided to change the episcopal rite of ordination - and this, according to Archbishop Lefebvre, made the rite at best - dubious. The implications were massive, because, if the newly ordained bishop was only dubiously ordained, it rendered the priests he was ordaining as dubious too! Just think about that - over many decades of using the new rite, eventually all priests would only be dubiously ordained. If their ordinations are invalid, it invalidates their sacraments! How terrible is that! The modern day Confirmation rite is also dubious and it's a good idea to get a conditional confirmation by a valid bishop.

God obviously used Archbishop Lefebvre to preserve the ancient Mass, and not only that - he ordained 4 bishops in the ancient rite, so that they could validly ordain new priests. The brave Archbishop was excommunicated by pope John-Paul 2. 

Out of the SSPX, came the Sedevacantist movement, which holds that all the popes since John 23rd are invalid, as is the Second Vatican Council. 

I studied Vatican 2 at Maryvale Institute in Birmingham in the early 2000s. What stuck me was the duplicitous language of the documents - and the slippery language used. It was Cardinal Kasper who said in an interview, that the wording of the council documents was deliberately done, to make the documents ambiguous! That my dear people should make you flee from the modern catholic church as fast as possible. Compare the slippery language to the Vatican 1 council of 1870, and you see that the 1870 documents are black and white - no ambiguity anywhere!

If you want the true valid Mass you need to do your homework! Find a Latin Mass -  but more importantly, find out whether the priest was ordained in the new or ancient rite. Many so called conservative  priests say the old Latin Mass, but their ordinations are dubious and therefore you might not be attending a valid Mass!

IF YOU GENUINELY LOVE THE TRUE CATHOLIC FAITH YOU REALLY NEED TO WAKE UP TO THE DISASTROUS VATICAN 2 AND ONLY ATTEND A VALID LATIN MASS. 

If you are a priest reading this - ask yourself - was I ordained properly or not? if not - please get conditionally ordained asap.