TWENTY FIRST SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
21st October 2007
Graphics and cartoons appear only in the printed version
PROCRASTINATION
A Spaniard asked an Irishman, “Has the Irish language got any equivalent to “Manaña” in Spanish” The Irishman thought carefully for a while, then replied, “Nothing with quite the same sense of urgency to it.”
TRAVELLERS TALES (26)
(Andrew Neaum 2000)
After a substantial pub lunch with Joan, the widow of my father’s youngest brother we offered to take her to see my Father’s younger sister Anne, resident in a Roman Catholic home in Brailsford, no more than half an hour’s drive away from Belper. So Lil and I walked fast back to the Spinney to get the car and off we set along the Ashbourne Road to Cross o’ the Keys, left down to the Ashbourne/Derby road and then a mile or so up the road through Brailsford to a most elegant home set in lovely woods and fields. We found Anne, the youngest of the six Neaum children of her generation looking the least changed of anyone. She has a form of Multiple Sclerosis and has been wheel-chair bound for years. Still loud of voice and emphatic, she took us to a small sitting room and we sat and talked over a cup of tea. She seems happy there and introduced us to the matron who stayed and had a good chat with us. She also showed us the very lovely and modern chapel. From the little sitting room we looked out to a field full of jersey cows which I hope will have escaped the wholesale slaughter of cattle resulting from the current foot and mouth epidemic. Anne is our Elizabeth’s godmother and was particularly delighted to see her for the first time.
Enjoying Belper
On returning to Belper we deposited Joan at her flat and returned to the Spinney for a drink and dinner. It was beautiful sitting outside on a balmy, sunny English evening watching the blackbirds try to extricate themselves from the netting over Neil’s raspberry canes and the magpies and pigeons foraging in the new mown meadow, the line of the hills and valleys re-etching themselves on my mind and in my memory. Later Joan rang to say that her son John was visiting her and so at about 8.00pm Margaret and I walked down to Joan’s to meet him. He is a lovely fellow, not much different from how I remember him and, like his mother, using his hands a lot in conversation. Grey of beard and full of fun he is one of twins and he and his brother Michael were blessed with wonderful treble voices as boys. Michael went on to make a career out of music and although now retired is accompanist for one of the finest girls choirs in England and writes and arranges music, much of it published. John told us what a part the Spinney had played in his life and imagination, so much so that for many, many years after Joy and Neil had taken it over and started altering it, he couldn’t bear even to visit it. He and his brother had had so many memorable times there as boys, being led by Malcolm, another and older cousin, into all sorts of derring-do and naughtinesses like trespassing on the Strutt estate and peeing from the high Spinney walls on to walkers by. He is able to acknowledge with the rational part of his being that the place is vastly improved, but like me, deeper down, he resents the violation of so important and holy a landmark in his past. He is a bit of a writer and has kept for years a daily journal that now amounts to thousands upon thousands of words. He also has two novels written, but for dread of refusal won’t submit them to a publisher! His wife Heather is a church warden at Wirksworth and he sings in the choir, though he says he has lost his solo voice for want of proper voice production. They hope in three of four years’ time to be free to visit Australia. We talked about the Church and its future and so on and so on as the light grew less and less in the little flat. The love, respect and affection that both he and Joan have for Canon David my father was very evident. Gratwich and Leigh, Canon David’s first two parishes have almost as great a magic for him as the Spinney.
Rose scented, bee buzzed, bird sung
The next day was again a perfect one weather wise. I awoke, said mattins, wrote my journal and then went downstairs and greeted Neil who was reading the paper over a bacon and egg breakfast. I then went out for a walk. First up to the top of Shire Oaks, along the ridge of Bridge Hill, where, although there are a few more houses than I remembered, on the right hand side and overlooking Fletcher’s farm, I eventually came to fields much as I remembered them and to a stile leading into the fields. I resisted its invitation and instead walked back and down Bridge Hill towards Ashbourne, until I came to a gate in the typical Derbyshire stone wall of the big field, jumped over it and walked across to the track that runs between that field and the small one, newly mown, below the Spinney. I then walked down the track and through a gate to the water meadows of the river Derwent and upstream towards the Bridge and so back up Bridge Hill. I got back by 8.30 in time to say a final goodbye to Neil who was on his way to work in Derby. After breakfast with Joy and much phaffing about, chatter and a photograph or two, we left the Spinney and Belper heading for Norfolk. The glorious weather we enjoyed means that the girls memories of Belper will always be sunlit, rose scented, bee buzzed and bird sung.
Heading for Norfolk
A few miles out of Belper we turned off to have a look over Duffield Church and to remember the young Dorothy Irwin, who was the vicar’s daughter there in the 1930s and who eventually married my father and became my mother. It is as beautiful a church as ever. We then headed on to Allestree, negotiating roundabouts and fast roads that called for fast decisions, all of them correct enabling us to clear Nottingham with no great difficulty. We then settled on the not too crowded road to Grantham, which I think is the town where Margaret Thatcher comes from. There we bought lunch and pressed on, having passed from Derbyshire, through Nottinghamshire into Leicestershire and then on through Lincolnshire into Norfolk. The nastiest part of the trip was the flat, drained fen country of that corner of Lincolnshire and Norfolk that ends at Kingslynn. It is a district notable for vegetable production and there is also heavy traffic on a road that provides little opportunity for passing slower vehicles. We stopped for lunch in a little village called Wigtoft, eating in the graveyard of a lovely, old, but slightly dilapidated and locked church. Few people surely could warm to cabbage country, the most boring of all vegetables. As we ate, men were reaping them at great speed on the other side of the grave yard hedge. Once we were past Kingslynn, to be forever remembered for a particularly nasty roundabout, we got into Norfolk proper and the countryside became very lovely again. We arrived in South Creake, our destination, at about 2.00pm. It is a straggling but rathe pretty village, nearly all the houses and buildings of flint stone, which is very attractive. We had a look at the church from the outside, a big, impressive and ancient flintstone building, and then we found the vicarage. As is usual these days, it is not the original one, nor even anywhere near the church. Rather it is a red brick, two storied house on the village’s main street. I don’t think that today’s politically left-leaning church can bear the thought, let alone the expense, of housing its clergy in gracious buildings, though the bishops for the most part seem to retain their palaces!
Walsingham
We were to stay the night in the vicarage with Andrew and Pam Thomson, folk we had known well in Zimbabwe. Pam we found to be almost exactly as remembered. Andrew is rather plumper now and looking like his father, but is exactly the same in character and mannerisms as he always was. He never stops talking, “teeming with a lot of news”, hardly pausing for breath. He seems happy with the parish, though hard pressed both workwise and financially. We had a cup of tea with their three pleasant boys, surprisingly normal and polite for rectory children. Catherine, who is Margaret’s goddaughter and whom she particularly wanted to see was away. Andrew Thomson had some work to do and a wedding interview, so we went off with Pam to view that Anglican high-churchman’s Mecca, Walsingham, which is only five miles away from South Creake. Before the Reformation Walsingham was one of the most popular of all shrines to Our Lady in Britain. In the reign of St Edward the Confessor, so the legend runs, Richeldis, a widow of the Lord of the manor of Walsingham Parva, had a vision in which Our Lady appeared to her and took her in spirit to Nazareth and showed her the place where the Angel Gabriel had appeared to her at the Annunciation. She was told to take note of the measurements of the Holy House and to build a reproduction of it in Walsingham. Eventually, after many a miraculous intervention the holy house one night simply appeared on the spot which Our Lady had chosen! At the time of the Reformation this most famous and popular of shrines was despoiled and destroyed and it was only in the 1920s that an anglo Catholic priest, Alfred Hope Patten, set about restoring it, and now, once more, it is a popular place of pilgrimage.
We visited first “Little Walsingham” and the Roman Catholic shrine, which is less over the top than the Anglican one, and separated from it by “The Holy Mile” which is a holy walk for pilgrims between the Roman and Anglican shrines, a mile that Andrew Thompson delighted to inform us, is actually a mile and a half. The Roman shrine is obviously extremely well visited and is rather tasteful. The modern chapel, in which the sacrament was monstrance-exposed, was in particular very restrained. The actual shrine, known I think as the slipper chapel, was full of pilgrim lit candles, about 175 of them and was stiflingly hot, I hadn’t realised how much heat candles emit. Then we drove up the Holy Mile to Walsingham proper, trying to avoid hitting either rabbits or pilgrims.
The two shrines
The first surprise was how beautiful the village itself is. A genuine and unspoilt medieval and Elizabethan village, with lovely timbered houses, a cobbled square, a lovely pub and ruined abbey. The shrine complex too is very pleasing to the eye. Inside it is reminiscent of the High Anglo Catholicism of all Saints Margaret Street, though with no pretensions to that church’s high taste and high intellect. Only the Chapel of the Ascension, with feet portrayed dangling from a cloud and also a relic of the true cross in another chapel raised a derisive hackle or two. The Holy House itself is a dark, candle-blackened brick, holy of holies box in the centre of the building, filled with candles lit by pilgrims and with prayer petitions pinned in rows beneath the lines of candles. The famous statue of Mary which provides the shrine’s focus and which looks like an exotic moth, was absent on tour, replaced with a very ordinary statue of our Lady of Walsingham. When we arrived a great queue of people were standing awaiting sprinkling! In the outer chapel there was a wall full of little plaques attesting to miraculous answers to prayer. All in all it was nowhere near as bizarre as I expected and indeed quite lovely in its way. That there should be a twentieth first century equivalent of St Thomas of Canterbury’s shrine, one that pulls coaches and coaches full of pilgrims, shouldn’t be regarded as a bad thing. If I have any substantial criticism it would be that there seems to be a slight sense of contrivance about the place, the atmospherics are considered and planned and built for, it hasn’t simply happened, which surely is preferable. This perhaps is why St Julian of Norwich’s shrine, or even Iona pull pilgrims in a less sectarian and more healthy way. (to be continued)
CONGRATULATIONS
Birthday
Anne Russell. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20th Oct
Zachary Liley. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26th Oct
Anniversary
Nola & Laurie Brewer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25th Oct
GARDEN PARTY AND FAIR
ALL CAN HELP!
Delivering leaflets (flyers).....More planning and work has gone into this year’s Fair than you can imagine. Let’s all play our part by ensuring that lots and lots of people come and enjoy the day with us. This can be achieved by everyone who can walk taking a map and copies of the FLYER and delivering them in the next 19 days. We need to have the flyer placed in every letter box. PLEASE help us. They are available in the Narthex for collection today. The individual maps for collectors have been carefully pared down to small areas so as not to overburden walkers. So the energetic might like to take more than one. For the boundary streets of each little map you deliver only on the inside of the street.
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NAME TAGS
Parishioners helping on the stalls and with other activities, are requested to wear their name tags at the Parish Fair and Garden Party
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IMPORTANT LAST MEETING
The next meeting of the Parish Fair and Garden Party Committee will be held in The Den at 4.30pm on Thursday 25th October. Come early and enjoy a sherry and nibbles.
All people organising stalls and activities need to attend what is the final meeting.
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CLERGY CONFERENCE
The Clergy Conference last week was enjoyed greatly by your Rector. The most polished presentation was by none other than Heather Fitzgerald who outlined our successful Planned Giving Campaign, proffering some reasons for its success. It was pleasing for me to be able to bask proudly in the light cast by so accomplished a Shepparton parishioner, and thank you to all of you for responding so well to the campaign which continues to realise the promise it offered a year ago.
ALL SOUL’S Day 2nd NOVEMBER
There is a list in the Narthex for the names of those we wish to be remembered by name on All Soul’s Day, November 2nd.
ARISE 255 (YOUTH GROUP) 7- 9pm
Come along on Friday October 26th and join in the fun, all welcome. We will be dressing up for Halloween. For further information contact Mary Pearson 58299418
MUSIC MATTERS
We have just started practising music for the Christmas Carol Service. Sopranos and Altos who would like to join us are most welcome. We meet on Thursdays at 5.30pm.
PARISH COUNCIL
There is a Parish Council meeting on Wednesday at 7.30pm in the Den.
MORE MUSIC MATTERS
It is disappointing that our offer of a thousand dollar choir scholarship to a young person with a treble, soprano or contralto voice, to sing in our choir, has not been taken up. I cannot make up my mind whether this is because folk are too affluent these days for a thousand dollars to seem worth any effort, or because singing in a church choir is deemed a fate worse than death, or because Shepparton is as much a cultural wilderness as it is an architectural one, (for sheer commerce inspired ugliness the new development on the corner of Doyles Road and the Benalla Road is hard to beat), or lack of publicity. Do remember and promote the scholarship to any young person you know who warbles sweetly.
DATES FOR THE DIARY
Oct 25th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Parish Fair & Garden Party Committee mtg
Oct 26th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Arise 255/Halloween dress up.
Oct 27th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Wedding 1.00pm
Nov 2nd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Garden meeting
Nov 3rd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Garden working bee
Nov 9th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Arise 255/Video Scavenger Hunt
Nov 10th . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Parish Fair & Garden Party
Nov 13th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Grief Support “Moving On”
Nov 17th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wedding 3.00pm
Nov 17th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wedding 5.00pm
Nov 23rd. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Arise 255/Aqua-moves
Nov 24th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wedding 2.00pm
Nov 24th. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wedding 3.30pm
Dec 1st. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Wedding 2.00pm
Dec 8th . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Arise 255/Youth Service Covenant Players
Dec 8th . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Wedding 4.00pm
REQUESTS FOR PRAYER
At the beginning of each month this list is cleared and ALL names need putting down again on the list in the narthex and signed in. No names should be listed without a person’s permission.
Tony Armstrong, Liam Bognar, Nicky Cavill, Christine Day, Donna Dyson, Frank Harder, Vida Hardy, Thelma Irwin, Sylvia Kennedy, Denise McKellar, John Moore, Margaret Noble, Margaret Neaum, Margaret Osborough, Reg Oxenford, Jan Riches, Robyn Stone, Peter & Eva Swindells, Lorraine Vogul, David, Glenda, Joy, Alexandra & Charles, David & Judith, Roslyn, Maureen.
Rest In Peace
Craig Chalker, Murray Moon
Anniversary of death
Rene Classen 18th, John Damianopoulos, Gaye Nissen, Jean Brown, Edna Hopkins 19th, Lionel Batey, Alice Grantham, Ernest Esam 20th.
Duties for 21st October 2007
Vigil Eucharist at 6pm 20th Oct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Andrew Neaum
Celebrant 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Gail Bryce
Celebrant 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Andrew Neaum
Celebrant 8.45 St. Luke’s Dookie. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Gail Bryce
Celebrant 10.45 St. Mary’s Katandra. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Andrew Neaum
Readers 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Fiona Campbell, Liz Gyles
Readers 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Bev Condon, Andrea Fisher
Servers 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Michelle, Ben, Daniel
Servers 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Joan, Joe, Zebedee
Intercessors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Celebrant, Carole Henderson
Euc. Assts 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ian Bryce, Heather Fitzgerald
Euc. Assts 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Carole Henderson, Bev Condon
Welcoming 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Gwen Betson, Judy Lloyd
Welcomers 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Frank Steen
Sidespeople 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Joy Campbell, Trevor Batey
Sidespeople 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .John Pleming, Charlotte Brewer
Tea 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Bev Reither
Welcome Tbl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8.30 Margaret Hoare10.30 Dorothy Cook
Mowing 19th . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Margaret Carroll, Brendan Carroll
Duties for 28th October 2007
Vigil Eucharist at 6pm 27th Oct. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Andrew Neaum
Celebrant 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Andrew Neaum
Celebrant 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Gail Bryce
Celebrant 8.45 St. Luke’s Dookie. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Gail Bryce
Celebrant 10.45 St. Mary’s Katandra. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Andrew Neaum
Readers 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Norm Mitchelmore, Heather Fitzgerald
Readers 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Volunteer, Courtney Craven
Servers 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Beth, Alex, Philippa
Servers 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Jenny, Erin, Sally
Intercessors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Margaret Neaum, Volunteer
Euc. Assts 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Carole Henderson, Bev Condon
Euc. Assts 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Jenny Pleming, Ian Bryce
Welcoming 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Bev Reither, Jeanette Berry
Welcomers 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nola Brewer, Sandra Simonis
Sidespeople 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Gwyn Cowland, Merv Cowland
Sidespeople 10.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Nola Brewer, Alan Akers
Tea 8.30. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Shirley Dean
Mowing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Kay McGregor, Merv Cowland
Welcoming. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8.30 Judy Lloyd 10.30Mary Pearson
THIS WEEK IN THE PARISH
Mon October 22nd Rector’s Day off
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
Tuesday 23rd October
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
10.00am Playgroup - The Den
12.15pm Simply Soul Soothing - Lady Chapel
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
Wednesday 24th October
7.45am Mattins only- Lady Chapel
10.00am Eucharist - St Augustine’s
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
5.30pm Choir Practice for 10.30 Eucharist
7.30pm Parish Council
Thursday 25th October
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
10.15am Grutzner House
11.00am Eucharist- Harmony Village
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
4.00pm Parish Fair meeting the Den
5.30pm Choir Practice
7.00pm Wedding Rehearsal
7.30pm Study Group - Carole’s Pad
Friday 26th October
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
11.00am Ave Maria
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
Saturday 27th October Associate Priest’s Day Off
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist (Traditional Rite)
1.30pm Wedding
6.00pm Vigil Eucharist
Sunday 28th October 21st Sunday after Pentecost
8.30am Eucharist - St Augustine’s
10.30am Eucharist - St Augustine’s/Baptisms
8.45am St. Luke’s Dookie
10.45am St. Mary’s Katandra