St. Blogory's: the internet café at St. Gregory's Episcopal Church, Deerfield, IL

Quick Update!

After over a week since the last time I could find an internet connection, and this is a dial-up and slow! We are near the end of the Diocese of Antananarivo's Synod (Convention) and I have preached twice at 6:30 am Communion services.

Much to tell but who knows when I will have the next chance to post, and enough speed to add pictures?! I am also using a French keyboard which hqs keys in different places (like q where we have a, and w where we have z and three possibilities where we have two on the top row, for example é 2 ~ on the second key in from the left! Which slows down my typing!

Bishop Todd McGregor has been a thoughtful host, and the people have been wonderfully welcoming.

Until the next opportunity. . . !

A Good Final Full Day in England

While Ingrid made last travel preparations in the flat, I met with a friend from my Sabbatical time in Windsor Castle four years ago, Roman Catholic priest and British Army Chaplain Andrew Lloyd; and Ian Mobsby, one of the leading lights of the Emerging Church in England. Much more later, of course.

Until my next post, I will leave you with this painting, which hangs in Bangor Cathedral, for your meditation and contemplation.

Exhausted!

The end of a full and delightful day, of travel to and from and reunion with Leo and Jo Morris, and a feast of friendship and a feast of food.

And the realization of only one more day in England, and the need to repack for the coming journeys to France and Madagascar, and my mind is too exhausted for creative and informative blogging!

Perhaps tomorrow . . . . 

Afon Menai Meeting

In an earlier post, I mentioned my Sunday with Robert Townsend at two of his congregations. On the preceding Friday, June 26, Robert had called together some clergy to meet with me. I drove to his home in Llanberis (the GPS got me to the church, and then I had to call him for directions to his house-- on the other side of the church, as it turned out!), and then he drove us to the home of Angela Williams, who lives in the community of Menai Bridge on Ynys Môn (Anglesey). Also on hand: Chris Buckley, Lloyd Jones, and Peter McLean.

Angela led us on a brief walk to one of her three churches, St. Tysilio, located on Church Island, or, to use its Welsh name, Ynys Tysilio: Tysilio's Island. Located in the Afon Menai (or Menai Straits), it is reached by a causeway.

 

Here is the church, which dates to the 1400s, and was built on or near the first church, which St. Tysilio founded in 630. 

 

Inside the church is a lovely sanctuary. Like many churches in Wales, and in England as well, St. Tysilio's displays the Ten Commandments behind the altar.

At the highest point on Church Island, I took this picture of our gathering. From left to right, Chris, Lloyd, Angela, Peter, and Robert.

As I was going through my notes of this meeting, I realized I had skipped over some of Bishop Andrew's comments. Because some of his points were reinforced in Friday morning's gathering, I am going to bring this post to an end and regroup!

Perhaps this is a good time to mention my uncertainty about getting out posts from this point on. Tomorrow Ingrid and I will be gone from morning to night, training into London's Charing Cross Rail Station, taking the Underground Bakerloo Line to Oxford Circle, then transferring to the Victoria Line and traveling to King's Cross and St. Pancras, and then walking to the St. Pancras Rail Station for a train ride up to Harpenden, north of London. There we will spend the day with Leo and Jo Morris. Leo has been an Anglican priest for 55 years, and during my last Sabbatical we were able to be present for his 50th anniversary celebration. We first met Leo when he came to St. Bartholomew's in the late '80s and early '90's. He was long active in the healing ministry of the Church, and has been a mentor as well as a friend ever since we first met him. We first met Jo in 2000 on my first Sabbatical. We may return to Tunbridge Wells too late for a post, or perhaps in time for just a brief one.

Thursday may offer a better chance, but I have two meetings in London, and then Ingrid and I need to pack for Friday morning's departure for Paris by train through the Chunnel.

Perhaps as early as Saturday we will take the train to the south of France to visit Ingrid's Oncle Pierre in the small village of Poyanne, near Dax. Access to the Internet there is unknown but probably iffy at best. And then back to Paris for our flight to Antananarivo, Madagascar, where access to the Internet may be sporadically possible, but . . . we shall have to see!

Interrupted

As previously reported on my 4th of July post, Ingrid and I have been staying in Tunbridge Wells at the Reynolds' flat. On Sunday, July 12, David and Tina arrived, with long time friends Murray and Cindy, to reclaim their flat for one night as a stepping stone for a trip to northern Europe. Their car had been equipped with a roof-top carrier, and they were scheduled to leave bright and early on Monday morning for Dover and a crossing of the English Channel (or French Sleeve). Sunday night they drove down to Tunbridge Wells' Pantiles neighborhood, to the hotel where Ingrid and I would be staying for the one night, to join us for dinner. While we were eating, Ingrid saw through the restaurant window the flashing lights of an ambulance or police car.

As we turned the corner on our walk back to the Reynold's car, we saw the flashing lights of both an ambulance and a police car. Unbelievably, we discovered that the Reynold's car had been smashed from behind, the rear bumper snug against the back left tire, and glass from the rear light scattered on the pavement. An elderly woman had lost control of her car and hit the Reynold's.

Amidst all the activity of checking on the wife's condition, taking information for insurance, and consulting with the on-scene police, it became clear that the Reynold's trip would be delayed at least a day, and that Ingrid and I would be spending a second night at our hotel (fortunately, they had another room available for tonight).

By late this afternoon, David was able to report that his insurance company had agreed to provide a loaner car for their trip to the continent, and a new crossing scheduled, and that the woman who had hit their car was doing well but had suffered some broken ribs. So tomorrow the Reynolds and their friends will resume their journey, and we will be back in their flat until Friday, when we take the Chunnel to Paris and the next phase of our Sabbatical.

In the meantime, tomorrow I hope to resume my posts on the first, Welsh, phase.

Gwela i chi yfory! (See you tomorrow!) 

Icon and Insight, Family and Food

Bishop Andrew's office looks very much like any office, but his chapel is a special place. The view through the window behind the altar, which I had hoped to capture in this photograph, is the one you saw at the beginning of my last post.

The object on the left front corner of the altar is a Tau, a T-shaped cross which I remembered from Ingrid's and my days in the Third Order of the Society of St. Francis.

Bishop Andrew showed me a special icon which he keeps on the ledge of an octagonal window on the south side of the chapel. He received the icon from the artist who fashioned it out of an imperfect block of wood which looked as if something had gnawed at it and in some places gnawed through it. The icon depicts the Annunciation to Mary, and the gnawed abyss between the Angel and the Virgin both unite the divine and human figures and show the gulf between them.

Next we gathered for a delightful dinner around the kitchen table, and second helpings were heaped upon the grateful guest's plate. There was lively conversation around the table, including an exchange with Beth, who is interested in acting and who needed to master an American accent for a play. Her father encouraged her to try it out with me, and she only agreed to do it when I agreed to try speaking with an English accent (drawing on my once-upon-a-time mastery of My Fair Lady). Then on to a delicious dessert, after which the children vanished. Bishop Andrew and Caroline and I moved into the living room where we talked about the Church and also kept track of the goings on at Wimbledon, when British hopes for Andy Murray were still high.

The Bishop began by mentioning the poverty in northwest Wales and the challenge it means for the diocese. He noted that the further west and the further north one travels in Wales, in other words the further from the economic power of England one travels, the deeper the economic hardship. This isn't mere happenstance: the only superhighways in Wales are along the northern and southern coasts because they link directly with England's Liverpool and Manchester in the north, and London in the south. By contrast, there aren't any superhighways connecting the north and south of Wales. In fact, it takes less time to get to London from Bangor than it takes to get from Bangor to Cardiff.

I asked him about the Evangelical tradition in the Church in Wales, in which the Bishop himself finds his spiritual home. He suggested that evangelicalism is "softer," not as polarized in Wales as in other parts of the Anglican Communion. One reason is that Church in Wales evangelicals aren't numerous enough to afford a movement within a movement. A more important reason has to do with the different contexts in England and Wales. The Chapels, so significant in the Welsh context of the 19th century, meant that the Church of England in Wales (as it then was) developed in contradistinction to the conservative evangelicalism of the Non-Conformist denominations. As a result, preaching and the exposition of Scripture in the Welsh Church has reflected mainstream Anglican tradition.

When the Bishop learned that I was planning on attending the diocesan Ordination on Saturday, he invited me to vest and process with the other visiting clergy! I was so touched and appreciative of his kindness, and on that gracious note I thanked him and Caroline for a wonderful time with them and their family.

Bishop of Bangor

On Thursday, June 25, I headed to the northwest corner of Wales, to the City and Diocese of Bangor. Most of the rest of my time in Caerfyddin had been spent in preparing my sermon for the coming Sunday, and packing for my last destination in Wales. I said my final goodbyes to Dulais and Leigh, and began the long drive to Bangor.

I was dressed in my black suit and clerical collar, as I had been for my flight to Heathrow, and the drives to Caerdydd, Caerfyrddin, and Llanbedr, in order to keep them from getting wrinkled in my suitcase. A good thing, too, because although I had left for Bangor with what I thought was plenty of time, I arrived at Bishop Andrew John's office just in time for our 4 o'clock appointment!

I soon discovered that the Bishop's office was in the Bishop's House, where he lives with his wife Caroline, their son, Matthew, and their three daughters, Beth, Hannah, and Harriet. The Bishop's House is perched on the highest point of northwest Wales, with magnificent views overlooking Porth Penrhyn to the east.

 

After a cup of tea, Bishop Andrew (bishops in Wales are addressed by title and first name, rather than title and last name as is our custom in the United States) took me on the short walk to the western side of the promontory which overlooks the Afon Menai (the Menai River, in Welsh, is known as the Menai Straits in English). The Menai River separates mainland Wales from Ynys Môn, the Welsh island of Anglesey, which you you can see in these photographs.

Bishop Andrew and I had a companion for our walk.

When we returned to the Bishop's House, Bishop Andrew took me on a tour of his office and chapel, and then we had dinner with his family, and our conversation about the Church in Wales and the Diocese of Bangor.

I'w barhau! To be continued!

St. Fagan's

On Monday evening, June 22, I hosted Dulais and Leigh Rhys at Sai Wu, a Chinese restaurant with delicious dishes and delightful decor, and whose amiable owner, a friend of the Rhys', chatted with us as we enjoyed our dinner.

The next day Dulais and I drove to St. Fagan's, Wales' National History Museum. Dulais had taken me there once before, five years ago, but since then the museum had rebuilt, piece by piece, St. Teilo's church, which had been built, stage by stage, from 1100 to 1520.

The Church building is modest enough from the outside. . .

. . . but inside it has been recreated to reflect the colours we would have found in the late 1400's:

 

The murals are based on the faded originals which were found and preserved when the building was acquired.

Here is a rood screen in front of the Lady Altar, followed by a close up of the intricate artwork on its base.

A particularly poignant bas relief depicts the symbols of our Lord's Passion on the Cross. See how many you can identify:

St. Fagan's is a collection of over 40 original structures which have been meticulously dismantled, their every piece numbered, and then rebuilt on its 100-acre expanse. Here is another of its buildings, a one-room school house (exterior and interior):

 

 

In 1870 Parliament passed an Education Bill that required all schools to teach through the medium of English. This assault on the Welsh language led to a notorious byproduct: the "Welsh Not." This was a wooden stick or slate plaque bearing the initials "W N" and hung around the necks of children who spoke Welsh during school. Sometimes the last child possessing the Welsh Not at the end of the day was punished; sometimes a child could escape punishment by naming another Welsh-speaking child. For the children who suffered the humiliation of wearing it, the Welsh Not was a cruel reinforcement of their imputed cultural inferiority.

Here is one such Welsh Not, which was used in this school:

In the bookstore afterward, I discovered a card with this inscription on the front:

"Mae Duw yn gweld popeth ond dyw’r cymdogion yn colli dim."

 

"God sees everything but the neighbors miss nothing."

 

And with that bit of disturbing wisdom, nos da!

A Farewell to Aberystwyth

I returned to Eglwys y Santes Fair (St. Mary's Church) for 6:00 pm Hwyrol Weddi (Evening Prayer). Lyn Davis was the Reader, and not only did he lead the service, he also preached. Afterward we headed out to have coffee and our third conversation, with a new companion, Menna Phillips, and at a new venue, The Orangery.

After Lyn recapped our previous conversation for Menna, she mentioned the Great Strike of 1926. In the aftermath of the Great War, the British coal industry faced new competition from the United States and other coal-producing nations, and prices fell when "free" German coal entered the marketplace as one element in Germany's war reparations. Mine owners decided to protect their profits by cutting the mine workers' pay and increasing their hours. In May of 1926 the Trades Union Congress called for a General Strike in support of the mine workers. The only General Strike in Britain's history, it lasted a little over a week. By November most of the mine workers had returned to work, but many remained out of work for years. This exacerbated the loss of faith with the leadership of the chapels, and during the subsequent Great Depression, many Welsh mine workers emigrated to the industrial areas in England. Emigration of Welsh-speaking miners, immigration of English workers, and disillusionment with Welsh-speaking Non-Conformist politics contributed to the decline of Cymraeg in Wales.

Menna mentioned that another lingering problem for the Church in Wales as it tries to reach out to people from Non-Conformist backgrounds is the Degwm, or Tithe. When the Church in Wales was the established Anglican Church of Wales, everyone paid the Degwm, Chapel-goers as well as Church-goers. The understandable resentment of Non-Conformists in having had to support the Church has persisted among many, despite the fact that the Church has been disestablished since 1920.

I asked Menna how she had become a member of the Church in Wales. Her mother was a nurse, and the old vicar in her village, whose health was fragile, frequently needed her care. A great friendship developed between the vicar and her mother. When she married her husband in a Presbyterian ceremony the vicar understood, but asked her whether she give him the privilege and joy of baptizing their first child. She did, and Menna was that child! Her story made a touching and poignant conclusion to all these conversations about Cymraeg.

We went our separate ways, but Lyn and I had one more rendezvous. We would meet again for coffee the next day at the National Library of Wales before my tour of the Library and my journey back to Carmarthen.

The next morning I awoke to another sunny day in Wales, and my last in Aberystwyth. I said my goodbyes to Stuart and Prudence, grateful for their generous hospitality, and loaded up the car. My GPS quickly took me to the Library.

As I waited for Lyn in the Library's small restaurant, I noticed the following sign on the table:

"Byddwch mor garedig â dychwelyd eich llestri i'r silfoedd a ddarperir. Diolch i chwi." 

Here's a fairly literal translation into American English: "Would you be so kind as to return your dishes to the shelves which are provided. Thank you."

And here's the English translation which appeared below the Welsh: "Please return your crockery to the bays provided. Thank you."

Over the inevitable coffee, Lyn told me that he had spent his first ten years at the Library overseeing the Library's 800,000 photographs, negatives, and transparencies. But with the need to digitize all of the Library's collections, and Lyn's technical savvy, he is now its Metadata Manager.

We said a final "hwyl" to each other, and then I began my tour of the Library. Along the way I picked up several brochures: "Family History" and "Step by Step," both guides to tracing one's family tree; and "Digital Mirror: Reflecting the Collections of the NLW Online."

On the tour, I saw a family tree showing that President Obama's great great great grandfather was from Ynys Môn, or Anglesey, the island off the northwest coast of mainland Wales, where Cymraeg is still the predominant language.

We saw the isolation block, where new aquisitions from estate sales and attics and other unprotected provenances are kept until they have been cleared of any possible molds, insects, or anything else that might "infect" and damage the other books in the collection.

In the event of a fire, doors shut, the oxygen is sucked out of the rooms, and carbon dioxide floods the rooms to put out the flames.

We also got to see some of the greatest treasures in the Library, among them the Black Book of Carmarthen.

When the tour was over, I took some pictures. Here are a few of them, beginning with the Library itself. Then there's a view of Aberystwyth from the Library steps, with St. Michael's tower toward the left and Cardiff Bay beyond. And finally, a stone's throw from the Library, sheep gathered under the shade of a tree while other sheep grazed on the grass just beyond.

 

 

This ends my chronicle of Aberystwyth, but before my final Hwyl to this fascinating city, I want to say a word about the last three titles for my Aberystwythian posts, Aberystwyth Mon Amour, The Unbearable Lightness of Being in Aberystwyth, and From Aberystwyth With Love. These are all titles, along with Last Tango in Aberystwyth, and Don't Cry for Me Aberystwyth, by the gifted writer of a series of noir detective novels, Malcolm Pryce. His series is one of Ingrid's and my favorites, and the most recent one awaits our return from Madagascar. His books even include an occasional Welsh phrase, which I will be happy to translate for you (if you call at a decent hour). We can't recommend these books too highly, and if you want more enticement, here is the author's website. (You will find information about these novels under the "Aberystwyth Rock.")

In fact, on the very first evening, when I saw the Promenade and Royal Pier and Amusement Arcade, all of which feature prominently in the novels' setting, I couldn't help but take some pictures to show Ingrid:

 

 

 

And so, Arrivederci Aberystwyth!

From Aberystwyth with Love, Part 2

My second conversation with Lyn took place at the same friendly coffee house, where Welsh is spoken as the, you should pardon the expression, lingua franca.

As late as 1970 the Welsh language (Cymraeg) was still predominant in rural areas, but by then the accumulated changes in Welsh society since the turn of the twentieth century were culminating in a greatly changed landscape. During the late 19th century, Cymraeg and Non-Conformity had become deeply identified with each other, while the Anglican Church in Wales retained its deep roots in both Cymraeg and English. At the same time, there was increasing concern for the social conditions wrought by industrialization. Non-Conformity was strongest in the Welsh working class community, and their ministers encouraged their members to support the Liberal and Labor parties in seeking improved conditions.

The shock of World War I, with its massive scale of death and destruction, brought an end to the almost universal belief in European and American cultures that scientific and social progress were inevitable. The resulting pessimism affected religious communities as well. The Labor party increasingly included socialists and atheists, and many Welsh workers turned away from their Non-Conformist allegiances. And because Cymraeg and Non-Conformity had been so deeply linked, allegiance to the Welsh language also suffered. For further reading, Lyn suggested Robert Pope's book, Seeking God's Kingdom: The Nonconformist Social Gospel in Wales, 1906-1939.

After World War II, which brought with it increasing mobility, rural communities also became less Welsh-speaking. As an example, Lyn mentioned the custom associated with Nos Galan, when people went from house to house singing traditional songs in Welsh. As new people who didn't know the language or the songs moved in, such customs began to fade. The choirs who sang the great traditional Welsh hymns also suffered. Non-Conformist chapels lost traction as well because for most newcomers the Church's worship seemed more familiar with its regular celebrations of Holy Communion and its embrace of bilingualism. 

Lyn and I parted ways until the evening's service, and I made my way to St. Michael's. As I approached the church, many of the parishioners were leaving the service. Still steeped in my conversation about Cymraeg, I greeted one family with a hearty "Bore da!" When I saw the puzzled look on their faces I remembered that this was the English-speaking congregation, and laughed at my unthinking salutation.

Here are some of the pictures I took. You will notice the striking blend of traditional and modern appointments, and the imaginative use of beautiful hangings to soften the strength of the stone.

On this particular Sunday St. Michael's offered a traditional Holy Communion service at 8 o'clock, and at 11 o'clock a service of worship organized around the theme "Where is God in the Credit Crunch?" with a special speaker from Credit Action Cymru. Later at 6 pm there would be an Evening Praise service.

At the back of the church was a good sized store for purchasing books, from Bibles and Prayer Books to biographies of church leaders and missionaries, works of theology, and commentaries. There were also gift items, from cards to crosses. And several tract racks, with information about St. Michael's various ministries. For example, one brochure was titled "Fast Forward," and carried information about the Aberystwyth Academy of Christian Discipleship; you can find out more about that here.

After this, I joined Stuart and Prudence back at the Rectory for lunch, and took their picture:

 

After dinner I had some time to pause in the day's activities, and so I will pause now and rejoin you later!

Hwyl am a tro: Goodbye for now.