J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4 ANGLICAN PARISH OF BELMONT NORTH REDHEAD Weekly Pew Bulletin & Newsletter

DETAILS FOR DIRECT CREDITING WEEKLY OFFERINGS AT THE BOTTOM OF FINAL PAGE OF BULLETIN This weeks readings I N T H I S I S S U E SECOND SUNDAY AFTER : READINGS FOR AND PRAYER GENESIS 18.1–15 PSALM 116.1–2, 116.11–18 OF THE WEEK ROMANS 5.1–11 MATTHEW 9.35 – 10.23 READINGS FOR THE REST OF THE WEEK THE MARTYR IN STREET MONDAY: EVELYN UNDERHILL SPIRITUAL WRITER 1 KINGS 21.1-16 PSALM 5.1-6. MATTHEW 5.38-42 CLOTHES: THE STORY AN TUESDAY: ICON TELLS 1 KINGS 21.17-29. PSALM 51.10-14 MATTHEW 5.43-48 an article by Stephanie Saldaña WEDNESDAY: from Plough Magazine 2 KINGS 2.1, 2.6-142 PSALM 31.21-27. MATTHEW 6.1-18 THURSDAY: EVELYN UNDERHILL: LIFE SIRACH 48.1-14. PSALM 97.1-9. MATTHEW 6.7-15 AS PRAYER - A SHORT FRIDAY: ARTICLE ON HER WRITINGS 2 KINGS 11.1-4, 11.9-20 PSALM 132.10-18. MATTHEW 6.19-23 SATURDAY: 2 CHRON 24.17-25 PSALM 89.1-4 MATTHEW 6.24-34 "JESUS SEES THE CROWDS AND HAS COMPASSION" Prayer of the Week REV. GREG'S SERMON Lord, we beseech you to keep your family, the Church, in continual MEET THE FAMILY: ANDREW godliness, that through your protection & JANET CORR it may be free from all adversities, and MINISTER: REV’D GREG COLBY devoutly given to serve you in good PHONE: 0401 996 961 RECTORY PHONE: 02 4945 5860 works, to the glory of your name; EMAIL: through Jesus Christ our Lord. [email protected] WARDENS: STEVE EVANS, Amen. CAROLYN COOK & MARILYN DEAS J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4 The Martyr in This Week We Street Clothes Pray For: An icon reveals the hidden power of a friendship beyond Healing Karlene, Cindie, Pam, Robyn, Jan, Frank boundaries Rynehart, Fay House, Carolyn & Grahame by Stephanie Saldaña Cook, Les Hutchinson, Edna Parmiter, https://www.plough.com/en/topics/faith/witness/the- martyr-in-street-clothes Adele, Trevor, Pat. & Sybil A copy of the icon sits on my Diocesan Ministries desk, calling to me: the nineteen The CathedralKatherine Bowyer and martyrs of , who gave their (The Dean) Angela Peverell (Sub Dean) David Cole and Sue (Canon Liturgist) lives in love during the civil war Adamstown: Chris Bird and Meri. The icon of the nineteen martyrs of Algeria. Written of the 1990s. Here they stand All ANeWArthur Copeman and by Odile, Petites soeurs de nazareth et de l'unité. Courtesy of the Diocese of , Algeria. gazing at me, in the loose robes Anabelle. Sam Chiswell, Kate Rogers and Amy Soutter - Ministry Assistants they might have worn when visiting the market, nursing the ill, teaching, or saying Mass. Monks and , , a , all with their faces haloed. Wider Community Simple, humble, their feet firmly planted in the Algerian soil. Prime Minister and Cabinet. Leader of the Opposition and Shadow Cabinet. It is rare that happens so quickly, that I can call Australian Defence Force Chaplaincy. “Blessed” those who lived and died in my own lifetime, those I Local Federal Members of Parliament. might once have passed in the street. Yet here they are, not thirty Leaders of commerce, business and industry. Trade Union Leaders. Small years after they were martyred, dying along with nearly 200,000 Business owners and the staff they employ of their Algerian neighbors. Their beatification, held on December 8, 2018, in Oran, serves as a stark reminder that holiness lives among us, that saints do not belong to other eras but to our lives, Each Day we pray for our friendships, our own streets. Peter, our Bishop with Sonia and Charlie our Assistant . But it is not their nineteen faces that draw me in most. Instead I Health professional diagnosing and treating find myself turning towards a twentieth figure – a young man, the COVID-19 virus and those researching standing in the corner, wearing jeans, sandals, and a blue shirt and developing treatments and cures. The First Peoples of the Diocese especially the with polka dots. He has no halo; its very absence pulls me to him. Awabakal, Biripi, Darkinjung, Geawegal, He gestures toward the minaret of a mosque. How did he come to Kamilaroi, Worimi and Wonnarua be on this icon of the Christian martyrs of Algeria? peoples. In time, I learn that his name is Mohamed Bouchikhi, and that • The Diocese of Guadalcanal. • The leaders of this nation in parliaments this young Muslim offered his life for his Christian friend, and the public service. Bishop . • Those who are affected by the COVID-19 virus, their families and their friends.. The Primate and the General Synod Office Reflection on Matthew 28. 16-20 In this passage Jesus gives the Great Commission to the covenant people. We are not all evangelists in the formal disciples and therefore to us: to make disciples of all sense but we have all received gifts that we can use to help nations (not just the Jews), to baptize them and to teach fulfil the Great Commission. As we obey , we have comfort them to obey His teachings. Baptism symbolises a in the knowledge that Jesus is always with us, through his willingness to live God’s way and to identify with God’s Spirit. J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

The Martyr in Street Clothes - Even as many continued French in Algeria The story of how Mohamed came to be on the icon left for in of nineteen Christian martyrs is equally the story the wake of Algerian of how nineteen martyrs came to be on the same independence, Pierre icon as Mohamed, in whose country, Algeria, they Claverie experienced chose to live and die. It is the story of Muslims a conversion of the and Christians witnessing to hope together, heart. He became a asking, even in death, to be written into a single and asked to frame. return to Algeria The icon’s most imposing figure is the bishop – no longer as part himself, Pierre Claverie, who stands with a staff of a group in power, in hand, wearing red and white vestments. His but as a common journey onto this scene was as unlikely as pilgrim bound together Mohamed’s. Claverie was born in Algeria in 1938 with his neighbors. He wanted to rediscover the when it was still a French colony. As the child of country of his childhood as he had never known French settlers, whose family had lived in Algeria it, to study and Islam and to give his life for generations, he would later reflect back on a to this new Algeria. He wrote: “It’s there that my happy childhood, but also on the “colonial bubble” true personal adventure began – a rebirth.” in which he grew up – raised by loving parents Claverie became part of a transformed church, a but little aware of his surroundings. He spoke no diminished group of Christian religious who Arabic and had almost no contact with Muslim decided to stay as guests in the house of Islam. Algerians. They were led by Archbishop (later Cardinal) He traveled to complete his studies in France, and Léon-Étienne Duval, originally from Savoie in it was there, as a young student and a seminarian, France, who had been sympathetic to Algerian against the backdrop of the rising Algerian self-determination and had spoken out against independence movement back home, that the French government’s use of torture. French Claverie’s worldview was shaken. For the first critics mocked him as “Mohamed Duval.” time, he met those who questioned the French Unfazed, he took dual French and Algerian presence in Algeria, angry that they might have to nationality to emphasize his devotion to risk their lives in military service there. Claverie Algerians. “I can summarize my apostleship in became aware that as a Frenchman in Algeria he Algeria with one word: friendship,” he once said. had participated in a system that excluded his “I have called you friends,” Jesus tells his Muslim Algerian neighbors. “How could I have disciples in the Gospel of John, and it was in the lived in ignorance of this world, which demanded spirit of friendship that these clergy stayed on, recognition of its identity and dignity?” he asked. living with, learning from, and serving their “In churches, how could I have so often have Muslim neighbors, in some cases taking on jobs heard the words of Christ about loving the Other as teachers, nurses, and librarians. Their faith as myself, as Him, and never met that other?” was bound up in the immediate practice of

Looking for prayer resources? Use this link: https://bit.ly/prayer-links J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

The Martyr in Street Clothes - continued neighborly love. Claverie wrote: “The covenant with God passes through the covenant with the people to whom he gives us. It is a covenant lived in the way Jesus lived his covenant with the men and women of Palestine – as a servant, and not as a master; in giving one’s life rather than lessons.” These Christians harbored no desire to proselytize. Claverie wrote: “I not only accept that the Other is the Other, a distinct subject with Pierre Claverie with nuns of the Sacred Heart in Bikfaya, Lebanon Photograph from freedom of conscience, but I accept that he or she the Sacred Heart Archives may possess a part of the truth that I do not have, sifting through nearly five thousand pages of and without which my own search for the truth documents about their lives. I find him in his cannot be fully realized.” office, surrounded by books. When I show him During his consecration as bishop in 1981, he my framed copy of the icon, he leads me to a thanked the Algerians of his childhood, whom he copy that he also keeps, and we study the faces had at last come to know, for revealing some of together. these hidden truths. “My Algerian brothers and Priests, nuns, teachers, servants. Killed at work, friends,” he said, “I also owe it to you that I am at home, on the way to Mass. Haloed, but many who I am today. You have welcomed me and of them wearing the humble clothes of their daily sustained me by your friendship. I owe it to you lives. Nineteen ordinary people. that I have discovered the Algeria that was still “They weren’t perfect,” Pérennès tells me. “It my country, but where I had lived as a foreigner shows that holiness is possible for people like throughout my youth.” us.” No longer a foreigner, in his years as a priest and bishop of Oran, he celebrated Mass in Arabic, engaged in dialogue with Islam, and could be recognized wearing a stole on which was written in Arabic Allah Muhabba: God is love. Wanting to know more about Bishop Pierre Claverie and Mohamed Bouchikhi, I travel across Jerusalem, where I live, to meet Father Jean- Jacques Pérennès, a Dominican priest who is director of the École Biblique et Archéologique there. Pérennès lived in Algeria for years and was When the civil war between an Islamist a close friend of Bishop Pierre, who ordained him. insurgency and the Algerian military began in He has written Claverie’s biography and took part the early 1990s, in what is often referred to as in the historical commission in charge of the the Black Decade, the religious were not the beatification process for the nineteen martyrs, first to be assassinated. Islamist extremists

“Relying on God has to start all over everyday, as if nothing has yet been done.”—C.S. Lewis J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

The Martyr in Street Clothes - continued first targeted those who represented the state, such as judges and policemen, then those who represented an open society. Finally, they started to attack foreigners. “We didn’t think that the religious would be killed,” Pérennès tells me. “The first two killed, on May 8, 1994, came as a big shock.” Each member of the clergy and of the religious most famous of the martyrs, memorialized in the orders in Algeria had to decide if he or she would film Of Gods and Men, the Trappist monks of the stay; Pérennès recalls the bishops meeting with monastery of Notre Dame de l’Atlas in Tibhirine. the members of the religious orders and insisting Already while they lived, Cardinal Duval had that they feel no shame if they decided to leave. called their vocation the “lungs of the Church of Some were having nightmares. In other cases, Algeria” – their simplicity and dedication to their families were pressuring them to come back prayer respected by their Muslim neighbors, who home. He estimates that two-thirds of the themselves prayed five times a day. religious decided to remain in solidarity with their I recognize the abbot, Christian de Chergé, in the neighbors, who were being killed by the center of the seven, holding the text of thousands. “They said: ‘We choose freely to his Testament, a farewell letter expressing his remain in this country, despite all of the risk, out gratitude towards Algerians and forgiveness of love for the gospel, for the church, and for this towards his killer, whom he calls his “last- country to whom we have been sent.’” minute friend.” I squint to read the French text They did not see themselves as members of a on the icon: Adieu, merci. persecuted church. They lived as their neighbors Goodbye. Thank you. Why such gratitude in the lived – in great danger. They died among others face of death? Hidden behind the story of Father who were also dying: Algerian intellectuals, Christian’s life and vocation had also been the doctors and lawyers, foreigners working in the transformative witness of a pious Muslim friend country, artists and writers, Muslim imams who named Mohamed – who might just as easily have denounced violence, and women and children. been pictured on the icon too. “We must not be afraid. We have to live the present well. The rest does not belong to us,” said one not long before she was killed. As the violence mounted, Bishop Pierre reflected on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s notion of “costly grace.” In a letter written in 1994, he wrote: “We will remember this Christmas that the path of hope passes through the cross.”

Now my eyes are drawn to the seven figures in The seven martyred monks of Tibhirine with a friend white robes gathered at the bottom of the icon: the Photograph © SIPA

“Religion says, ‘I obey; therefore I am accepted.’ Christianity says, ‘I’m accepted, therefore I obey.’”— Timothy Keller J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

The Martyr in Street Clothes - love everyone, because that is our choice. continued Christians are not the only martyrs of charity. Muslims are, too.” The story goes roughly like this: as a seminarian Christian de Chergé and his fellow monks were in 1959–61, the future Father Christian had kidnapped and killed in 1996. Cardinal Duval, by carried out his French military service in Algeria, then retired, was heartbroken by the news and during which time he befriended Mohamed, a died a week later, so that his casket was also rural policeman. The two had often gone on walks wheeled out along with those of the seven monks together, discussing their respective faiths. when the funeral was held. In his Testament, Christian was moved by the depth of his friend’s written before his capture to be opened if he died piety, which encouraged him to deepen his own. by violence, Father Christian paid tribute to his Mohamed had once said to him: “You Christians, beloved country, calling Algeria and Islam “a you do not know how to pray.” Christian received body and a soul.” those words not as a criticism but an invitation, When i first saw that twentieth figure in the and he remembered them for the rest of his life. corner of the icon, displayed during a Mass for One afternoon, when the two of them were the martyrs in Jerusalem, I asked a woman walking, they were attacked by a group of rebels. standing beside me: “Is that Christian de Chergé’s Mohamed defended Christian, and as a result the beloved friend Mohamed, the one who died for Frenchman was left unharmed. But the next day, him and who became the source of his vocation?” Mohamed was found killed. That sacrifice was the “No,” she answered. “That is Bishop Pierre’s source of the young seminarian’s vocation. He friend Mohamed.” became a Trappist monk, and called the And I, who had thought that I knew the story monastery in Tibhirine “a place to pray among well, asked: “Wait … Pierre Claverie had a friend those who pray.” He led a Muslim-Christian named Mohamed, who died for him, too?” dialogue group and prayed with the as well Here at last enters the story as the Bible. And he always remembered his of Mohamed Bouchikhi, friend Mohamed, who had given his life in whose kind face and out- exchange for Christian’s own and thus given stretched arms invite me in witness to “the greatest love of all.” every time I meditate on the Later, Fadila Semaï, a French journalist born to icon where he stands. Algerian parents, went searching for the story of Mohamed grew up living this Mohamed, naming her book L’ami parti beside the presbytery of the church, where he devant after the one Father Christian referred to befriended the parish priest and the religious as “the friend who departed in front,” whom she sisters. As a youth he used to volunteer to be of calls his friend “without a face.” In the offering of service to the church however he could. this unknown Mohamed’s life, she discovered a As he grew older, Mohamed especially loved to love unbound by religion, colonialism, or run errands by driving the church’s white nationalism – a love that Father Christian would Peugeot. In one of the photographs we have of take up, embody, and one day offer back to his him, Mohamed stands proudly next to the car, Algerian neighbors in return. wearing that same blue polka-dotted shirt, a At the height of the later civil violence, Father smile on his face. He sometimes picked up Christian said, “We are protecting our freedom to Bishop

“One hundred religious persons knit into a unity by careful organization do not constitute a church any more than eleven dead men make a football team.”—AW Tozer J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

The Martyr in Street Clothes - beatification of the martyrs of Algeria took place continued two decades later in Oran, the official icon of the martyrs was unveiled. And there was the figure Pierre from his meetings, despite the increasing of Mohamed Bouchikhi, standing quietly in the danger. Pérennès tells me that Bishop Pierre had corner, pictured with the other nineteen friends. been receiving threats, and so on one occasion, I ask why they depicted him without a halo. worried about Mohamed’s safety, he asked him to Pérennès tells me this is a gesture of respect, a consider stopping his help. The question reflection of their desire to honor him without apparently made Mohamed upset. annexing him. “He’s a Muslim,” Pérennès says Pierre, for his part, told a friend of his that “if firmly. “We’re not going to say that he’s it’s just for one like Mohamed, it’s enough of a Christian. But it’s a way of saying that being a reason to stay.” Muslim, he has the same quality of love, and the On the fateful night of capacity of giving himself, the same generosity. August 1, 1996, Mohamed It’s not restricted to Christians, the ability to drove to meet Bishop give your life for others.” Pierre at the airport. The The emotion is evident in his voice when says: bomb blast when they “In our hearts there were twenty.” arrived at his residence There is no greater love than to lay down one’s hit them both at once, life for one’s friends. These words crown the top their blood mingled on the of the icon, just above the face of Jesus who said ground. Mohamed Bouchikhi Photograph them, the twenty-first friend. courtesy of the author It was later discovered that Mohamed had Mohamed, full of love of God and in full witness recorded his own testament in a notebook, in of his Muslim faith, died for his friend Pierre. preparation for this moment: And Pierre, full of the love of God and in full witness of his Christian faith, died for his friend B ismallah, al-Rahman, al-Raheem. In the name of God, the Mohamed. Just as Christian de Chergé’s friend Merciful, the Compassionate. Mohamed died for him, and Christian later died Before I pick up my pen, I say to you: Peace be upon you. I for his Muslim friends. These witnesses become thank you who will read my diary, and I say to each one of signs of hope, reminders of a love that outlasts those whom I have known in my life that I’m thankful. They death. It is a love on pilgrimage, a love still will be rewarded by God on the Last Day. Farewell to those doing its work in us, the living, taking us by the who I have harmed, I ask your forgiveness. And may those hand and leading us into an ever-widening who have forgiven me find pardon on the Day of Judgment. frame, where we might know truly that we Forgive me for any time that an evil word has passed my belong to one another. lips, and I ask all of my friends to forgive me on account of my youth. Yet, on this day on which I am writing to you, I remember the good that I have done in my life. May God, in Quotes from Pierre Claverie are taken from A Life Poured all of his power, help me to surrender to him, and grant me Out: Pierre Claverie of Algeria by Jean-Jacques Pérennès and Lettres et messages d’Algérie by Pierre Claverie. his tenderness. The story of Christian and Mohamed is told in The Monks of “They shared their friendship and they shared Tibhirine: Faith, Love, and Terror in Algeria by John W. their death,” Pérennès tells me. When the Kiser and Christian de Chergé: A Theology of Hope by Christian Salenson.

“Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrows; it empties today of its strength.”—Corrie Ten Boom J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4 Jesus saw the crowds and had compassion: What do you see?

I love going to cafes and just sitting there on my in your stomach. This is what Jesus was feeling own watching the world go by. Sometimes I'll for the crowds. enter into conversation with complete strangers What makes you feel this way? about their lives, the things they're doing, their I've included in our Bulletin this week the story children and grandchildren. One thing I never do of the 19 Martyrs of Algeria. though, is be surprised by the fact that I can The martyrs of Algeria gave thier lives during a never tell what any person is going to tell me. I time of great political upheaval in Algeria. The can't look at a person and know what it is that small African nation, which had been a French their story will entail. I am almost certain I will colony, was seeking independence from France. be surprised by something they tell me. During this violent time nearly two thirds of Everyone has a story. Everyone is different. those in religious orders chose to stay rather Everyone, at sometime, feels lost; like a ship than flee Algeria, as most other french people without a rudder, like a crowd with out a leader. were. They stayed to minister to those around Jesus could see this. him, wether of Christian or Islamic faith: ‘We Jesus did see this. choose freely to remain in this country, despite Jesus still sees this. all of the risk, out of love for the gospel, for In Matthew's gospel the recurrent theme of "the the church, and for this country to whom we crowd" runs throughout the text, like a rich have been sent.’” It was out of a deep seated thread through a colourful piece of woven fabric. compassion for the people of Algeria, that these In fact, the trope appears some 50 times within 19 Christians, and one Muslim man who worked the gospel. Time and again, Jesus sees the with the local Bishop, who was also killed, gave crowds and is moved to do something. Like their lives. "sheep without a shepherd", Matthew's "crowd" Jesus had compassion on the people who were is lost and wandering about aimlessly. Having harassed and helpless. Not only do I see the need suffered bad leadership, they "await divine for me to have compassion on other - but I see intervention", and Jesus is the one who sees it myself in the crowds. I am personally like a and will be the one to deliver it. sheep with out a master if I am not submitted to In today's gospel we encounter Jesus who has Jesus. Jesus has compassion on me. He has literlly had his stomach churned, that's what the compassion on you. He has compassion on those word translated as compassion means. Have you who are not like us as much as on those who are ever seen a news article, either in the paper or just like us. Giving and receiving compassion on TV, where you found yourself feeling are marks of our faith. How will you receive compassion Christ's compassion for you this week?

Forgiveness is unlocking the door to set someone free and realizing you were the prisoner. J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

EVELYN UNDERHILL

Underhill was a poet, novelist, spiritual author, more accessible than the earlier writing. Perhaps and theologian—as well as being a sailor, the best introduction to her is Letters, edited by bookbinder, and artist. Drawn simultaneously to Charles Williams, which give an introduction to psychology and mysticism, she was one of the her principal ideas, her style of guidance, and her preeminent spiritual voices of the twentieth immense sense of humanity and accessibility. The century, in spite of the religious indifference of Spiritual Life, an edition of her BBC broadcast, her parents and husband. Though she wrestled first given orally, is a clear, concise introduction with her own doubts and limitations, she became to her thought. Most of Evelyn Underhill’s retreats the definitive model for retreat leaders and were published, and many are still in print. A spiritual directors for her generation and those to wonderful anthology of her work is Delroy follow. Oberg’s Evelyn Underhill: Daily Readings with a Evelyn Underhill was a prolific writer who Modern Mystic.Her key early works on mysticism published 39 books and more than 350 articles and include Mysticism: A Study in the Nature and reviews. In her early years, she wrote on Development of Man’s Spiritual mysticism; in her latter years on the spiritual life Consciousness and Practical Mysticism. as lived by ordinary people. This latter work is

May God's richest blessings be upon us all. J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4

THIS WEEK: Andrew & Janet Where did you live as a child? Janette: I Lived in the Suburb of Hamilton North (Newcastle) all of my childhood and I have Woolworths as a check out operator, in the one brother who is older by 3 yrs 3 mths 3 day when you had to learn the weekly days. My mum dad and brother were all born specials.I left school after year 10 and worked on the 10th day of different months and I for a family owned industrial company in the tried by arriving early but was born on the field of administration and accounts. I was 13th. Andrew: I lived in Gateshead as 1 of 6 fortunate to be a stay at home mum for many children, I had 2 older sisters, then me, 2 years and re-entered the work force ( when younger sisters and then a very young my husband was retrenched and studied for 2 brother but I’m pleased to say we all get years) and worked for several years at along really well and look forward to any Harvey Normans in the Finance and family gatherings. Administration area. Also I have had What is one memory you have of your volunteer positions as playgroup leader, childhood? Janette: Car trips for holidays Caritas and Op shop. whether it was to Queensland or to a country Andrew: I left school after completing year 10 farm in NSW where I learnt to ride a horse and started working as an apprentice or play in the shearing shed. Visiting family bricklayer and was in the industry for in Sydney and also lots of drives for a picnic approx. 12years, being self employed for about 7 of those years, after that I worked at Lane or visits to Merewether baths. Hardware for 11 years and learnt a lot about Andrew: There were so many great memories chemistry and looking after electroplating of my childhood but the one I cherish the solutions, after being retrenched I studied most is playing with my Dad in the environmental science for 2 years and then swimming pool at Carey Bay Caravan Park, worked for Hydro Service / Hydrochem for it was a bit of a rarity for Dad to spend time the last 20years until my recent retirement. with us as he worked a lot and I think from Share something about your family. Andrew memory I nearly drowned him but I loved and I have been married for 42 yrs we met at that time. a fellowship camp at St.Johns Morpeth. We What kind of work have you done as an have two children and five grandchildren a adult? Janette: My first was part time married daughter Rachael in Victoria with a while still at school which was with Son, daughter and step daughter. Our married J U N E 1 4 , 2 0 2 0 V O L . 2 4 Andrew & Janet continued we moved to Jewells and started attending Belmont Nth/ Redhead. son lives in Warners bay and has two sons. Is there a particular time in your life that you A fun fact; our daughter and son were both have felt close to God? Janette: I am probably born on the same date just three years not very good at interpreting signs but I am apart, so it was a big day when we had an very thankful for my life I have had so far. 18th and 21st – shall we say a big week. Andrew: During my time at the Gateshead How long have you lived where you do now? parish with Fr. David Simpson I gave serious We have lived in our current home for 39 thought to becoming a priest, Fr. David years. suggested I spend my annual leave living with What kind of interests/ hobbies do you have? the Society of St. Francis brothers, they Janette: Grandchildren and catching up taught me so much and I did feel so close to with friends and family. Getting away in the God however soon after I met Janette and I caravan also craft, patchwork and family decided to find other ways to serve God. history. Andrew: As with Janette, Is there a time you ever doubted God or felt grandchildren, friends and family are very distanced from Him? Janette: No I have not important to me, I also love travelling in doubted but sometimes probably at a distance the caravan and overseas however I don’t when not spending enough quiet think we’ll be doing much of the overseas time. Andrew: I have never doubted God as I travel for a while. I also love listening to believe that he is always looking over us but music from bands such as The Beatles, Pink we sometimes don’t put as much effort in to Floyd, The Beach Boys, Deep Purple and him as he does in us and that’s when things many other bands from that era. fall apart. What would you say if someone What is your first recollection of church? asked you why you are a Christian? Janette: I Janette: My family was always involved have never really questioned my faith or with church so from very early on went to greatly challenged it as I suppose I have Sunday school at St.Aidans Hamilton North. always been surround by similar beliefs and Andrew: At first I was dragged kicking and feel there was always a creator. Andrew: I screaming to Charlestown parish but as I didn’t really set out to be “a Christian” I just grew up I eventually found being an altar wanted to live the best life I could, but it boy was an enjoyable part of my life, when gives me comfort to know that God is looking the Gateshead parish started up I went there over me. and continued serving at the altar. After meeting Janette I attended St. Aidans until

Website: belmontnorthredhead.com.au Make sure you visit our parish website often. Account details for direct giving to ASDF There are some fantastic resources on there that will help you worship at home. account: BSB: 705-077 Resources are added regularly. Account Number: 00022243 Resources to be printed for those without a computer