Candlemas: Holy Trinity Winchester

Not long before Holy Trinity Winchester has its own (House for Duty) priest. We have been going there with other retired clergy for almost four years now. So Candlemas was very special for us today. This is more or less what I said in the Sermon at Mass.

Since all the children share the same blood and flesh, Jesus too shared equally in it.

A week ago we were in France, not far from Limoges. We were visiting old friends who have a house there, and during our four day stay we saw many local churches. In each of them, the crib was still in evidence… some very grand indeed, where at the touch of a button the lights came on and music played… One had a watermill, and beyond it a caravan of camels which had, no doubt, brought the kings. Today, our simple crib, like those far grander ones, will be stowed away, as we brace ourselves towards Lent. In ancient Roman statuary, Janus, the god of the start of the year, has two faces, one looking forwards, the other back. For Christians, it is this Feast which looks both ways, the feast of the Presentation of Christ in the Temple; or the feast of the purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary; or more simply, Candlemas.

Over our shoulders, receding into the distance, is Christmas. It was easy then to be caught up in the beauty of it all. We also recall the Nativity today; as the time when Jesus shared our blood and our flesh, as the letter to the Hebrews puts it. But mention blood and flesh, and we are alerted to another aspect of the Nativity of the Saviour. As we think of his birth, we are made to face towards his suffering. We look ahead as well as back.

In reality, this is how it is in every Mass, though we are not always aware of it. When we eat this bread and drink this cup, we show the Lord’s death until he comes again. The altar is where both the death of Jesus and the birth of Jesus are presented week by week.

The symbol which the Church took for this festival is the candle. We have had so many far brighter sources of light in the modern world – incandescent bulbs, fluorescent tubes, floodlights and streetlights. Yet no one seems to write poetry about them – well, maybe John Betjeman did, you will have to remind me. But candles have always attracted us, like so many moths. “Jesus bids us shine with a pure, clear light” we sang in Sunday school; “My candle burns at both ends” wrote an American poet, and we know just what she meant – and ‘candle in the wind’ was adapted, as we all remember, for Diana’s funeral. It has to do, perhaps, with the inevitable end of the candle – nothing but a pool of wax. It has been used to measure time, and to light the way to dusty death. Above all, it is used in Church for the sheer wastefulness of it, like the precious ointment poured over Jesus’ feet. The mock, flickering electric replacements are always poor imitations.

The candle is individual; it can be held in the hand without being connected to a source of power – and when it is the real article, a genuine beeswax candle, then it connects us with the mystery of the natural world and God’s creatures, the bees, as the Easter Hymn exsultet puts it.
Five years ago on this Sunday we were ending our month of looking after the English Church in Copenhagen. (We dpn’t spend all our time abroad, though). There in Denmark, and all through Scandinavia, candles have a very special place; indeed, our leaving present from the church was a pair of little glass candlesticks. In those dark winter nights the Danes always put candles on their tables, not just to lighten the darkness, but to lighten their hearts – even at breakfast!

All these themes come together in this Mass; Christ who is the light of the world suddenly comes to his temple, and the temple is illuminated with his presence. Some of the great painters of the Renaissance had a way of depicting Christ in the manger as the source of light; his mother’s face glows in his reflected light as she leans over him. We light our candles today to remind us whose light it is that is come into the world; a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the Glory of his people Israel.

He is come in blood and flesh; that is to say, he shares our nature. Not only our human nature though, he also shares our suffering .. and in sharing it, transforms it. Instead of being totally negative, suffering borne for the sake of Christ becomes part of his offering to the Father. Those outside the church often misunderstand this, and make us out to be masochists, valuing suffering for its own sake. Not so; but in every life, suffering of some sort is inevitable. How much better that it can be transformed, to the glory of God, rather than that it should become destructive and embittering.

This gives us a context for our coming Lent, when we shall be disciplining ourselves to be ready for Easter. We give up things which in themselves are harmless, good even, for the greater good of entering, in even a very small way, into the sufferings of Christ. Not the suffering of Calvary, but something of the self-denial of his time in the desert. It will be only very small things that we can do; but they will help make straight the way of the Lord.

Above all, though, at Candlemas, we should consider the light; that our light is to shine before men, that they may see our good works and glorify – not us – but our Father who is in heaven. The candle gives itself, that is what it is for; and eventually it expires. For us, though, our hope is full of immortality; that we shall be raised up into that greater, light of eternity. There in that house we shall dwell, “where there shall be no cloud nor sun, no darkness nor dazzling, but one equal light”. As so often, John Donne says it for us, in words we would struggle to find. No little separate flickering candles, but in the end, for us all, one equal light.

Charles, King and Martyr

Our walk on the Salterns today became a pilgrimage more than a constitutional, as we remembered Charles I, incarcerated at Hurst Castle at the tip of a mile-long shingle spit. The comforts of Carisbrooke were replaced by the grim austerity of a Prison constructed as a gun-platform to defend England against invasion; and the material with which it had been built came from the sacked monastery of Beaulieu. So here was a King of England, imprisoned and soon to die, held in a gaol ordered by his predecessor a century earlier.

There has been some snide blogging elsewhere about how Charles could not have been a Saint since his cause was not taken up by Rome. It recalls a moment when a student from St Stephen's House was visiting for Christian Aid week. At the home of a well-know Roman Catholic couple he was berated by the wife, a former nun. How dare he pretend to be ordained, since he was not a Catholic? And anyway, the Church of England had no saints; the Saints were all, without exception, Catholics.

He was very battered by the encounter; but had his spirits lifted a little further down the road when a Muslim family invited him in, gladly contributed to Christian Aid week, gave him refreshments and asked if he could not stay for a meal? Not everyone who says, 'Lord, Lord will enter the Kingdom...' And many surprising ones will be there.

Living through this time of discernment over the Ordinariate, one of the hardest things to face is the animosity within the Catholic camp ... SSPX, Vatican II Fundamentalists ... I hope we can all overcome the bitterness in every faith and none, and above all seek to have it forgiven in ourselves. Blessed Charles, pray for us.

A wet day in Venice

Recent peregrinations have meant that I've not been painting much lately. Today, though, it was back to the studio, so I thought you should have a chance to mock. There is a wild fauvist version of St Thomas' Lymington (which, unaccountably, our tutor seems to like) done in five minutes at the end of a class; a somewhat severe portrait from a photograph (fortunately I do not know the lady concerned, so am unlikely to be sued) and today's effort, a version of Venice (near the Madonna del'Orto) from a photo I took on our one and only visit to Venice, at Easter last year. Be warned; if you click on some of these you might get an even larger version.

Bishop's Briefing

Comper Window and Resurrection Plaque, St James' Milton

Today was a cheering occasion for thirty or so priests from Hampshire who met with Bishop Keith to hear his take on the Ordinariate. St James' Milton in the City of Portsmouth was the place. After Mass of Timothy & Titus, we listened to our Bishop and asked him questions for an hour, then had a very good lunch, courtesy of the Vicar's wife, Mrs (Marilyn) Alby.

Bishop Keith reminded us what it was we had always asked for; the capacity to be united with the Western Church not just as individuals, but as a body. That was exactly what we are being offered. Some have misgivings about ordination; but we are not being asked to deny the efficacy of our ministry up to now; simply to accept that the ministry of the Church of England is defective - and it clearly is, with such divisions between us already, divisions which can only deepen if and when women are consecrated as bishops. Being ordained in the Catholic priesthood leaves no shadow of doubt - and this is not just about "validity" (for there are episcopi vagantes whose orders are probably "valid"). Rather it is about Communion - and the catholic movement in the Church of England has always said it looks to Communion with the wider Church.

There are those around who seek to undermine Anglicanorum Coetibus. Commentators have said, for instance, that members of the Ordinariate will only be permitted to celebrate whatever 'Anglican' rite is provided for us. That is not so, and the document itself spells out quite plainly that the Rites of the Latin Church will be available to the Ordinariate as much as to the rest of the Catholic Church.

More damagingly still, some have claimed that the only married men to be ordained will be those already Anglican Priests or Bishops. Not so; the very fact that the documents spell out that there may be exceptions for other married men makes this quite clear.

We asked about buildings; no, there was no certainty whether we could continue to use any of our churches. This would depend on the ecumencial spirit, or otherwise, of the Church of England towards us. Because the churches in which we currently worship would be idfficult to dispose of, it must be at least a possibility that we could have some leasing arrangement which would mean we could continue to use them. If that were not possible, the Roman Catholic authorities would certainly help us find other places of worship.

More than what he said, though, was the great encouragement Bishop Keith gave us by his presence and up-beat assessment of our situation. Finally, he enjoined us to pray, and especially to make February 22 a Day of Prayer, wherever possible in conjunction with our Roman Catholic neighbours. That day was not a deadline for decisions - rather it is a step on the road of discernment, a seeking for God's guidance which must engage us all.

The Laity and the Ordinariate

Le Dorat is a wonderful and strange church, just a few miles north of Bellac. The pictures in this post are from there.

There have been some misgivings expressed concerning the place of the Laity in the Ordinariates. I raised this very particularly with Fr Allan Hawkins (see my last blog) and he reassures me in these terms:

"A Pastoral Council exists in every diocese. Its lay president, in the Diocese of Fort Worth, is currently a laymen from my Parish.

However, the Catholic Church is not a democracy, and it does not pretend to be so! The bishops alone, of course, determine matter of faith and morality.

Every parish is required by the 1982 Code of Canon Law (in which, by the way, the rights and duties of the laity are set out with precision and clarity) to have a parochial pastoral council and a parish finance council. These bodies are composed of laity, who care for the temporal and corporate life of the parish and advise the pastor on such things. Some parishes conduct elections, others have ways of reaching discernment as to the identity of these who should serve.

Laity are widely present and influential in a variety of diocesan commissions and departments. And dioceses do, from time to time, call together multi-session synods for particular purposes;and laity are fully involved. "

In view of the aberrations which have sprung from the General Synod of the Church of England, and comparable bodies in other Anglican churches, it comes as a great relief to be assured that the Catholic Church is not a democracy. Majorities in favour of women priests mean nothing when those voting have little understanding or knowledge of the history of the Church, nor of Holy Scripture.

Fr Hawkins is also most reassuring concerning the pastoral way in which he has been treated by Rome. I believe that perhaps in England there will be few of us at the beginning who ask for an Ordinariate; but once it is established and fears allayed, there will be many more asking to join it as time goes on.

Anglican Use in France

No blog for the last few days. We have been in France, staying not far from Limoges in the house of an old friend in Bellac (not as I previously blogged, Beziers!) It is a lovely old hill-top town, on the river Vincou.

Our friend is Fr Allan Hawkins, parish priest of St Mary the Virgin, Arlington, Texas, an Anglican Use Parish in the Roman Catholic Church. He is just one of many in the USA who is very excited at the prospect of the Ordinariate; and it was to get his take on that provision that Jane and I made the pilgrimage to the Limousin last Wednesday.

Of course, we sight-saw - and there are some great sights there. In the parish church of Bellac is this amazing crib (surviving until Candlemas). Press the light switch, and not only does it come to life in glorious technicolor, there is also a lively and surprising rendition of "O Tannenbaum".

Here is Fr Allan's wife, Jose, is the garden of their house - with another great prospect of the Collegiate Church of Bellac. Jose has found herself well accepted by Roman Catholics in Texas and beyond. Their daughter delights in having a photo of her father on her desk, and then getting her friends to puzzle out how she is the daughter of a Catholic priest.

We went to Mass in a neighbouring village, part of
the Bellac benefice whose several churches are all served by the same solo priest. This chaste Romanesque church was well attended last evening for the first Mass of Sunday - the organist is an Englishman who, in his spare time, writes for the Daily Telegraph. Here Fr Allan poses with my wife Jane just before we went in for Mass. Inside the church was another Crib, elbowing the altar into a slightly off-centre position.

Now I should be telling you all about the Anglican-Use view of the Ordinariate; but that will have to wait for another day. Just now, at close to midnight our time and nearly one a.m. French time, I shall break off; and so to bed.

Unity and Patrimony

After the thaw, Holy Trinity Winchester was back on form this morning. They even laughed at the right places in the sermon - so for better or worse, here it is:-



There is a variety of gifts, but always the same Spirit I Cor xii.4

One of the great men of Methodism was coming to Oxford to speak, and a friend of mine from college dragged me along. Well, it was unity week after all. The topic was to be ‘The Ethos of Methodism’. Little of what he said remains all these years later, but how I felt about the talk I have never forgotten. He had listed the particular emphases which he saw as being the special gifts of Methodism – and each of them seemed to me to belong equally to the Church of England.

It is a little like that over the recent proposals to welcome the special graces of Anglicanism (the Anglican Patrimony, they call it) into the Roman Catholic church. At a meeting about the proposals, held last week in Bournemouth, one Roman Catholic lady asked very pointedly just what we thought we were bringing to the Catholic Church. Did they not, after all, possess every possible gift and blessing already? My hackles began to rise; until I remembered that was just how I had thought about Methodism all those years ago.

We are beginning the week of Prayer for Christian Unity; so it is a good time to be asking about gifts; and especially so in view of today’s Epistle; ‘there is a variety of gifts, but always the same Spirit’, says S Paul. Perhaps it is because the Spirit is One that I recognised in Methodism things which I had always thought particularly Anglican.


The Holy Spirit, though, does measure his gifts according to the capacity and the needs of those who receive them. The gift of celibacy is just that; a gift, for those who are chosen to receive it. In the Roman Catholic church, that is seen as the special calling of all priests. Not so in the Church of England; and not so in the Orthodox churches, nor even in the Eastern Rite churches of the Roman Church. There is no doubt that a celibate priest can devote himself whole-heartedly to the needs of his parishioners; But there is also a vocation to Holy Matrimony, and the married Vicar, who must give attention to his wife and family, may also have them as his allies in ministry. How many clergy wives have enriched their husbands’ ministry? And how many clergy children, by humanising their father, have made him more useful to the parents and children in the parish? It is not that celibacy or the married state is better or worse than the other; as St Paul tells us, there is a variety of gifts, but the same Spirit, at work in all sorts of different ways in different people.

A very wise Roman Catholic priest told me that he never had any problem with people of other churches when they spoke positively about their belief; but when they said what they DID NOT, or COULD NOT, believe, that was where the trouble started. In the same way, it is no good looking at the Roman church and telling them “Your preaching isn’t as good as ours” or “your priests don’t give the same pastoral care as ours”. Such sweeping generalisations are necessarily wrong, and offensive too.

In fact we shall not know what is the Patrimony of the Church of England until it is working alongside other Catholics in a wider church. When that happens there may be some surprising things that we have always taken for granted, not even noticed, but which others find attractive. Equally, we shall learn just how inadequate we have always been in many ways when we compare ourselves with other Catholics.

Fifty years ago, in a parish in Guildford diocese, we began in a very small way by sharing our parish church with the local Roman Catholic community. Their principal church was in town, a couple of miles away. Their priest wanted a mass centre our near us, and wondered if they might use our Church School. It seemed silly to use a school building when we had a purpose-built church. So, eventually, after a great campaign of persuasion, our Bishop and the Bishop of Arundel and Brighton agreed that we might begin this experiment in sharing.

It began rather tentatively. At first, the priest brought everything with him, his altar linen, an altar stone, vessels, vestments, bread and wine; within a very short time he seemed at home, so that he would ask “I’m a bit short on wafers; could we use some of yours?” Slowly, an atmosphere of trust replaced the suspicion with which we had viewed one another. The experiment. if that is what it still is, continues. Woe betide anyone who tried to stop it.

Now, with the proposals of “Anglicanorum Coetibus”, we have a chance to go much further in getting to trust and understand one another. Already suspicious natures are saying this is a case of sheep-stealing, that the Pope is trying to undermine the Anglican Communion. If we look for the best motives in others, though, instead of always trying to look for the worst, we might discover that this really is someone trying to help us; not just Anglican Catholics, who have asked for provision from our own church and not been given it. No, it is much more than that; if this new experiment works, even in a very small way, it might be the very thing the Holy Spirit is doing in answer to our prayers. Once SOME of us respond positively, it might become possible for others to do the same; not perhaps immediately, but many years from now. After, perhaps, some of the unrecognised gifts of Anglicanism, our hidden patrimony, has become accepted and welcomed by the whole Catholic Church.

I’ve often been dubious about Rabbie Burns, with his wish “O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us, to see oursels as other see us!” Very uncomfortable, that might be. Yet in the Ordinariate that gift of insight might become ours, painful maybe to realise how irritating the effortless superiority of our Anglicanism must have been… but perhaps, too, we shall find some things in our Patrimony which really are worthwhile, which at present we do not see, but which others will help us to value.