Hove’s Ecumenical Good Friday Walk of Witness

The weather forecast  - ‘heavy rain all morning’ – did not bode well for today's Good Friday annual Walk of Witness with sister churches in Hove, especially since quite a few of the walkers were elderly. And, indeed, it rained all morning, a constant cold shower of rain from leaden grey skies, right up until we reached the final Station at St Andrew’s Church.

Surprisingly, there was a good turnout. Last year I counted about 150 walkers and this year I recorded 164 as we set off from St John’s Anglican Church at Palmeira Square at 11 am. Mind you, I only saw one four-legged marcher this year, compared to at least four dogs last year.   

Umbrellas were the order of the day as the Rev. Paul Doick of St. John’s switched on his megaphone and, after the first Station of the Cross (I. Jesus is Condemned to Death), and five verses of ‘Take up thy cross, the Saviour said,’ we set off in a long and straggly silent procession along Church Road.

As we crossed Church Road via the pedestrian crossing the traffic was forced to stop for a minute or two. Several impatient motorists sounded their horns; being a driver in Brighton & Hove can be a stressful matter without having to cope with a shuffling conga line of the devout.   

Our first stop was in front of the beautiful All Saints Anglican Church in the Drive, renowned for its lunchtime concerts of classical music. The second Station (II. Jesus Falls) was followed by the hymn ‘Crown him with many crowns,’ the words almost swallowed in the roar of traffic and the endless rain.

Then it was off again, dodging the cars until we reached my own church, Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Norton Road. Fr. Kevin Dring led the worship and ended with the ‘Hail Mary’, particularly appropriate since the third Station was ‘III. Jesus Meets His Mother.’ After four verses of ‘Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord’ our sodden procession squelched on to the Central United Reformed Church at Ventnor Villas, a couple of streets away.

There is no traffic island or barrier in front of the church so the photograph of this Station (IV. Simon of Cyrene Helps Carry the Cross’) usually gives a good idea of the size of the procession – but not today, the umbrellas obscure much of the gathering. After a more tuneful offering of ‘My Song is Love unknown’ we continued on to George Street, the main shopping street of Hove.

Truth to tell, George Street isn’t much of a shopping street. It has a handful of high-street chain stores such as Boots the chemists, WH Smith books and Robert Dyas for home and garden supplies. Then there is a bank branch, a couple of pubs, several coffee shops, a few small shops and a great many charity shops, more a statement on the present economic situation than the locals’ love of thrift and bargains. (That said, at least George Street saves us from having to travel into Brighton for the essentials in life, like browsing the latest magazine issues).     

Today, George Street was virtually deserted, shoppers were sheltering indoors. We prayed the next Station (V. Jesus is Stripped) and, in the reflection, pondered on our behaviour to others, including the homeless and destitute. At this, one of the homeless men sheltering in the doorway of the closed-down Phones4U shop loudly applauded (see the extreme left of the photo above). Two verses of ‘O sacred head, sore wounded’ and we were on the move again – just a hundred yards further on to the bottom of George Street where we prayed the next Station (VI. Jesus is Nailed to the Cross) and sang ‘Were you there when they crucified my Lord?’ a hauntingly beautiful  American spiritual.    

Then the Revs. Douglas Holt Paul and Phil Ritchie with cross-bearer Michael Rainbow led us on the final stage to our last stop, St. Andrew's Anglican Church. St. Andrew’s is a fine early Victorian structure surrounded by a churchyard (which includes the grave of Sir George Everest, once Surveyor-General of India, whose name was given to the world’s highest mountain).

The rain had finally stopped and we stood outside the church, among the gravestones, praying the final Station ‘VII. Jesus Dies on the Cross’ and singing ‘When I survey the wondrous cross’  probably Isaac Watts’ best hymn. There is a haunting melancholy to the words, a solemn and aching wonder at the extent of Jesus’ sacrifice for us. The lyrics are over 300 years old but they still have the power to move the spirit.

...Love so amazing, so divine

Demands my soul, my life, my all.

 Then it was hot drinks and food in the parish hall - Deo gratias!

Homeless Night Shelter Wrap-up

The Brighton & Hove Churches' Winter Night Shelter has just completed its 18-week run from November 2014 to March 2015. Tonight, we had the Church Coordinators' final wrap-up meeting.

A total of 108 homeless men and women were referred to the Shelter by four of the city's front-line agencies that deal with the homeless on a daily basis; First Base, Project AntiFreeze, YMCA and the Crime Reduction Initiative. About half (52) of these individuals gained places in the Shelter. A total of 16 persons - including all four women - out of the 52 that entered the Shelter were subsequently provided with housing by the local authority - a great result. It is a condition of entering the Shelter programme that individuals have to engage with initiatives to improve their lot, such as attend housing or work interviews, attend addiction programmes or undertake relevant training.

At Sacred Heart Church we looked after 21 separate homeless guests during our nine-week spell, including three women.

Interestingly, this season we have seen more individuals with deep-seated problems that, in many cases, arose at an early age, whether it was mental health issues, trauma or a particularly negative experience. Also, there seems to have been more fractiousness between individuals, particularly over the Christmas and New Year holiday period. Finally, the baleful influence of 'legal highs' on the behaviour of several guests was quite evident this year. 

This was the first time that the Shelter made places available for homeless women (in previous years other specialist agencies had looked after them, or they remained on the streets) and the innovation was an undoubted success. Apart from the guests that were successfully housed, there were other examples of individuals who began to transform their lives, and, in at least one case, embraced faith. Of course, there are others who returned to the streets with little to look forward to and will revert to their addictions. But, as Tom, one of the Central Coordinators, remarked, all the guests' lives were impacted by the love and care they experienced from the Shelter volunteers and, in God's own time, and if it is His will, the love they experienced will bear fruit. Similarly, it seems to have been a common experienced that, once again, the Shelter volunteers were greatly enriched by caring for those who have so little.

‘For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow...’

Three days ago it was our parish priest Fr. Kevin’s 50^th birthday. He became aware that some of the parishioners were arranging a hush-hush party for him in the Parish Room and – a little embarrassed - agreed to attend, but requested that there be no gifts.

The expression ‘blind bit of notice’ describes well what followed. On Saturday evening the tables were laden with a huge variety of food, there were streamers and balloons galore, the wine flowed - and he was presented with a very generous gift, the result of stealthy collections organised by a ‘well known lady of the parish.’

This morning, when our little team of counters arrived at the presbytery to count and bank the weekend’s collections, the dining room table that we normally use was somewhat occupied...

 

So, it's Happy Birthday to Fr. Kevin.  

We Have a Bishop!



(www.catholicnews.org.uk)

We have a bishop! Yes, less than six months after the former bishop resigned, Pope Francis yesterday named the Right Reverend Richard Moth as the fifth Bishop of Arundel & Brighton Diocese.

Bishop Moth is currently Bishop of the Forces. He was ordained a priest in 1982 and served  in parishes of the Archdiocese of Southwark, where he was also Vicar General and Chancellor, before being appointed Bishop of the Forces six years ago by Pope Benedict.

Born in Zambia - then Northern Rhodesia - fifty-six years ago, Bishop Moth obtained a Masters degree in Canon Law from Ottowa, and has since held a variety of roles. These include Liaison Bishop for Prisons, Episcopal Advisor to the National Catholic Scout Fellowship, lead Bishop for the Bishops’ Conference Mental Health Project and Chair of Governors at St. Mary’s University, Twickenham.

Bishop Moth will be installed at the Cathedral Church of Our Lady & St. Philip Howard, Arundel, on Thursday 28^th May, the 50^th anniversary of the foundation of A&B diocese (which was originally part of the Archdiocese of Southwark). He will then preside at the Jubilee Mass of Thanksgiving at the Amex Stadium here in Brighton on Sunday 5^th July.

The Bishop has been a Benedictine Oblate for over 30 years and is a member of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem. For relaxation, he enjoys walking and horse riding (which I suspect he will find more relaxing in the verdant Sussex countryside then in urban Southwark!).

A huge welcome to Bishop Moth, pray for him.

No Longer Holy (or Holey)

The saga of the arm is finally over....

Nine months ago I slipped on my garage floor and broke my right arm in several places; the point of the elbow was particularly badly damaged, shattering into five or six separate pieces.

The following day, in a three-hour operation, surgeons at the Royal Sussex County Hospital patched it up, inserting a metal plate and several screws to hold the pieces together.

Then, two months later, the scab on the point of the elbow came off and revealed a small hole in the arm - with part of the plate and the heads of some screws plainly visible.

My doctor sent me back to hospital where the surgeons were surprised - and a little alarmed -  whipping out their mobile phones to take photographs of the elbow. I was told it was rather dangerous because of bacteria on the exposed plate and another operation was needed urgently, so they scheduled it for a couple of days later.

However, on the day the operation was due, a specialist arm surgeon advised against it as the bone fragments had not fused yet and removing the plate and screws might cause the arm to ‘collapse.’

So, I returned home with my holy arm. A couple of months later we found a possible reason for the failure of the bone fragments to fuse – tests showed that I had osteoporosis in the spine and osteopenia in the hips. In the meantime, the hole enlarged slightly and the plate and screws were quite visible, glinting brightly...

Two weeks ago the saga ended with another operation to remove the plate and screws and sew up the hole. I’m relieved to report that the surgeons found that the bones had finally fused. Also, the bacteriological results from the inside of the arm were satisfactory in that they did not find any truly-nasty bacteria, and a prescription of three months oral antibiotics should sort out the junior league bacteria that they did find.

So, I’m no longer quite so holy (or holey) and the arm works well so I can now be more timely about updating the blog...  

Lent (and Thinking of Syria)

‘Flooded with news reports and troubling images of human suffering, we often feel our complete inability to help.’ The words are from Pope Francis’ Lenten message where, in his usual plain-speaking and challenging way, he addresses what he calls the globalisation of indifference.

The list of current-day horrors seems endless...Ebola, Islamic State, Boko Haram, al-Shabab, al Qaeda, Ukraine, Libya, Palestine, typhoons, wildfires, earthquakes, floods, kidnappings, school massacres ...never before have we been informed so rapidly and comprehensively, with up-to-the minute video reports by satellite and blow-by-blow accounts on the internet.

Yet, the more the tsunami of horror floods our consciousness, the less impact it seems to have, morphing into yet another infotainment; if the news is too distressing I can always flip a switch and retreat to one of the hundreds of other channels on my Sky tv. After all, there is too much horror isn’t there? And we are powerless, too far away to make a difference. And even if we could, we don’t have the ability or resources to change things.

Not so, says Pope Francis.

‘If one member suffers, all suffer together’ (1 Cor 12:26) he reminds us. Although he does not spell it out, I’m sure that the suffering of Christians in the Middle East is very much on his mind.

Syria is one of the oldest Christian communities in the world where a few still speak Aramaic, the language of Jesus. About one hundred years ago, Christians made up 30% of the population of Syria, now it is around 7% or one million people, mainly Greek Orthodox, Armenian and Syrian Orthodox. Already, an estimated five hundred thousand Syrian Christians have been displaced by fighting or have left the country, dozens of churches have been destroyed and entire villages razed to the ground. Many people fear a repeat of the violence that occurred in Iraq after the US invasion, when Christians were targeted and whole communities destroyed, so that in a few years the estimated number of Iraqi Christians fell from a million and a half to about 400,000. Similarly, in Palestine the proportion of the population that is Christian has dropped from ten per cent seventy years ago to about 2% today.

So, what can we do? Here’s what the Pope says:

(1) Pray (and may I recommend a prayer from Maronite Archbishop Samir Nassar of Damascus?)

 A Prayer for the People of Syria

God of Compassion,

Hear the cries of the people of Syria,
Bring healing to those suffering from the violence,
Bring comfort to those mourning the dead,
Strengthen Syria’s neighbours in their care and welcome for refugees,
Convert the hearts of those who have taken up arms,
And protect those committed to peace.
God of Hope,
Inspire leaders to choose peace over violence and to seek reconciliation with enemies,
Inspire the Church around the world with compassion for the people of Syria,
And give us hope for a future of peace built on justice for all.
We ask this through Jesus Christ, Prince of Peace and Light of the World,
Amen.

 (2) Have a strong but merciful heart and make an act of charity – particularly since it is Lent (and may I recommend Aid to the Church in Need?  Aid to the Church in Need )  

(3) Let the dire need of far-away Christians in the Middle East remind us that life is uncertain, we too are dependent upon God and our brothers and sisters. Let us accept that – by ourselves - we cannot save the world; we need to implore God’s grace and trust in His love.   

Amen.

The Rite of Election

On the First Sunday of Lent several hundred people gathered in Arundel’s beautiful Cathedral of Our Lady and St Philip Howard to participate in and witness a key stage of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA).

Watched by their godparents, sponsors, catechists, priests and families, the Candidates (who were validly baptized in other Christian denominations) and the Catechumens (who were never baptized) publicly attested to their desire to join the Catholic Church. This RCIA Rite of Election and Enrolment of Names was presided over by Archbishop Peter Smith, Archbishop of Southwark.

A total of 143 individuals from A&B Diocese shared their intention to become Catholics, while, on the same day, it is estimated that more than 3,000 people nationally made the same declaration as part of their journey to joining the Catholic Church at Easter.

In his homily the Archbishop spoke of this day as a special window of opportunity for the participants, a chance to allow Jesus to mold them in his likeness. The Holy Spirit guides – often in hidden ways – and gives the gift of faith. He reminded them of Pope Francis’ request to shun indifference and deepen their personal encounters with Christ this Lent. In conclusion, he spoke of his desire that the day be one of great joy and strength for the candidates; while there will be challenges, he concluded by asking them to hold firm to the words of Jesus: ‘Courage, do not be afraid for I am always with you until the end of time.’  

Following the testimony of the godparents and sponsors that their catechumens and candidates were properly prepared, the Archbishop greeted each candidate personally, together with their supporters.

It was fitting that the Rite of Election took place in Arundel Cathedral, which is dedicated to St Philip Howard and holds his relics. In his youth St Philip was a bit of a playboy and indifferent to religion until the prayers of his saintly wife and the preaching of St Edmund Campion converted him. Some of the candidates shared their journeys and stories of conversion; as the Archbishop observed, the Holy Spirit guides, often in hidden ways.