Y DDOLEN THE LINK Cylchgrawn Plwyf Your Parish Magazine Awst 2021 August ______
______PARISH OF PENARTH AND LLANDOUGH PLWYF PENARTHYG A LLANDOUCHAU £1.00 ______
CONTENTS
Father Mark writes: The Prophet who teaches about God without using Words! 3 Editorial 6 Admin Corner by Rachel Elder 7
FEATURES Ellacombe Day at St Augustine’s by Helen Kerbey 8
The Twelve Apostles – in Devon by Judith Martin-Jones 10
Commemoration of the Month: Mary Sumner, founder of 12 Mothers’ Union
Mothers’ Union - St Augustine’s Branch and into the 14 Future by Viv Liles
Econews from Tom Blenkinsop 16
FROM THE ARCHIVES Writing Letters from the Church Times of August 20th, 1971 18 FROM THE REGISTERS 21
PARISH DIRECTORY 22 With Music in Mind 23
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FATHER MARK WRITES …
The Prophet Who Teaches Us about God - Without Using Words! My last article probably prompted the putting on of many ‘thinking caps’ – this one is a little lighter, but no less stimulating, I hope! I want to talk today about the prophet Jonah, who is described in the short book (4 chapters, or just 2 pages in my Bible!) of the Old Testament with the same name. The account appears in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran, as well as the Christian Bible. Some people view the work as an historical document (placed somewhere between 793-753BC), claiming that Jonah was a contemporary of Amos and Hosea - whilst others view the account as parable or allegory, written much later. Whatever your view, it’s full of interesting things to mull over! It all starts off with a character called Jonah receiving the word of God. My research tells me that Jonah’s father was from a village in Galilee (Gath- hepher), about 5 km north of Nazareth, and that Jonah is reported to have been buried here - so it is likely that this is the location for the start of the story. God commands Jonah to go to Nineveh (which is approximately where Mosul in northern Iraq is today) - the largest city in the world at the time – and capital of the increasingly important Neo-Assyrian Empire. There he is to preach a message of impending judgement against the 120,000 pagan inhabitants. Jonah, however, has different ideas. Not keen on the idea of reprisals, presumably from turning up at the largest city on the planet and telling them they’ve got to change their ways, Jonah sets off in a different direction. Instead of going east to Iraq, Jonah wants to go west… as far west as was then known to his peoples - Tarshish may have been a town in Spain, close to the Straits of Gibraltar, Sardinia or Tunis. Jonah obtains passage on a ship at Jaffa (called Joppa in the accounts), and they set off. A huge storm arises, and the sailors discover ‘by casting lots’ that the cause is Jonah, who had previously admitted he was running away from his God. Jonah is questioned and he confirms that the storm is down to him. We then discover that Jonah is a man of bravery – he tells them to throw him overboard, that they might save their own lives. They are similarly resilient, and try for a long time to avoid this
3 outcome. Clearly human beings have something positive within them that God loves to see. Eventually they pray to the God of Israel for their lives, and that they not be held responsible for the loss of Jonah’s life. They eventually throw him overboard, and immediately the storm ceases. They are given supernatural verification of Jonah’s account. But this is not the end of Jonah. God has a purpose for him, and Jonah is famously rescued by being swallowed, and held, in the belly of ‘a great fish’ for 3 days and nights. Now we could get side-tracked here over what species could have swallowed him, but the whale shark and many types of whales are favourites. The real point is that (a) his life was saved, and (b) that Jonah had time to reflect on what he was doing. I think it is very interesting to compare the prophet Jonah, who refused to carry out God’s wishes (in fact he initially did the opposite!), with Jesus - who was afraid too, but who did what was asked of him. Both also spent 3 days, after a calamitous event, in pitch darkness, as far as outsiders were concerned, somewhere between life and death. Jonah eventually called out to God (from within ‘the belly of Sheol’, and he was vomited up near a beach to carry out the task that had originally been given him. Clearly Jonah was not in the actual Sheol of pre-500BC times (or he would have encountered all the others who had died before him), neither was he in the Sheol as envisaged between 500BC and 70AD (as the idea started to become more widespread in those days that there was indeed a distinction between the places where the good and the bad went before the Last Judgement). It appears that God has saved him, and also given him some time to reflect and gain perspective on what the important things in life really are. Having come face-to-face with death, what now does Jonah think it is important to do in life? We find out that Jonah believes that, on reflection, a good way to live life is always to have in mind the eternal and the divine - and thus he risks death by setting off for Nineveh. Jonah proclaims the destruction of Nineveh at God’s hand, but the people believe, and make a last-gasp effort to persuade God to do otherwise by repentance. God indeed changed his mind. And this is where the account again become interesting. In Christianity, Judaism and very especially in Islam, prophets have a certain character, and people are supposed to hold them in a certain light, and emulate them- after all, they are in a special position to tell us about the nature of God. In this account though, Jonah throws a wobbly! He is angry that God is merciful, and he tries to justify his former behaviour by saying that he didn’t really want to deliver the message anyway, since he knew it was all going to be a waste of time – God was always going to be merciful! That’s a good observation, Jonah! However, Jonah decides to be all emotional, stating that it’s better for him to die than to live in such a world, presumably because God has either made him look foolish, or because Jonah, like many
4 converts, has developed an incredible zeal, and a black and white attitude to everything. “Is it right for you to be angry?”, questions God, leaving the question hanging - and Jonah stomps off - setting up a makeshift shelter overlooking the city - where he can get a good view of any righteous destruction God might have in mind following Jonah’s righteous tantrum. Even though he’s having a tantrum, God provides for Jonah, and a large-leafed plant miraculously provides Jonah with shade from the strength of the sun and allows him to survive. Jonah is once again given time to reflect, this time overnight – and next morning, God forces the situation. The plant is suddenly removed through the action of some invertebrates! Sulky Jonah claims that he loved the bush and suggests that God didn’t have the right to take it away; that he didn’t have the right to decide about the life and death of the shrub - whereupon God remarks that the city lying there in front of them contains over a 120,000 people and thousands of animals - who don’t know their right hand from their left - and didn’t have the ability to argue their case with God as Jonah was – and yet God loved them regardless. It seems that the message from the Book of Jonah is not about Jonah at all – but about God – about his role as Creator and Sustainer of Life; about his ultimate power over life and death; about his compassion and care for all the organisms of the planet, sentient or otherwise. In human terms, regardless of nationality, language and religion - the Creator God shows His power, His sustaining of us, His love and His compassion for all. And he demonstrates all of this in how he deals with the not-very-likeable character of sulky Jonah – who, paradoxically, succeeds as a prophet - not by telling the reader more about God’s nature using his words - but through how we see God behaving towards him and others in the account. Jonah’s words about the nature of God are hardly even recorded in this book of the Bible – yet everywhere we discover the nature of the loving God who sustains and cares for all his creatures. It may seem difficult to understand why God chose Jonah in this account – but I think you’ll agree that because of this strange choice, we have discovered more about God from these two pages of the Old Testament than we could possibly have hoped for! God bless, Fr Mark
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EDITORIAL
You will have noticed (I hope!) that this month’s cover bears a picture of Jonah inside the whale and so, even for him, at a particularly climactic moment in his biography; the point of the cover, of course, is that it leads us into Father Mark’s reflection on the meaning of Jonah’s life and faith.
The magazine is in a slightly different format this month. This is because we have received a good number of feature articles from readers and parishioners so that one or two of the more regular items have had a bit of a holiday and sat out this month, or changed a little. We start with a fascinating account by Helen Kerber of the mechanical artistry of the Ellacombe chimes. Viv Liles’ article about the aims and activities of our Mothers’ Union (MU) is preceded by a commemoration of the founder of the MU that has been made to fit in with Viv’s contribution. If you don’t already know about our MU, you might be surprised (and perhaps attracted) by the breadth of activities and interests that Viv writes about.
The magazine also includes some important news about environmental matters from Tom Blenkinsop, and an account of a trip to Dartington Hall written by Judith Martin-Jones which incorporates a drawing of the Elmhirsts, the founders of Dartington, by Tony Martin-Jones. For reasons we all understand, Judith, the Link’s foreign correspondent, of course, has been unable to venture far in recent times but, with things loosening up in past months, travel to faraway Devon became possible so we again have the benefit of being able to read more of Judith’s travel writing.
Dartington has a long and interesting history. Between 1961 and 2008, the buildings housed the famous Dartington College of Arts and, wonder of wonders, two parishioners actually studied there. I won’t tell you who they are here and now (of course, many of you will know anyway!) because, having been stimulated by Judith’s writing, they are writing personal memories of Dartington for next month’s issue of the Link.
JK
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ADMIN CORNER
With the holiday period now here, things are slightly quieter, but it’s a chance to make progress on longer projects that take more time. I’ve started work to get the inventory for Holy Nativity on to computer by scanning it and turning it into a Word document. This should make future updating a lot easier.
It is also a chance to have some thinking time about the next steps needed for the Parish merger and how we are going to combine our Admin systems.
I continue to volunteer with the Churchyard project on a Tuesday afternoon, trimming round graves and keeping on top of the ever-growing grass. The past week we at last saw some Ringlet butterflies skipping through the long grass left especially for them, which was a pleasing sight! With the cold spring, butterflies have been rather scarce this year. Now the summer is here, we hope for more.
Rachel Elder ______
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FEATURES Ellacombe Day at St Augustine’s Church Helen Kerbey, the Secretary of Penarth Bell Ringers, explains the history and mechanical sophistication of the famous Ellacombe chimes.
Those members of the congregation that live near enough to St Augustine’s will remember hearing the Ellacombe chime demonstration a few weeks ago on 26th June. What are the Ellacombe chimes and how do they differ from the usual chimes? St Augustine’s Penarth originally had 6 bells but was augmented to eight in 1935 and it also has the ‘Ellacombe’ chime mechanism installed in the tower. This type of chiming apparatus was invented in 1821 by Rev Henry Thomas Ellacombe, at St Mary’s Church, Bitton, near Bristol. A small hammer is installed by each bell. The hammer is attached to a rope, which, when tightened, can be pulled to make the hammer strike the bell. All the ropes are fed via pulleys to one central frame, thereby enabling one person to pull the ropes and ‘chime’ all the bells. It is not known when an Ellacombe chime was installed at Penarth – probably not long after the augmentation to 8 bells. Rev Ellacombe originally invented this method of ‘one person’ ringing because he was apparently fed up with ‘wayward’ bellringers who would not ring for service. We have not really used the Ellacombe at Penarth for at least 20 years. Happily, this was mainly because we have plenty of ringers available for services; lately though, it was also because some of the mechanisms had become rusty and in need of repair. In many churches they have been a valuable aid to allowing one person to sound the bells during Covid restrictions.
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The bicentenary of the Ellacombe became a good impetus to get it all fixed. The Bicentenary event was run by St Mary’s, Bitton. They asked everyone with chimes to ring them at 12 noon on the 26th June. As there are chimes all over the world this meant New Zealand started off the chiming and Canada finished it! At Penarth we took all the ropes down, repaired the rusty hammers, oiled the wooden spools, removed some furniture from the upper chamber, and got it in working order just in time. The ropes are in a frame with the heavy bell rope on the left and the light bell rope on the right. This causes some confusion with numbering and music as bellringers always assume the lightest is no. 1. Some chime ringers count from the left so the heaviest is ‘1’, and some frames are apparently roped the other way around. There are only 8 notes so the music one can play is slightly limited, however on the day of the bicentenary we managed ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ and the ‘White cliffs of Dover’ here at Penarth. Now the apparatus is fixed we hope to use it occasionally for events - or should the ringers become too ‘wayward’!
There are many videos of each tower’s performances on a Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/135681541720946/ including Penarth at - https://www.facebook.com/groups/35681541720946/posts /228518882437211
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The Twelve Apostles – in Devon Judith Martin-Jones guides us through the architecture, history and cultural importance of Dartington Hall
The Elmhirsts by Tony Martin-Jones After so many months of restricted travel, in May we planned a short trip to Devon, staying at Dartington Hall near Totnes. Our hotel accommodation in the west wing of the mediaeval courtyard rooms opening onto the grassed courtyard and facing the historic hall, was spacious and peaceful and frankly just what we needed. We had previously called there as day visitors en route from other holiday destinations and to buy pottery and glass and been vaguely aware of people carrying cellos across the great lawn but we had never fully explored this remarkable place. We have taken the opportunity to learn more about its history and here offer a taste of Dartington. The restored buildings lie at the core of the 1,200 acre Dartington Estate, owned and run by the Dartington Trust which has a legacy of learning, the arts including an annual music festival and ecology.
The ‘Dartington Experiment’, as it was known, was set up in the 1920s by American born Dorothy Elmhirst and her British husband, Leonard. The Elmhirsts were pioneers, influenced by many innovative
10 thinkers of the time, and through Dorothy’s inherited wealth, exceptionally well off, and in 1925 they purchased the neglected 14th century estate. They restored the roofless Grand Hall and added new buildings in both Modernist and Art and Crafts styles. Early initiatives there included Dartington Hall School, the eponymous Tweed Mill and Glass and Pottery enterprises. The place became a magnet for artists, architects, writers, philosophers and musicians from around the world, creating a centre of creative activities. The roll call names associated with the place is truly awesome – from Benjamin Britten, Ben Nicholson to Jacqueline du Pre and Igor Stravinsky. Our room was named after Florence Burton, a key figure in the drama department; the next room had the name Holst.
Dorothy Elmhirst had a passion for gardens and set about re-fashioning the landscaped setting of the buildings with the help of eminent designers of the day. First of these was American designer Beartrix Farrand and her design (the only one outside USA) from 1934-39 is still evident there in details like the courtyard paving; her long border with abundant planting is a joy and it overlooks the 13th century ‘Tiltyard’, a sunken area at one time used for outdoor drama. We greatly enjoyed roaming around the gardens and along the lanes overlooking the farmed areas. But the big players in these gardens are the original features including the 12 Irish Yew trees, known as the 12 Apostles, the avenue of ancient gnarled Spanish chestnuts and the collection of modern sculpture including a Henry Moore reclining figure.
On a rainy afternoon we explored the unused rooms of the west wing standing idle due to Covid; we saw art deco fittings, an immense board table made on the estate, and etchings by John Piper standing in dusty unused rooms; at the end of the upper corridor was the library redolent with scholarship. Behind the west wing stands a lonely church tower from the former Dartington Church, which dates from the 13th century. It stood here until 1878, materials from it were used to build the new Church of St Mary’s. The tower served as an American radio communications tower in WW2.
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Workers were helping to re-invigorate Dartington after the Covid lock-down and plans are afoot for short art courses and the re-launch of the Music festival. The Trust has to rely on other sources of income – including our hotel rooms, wedding and other functions - and seems a far cry from the altruistic objectives of the Elmhirsts. One can’t help but wonder, with the current thirst for creative activities, whether Dartington’s original objectives might not have new birth.
______COMMEMORATION OF THE MONTH Mary Sumner, founder of Mothers’ Union
Mary Sumner was born Mary Elizabeth Heywood on 31st December 1828 in Swinton near Salford, Lancashire, the third of four children. Her father Thomas Heywood was a banker and keen antiquarian and her mother was a woman of Christian piety. The family moved to Colwall near Ledbury, Herefordshire, in 1832, where Sumner's mother held mothers' meetings. A year after their arrival in Herefordshire, Mary’s six-week-old brother died. That death, and her mother's faith, sustained in the face of this searing personal tragedy, may have played some part in Mary’s decision, many years later, to found Mothers' Union. Like most middle-class girls in 19th century England, Mary was educated at home; she learned to speak three foreign languages and sing well. To complete her education, she travelled with her mother and elder sister to Rome. Whilst there, she met her future husband, George Henry Sumner, the son of Charles
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Richard Sumner, the Bishop of Winchester, and a relative of William Wilberforce. The couple were married in Mary’s home town of Colwall on 26 July 1848, 18 months after George's ordination as an Anglican cleric. They had three children: Margaret, Louise and George (who became a well-known artist in the Arts and Crafts tradition and a friend of William Morris). In 1851, Rev. George Sumner received the living of Old Alresford, Hampshire, in his father's diocese. Mary dedicated herself to raising her children and helping her husband in his ministry. The way she decided to help him was to provide music and Bible classes. This first act of commitment and leadership was to set in motion her lifelong direction of travel. In 1876, Mary took another step in her life by the simple act of creating a meeting of mothers in the parish to offer one another mutual support on the Victorian self-help principle. This was the beginning of the eventually worldwide union of mothers for which she is celebrated this month every year. Her plan was socially radical in its day as it involved calling women of all social classes to help one another. The first meeting was in Old Alresford Rectory, but, apparently, Mary was so overcome by nerves that her husband had to speak for her and invite the women to return the following week. At that second meeting she had gathered enough courage to lead her own meeting. To begin with, Mothers' Union was something that just happened in Mary’s home parish. However, in 1885, she was part of the audience in the Portsmouth Church Congress, some 20 miles from her home. The first Bishop of Newcastle, Ernest Wilberforce, had been asked to address the women churchgoers. However, the Bishop modestly and insightfully decided that Mary would, in fact, be the more useful speaker. She had obviously developed great confidence since her first tentative steps in the craft of leadership. Mary gave a stirring address about national morality, the importance of a women's family vocation and the responsibility women bore for improving the nation by improving its people, morally and spiritually. A number of the women present went back to their parishes to found mothers' meetings on Mary Sumner's pattern. Mothers' Union spread rapidly to the dioceses of Ely, Exeter, Hereford, Lichfield and Newcastle and then throughout the United Kingdom. By 1892, there were 60,000 members in 28 dioceses and, by the turn of the century, Mothers' Union had grown to 169,000 members. Annual general meetings began in 1893, and the Mothers' Union Central Council was formed three years later. Mary was unanimously elected president, a post she held into her nineties. In 1897, during her Diamond Jubilee, Queen Victoria became patron of the Mothers' Union, giving it an unprecedented stamp of approval. The Mothers' Union set up branches
13 throughout the British Empire, beginning in New Zealand, then Canada and India. Mary Sumner died at the age of 92, and is buried in the grounds of Winchester Cathedral with her husband, who had died 12 years earlier. She is remembered in the Church of England with a Lesser Festival on 9 August Mothers’ Union has more than four million members in 84 countries. As do our local MU Members (as you’ll find out below) they continue to help women and to promote family life through a range of activities, guided always by Christian faith and prayer. ______Mothers’ Union – St Augustine’s branch and into the Future Viv Liles brings us up to date with the activities of our Mothers’ Union This year marks the 145th anniversary of the founding of Mothers’ Union in 1876 and also it is 100 years since Mary Sumner died in August 1921. August 9th is designated Mary Sumner Day and members try to mark the anniversary in some way. This year there is to be a Deanery service in All Saints, Barry.
St Augustine’s branch started with a service on 29th February 1912 when 53 members were enrolled, so we celebrated our 100th anniversary with a Wednesday morning Eucharist on 29th February 2012. The photograph shows the committee members in 2013. Sometime during the 1990’s Mothers’ Union became a charity and this changed the way that branches worked as well as other social changes that had occurred – most married women worked so afternoon meetings had to be changed to evening ones. Project work such as prison visiting, running
14 parenting or toddler groups in the daytime diminished. When fund raising events are held the proceeds are supposed to go to Mothers’ Union own charities such as the literacy fund, overseas fund and, nearer to home, ‘Away from it All’ activities. This project takes different forms across the Dioceses – some pay for a Butlins holiday, others a Bed and Breakfast stay for a needy family. In this diocese of Llandaff we have a caravan in Trecco Bay and families apply or are recommended for a week’s stay with basic food supplied and play activities for the children. Each branch takes a turn to go to the caravan to make up beds, leave food and bags of games for wet days. St Augustine’s have taken their turn in doing this and also raising money for the upkeep and replacement of the caravan every few years. The other thing that our members do is to provide toiletries and gifts to the local Women’s refuge on a regular basis as well as Christmas gifts for mothers and their children, either a Mothering Sunday or Easter gifts such as a Simmel cake, knitted chicks filled with a chocolate egg, and, more recently, bedding, small items of furniture, cooking utensils etc. for those leaving the refuge and moving on to other accommodation, often having nothing but a suitcase of personal possessions. In normal times our branch holds a monthly meeting often opening it to members of the congregation as well as All Saints’ branch, to hear a speaker who may inspire us for a future project. A small entrance fee and a raffle help to raise funds between other fundraising events such as a coffee morning or an outing. Members also attend Deanery and Diocesan events such as quiet day in the Cathedral, an Advent service in St John’s, a diocesan fund raiser and the annual Deanery Festivals where many can meet members from other branches and enjoy fellowship. Some members recently attended a deanery service of remembrance which was enjoyed and it is hoped that we shall be able to meet as a group again in September. As our parish joins with All Saints in a Ministry Area in January, it makes sense for our two branches to merge and we already share meetings and other events. This is happening in other Ministry Areas too as the church changes its way of working. Mothers’ Union has a structure following the church’s one with provinces, dioceses, deaneries and now ministry areas or benefices into which parishes are absorbed. Mary Sumner House in London is the centre for our administration with the World Wide President, a chief executive officer [C.E.O.] and Trustees who determine policy and run the organisation, passing down the information to members. A new Constitution has been passed and this will gradually change things in the future to enable the charity not just to survive but grow in C21st. Young people live very differently with their focus on social media so, in order
15 to attract them as members, MU must operate differently in the future making greater use of modern technology. Mothers’ Union has category 1 status at UN because of the work it carries out around the world, which benefits so many people. There are four million members worldwide of which 60,000 live in the five regions of the UK. Africa has the greatest number of members. In many of those countries, persecution of Christians is very prevalent, and they often suffer most when disasters such as flooding or disease occurs, so the support provided to these members is vital. Awareness of issues such as FGM, forced early marriage, trafficking, domestic abuse and exploitation of children in various ways has been raised leading to lobbying for change on some of them. This sort of involvement may appeal to younger people who do not want to attend our sort of meetings, but do want to play their part in a Christian organisation that has, as one of its objects, to ‘support marriage and family life’. ______Econews
Government credibility matters for climate leadership, says the Climate Coalition, which represents a network of environmental organisations, in this article from Tom Blenkinsop.
Ever since the Climate Change Act of 2008, UK Prime Ministers have claimed that Britain is a world leader on addressing climate change. But that claim is now wearing dangerously thin – and that risks terrible international consequences. A concerning illustration of PM Johnson’s attitude to the issue was his boasting about the UK’s commitment to achieve ‘Net Zero’ on greenhouse gas emissions and then making the trip from London to Cornwall for the June G7 on a plane – the highest greenhouse emitting form of transport he could have chosen.
To be fair, the UK has led the way on addressing climate change in some important ways. We were the first country to bring in legally binding greenhouse gas emissions targets, thanks to the Climate Change Act; we have almost entirely shut down our coal fired power stations, we have the greatest
16 installed capacity of offshore wind farms in the world, and we are one of the first countries to declare a ‘net zero’ target – important, but still only words at this stage. These are all things we can be proud of. But the truth is that the government regularly undermines these same commitments with its own action and inaction – and it is time for charities that care about people and nature to call this out.
We are in good company. In June 2021, the Committee on Climate Change, established by the Climate Change Act as the government’s independent advisory body, published its annual review of the UK’s progress on it’s legally binding climate targets. It found that in the previous year the government has made historic climate promises, but has done little to nothing to deliver on them, so that the UK government was now badly off track to deliver on its ‘world leading’ targets. It is failing to deliver on everything from clean transport, through energy efficient homes, to hydrogen energy and so many more essential solutions besides.
And it’s not just a ‘failure to deliver’; the government is actively undermining its own stated vision and promises to achieve it. For example, at the beginning of 2020, Prime Minister Johnson said: ‘unless we take urgent action, we will get 3C hotter. As a country, as a society, as a planet and as a species, we must now act.’ Yet, a month later his government announced a £27.4bn budget for road building, as part of a plan to rebuild the economy post-Covid. If carried out, this will massively increase carbon emissions and destroy forests, wetlands and grasslands which act as ‘carbon sinks’. The government has also drastically cut the UK aid budget at the exact time when agreement on how rich countries will deliver on their past promise of providing $100 bn of aid to help poor countries address climate change, is critical for agreeing much steeper and faster emission cuts at COP26 (the UK aid cuts reportedly scuppered a bolder agreement at the G7, which simply ‘affirmed’ the previous $100 bn promise). The 2015 Paris accord aimed to keep global temperature rise as close to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels as possible. Scientists have since confirmed that anything more would spell widespread catastrophe for people and nature; and that in the next decade we must reduce greenhouse emissions by more than 40% and restore our carbon sinks, to have a fighting chance of keeping the right side of 1.5 degrees. Decisions on how to do that must be made at COP26, in the UK, in four months’ time. It is a privilege as well as a responsibility for the UK to host and chair the summit. Our government is in a unique position to steer the international community to an agreement. So, shredding the UK’s credibility on climate and aid in the approach to the summit is beyond stupid. It is potentially
17 catastrophic for future generations. Tough language for a Christian charity; but we need to be crystal clear on what is now at stake.
The time has more than run out for this government to be shouting ‘forwards’ on climate – it now seems to be taking us backwards. So now is the time for us UK citizens and Christians to take just a few minutes to raise our voices together, to help our government understand the urgency of changing its ways on climate change. The best way we can do this is by supporting the proposals of the Climate Coalition, of which A Rocha UK is an active member. Please sign the Time is Now declaration (https://thetimeisnow.uk/declaration) calling on the Prime Minister to take much bolder and more consistent climate action before COP26; and when you have done that, email your MP asking them to endorse the Climate Coalition’s Ten Point Plan (https:// www.theclimatecoalition.org/greenrecovery) to get the UK back on track with its own targets. Then tell your friends and church, and encourage as many other people as you can to do the same. Then pray for changes in hearts and minds in high places. That would be climate leadership by citizens. And that is the least we can do with the huge responsibility and privilege of the UK as the host of this COP26. Andy Atkin, A Rocha web site.
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FROM THE ARCHIVES The Church Times: August 20th, 1971 Writing Letters
When did you last get a letter – a personal letter, that is, with characteristic and recognisable handwriting on the envelope – waiting on your front door mat? And when did you last write one to a friend or relation? If you’re like most of us, you are probably just now struggling to remember the answer to both these questions. Even formal business letters are now quite rare, aren’t they? The days of letters do seem to be gone for ever, replaced by email, messaging and communication through social media. Disappearing with the letters themselves are the training they gave to everyone in writing to tell a story, to persuade someone of something, to bring an event to life, to sympathise, to argue out a point of view, to tell off or to warn, to commiserate … and so on, and on and on. Most importantly they seemed to be truly personal in the way that so much of our communication nowadays is not. Social media posts are broadcasts, really; they are not private and personal, and not designed in their tone and content for reading by a particular, known person. The article here extracted from the Church Times of August 1971 catches a moment in the history of personal communication that seems so long ago: the time when only two methods of personal communication were generally available - the letter and the telephone - and when the latter was displacing the former in many situations. The feature writer, one Marjorie Kunz, discusses the strengths and weaknesses of telephone calls and her deep conviction that letters were private, personal things, not to be read by anyone else. How quaint that idea of privacy feels in an era of Twitter and Facebook? Will people think of themselves as having private lives at all in another fifty years?
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We are dependent on letters if we are not to wilt with a sense of rootlessness, of belonging nowhere. When for a day or two our mailbox does not contain a single envelope with the Queen’s head somewhere on the stamp, I glumly feel there is something to be said for the glib claim that the telephone has done for the art of letter-writing what television has done for the art of conversation. Then a letter turns up, and I realise it is not true. What the telephone has largely supplanted are bread-and-butter letters, replies to invitations and messages of congratulation, thanks or sympathy. Not for me though. I have an absurd inhibition about initiating a telephone call. Countless times I have sat in front of the wretched instrument in a lather at the possibility that I am about to barge in where and when I am least wanted. Reason tells me that lots of people love to be rung up — I do myself, sometimes. But reason does not operate where inhibitions are concerned. All I can think of is that it may be the worst possible moment to disturb the person at the other end of the line. How am I to know that he is not in the bath, or asleep, serving a meal, saying his prayers or hearing the children’s? He could turn a deaf ear to that hatefully insistent bell. But who of us ever does? And there are few human sounds more chilling than the note of repressed rage in the disembodied voice that answers my untimely call. That is why, when I wish to communicate, nine times out of ten, I reach for pen or typewriter rather than the telephone receiver. With most people it is the other way round, my mother for one. It is true that she wrote gay, racy letters to her own family quite effortlessly, the rare kind in which every turn of phrase is so characteristic that it brings the voice, the linea- ments, and the whole personality of the writer vividly to mind. But when she sat down to the simplest of what she termed with dread and loathing “business letters”, it was as if the ink froze in her pen. Sooner than see her suffer, I wrote them for her from about the age of twelve, tackling the job with the unconcern of total ignorance. My mother put a touching and wholly unfounded trust in what she called my flair for writing business letters, and so cried it up that I came to believe in it myself. As most people take us at our own valuation of ourselves, my services as a stop gap in this line have been in considerable demand, never more so than since I have lived abroad … Privacy is at a discount today. Fashion dictates that on the stage, on the screen, in print and in the streets the intimacies of the mind and soul should be as fully exposed to the public gaze as the intimacies of the body. It is strange to recall that in my youth I encountered one or two people — leftovers from an earlier generation — who had scruples about reading letters not addressed to them , even when they were published in books and periodicals. They must have made
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some exceptions. I cannot picture them gumming up or tearing out the pages in the Bible which reproduce the letters of St. Paul, for example. No doubt, they appeased their consciences with the reasonable argument that, being composed under divine inspiration, the Apostle’s correspondence was free for all, and that he wrote or dictated the bulk of his letters, not for one pair of eyes, but for the whole Church in some particular place, even though it might number a dozen or so back sliding converts. I must admit though to an uncomfortable feeling that I was prying when I read the first volume of the letters that Rose Macaulay wrote towards the end of her life to a kinsman … so much so that I have never been able to bring myself to read the second volume. Illogical, I suppose, because if I had not read the first, I should have been deprived of that brilliant, intrepid woman’s description of herself going daily in her seventies to an early morning Mass at Grosvenor Chapel and then for a swim in the Serpentine. “Well, I hope you go home after it to a really good tuck-in,” said T. S. Eliot when she told him. In spite of this and many good things in these letters, I still cannot rid myself of the suspicion that they were meant for one person’s eyes, and that Rose Macaulay put what she wanted the rest of us to know about a phase of her life into her splendid last novel, ‘The Towers of Trebizond’.
______FROM THE REGISTERS Baptism 13/6/21 Alys Cariad BOWERS at St Dochdwy’s Marriage 16/7/21 Rhys Llewellyn JOHN & Elizabeth TOYE at Holy Nativity Funerals 18/6/21 Marita Anne BOULTON of Penarth age 67 at St Dochdwy’s 25/6/21 David Andrew Michael CHRISTODOLO of Sussex, formerly Cardiff, age 81 at Thornhill Crematorium 28/6/21 Beryl TURPITT of Penarth age 94 at the Vale Crematorium
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PARISH DIRECTORY Priest Revd Mark Jones 029 20709897 [email protected] Parish Administrator Mrs Rachel Elder 20708722 [email protected] (Parish Office)
Treasurer Mr Roger Owen 20702172 Gift Aid Secretary Mrs Jane Broad 07769 337969
Organists St Augustine’s Mr Robert Court 20619436 Holy Nativity Contact the Churchwardens St Dochdwy’s Contact the Churchwardens
Mothers’ Union Mrs Delyth Williams 20705898 Friends of St Augustine’s Ms Cathy Grove 07810 108627
Church Wardens St Augustine’s Mrs Linda Guilfoyle [email protected] 20706309
Holy Nativity Mrs Kath Williams [email protected] 20708554 07964 560365 Mr Huw Williams [email protected] 20708554 St Dochdwy’s Mrs Jan Cullen [email protected] 20704926
Parish Hall, Albert Road, Penarth CF64 1BX - To hire, please contact the Parish Office Home Communion, Sick visiting and other pastoral matters: Please contact Revd Mark Jones. Baptisms & Weddings: to make initial enquiries, please contact Rachel Elder at the Parish Office. Concerts at St Augustine’s – please contact Mr Robert Court Parish website: www.parishofpenarthandllandough.co.uk
Facebook: @penllanparish
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Sing, meet and support Canu, cyfarfod a chefnogi
Wednesdays 10am-12pm St Augustine’s Parish Hall (except 2nd Wed in the month)
A singing group for people aged 50+ Led by experts & professionals Get together to socialise & have fun
The group involves: Singing & chatting Other social activities Anyone of any background and singing standard is welcome. Phone Sarah and Kate on 07500 776295 for information and booking. £5 per session – 1st session free, carers go free
WITH MUSIC IN MIND
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