Synod Pilgrimage Day 3

Gunnerside to Reeth

The first surprise of the day was the fact that the sun was not shining. A fine mist shut off the view from the hostel over the valley, and still lingered after our nine o’clock prayers in the garden room and our prompt get-away – the bus driven today by Norma. The walk began exactly where yesterday’s finished at Gunnerside; and after half an hour or so of walking along the river bank we realised that the sun was nearly shining, and the forecasts we’d heard about a brilliant day were going to be realised again.

Ruined Chapel at Smarber

After a while we left the river and took a steep and treacherous path up the hillside. At the top, well guarded by nettles, we discovered the site of the original Smarber Chapel, gift of Lord Wharton (of Lord Wharton’s Bibles fame) to the original dissenting congregation of the late 1600s.

From there a much easier path took us back into the valley, and to the present Low Row United Reformed Church, successor to the chapel up the hillside. From there we walked the length of the village to Mellbecks, where we met  up with Norma and the van, and were warmly greeted in the Anglican church by two members of the congregation who provided coffee to accompany our packed lunches.

Low Row URC

The afternoon walking was as good as ever as we were led back up the valley side, giving us splendid views back over the way we’d taken over the past 48 hours. Then a gentle descent down to Healaugh (where a local told us how to pronounce it) and from there to the river. Stepping stones led us across to the other side: not that we were going that way, but none of us could resist using them. Back on track, we followed the river for a mile or so, and then took the field path up into the centre of Reeth.

Melbecks parish church

Norma had already discovered the Wednesday is early closing day in Reeth. But never mind: the ice cream parlour was open, and every pilgrim is able to recommend the home-made ice cream on sale there. But we finished the walk more quietly and thoughtfully in the Methodist chapel just off the green, before the minibus took us back to the hostel.

A little less rushed than some days, there was time for a shower and a little relaxation before Norma turned the bus around to take us back to Reeth, and a bar meal at the King’s Arms.

Synod Pilgrimage Day 2

Keld to Gunnerside

Worship in the well-being garden

Today has been another fine day’s walking, starting from Keld and the well-being garden which we visited yesterday. We began with a time of worship  in the garden, looking down the dale, as Mary led us through a time of reflection on bible passages about gardens which are portrayed in Pam Pavitt’s wall hangings at Windermere. On the way out we stopped to talk with the elderly couple staying this week at the manse next door – the wife was a child of the manse, literally the child of this manse, as she spent the first few years of her life in this very house. That there’s now electricity seemed to be her main reflection on the changes the years have brought!

Kisdon Force

We began our walk along the right bank of the river, with a significant stop after half a mile or so allowing us to clamber down to the splendid Kisdon Falls. Then we walked steadily towards Muker, where we first spent a few moments of reflection in the parish church, before tea shops and the Farmers Arms called us to a serious lunch break.

Haymaking in Muker meadows

2.30 saw us on our way again, back through the hay meadows and the nostalgic scent of the new-mown hay, then across the river and headed for Gunnerside. Most of the time we were close to the river, which was sometimes slow and sometimes fast-flowing, and varied in appearance from bend to bend. We watched a dipper at work, and hoped in vain for the sight of a kingfisher – but we know they are sometimes seen on this stretch.

From Ivelet Bridge it was an easy walk through the meadows all the way to Gunnerside, where there

Everywhere up and down the dale
are signs of the recent Tour de France

was some disappointment that the teashop was already closed. But the Methodist chapel provided an interesting and by its coolness welcoming place of shelter for our pilgrims as they waited for the minibus to bring them back to Grinton for a shower and a rest – and later in the evening an excellent meal down in the village at the Bridge Inn.

Synod Pilgrimage Day 1

Source of the Swale - Keld - Tan Hill

It was the meeting up again that seemed to take the time to begin with. Just eight of us walking today (others still to follow) – but by the time we’d gathered at the splendidly crenelated Youth Hostel on the hill above Grinton, and told one another of our individual morning pilgrimages to get that far – and eaten lunch as well…. But before we were ready to start, we spent time thanking God for what might lie ahead and for one another to share our journeys, as Mary led us in a time of worship outside the hostel, looking down the long expanse of the dale towards Richmond.

And then there was the long drive in the minibus right up to the head of the dale (and did anyone realise Swaledale was quite that long?) – and it was easy to grasp by now that somehow we were starting to walk at least an hour later than intended.

The first few miles from the so-called source of the Swale (in fact the point where two streams meet)  as far as Keld were present. Some of our number did not know Keld, which came as a revelation – and the others of us rejoiced over the fact that our Church has succeeded in keeping a presence that is clearly central to the village. As ever the chapel was open and welcoming, with simple summer flower arrangements forming a focal point. We just missed there being a minister in residence living in the manse, but we saw a couple of holiday makers enjoying their holiday let there. And the Resource Centre was open, giving us more information about the village and its surroundings, and a hint of the plans – if finance can be found – to develop the rest of the Institute building and the school building next door.

The well-being garden

And then outside the chapel we lingered in the well-being garden, drinking in the quietness and the views down the dale. And it has to be said we lingered quite a long time over a cup of tea and cakes served at the farm, before it was time for Henry and Linda to sort out transport matters, and ensure the minibus was where it was going to be needed by the end of the day.

Keld from the Pennine Way

Leaving Keld at 5.30 was seriously behind schedule – but never mind. At least the day was getting cooler as we struggled up the hillside, looking back over such splendid views of the village. And the two hours solid walking over the moors soon passed as we flushed out the occasional grouse and heard the cry of the curlew overhead. At last Tan Hill Inn appeared over a rise, and a final burst of energy got us there. A good hearty meal and refreshing drinks saw us far less concerned at how much of the day had gone, and how little of it was left. The minibus made short work of the road down through Arkengarthdale and back to Grinton. 

Soon we were booked in at the hostel, had breakfast ordered for the morning – and at least for those of us who have done little in the way of serious walking since last year’s pilgrimage, we were more than ready for the good night’s sleep that now is promised us.

Pennine Way leading to Tan Hill

Synod Pilgrimage 2014 - Introduction

For the sixth year running, Northern Synod has organised a pilgrimage for keen walkers who enjoy the wonderful countryside in our region, and appreciate linking this with times of reflection and expressions of thankfulness to the God who always journeys with us.

For the first years we followed in the footsteps of the saints, walking the recently developed long distance paths associated with St Cuthbert (twice) and St Oswald, and discovering together more about the Celtic dimension of our Christian heritage. Then in 2012 we marked the 350^th anniversary of the Act of Uniformity and all that by a series of walks in upper Coquetdale, which led us to the preaching trees that mark the spot where our dissenting forebears gathered to worship away from danger. And last year we looked further back over 500 years to the Battle of Flodden as we walked between the newly established Peace Gardens at Selkirk and Crookham.

For the first time the 2014 Pilgrimage is moving south of the Tyne, and will consist of a series of walks in the magnificent setting of Swaledale – the most northerly of the Yorkshire Dales, and the setting of two of our rural churches at Keld and Low Row. As ever, practical arrangements for the week have been in the hands of Linda Gowland, while Henry Gowland has mapped out the walks and will be leading us or cajoling us ever onward. We're all grateful for their readiness to look after us in this way year by year.

We meet on Monday morning (July 21^st) at the Youth Hostel at Grinton; and our week’s itinerary is as follows:

Monday          Source of the Swale to Tan Hill

Tuesday          Keld to Gunnerside

Wednesday     Gunnerside to Grinton

Thursday        Grinton to Marske

Friday            Marske to Easby Abbey

Each year we have given some account of our pilgrimage here on the synod blog. Internet access permitting (and we don’t know whether it will or not) we will again try to post a day by day account of our journey. Watch this space!

John Durell

Sabbatical Blog 2: Manatoulin Island, Ontario, Canada

Ray Anglesea shares the second installment of his blog

Huron Carol revisited

“Twas in the moon of winter-time, when all the birds had fled,
that mighty Gitchi Manitou sent angel choirs instead”

The Huron carol is a common Christmas hymn in many Christian denominations. Canadian in origin it was probably written in 1642 by a Jesuit Missionary, the melody based on a traditional French folk song. The English version of the hymn uses Canadian imagery in place of the traditional Nativity. Jesus is born in a "lodge of broken bark", and wrapped in a "robe of rabbit skin". He is surrounded by hunters instead of shepherds and Magi are portrayed as "chiefs from afar" that bring him "fox and beaver pelts" instead of the more familiar gifts. The hymn also uses a traditional Algonquian name, Gitchi Manitou for God.

And it was to Manitoulin Island the home of Gitchi Manitou and peopled 300 year ago by Ottawa Indians that I headed to in June 2014, a long 8 hour drive north of Toronto with a refreshing overnight stopover at the beautiful Georgian Bay. Manitoulin Island is a Canadian Lake Island in Lake Huron, the largest fresh water lake island in the world where native life and legend combine with European history. I was heading to the small community of Sandfield, some distance from the island town of Manitowaning the first European settlement, near to the small town of Wikwemikong which remains the only unceded Indian Reserve in Canada.

Durham Canon Stephen Cherry writing in his blog “Another Angle” May 2014 stated that he “believes in sabbaticals, and would encourage clergy to make the most of the opportunity not for productivity, but for a deeper sort of renewal. Big things can happen on sabbaticals, especially if they are not over-planned and if there is an element of exploration and an intentional stepping outside of the personal comfort-zone.”

Out of my comfort-zone on the island was indeed an under-statement!  My nephew in his wind-up about the island had not prepared me for the worst - no internet connection and no WiFi! Having lived and worked in Africa I could just about cope with packs of mosquitoes, a 15 minute drive to the nearest highway, 30 minutes to the nearby shop, and lack of nearby medical facilities. For a person who can’t function at all without constant input and support from other people, I had a feeling that I may be overwhelmed and trapped by boredom and fear on Peter’s 35 acre estate; in a large bungalow designed in the style of that famous American architect Frank Lloyd Wright, with lawns that rolled down to the lakeside, the large wooded estate comprising of stables, childrens cabins, tennis courts and a boat house.  Could I manage without my daily habitual ways of seeing the world through technology, particularly through social media networks for which, I freely I admit, I am a prisoner? The cottage at Sandfield maybe beautiful, the beavers and brightly coloured humming birds awesome, the silver lake shimmering in its early morning glory, but it is hard to be cut off completely, and the instinct to switch on the phone, just in case, is overwhelming.   

After 48 hours of reading, walking, taking the speedboat out for a spin, dinners at local restaurants, the urge to switch on gradually subsided. The imposed de-clutter, the enforced detachment, freed the heart to honest self-appraisal and confession uttered from the deepest place.

God had brought me intentionally I suspect to a retreat place, to rest and relax, to find a deeper sort of renewal,  to explore again the beauty and love of his world. Peace and stillness began to settle on me.

I guess most of us want to think of ourselves as good, kind, intelligent and caring people. Sometimes that’s true. Sometimes it isn’t. I guess reality is complex.  Everything we have, I suspect everything we’ve learned about our faith came to us through someone else’s hands. At our best, we pass on this borrowed faith to others, enhanced by our contribution. At our worst, we waste and squander it. And in that week I began to realize that the truth really does set you free; free to work on being better and to forgive yourself for being human; free to express your gratitude to others and recognize what you owe them; free to acknowledge your feelings without letting them dominate your life. Above all, free to understand the truth of living: that much of what happens to you is no more than chance. It can’t be avoided and is not my fault.

But this week’s communion with God is ultimately I believe to help me reach out afresh to those around me. After all Adam could not cope with being alone – God had to give him a companion in order that human life in all its depth and richness could begin. I guess we are hardwired for relationship, for connectivity. It struck me therefore there is a profound synchronicity between the yearning for connection with God and our connectivity with one another. I guess the Ottawa Indians may have used smoke signals to connect with one other long ago, (to sing the Huron Carol perhaps?), my iPhone is another way. But the same search for reception in the remotest place stems from the same impulse that drove Moses up a hill all those centuries ago, to communicate with the divine and to return with the ultimate hardware, the building blocks for human and divine relating. 

So unashamed I was thrilled to hear my phone beeping at Tim Hortons when we left the island - Tim Hortons is a Canadian multinational fast casual restaurant known for its coffee and doughnuts. It is also Canada's largest fast food service; and offers free WiFi. Yippee!

After a week on the island I felt at peace, my heart open in expansive generosity, ready to receive.

Ray Anglesea

May 2014

Sabbatical Blog 1: New York - A Hidden Garden

 Ray Anglesea is sharing his blog from his recent sabbatical. This first installment is labelled "New York: April 2014". Ray promises further postings each week.

Tucked away in the shady recesses of New York’s financial district is a small, understated garden. It took a while for me to find it amongst the dense architecture of Lower Manhattan, but when I did, what a joy. No bigger than an average size British allotment the garden is called The Queen Elizabeth II September 11th Garden; the garden’s namesake together with the Dean of Westminster Abbey made a visit to the garden on July 6th, 2010. Made to order by the British Memorial Garden Trust it was given to the City of New York in memory of British and Commonwealth citizens who lost their lives during the attacks of September 11th 2001 and in the ensuing wars.

Before finding the garden I had been to a communion service (Easter 1) at one of the oldest church’s in Manhatten, St Paul’s Chapel (1766), a Georgian chapel modelled on St Martin in the Field, London. St Paul’s remained miraculous unharmed church during the 9/11 attack; it served as a place of rest and refuge for recovery workers at the World Trade Centre. For eight months, hundreds of volunteers worked 12-hour shifts around the clock, serving meals, making beds, counseling and praying with fire fighters, construction workers, police and others. The church survived without even a broken window.

After communion I visited the World Trade Centre Memorial Garden, a stone’s throw away from the chapel. The Memorial Garden features two massive square waterfall pools that are set within the footprints of the Twin Towers, and bear the names of the nearly 3,000 people killed in the 9/11 attacks and the 1993 bombing of the North Tower. A Memorial Museum stands in between the two fountains. The plaza surrounding the fountains and museum is filled with hundreds of oak trees. One tree, however, is different: a single pear tree stands out from the rest. This Survivor Tree was saved from the original World Trade Centre site after the attacks and nursed back to health. It now stands proudly at the plaza once more, and has even bloomed again. Visitors gather here just to touch the bark of the “miracle tree”, which has inspired hope and stands as a vision of rebirth. And there on the north west corner of the new World Trade Complex stands Freedom Tower, a glass 104 storey super-tall structure, its spire allows the building to reach a symbolic height of 1,776 feet (541m), a reference to the year of the United States Declaration of Independence.

In comparison to the calm and beauty of the World Trade Memorial Garden the English Garden which I visited later in the day and dedicated to the memory of the 67 British victims of the terrorist attack is a very practical walk-through “living” garden. Situated in Hanover Square the rich tradition of English gardens meets the hard urban American skyscraper landscape. New York based garden designers Lynden Miller and Ronda Brands worked with the English landscape designers Julian and Isabel Bannerman to create an enduring garden for all seasons, with plants that capture the spirit of an English garden. The park’s footprint is the shape of the British Isles; wrapping around the island is a ribbon of Morayshire sandstone. This ribbon of stone is inscribed from north to south with the shires of the British Isles, County Durham is named and my home Welsh County (in Welsh) Sir y Fflint. A large, rounded “Braemar’ stone, from a riverbed near the HM The Queen’s home in Balmoral, sits at the south end of the garden - in the spirit of a cairn.  

Four evergreen hollies derived from an English holly parent, stand as entry pillars at the north and south ends of the garden. They are linked to the vertical spires of other holly species by a winding row of 67 evergreen shrubs with foliage that turns red and orange in the colder months, each signifying one of the 67 British victims. Along the backs of the serpentine benches - made of white Portland stone quarried in southern England and carved in Northern Ireland - are rounded yew shrubs, an iconic feature of English churchyards, embodying I imagine the natural link between the living and the dead. These plants are the backbone of the garden, perhaps suggesting the narrative that led to its making.

Nestled within the garden borders are a range of herbaceous and woody flowering plants that recall the plant palette of an English garden, ranging from the tiny blue flower of the Siberian bugloss and the pink blossom of pig squeak to a host of hydrangeas, spireas, rhododendrons and azaleas; my favourite the flowering lady’s mantle often found in English gardens, bears lime-green florets in early summer. At the southern reach of the planting beds - rises a yellow magnolia tree, fortuitously called Magnolia “Elizabeth.’ The Magnolia was planted by Prince Harry on May 29, 2009. With fragrant yellow flowers, it is an early bloomer, catching the first rays of spring light as the sun rises over the tops of the skyscrapers and into the garden (the bar opposite the magnolia tree is called the Prince Harry!). The four national flowers of the British Isles, a rose for England, daffodil for Wales, thistle for Scotland and flax for Northern Ireland are embossed on the finials that top the Eastern Memorial Fence.

As I sat in the garden in the warm April sunshine I remembered the 67 people who had lost their lives in a reckless act of evil. Remembering, after all, is at the heart of the gospel, “remember me” are some of the last recorded words of Jesus. When we remember we bring out of the past and into the present those people whom we have loved and lost; those whom we still love, yet see no longer; those to whom we owe a debt, yet cannot repay – or thank enough. I remembered such people that I knew. One act of remembering it seems to me is making sure we don’t forget such people and in particular the people for whom this garden was designed and created. In an act of creativity this garden symbolises another act of remembering - an attempt to put something together that has come apart or has become dismembered. Remembrance is not only an act that brings memories of the past to the present, an act to remember individuals, a society, a country or a nation, it is can also be an invitation to remake something that has been broken. By remembering we are inviting God to re-shape not only our environment but also our lives, so that our world and our lives can be re-fashioned, re-made and re-deemed. Gardens it seems to me help in this process, they help to signify the possibility of a new and better created world. Gardens can be read like letters, each flower, shrub or stone capturing a part of a human story, a human individual. Here amongst the quarried stone and plantings, sent from the English to the Americans in a time of mutual loss, this garden can be read and re-read in the days after, remembering loved ones, re-creating bonds of peace and providing a space for healing.

Ray Anglesea - April 2014

Equal Marriage - What's a poor Rev to do?

Ray Anglesea has shared this pastoral letter today with his congregation at Crook

John’s gospel account of the Wedding at Cana is a much loved reading for a church wedding ceremony. Jesus and his mother respond to a wedding invitation. When the celebration was about to be cut short by the lack of wine, Jesus was at first reluctant to help, but before long, an impractical amount of water used for washing had been turned into a naughty, vintage Galilean red wine, in an act of generous, almost reckless liberality. An unplanned moment at a wedding party revealed Jesus as an agent of his Father’s blessing.

In our towns and cities, perhaps even on our doorstep, there’s going to be other wedding parties, other wedding invitations. This “other wedding” was visibly demonstrated in last Monday night’s BBC 2 viewing of the sit com Rev (31^st March 2014). Two of Rev’s friends, Jez and Rob of 10 years standing, invite the Rev to do the honours and marry them in church, which, as you know, is against the Church of England position on gay marriage. Rev agrees only to give them a blessing following a Wednesday communion service. But when the church’s communion service turns out to be a service decorated with flowers and confetti with a convivial party atmosphere being celebrated in the pews this was not how the Church of England through the eyes of the Archdeacon saw the communion service. The episode took a timely - but good natured swipe - on the predicament the church and it ministers now find themselves in.

The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 came into force on the 29^th March 2014. Soon same-sex marriages won’t be a novelty; they’ll simply be facts of public life. Same sex couples will be able to hold civil marriages in the same way as opposite sex couples.   A couple who are already in a civil partnership will also be able to convert this to a marriage. The church, however, is not officially part of the celebrations of the new Marriage Act.

The Act itself prevents the celebration of same-sex marriages in the Church of England; in the Methodist and United Reformed Churches consultations on the issue are currently being discussed in appointed working groups; it is my understanding that their findings will be reported to the 2014 Methodist Conference and URC General Assembly.

Refusing to allow same sex marriages on church premises is, however, neither contrary to the Equality Act nor any other legislation. The law makes it clear that individuals and religious organisations may not be compelled to consent to, to participate in or to conduct religious marriage ceremonies of same sex couples.

For my part I happen to take the discipline of the Church reasonably seriously. After all, my self-supporting ministry isn’t mine alone. It belongs to Jesus Christ, to the place where I work, the worldwide Church and to the United Reformed Church. It also belongs to my synod moderator, with whom it is shared.  So I will abide by the rules as they are at present.

But still the question remains. What should I do if and when I am invited to a same sex marriage party or invited to conduct a same sex wedding, perhaps in my own family? I have read many reports and other studies on homosexuality, which describe the wide range of views there are in the churches. We won’t ever find a clever theoretical settlement on this issue that finally resolves all debate.

But things changed on the 29^th March 2014. The Church - in the form of the Church of England - held out for the conventional understanding of marriage. It put its case, and lost. There is absolutely no prospect of reversing the law. So the manner of our theology must change. Instead of analysis in the abstract, we are required to do theology in the moment, in the local context with all its complexity.

As a self supporting minister working “in the world” (on the shop floor – literally) the local context is always the best place for theology.  It means that minister’s can’t pretend about the world as it is. We can’t lock the doors of our buildings and do our theology in laboratory conditions. We can’t be content to think in the abstract about idealized lives. Nor can we settle for recruiting a congregation with narrow interests or to build a community in our own image. God calls us out, into the world, to seek him and his Kingdom there. We must seek to understand scripture and to apply our faith among the lives that are lived in the streets outside the church. Our theology and our pastoral practice must always be adequate for our local church. Or else they're not adequate at all. My personal preference has always been to do theology from the ground up, working with both context and scripture, meeting real people who live real lives and making a space for hope, knowledge of God, mercy and peace, grace and truth. So I’m relieved that the phase of campaigning and theorising is over for Gay/Equal Marriage. Christianity is much better at dealing with facts, rather than hypotheses. And now the facts include equal marriage.

Throughout Jesus' itinerant ministry in the years that followed that rather awkward moment at the wedding in Cana, he was confronted with more real-life situations. Ministers of the Church find themselves regularly in unplanned moments where some kind of pastoral response is required of us and a blessing required. The reality is that our ministries will now take place in a society which includes the fact of same-sex marriage. We'll need to work out responses that are, at the very least, welcoming and accepting.

At the present time my church prevents me from marrying same sex couples, but I can show my support for their commitment and wish them well. I’m open to more learning in this and I've been glad to learn from people with whom I disagree (it is unfair to dub all who dissent as homophobic: there are many people of integrity for whom equal marriage is hard to accept); as well as those who share my thoughts. I agree with the Dean of Durham in his recent blog Equal Marriage – Crossing the Threshold that we need to be more intelligent about thinking biblically in relation to equal marriage. As the Dean states “equal marriage is another stage in the long evolution of an institution that has been reshaped at different times down the centuries. But its essence is what it always was: the covenanted union of two people for life. That has not changed.” And in all these complex issues we must acknowledge the pain and anger of gay people, people who are friends and family members who continue to feel excluded by the church’s stance on equal marriage, and from the church itself. I guess it will take time for change to be received and its theological significance understood.

In the meantime I’m certain that our church here in Crook will remain open to all people, regardless of their sexuality and lifestyle. I hope as Christians we will do our best to be non-judgemental and to be generous in our invitations. We will remain an “open church.” Open to God in his life-giving word and open to the real lives of those around us.