Parish Confirmation - take your pick!

St. Cuthbert's hosted the Deanery Confirmation as long ago as 5th July. Sorry we haven't uploaded any pictures before now.

So here we are with the Bishop of Jarrow - adults only from St. Cuthbert's; and all-age of St. Cuthbert's and St. John's....

On being late…

It's ages since we've posted on this Parish Blog - but there are updates today on various parts of this site. The Parish Magazine has appeared late as well - here's the Vicar's letter...

I must admit - it was part of the plan. With a two-month double issue of this Parish Magazine there didn’t seem too much urgency in getting this issue to press. And I wasn’t quite sure what we’d be including anyway! Meanwhile we have had plenty to keep us occupied in the parish, culminating in the wonderful Confirmation Service which we hosted last night (as I write). This is the third time we’ve welcomed Bishop Mark, the Bishop of Jarrow - and the third time he’s arrived in torrential rain. Later he tweeted that perhaps the Bishop of Durham should come next time in the hope that it will break the episcopal connection with extreme weather - but I reminded him that when he held that office Bishop Tom Wright had merely brought the hottest conditions of the year instead.

Nevertheless it was a great occasion. We started the service a bit late - in part because with 28 candidates for Confirmation the Bishop had to sign a lot of paperwork and presentation books beforehand. For which we were grateful - all our candidates received episcopally-signed cards together with prayer books which we hope will nourish them spiritually.

I was delighted that we were asked to be the host parish. Apart from anything else we do this sort of thing rather well in terms of organisation, liturgy and welcome - I’m glad to say that the Bishop told me that! But I’m pleased also because it gives us the chance to have a great act of witness in our midst: people of varying ages ready to stand up and say what they believe as they come to Baptism (for two of them) and Confirmation. It’s a reminder to the rest of us of our calling. Jesus chooses us - what are we going to do about it? Jesus is living in our midst - as the Bishop reminded us - so what are we going to do about it?

There’s no doubt that we do a lot of doing. Read about it in this issue! - and quite likely you’ve been part of it in one way or another. So now I’m hoping that things will slow down a little - or at least that we’ll have a change of pace and approach. For me it means less preparation, planning and policy-making (more of this another time) - and a move into a season of lots of Baptisms and Marriages. That’ll be fun! Hopefully there’ll be a little time for reading and reflection too - and maybe even some attention given to a now hugely-overgrown garden.

I hope other people will be able to change pace too. There’s so much to be thankful in the hard work, brilliantly executed, by so many. Thanks to you all - and for your support and encouragement!    

 

Martin Jackson

Jeremiah, gloom and looking beyond the horizon

Preached at University College, Durham 28 May 2015

 

(Jeremiah 2.7-13; Mark 10.32-37)

I’ve said that I’d say something today about Jeremiah, the Old Testament’s great prophet of doom and gloom - and certainly the prophet who had more to say than anyone else, as you’ll find if you work your way through the 52 chapters of the Book which bears his name (with still further Lamentations to follow).

But first… a mention that today in the Calendar of the Church of England is an optional commemoration of Lanfranc, who became Archbishop of Canterbury in the year 1070. Lanfranc got the job because he was appointed by William the Conqueror. They’d known each other through William’s previous life as Duke of Normandy, where Lanfranc had been Prior of the Abbey of Le Bec and then Abbot of Caen. Despite falling out over William’s choice of wife, they patched things up and the newly established King of England decided that Lanfranc was just the man for the Church’s top job. And he didn’t disappoint. Already he was a top scholar and an able administrator. Now Lanfranc set about renewing the Church through its monastic life - while the King’s approach was to replace most of the Anglo-Saxon bishops with Norman appointees. One happy outcome was a programme of building Cathedrals - our own Durham Cathedral amongst them. But, of course, Durham didn’t just get a Cathedral - it got a castle, this Castle. Cathedral and Castle stand together - a sign of orderly government in church and state, but also, I fear, of the subjection / subjugation of its people. Cathedral and Castle together showed them who was in charge!

Nearly a thousand years on we can be grateful for what we’ve still got. But we need an awareness of the history - and of what might be beneath the surface.

Jeremiah was a prophet who dug below the surface. He looked at what others had dug - and this is his central judgment:

… my people have committed two evils:

they have forsaken me,

the fountain of living water,

and dug out cisterns for themselves,

cracked cisterns that can hold no water.

Nearly 40 years after I lived there, I still remember reflecting on those words one day in a street in West Jerusalem. I don’t know why, but they came upon me as something of an epiphany. There I was, living in a modern state established and maintained by three major wars - but that day I think I was struck by just how much like any other western city it was in so many respects. Actually I loved it for that - the vibrancy of a relatively new country, the vigour of its people and the throb of its nightlife at the end of the Sabbath. There was plenty of religion - but for most people it was separate from the daily lives they led, while the Ultra-Orthodox who lived behind us in the Mea Shearim made it look as though religion was to be turned into an end in itself. That’s an over-simplification - but there was always an underlying tension: a religion that had sustained its people for centuries in the ghetto and had resisted any temptation to develop a wider vocation; and a secular society in danger of forgetting its roots while so conscious of the threats to its existence. There was a clash of understandings as to what their nation existed for. And that was something Jeremiah himself diagnosed over two and a half thousand years ago. And it’s something probably true about our own society also.

To call someone “a Jeremiah” is to say they’re not going to be very popular. Old Testament prophets castigated the ills of their society. Jeremiah takes that to new heights. His aptitude for “being negative” could be matched in the opprobrium he attracted only by someone in our own society who commits the deadly crime of being boring. But suppose Jeremiah were to speak to us - what would he see? We still have the grand edifices of religious glories - but religion is in decline and its values so often receive little more than lip service. Baptism is still popular (it’s a much cheaper way of organising the big family party than getting married) - but professions of faith rarely come to maturity. Apparently about 50% of people in this country profess a religious faith - and that raises the question, is the glass half-full or half-empty? The optimist will remind you that the half-empty glass gives you the opportunity to put some more into it. But Jeremiah sees the cistern as not only empty - it’s one his people have dug for themselves, heedless of the faith which had formed them, and it’s cracked, so that it will never hold anything they put in it.

There’s no hope in those cracked cisterns - only new and different vessels can serve the renewal of faith. We need to be challenged in our fundamental understanding. You’d think that Jesus would manage that with those who followed him. But look at our New Testament reading today. Jesus is on the road with his disciples. He speaks of his approaching betrayal, condemnation, death and resurrection. And what happens next? Two of the disciples come to him and ask for places of honour at his right and left when he establishes himself in glory. Jesus speaks of the vocation of the Son of Man - of God’s purpose - and the disciples miss it completely. We can listen but not hear what is said. We have our own understanding and expectation which so easily are deaf to any real challenge. “Cracked cisterns” which don’t work for Jeremiah - against this Jesus will say we need new wineskins to hold the new wine.

Jeremiah is a gloomy pessimist, but the working out of his vocation is compelling. He resists it at first, complaining “I am only a child,” but then goes on to speak the truth to power. He endures punishment and imprisonment, on one occasion lowered into a cistern at the bottom of which he sinks into the mud (38.6) - he knows the plight of another 70 men who are slaughtered and thrown into another cistern (41.7). All along Jeremiah is a doomed man, finally abducted and carried off to Egypt where his eventual fate is unknown. But throughout he is steadfast, unwavering in faith. Hope and deliverance lie beyond the horizon of his life, but he dares to believe that they are real. When life is at its most bleak he buys a field and stores the deeds away (32.14) - he will never enjoy its use, but there will be a time when later generations will.

I began by talking about Lanfranc and a new order which he established - which became just that, “established.” It’s an order signified here in Durham by Cathedral and Castle together. And again and again we have to ask what are they here for? Not to stand as a reminder of power established by force, nor to contain an ever-diminished faith leaking away from the past - but to be places now for the renewal of faith and learning, for the establishment of a fresh vision and way of life in which all may flourish.

Jeremiah saw that. We are to be like clay in the hands of the potter (18.2ff). And God promises his people a “new covenant:” 

“I will put my law within them,

and I will write it on their hearts;

and I will be their God,

and they shall be my people.”

 

Now online...

The May edition of our Parish Magazine is now available - rather earlier than usual, so you can plan ahead!

The print edition costs just 50p - and you can actually read it free by following this link!

Easter Homily

It’s Easter Day - and this is the call we hear today:

Are there any who are devout lovers of God?
Let them enjoy this beautiful bright festival!

Are there any who are grateful servants?
Let them rejoice and enter into the joy of their Lord!

Are there any weary with fasting?
Let them now receive their wages!

“Let them now receive their wages!” In the Lent study course we’ve been following this year the session which provoked the most discussion was the one where we read Jesus’ Parable of the Labourers in the Vineyard. That’s the story where a vineyard owner is looking for workers who will harvest his grapes. From the first hour of the working day to the last he keeps sending out to find more workers. At the end of the day he pays them. He starts with those he took on last who had worked only an hour - but he pays them for the whole day. And so he goes on until he comes to those who have laboured all day - right through the heat of the middle of the day. And he pays them the same, the day’s wage. At which they get quite upset: why had the owner paid them only the same as those who had worked just six hours or three hours or only one hour? We had quite a discussion of this - and there was considerable sympathy for their point of view. Of course, you could point out that the people who had worked all day had agreed their wage - right at the start their employer had said he would pay them for a day’s work. But when he pays all the others the same it simply has to be admitted - it’s just not fair.

Don’t expect this parable to be used by any of our politicians who are currently talking about rewarding “hard-working families.” Nor those who talk about seeing that benefits and taxes are adjusted to give proper reward to “deserving UK citizens.” As someone who would finally fail dramatically to gain the votes of the public Jesus got it wrong - we hear that from the crowd on Good Friday when they call for him to be crucified. With parables like this one - and the Sermon on the Mount for a manifesto - Jesus evidently had no political nous. And far from exalting the virtues of the deserving hard worker, he judges us finally as to how good we are at going to help the most despised in society: whether we feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, visit the sick and prisoner - and do this without regard to any Social Benefit sanctions which might justly have been imposed,… without regard to their failure to measure up to disability guidelines,… even reaching out to those whose crimes deserve only punishment.

And that’s the point of Easter. The Resurrection shows that the truth of the Gospel is not good news only for those who deserve it. It’s simply Good News. You might feel you get more out of Easter Day if you came to every service we had in Holy Week - I’d love to tell you that! But the Good News that Christ is risen from the dead is true however long ago you reminded yourself that really you ought to do something about drawing close to him.

“If any of you would be my disciple, then take up your Cross and follow me.” That’s the rather forbidding invitation we hear at the beginning of Lent and throughout Passiontide. But now that we are here anyway there’s just one truth for everyone, however long we have been on the journey. As the hymn puts it:

Lo! Jesus meets us,

Risen, from the tomb;

Lovingly He greets us,

Scatters fear and gloom…

The risen Christ is here for us all. Those words with which I began are attributed to St. John Chrysostom and read in every Orthodox Church at Easter. They go on:

If any have toiled from the first hour,
let them receive their due reward;
If any have come after the third hour,
let him with gratitude join in the Feast!
And he that arrived after the sixth hour,
let him not doubt; for he too shall sustain no loss.
And if any delayed until the ninth hour,
let him not hesitate; but let him come too.
And he who arrived only at the eleventh hour,
let him not be afraid by reason of his delay.
For the Lord is gracious and receives the last even as the first.
He gives rest to him that comes at the eleventh hour,
as well as to him that toiled from the first.

We simply have to believe it!

So what do we find this morning? What do the first disciples find? St. Mark’s Gospel - which we read today - tells us that the first disciples to witness the Resurrection are women: Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Salome, who go to anoint the body of Jesus where they had seen it laid in the tomb. But they find the tomb is empty. The stone has been rolled away. There is just an unidentified young man dressed in white sitting beside it.

That is St. Mark’s account of the Resurrection - except repeatedly to tell us that the emotion the women feel on discovering the empty tomb is not joy but fear. “… they were alarmed,” he tells us. The young man says, “Do not be alarmed.” They flee in “terror and amazement.” And they say nothing, “for they were afraid.”

That’s where the Gospel ends. It’s where we stop today. There are more verses in our Bibles but it seems these were added later. For St. Mark, this is it. An abrupt ending - he even ends his final sentence with a preposition, a word that translates as “for” or “because.” “… for they were afraid.” We might put it, “they were afraid, because…”

And yet here is the truth of Christ’s Resurrection, the vindication of his teaching, his listening, his work of healing, his love and his readiness finally to die upon the Cross. Here is the beginning of that strange institution which has now endured for 2,000 years called “the Church.” From this instant there are all the other instants which have followed in which his disciples would encounter the risen Jesus in the flesh or know his Resurrection as a truth which changes them and gives meaning to their lives.

Is it a problem that the story ends so abruptly? The other Gospel writers tell us how Mary Magdalene would meet the risen Christ in a garden near the tomb. Other disciples discover him to be a companion as they walk along the road. Those who would be called the Apostles encounter him as he comes to them through locked doors in a room in Jerusalem or meets them by the lakeside in Galilee.

But Mark simply stops - with all the emotions churning for those women who first found the tomb to be empty. And that is enough. In time they will understand. The same Mark who breaks off without going on to give us accounts of the Resurrection is the man who has already recorded Jesus telling the disciples that he would go up to Jerusalem, that there he would be betrayed, condemned to death, but then that he would rise from the dead. Now they know it to be true. The implications are fearful. For them and for us - but we are invited to grow in that truth.

It would take more than another 350 years before John Chrysostom would set his understanding of the Resurrection in terms of worship and praise:

Let no one mourn that he has fallen again and again;
for forgiveness has risen from the grave.

Let no one fear death, for the Death of our Saviour has set us free.
He has destroyed it by enduring it.
He destroyed Hell when He descended into it …

Hell took a body, and discovered God.
It took earth, and encountered Heaven.
It took what it saw, and was overcome by what it did not see.

O death, where is thy sting?
O Hell, where is thy victory?

Christ is Risen, and you, O death, are annihilated!
Christ is Risen, and the evil ones are cast down!
Christ is Risen, and the angels rejoice!
Christ is Risen, and life is liberated!

Christ is Risen, and the tomb is emptied of its dead;
for Christ having risen from the dead,
is become the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

To Him be Glory and Power forever and ever. Amen!

Holy Week: 29th March - 5th April 2015

Holy Week gets its name because it is central to our faith. Without the events of that week there would be no Christian faith. We often talk about “commitments” when we mean distractions. This week tells us about God’s commitment to us - what about our commitment to him? So let us give our attention to Jesus: hear his voice afresh; experience the touch of his love; resolve once more to be his follower. Please make the effort to be with us, especially on Palm Sunday, Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Day.

Services during Holy Week begin with Palm Sunday on Sunday, 29^th March. Processing into church with our palms we realise that the people who take part in the drama of Holy Week were much like ourselves. In church we hear a dramatised account of the Passion according to St. Mark. Our aim throughout this most Holy Week is to draw close to Christ in his Passion - even as we realise that we are there with the crowd baying for his blood, or in the shoes of St. Peter, saying we will never desert him and then denying him three times. Do we have the will to walk with Jesus throughout this week? Palm Sunday helps us make a good start.

On Monday 30^th March there’s a Eucharist at 2p.m. in Derwentdale Court. There’s also a United Service in St. Cuthbert’s for all the churches of Shotley Bridge, Blackhill and Bridgehill at 7.30p.m. Further, more reflective, services are held in St. Cuthbert’s on Tuesday and in St. John’s Church, Castleside on Wednesday - so it’s possible to join in worship each day of Holy Week. On Tuesday morning there’s the opportunity also to take part in the “Stations of the Cross.” We use the pictures in church which depict Jesus’ journey to the Cross as a guide to meditation “on the move” - our aim: to draw closer to Christ at this time of his Passion.

On Maundy Thursday, 2^nd April, the clergy of the diocese take part in the “Chrism Mass” with the renewal of ordination vows in the Cathedral. There also the Bishop blesses the holy oils for use in Baptism, Confirmation and the anointing of the Sick. There is no Thursday morning Eucharist that day - the parish celebration is reserved for the evening; please join us then!

It's on Holy / Maundy Thursday evening with the Sung Eucharist of the Last Supper that we begin the "Triduum," the Great Three Days which are at the centre of our faith. Jesus washes the disciples’ feet, breaks bread with his friends and then turns to face his Passion. He wants us to be with him. As this service closes, we have the opportunity to remain for a time in church for silent prayer, just as Jesus watched in the Garden of Gethsemane with his disciples. After being in Castleside for this service last year, we’re now back at St. Cuthbert’s. Come and join us.

Good Friday brings us to the Cross. At 10.00a.m. there is a special service for all ages - see the extent of God's love for us, that it can bring his Son to die for our sake. At 2.00p.m. we mark our Lord's last hour on the Cross with a Solemn Liturgy of the day, including St. John's account of the Passion and Holy Communion - as on Maundy Thursday we leave the church in silence without a dismissal: God's work is still to be completed….

We recognise the fullness of God’s work on Easter Day. From the darkness we come to celebrate the triumph of light, the victory of the Resurrection and the power of Christ's risen life over death. In our 10.30a.m. Sung Eucharist the Easter flame is lit, and we are called to the renewal of our Baptismal faith and hope - today the call goes out to all who would put their trust in Christ:

If any be a devout lover of God, let him partake with gladness from this fair and radiant feast. If any be a faithful servant, let him enter rejoicing into the joy of his Lord. If any have wearied himself with fasting, let him now enjoy his reward....

Enter, all of you, into the joy of our Lord. First and last, receive alike your reward. Rich and poor, dance together. You who have fasted and you who have not fasted, rejoice today. The table is fully laden: let all enjoy it. Let none fear death; for the death of the Saviour has set us free.

May the love of Christ, 
crucified and risen,

fill your life with his joy

Join us at St. Cuthbert's during Holy Week and Easter-tide. See our Calendar page (use the tabs above) and get more information from our online Parish Magazine.

Now that Lent is underway...

Sorry there haven't been any recent updates to this site - until today! Go to the Calendar and Homily / Magazine tabs at the top of this page to see what we are and have been up to. You can read the March issue of the Parish Magazine here.


Fortuitously Shrove Tuesday and Messy Church coincided in February. This got us off to a good start in thinking about Lent.

Inevitably there was an engagement with pancakes - and how many times you could flip one in a minute:

 



The Vicar was pretty speedy:

though then things came apart...

Remembering Jesus' time in the wilderness, we created a desert scene:

The Gospels tell us Jesus was with the wild beasts - an excuse for edible snakes!

But we didn't forget that the purpose of Jesus' Forty Days in the Wilderness was to come close to God - before making our way to church we created a Prayer Tree:

Tin Can Pancakes fit on the tongue - you have to look carefully to see how this one is cooking:

Happily we finished off by sharing the full-sized version - and more!

The next meeting of Messy Church looks forward to Holy Week and Easter - Tuesday 17th March at 3.30p.m. in St. Cuthbert's Church Hall. All children welcome - please bring a parent or carer!