Catching Up
One of the privileges and joys of travelling is the opportunity to meet up with Companions where they live and work as well as to rekindle friendships. It was really good to stop overnight with John and Sue Richardson. I’ve known John from his days as Dean of Bradford Cathedral where we used to go frequently as a Community, holding gatherings and leading events in a church dedicated and greatly influenced by the Celtic Saints, the Aidan Chapel being one of my favourite sacred spaces. John and Sue moved onto Wye in Kent where he reformulated Minster ministry and two years ago moved to Margate into a very challenging parish. John is a big guy in every sense of the word and combines a depth of down to earth northern spirituality with the courage to take on challenges and bring about transformations and turn difficult and troubled situations around to something good. This has been the pattern of his ministry through many years and Margate is no exception. We had the opportunity to visit the church centre which is now a hive of community activity; over 3,000 people use or pass through the centre on a weekly basis with a myriad programme of happenings that reflect the church’s commitment as expressed on the etchings on the glazed front doors; sharing, playing, dancing, eating, serving, worshipping, caring. Church without walls and unusually but delightfully a place which gathers people from all backgrounds, believer and unbeliever, rich, poor and middle class. A real beacon of light in a fairly dark context. It was salutary and grim to see in the church grounds a memorial being erected for the victims of a paedophile who abducted and murdered children at his home just across the road from the church. Removing the dark blot of evil with the healing, redemptive light of Christ.
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