So what is the Collect?

At the time of writing, The Collect is a baby movement, started by two Catholics, each of whom runs a baby business with a Catholic objective.   

At the time of writing, its canonical status probably approaches something like a very, very small private associatiaton of the faithful - inasmuch as we are just getting off the ground and haven't yet considered the movement enough of a 'thing' for which to seek any official recognition or acknowledgement by the Church.  Therefore what we do is essentially unofficial - but we aim it to be entirely at the service of the Church and 100% faithful to Her teaching and discipline.

At the time of writing, we are in the process of organising our second retreat, and looking forward to a few other projects...

If that doesn't answer your question - let's move beyond the time of writing!

In trying to describe what the Collect essentially is, possibly the more pertinent thing to consider is actually what the Collect intends to be, inasmuch as things are at an early enough stage that we consider a lot of our mission to exist at this time only really in intention and potentiality.

To do this - there are two main things to consider:  The mission - and the methodology.

The Mission

Have you noticed that our Church is divided?  

And I don't even mean that some people who claim to be Catholic hold on to ideas that are openly heretical and reprehensible, rejecting the clear teaching of the Church.  That's been going on for a while now and is somewhat beyond our primary scope.

I mean that those who sincerely love and desire to follow Christ, to receive Revelation (rather than recreate it in their own image) and be faithful to His Church are confused and polarised - divided.

Christ gave us the Church.
Christ gave us the Hierarchy.
Christ gave us the Magesterium.
Christ gave us Tradition.

In illo Uno unum...
And yet how to be faithful at the same time to Christ and all these aspects of His Church seems to be a topic that well intentioned Catholics are seriously struggling to agree on.

If you haven't noticed this, the mission of the Collect is probably not for you.
The things that God may be calling you to focus on are possibly other - and that's ok.
But the Collect exists essentially to try - in its own humble little way - to do something to heal this division.

The Methodology

The Collect seeks to carry out its mission through 'Community, Prayer and Enterprise' - let's look at each one separately.

We seek to build community in order to create a safe place where people can come together to really thresh out their differences in the pursuit of Truth.  Only in love and respect can we really expect conversations about difficult or divisive topics to move in a healthy direction.  For this reason we hope to provide a space in which those who love Christ and His Church can really get to know each other - and together fearlessly seek to know both Christ and His Church as they really are.

We seek to grow together in prayer because we were created to know and love God - not merely to know about Him.  Growing in intimacy with Him is fundamental to every aspect of what we may hope to do.  Without God's grace hearts will not be touched, souls will not be saved, and even we ourselves will miss out on the graces we think we want to receive.  Therefore to serve the mission we must first pray - and we seek also to create possibilities for other Catholics to pray and grow in faith together.

We seek to foster enterprise ...in many ways simply because when your state in life is not one in which you are provided for, something has to put food on the table.  In order, therefore, to free us to be more fully available to what we want to do for the Church, we have adopted a business framework.  Our hope is that this in time will give us the capacity to really grow our mission without compromise, remaining faithful to doing precisely what God Wills of us in every project and decision.

So now you have what the Collect is - and what it hopes to be.  Please pray for us, that above all else we may be faithful to the vision that Christ has for us, and willing to sacrifice all that He may ask, thus moving forward only and always in His Will.