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An Abbey moment
IN THE middle of the road that is my life, on St Richard of Chichester’s Day, I found myself not in a dark wood, but in the urban jungle of Westminster. I was there with a couple of clergy friends, one of whom wished to buy an ordination stole, and, as Richard is our diocesan patron saint, we went to the midday eucharist at the Abbey, and very nice it was, too.
Despite being gatecrashed in his own sacristy by three T-shirted, be-jeaned, soi-disant clerics, the officiant was kind and in the liturgy prayed for us, our bishop, and our parishes.
It was lovely sitting there, surrounded by ancient beauty. The stream of tourists did not distract at all from the flow of the service, and we were ministered to, for a change, rather than ministering.
I remembered some 25 years previously, on the eve of my Advisory Council for the Church’s Ministry (as it was then) selection conference, going to the Abbey for evensong, feeling desperate and physically sick, and asking a bemused nun to pray for me.
Now, sitting opposite the randiose memorial to Isaac Newton, I felt my own personal story touch base with the sweep of our national history, and was affirmed by that. It made the Church of England feel timeless and unchanging. But looks can be deceiving.
Reporting to head office
JUST before the service, we had popped into Church House, another Anglican institution, where we met a hospitable old friend, who gave us coffee and a tour round.
I was enchanted to see that around the dome of the central debating chamber, that scene of many gladiatorial combats otherwise known as sessions of the General Synod, was written not “Abandon hope all ye who enter here”, as might be expected, but a quote from the Salisbury diurnal: “Holy is the true light, and passing wonderful, lending radiance to them that endured in the heat of the conflict”. I also rather fell for a portrait of Archbishop Randall Davidson that dominates the staircase: he is the spitting image of Alastair Sim.
But behind all this, there are no panelled rooms and quill pens; it is all bright, businesslike, refurbished, and open plan, feeling for all the world like the head office of a modern multinational — which I suppose, in a sense, it is.
Slick — but soulless
IT REMINDED me of our own diocesan church house in Hove. For donkey’s years it had been crammed into two grand Regency houses in Brunswick Square: from the cellar to the garrets, they were stuffed to bursting with diocesan personnel and offices. If I remember correctly, the whole of the youth services was run out of a cupboard. Parking on curates’ training days was a nightmare: all of us had to run outside and swap cars around every two hours to avoid parking tickets.
Now it is in a purpose-built block on the site of a former rectory. It is slick, professional, functional, and (again) open-plan. It is also anonymous, and has about it as much charisma as the provincial offices of a firm of accountants.
The old Church House, with all its drawbacks and obsolescence, was greatly loved: despite it being efficient, and much better to work in, it is hard to love the new one.
Gather ye rosebuds
IT SO happened that two nights before the Westminster trip, I stayed with another old friend, who is a diocesan bishop. His house is, as above, new, practical, and functional, but similarly, from the outside, cannot easily be described as pretty.
Inside, it is beautifully furnished, and fit, as ever, for the generous hospitality provided. It is built in the grounds of the old Bishop’s House, which still languishes at the bottom of the drive, long sold on, now boarded up and to be filleted into flats.
I walked around it, seeing the old episcopal gardens flattened for development, and the long iron-work veranda, the arches interweaved with croziers, beginning to rust. Unworkable and impractical for the 21st century, it ought to go: I am sure that is right; but, even so, as with so much, something of beauty and rootedness is lost.
There was a wild climbing rose, untended and overlooked, clambering up a corner of the arcade. I cut a small bunch for the friend I was staying with that night, the flowers slowly wilting in the car as I left: a little offering from a lost palace.
The Revd John Wall is Team Rector in the Moulsecoomb Team Ministry in Brighton.
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