4 The Way www.cumbriamethodists.org.uk Summer 2013 Summer 2013 www.cumbriamethodists.org.uk The Way 5 By The Way THIN PLACES: COMMUNITY Thrivingcommunity revealsits love ‘Wherethe veil...is as thinas gossamer’

WE ARE lucky to have people in our village to organise coffee mornings, hold table-top sales, the Community Forum members who organise t’s 1983. Easter Sunday morning fun events like the dog show. We have church on Iona, watching the sun rise GEORGE MacLeod, the founder of the , famously described the island of quizzes, services and the First Responders, while I Iona as “a ‘thin place’ –only a ‘tissue paper’ separating the material from the spiritual”. over Ben Mor. Welly boots and others represent us on the Parish Council or help woolly jumpers our protection from Pilgrims continue to be drawn to the beautiful Scottish island to discover for themselves to keep the Village Hall going. the gentle elements. 6am, and a race what it means to inhabit that ‘thin place’. All these people and those who went before across the island to witness Big Al’s The Iona Community currently comprises around 270 members, scattered throughout them deserve our thanks. This is the sense of baptism in the sea at St ’s Britain but bound together by a Rule that calls us to daily prayer and Bible reading; meeting community that makes Allonby a special place Bay. Full immersion. together; accounting for our use of resources, money and time; and action for justice and and one we must preserve for future generations. I feel fully immersed: in creation and in peace. It is through the outworking of the Rule in our daily lives, and in our own Jesus wanted us to love one another; a thriving c o m m u n i t y. communities, that we ourselves strive to become the ‘thin places’, where God touches the community is a good indicator of our love for one physical world. another and for our community. A swift walk back to the abbey via the It is, of course, not the prerogative of Iona Community members to be thus: indeed it is Pam Jones –ABC: Allonby Beachcomber, The village to collect daffodils to adorn the the calling of all Christians to be the ‘hands and feet’, and the eyes and lips of Christ in our Monthly Village Newsletter resurrection cross. Gather in the world; and we are reminded that it is not our works and actions which create this ‘thinness’, graveyard and knock on the door of the but “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col.1:27). THE deanery is going through a period of chapel... “we have come for our Lord”. Three of us belonging to the Iona Community Cumbria Family Group have gathered our change. The retirement of so many clergy has “He is not here. Look in the place of the stories about what a ‘thin place’ means for us. We do not claim to be more ‘thin’ than anyone forced us to be more creative in our use of living.” Hallelujah we sing as we process else, but perhaps have come to recognise a little of how our lives may be thin places. ministers, lay readers and other lay members. from the graveyard of kings and Financially we are reviewing what we can afford. commoners to the place of the living, the It’s easy to get anxious and selfish in such abbey church, cruciform place of circumstances. But the concerns of the kingdom of co-joined to place of eating, sleeping, God should give us confidence to turn beyond our working –the cloister, the marketplace immediate needs and to the needs of the whole connects our life and our worship. Cross area and the needs of the church of the future. at front of procession holds aloft to the Stephen Griffiths –Drigg and Carleton world our faith. Full immersion in the Community News stuff of life: welly boots, sunrise, swelling ocean, new life: choose life. Singing and THE not quite state funeral of Lady Thatcher reminded us of what a divisive character she processing into the abbey to serve was. Love her or loathe her, there was no half communion to the hundreds. way. Jesus was divisive. We Christians think he A‘thin place’, where the veil of the was the greatest; the Jewish authorities loathed sunrise is as thin as gossamer, and the him as a trouble maker. Jesus himself said you shimmer of the ocean enlivens each fibre were either for him or against him. No half way. in the body. Brigham Methodist Church 1973. I am seven and we have been living on Iona for two of our five years. I IN JUNE 1953 a party from Blennerhasset may not have the words to describe it, but School travelled to London for the coronation of we live in an intentional ecumenical Queen Elizabeth II. They were accompanied by Christian Community, on an island where Ashley Braithwaite, headmaster, Mrs Lazonby Columba landed in 563 and brought ● Cutting edge: Ruth Harvey, husband Nick and their daughters on Iona and Mr Fawcett Storey, teachers at the school, to the western world. and myself. A marvellous time was had by all. I don’t then know that the Iona ebb and flow with the tide as urban the value of food banks and the scandal We made a record and everyone said their Community is at the cutting edge of poverty and world justice, peace and that they’re necessary; supporting our little piece about the visit. We finished by singing , peace and justice, worship gritty worship, form the fabric of our churches as they seek deeper unity that the Coronation Song, The Golden Coach. Since development and the re-forming of the living and our dying and our re-birthing. values difference and restores faith in then the 78 record has been re-recorded onto CD and most of us have a copy. church. I have no idea that all children do “Some come to Iona looking for peace and diversity; nurturing the art of honest Amanda Storey –Link: Aspatria Methodist not wake to a medieval bell, worship quiet, and return home committed to conversation in our churches where we Church, St Kentigern’s Aspatria, St Mary’s Gilcrux, twice a day in a restored Benedictine peace and justice.” can so easily mask conflict. St James’s Hayton monastery, or attend a school of five. My 2013. In Cumbria. The mountains and Is this what Columba meant when he seven-year-old self knows the joy of markets of this ‘thin’ place echo the ebb prophesied that “ere the world comes to HAVEN Saints: Each night begins with prayer sharing meals with 50 people, the fun of and flow: incarnation is through all. an end, Iona shall be as it was”? Is this before we go out on the streets. Our first walk meeting new volunteers each year, the There is something “sacramental in all of what MacLeod meant when he described round takes us past the pubs and clubs so we responsibility of serving in the Coffee life”. Sitting at my kitchen table with the Iona as a “thin place, where the veil can be seen, then it’s back to the Church for a House at weekends, of singing each candle lit, praying for peace and for between things spiritual and things warming cuppa and a biscuit before heading out Monday night in the ceilidh and of health for all; making plans with our material is as thin as gossamer”? I get it, again. This time, we may be out until 3am. greeting new guests at the jetty each children to raise funds through a Quaker here, in Cumbria. Our teams are made up of three people with Saturday. The sadness of saying goodbye cake sale for the children of Syria; part of ■ Ruth Harvey works for Churches at least one female per team. The team leader for the next. A ‘thin place’, where friendships a network informing and agitating about Together in Cumbria. that night has to decide which way we go and who is responsible for what. We try to make sure we are back in Duke Street by 1.30am, ready for chucking out time. Jackie Harkison –Living Stones, Whitehaven We all resonatewithGod’sownheartbeat United Reformed Church

BONNIE Prince Charlie suffered the stresses of Shap in his failed attempt to recapture the English EACH Friday, in the vegetables, I strive to maintain a days, facing their fears, celebrating and throne for the Stuarts, a house there being abbey church on Iona, a ‘connectedness’ with our earth and food. lamenting with them and their precious ● Columba’s landing place: ‘Ere the world comes to an end, Iona shall be as it was’ THE IONA COMMUNITY named after his stay in 1745. The onset of the prayer is used which The rhythm of the seasons and the ones, and, if it is their wish, holding 19th century saw the coming of the railway, built includes the words: “O vagaries of our climate bring me solace them, as their bodies become stilled. with much travail. The station’s closure in 1968 Christ, you are within and challenge, and an awareness of the God who journeys through our days THE strength meant the construction of the M6 was welcomed each one of us… Nearer fragility and resilience of humanity. with us, is closer than the hands which of friendship as bringing relief to the trans-Shap traveller. “Such are you than breathing, closer than Sharing the evening sun with the song hold us at the edges of our lives. and ways as we hope never to see again,” the verdict hands and feet.” And, in worship every of the blackbirds, turning my thoughts I am one of the team of street pastors, relationships of three soldiers of long ago from the more placid morning, those gathered affirm their as I turn the soil, I feel an intimacy with walking the streets of Lancaster each between plains of Norfolk is a reminder that this route will belief that God’s goodness is “at the the world God made; material and Saturday night between 10pm and 3am, members, never be an easy one. heart of humanity, planted more deeply spiritual are barely separable. Soil on offering practical help, a listening ear, a associates and friends is Heart of Eden Team Ministry than all that is wrong”. hands, skin on grass, a song on the bottle of water or a pair of flip-flops; not a key factor in We recognise that all people are breeze, “closer is God than breathing”. judging or preaching, but a caring THERE is still a tiny patch of snow high up on the the Iona Community in Cumbria wondrously made in the image of God, I am fortunate to be in paid presence. People find themselves out for Bootle side of Black Combe to remind us of the being a thin place for me. I see spectacular snow storms of March 20 and 21. that we resonate with God’s own employment, and my work is with people all manner of reasons: to celebrate or to something of the heart of God People tell me it was the worst snow since heartbeat and that our very beings are, facing the end of their lives. Birth and escape, to work or because they have when we support, challenge and 1947. In Bootle, we were cut off to both north in fact, the ‘thinnest’ of all places; after death are often places of wonder, nowhere else to go, and we reach out to encourage each other. When that and south and had no electricity for three days. all, even tissue paper is thick in fascination and fear. In the hospice where them all. God, whose own goodness is space between individuals, as we The police set up a road block outside the comparison with a breath. I work, I have the privilege of journeying planted deep in the heart of each person, meet, becomes something Rectory to stop traffic attempting the A595. We I live and work in Lancaster with my alongside folk at a time when their energy the spiritual and physical inseparable, sacred, I experience a taste of had to cancel Easter services. husband and our three daughters. We is restricted and their time precious. creates in us all the thinnest of places. heaven. Ian James –the Black Combe churches, are fortunate to have a large garden, and With our staff and volunteers we aim ■ Elaine Gisbourne is a physio- MICHAEL GISBOURNE is an benefice of Bootle, Corney, Whicham and Whitbeck by keeping a few hens as well as growing to add quality of life to their remaining therapist and street pastor in Lancaster. Anglican priest in Lancaster ● Ethereal: From Iona, looking across to Mull at sunset ● Isolated: A view from Camas towards the island of Staffa