Ampleforth: Fr Augustine Measures OSB has died

Fr Augustine Measures

Fr Augustine Measures OSB, Benedictine monk of Ampleforth Abbey, died peacefully in York Hospital on 9 February 2017, at the age of 89.

He was born in Wembley in November 1927 and educated in Welbury and at Ampleforth College. From 1946-1948 he was an Army (Tanks) Radio Instructor, before joining the monastic community at Ampleforth Abbey in September 1948. Fr Augustine studied at St Benet's Hall in the University of Oxford from 1951-1955, and a year after being ordained priest in July 1958 he joined the monastic community at St Louis in Missouri, which had been founded from Ampleforth Abbey in 1955. Fr Augustine returned to North Yorkshire in 1964 and became Senior Classics Master in Ampleforth College, before moving to parish ministry in Bamber Bridge in 1968. For nearly forty years Fr Augustine continued to serve on the parish missions, in Cardiff, Warrington, and Brindle, before returning to St Benedict's Monastery at Bamber Bridge in 1999.

One of Fr Augustine's great passions was the radio and in the late 1960s he qualified and obtained a Radio Amateur Licence. In 2006, he began sending out daily audio homilies to more than 250 listeners and websites around the world.

Poor health led to Fr Augustine's return to Ampleforth Abbey in June 2014, where he resided in the monastery infirmary until his death on 9 February 2017.

Fr Augustine's body will be received into the Abbey Church at Ampleforth on Thursday 16 February at 6pm. His funeral Mass will be celebrated at 11.30am in the Abbey Church on Friday 17 February, followed by burial in the Monks' Wood.