Rev James Marston was licensed at a 6pm service at St Michael’s & All Angels on Sunday 4th Dec. 

In this month’s issue of The Bridge, Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II is remembered with pictures from Parishes across the Diocese where books of condolence were opened, bells were rung, requiem Eucharists and services of thanksgiving were held.

Rev Matthew Watts, curate at St Mary the Virgin Mortlake, played an important role in the Queen’s funeral. The Bridge writes:

“Viewers would have heard music arranged by The Revd Matthew Watts (Parish of Mortlake and East Sheen), a former Army musician in the Scots Guards Band and Staff Arranger for the Household Division. He was responsible for arranging the funeral music for royal funerals, including the State Funeral of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth. “I was so proud of everyone there doing that job that I did for so many years. Only two years ago it would have been me there. I am proud of what I had done,” he said.”

Click here to read the full article in The Bridge.

On Sunday 9 October, Rev Neil Summers stepped down as Richmond Team Ministry Vicar after twenty two years of ordained ministry in the parish, eight of them as full-time priest at St John the Divine.

His final service was a Team Eucharist at St John’s on Sunday 9 October: A service filled with love, more people than the building could hold, and a wonderful sermon by Neil. Thank you, Neil. And thank you, God!

Before his final service, Neil wrote:

On Tuesday evening I sat in the Lady Chapel at St John’s, as I’ve done so many times, for half an hour of quiet contemplation with the Blessed Sacrament as the focal point.  This week was especially poignant because it was the last time I would do this as Vicar of the church.  It happened to be the feast day of Francis of Assisi, one of the four saints whose statues stand in the niches in the Chapel’s magnificent gilded reredos.  He is accompanied by Saints Agnes, Etheldreda and Martin – a somewhat eclectic gathering!

During these very special half-hours (the highlight of my liturgical week), I often recall the more recent saints I have met here over the past 37 years, both before and since my ordination.  As the hymn puts it: ‘These stones that have echoed their praises are holy, and dear is the ground where their feet have once trod.’  It wasn’t fame or perfection that made these people part of the community of saints at St John the Divine, and they will never be immortalised in a statue.  I remember them chiefly because of their very humanity – each of them in many ways quite ordinary, yet each one unique, as we all are.  They made their contribution to keeping the flame of faith alight in their time, sharing the spiritual and life journey with one another, and with me. 

Christians believe that God is to be found everywhere, but a church building has a special significance.  It is where people may experience the divine in particular ways, inspired by art, architecture, music, flowers, incense, candles, colour, vestments and, supremely, through liturgy and sacrament.  We call our churches ‘holy ground’ – and they are.  TS Eliot, an Anglican convert, wrote, ‘You are here to kneel where prayer has been valid’, reminding us of our links with preceding generations.  And even sceptics and agnostics recognise at least something of the importance; the poet Philip Larkin said a church is ‘a serious house on serious earth’.

In the Christian understanding, though, it is in you and me, not in bricks and stone, that God chooses to locate the divine dwelling place.  That is what Incarnation – God sharing our humanity in Jesus – is all about.  Yes, God is certainly to be encountered in the beauty of the church building, but what also makes our churches holy is that they are the meeting place of today’s community of very human saints whose prayers, whether spoken or silent, fill the air and soak into the very fabric, mingling with those of the generations who have gone before us.  In his celebrated sermon, ‘The Weight of Glory’, CS Lewis said, ‘There are no ordinary people.  You have never talked to a mere mortal….. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses’.

My colleagues and I quite often turn to the contemporary priest/poet, Malcom Guite, and I end my final RTM e-newsletter contribution with this reflection from him:

And now we turn our eyes from wood and paint
to contemplate the saints in flesh and blood,
the ones who’ve seen these pictures with us.  Faint
traces of God’s image, and his glad
presence in humanity, have shone
awhile for us in paintings on a wall,
the dark glass brightened, and the shadows gone.
How shall we know each other now?  Will all
that we have seen recede to memory?
Or is our sight restored, and having gazed
on icons in this place, will clarity
transfigure all of us?  We turn, amazed,
to see the ones beside us, face to face,
as living icons, sacraments of grace.

To the saints of the Church in Richmond, my thanks for the great privilege of serving in this parish. 

Over the past six months we have welcomed four new members of clergy to our deanery

Please share this with your congregations.

The Bishop of Kingston, The Rt Revd Dr Richard Cheetham, will be concluding his term of office on 17 October 2022, the 20th anniversary of his consecration. He is one of the longest-serving stipendiary bishops in the Church of England.

“It has been a great privilege to serve the Diocese of Southwark for the last 20 years,” said Bishop Richard. “The Kingston Episcopal Area, covering five London boroughs from Kingston to Waterloo, is a wonderfully interesting and diverse part of London, full of many fine examples of mission and ministry. It is served by very committed and able clergy and laity and their faithful and imaginative responses and adaptations to the many often rapid changes in communities during the last 20 years have been inspirational. I have also been privileged to engage with its many excellent institutions and organisations in the wider world on matters of common concern such as the environment, education and interfaith relations.”

To mark Bishop Richard’s retirement as Bishop of Kingston a live-streamed “Celebration of Church’s local ministry” is arranged for Tuesday 4 October at 7.30pm from All Saints Kingston. It will start with Evensong led by the Parish Choir and will include a celebration of the breadth of ministry across Kingston Episcopal Area through a range of short reflections and music.

The live-stream link is found at www.allsaintskingston.co.uk and the recording will be available afterwards on All Saints’ YouTube channel.

The Vineyard Community Centre has a part-time vacancy for a Foodbank Manager to run its four foodbanks that serve those who are in food poverty across the borough of Richmond. 

Full details and application form can be found at
www.vineyardcommunity.org/vacancy/foodbankmanager/.

Closing date: 12 noon on Friday 25^th February.

Welcome to Rev Kate Daymond who was licensed as Associate Vicar of St Peter’s Church by the Bishop of Southwark at St Peter’s on 2nd February. At the same service Rev Simon Coupland was licensed as Priest-in-Charge of St. Peter’s.

Announcement from the Archdeacon of Wandsworth on Kate’s Appointment

We are delighted to announce that the Bishop of Southwark, in consultation with the representatives from St Peter’s, has appointed the Revd Kate Daymond as Associate Vicar of St Peter’s Church, Petersham in the Deanery of Richmond and Barnes, subject to the usual legal formalities.

Kate is currently a priest in the diocese of St Albans having served as Interim Priest at St Leonard’s Sandridge following a curacy at St Helen’s Church, Wheathampstead.

Kate sends this greeting
Born in Ealing, I began my nursing career at University College London, specialising in Health Visiting and Children’s sleep Consultancy. The need for spiritual, as well as physical wellbeing prompted my call to training at St Mellitus London and ordination to priesthood at St Albans Abbey in 2017. I have served in Wheathampstead and Sandridge in St Albans. I am looking forward to following God’s call to join you in Petersham. I am blessed to have two adult children. My husband, Nick, and I look forward to meeting you and revisiting Brentford FC.

For the first time in nearly two years, St Michael and All Angels, Barnes, are once again offering the Chalice to the congregation on an expressly optional basis .

Father Stephen Stavrou has writes:

The suspension of the Chalice during the pandemic was a deeply saddening necessity. A necessity because of the potential risk of infection, but also saddening because in Anglican theology whilst the fullness of the Sacramental grace is contained in either of the Eucharistic elements (and this has rightly been emphasised), yet the fullness of the symbolism, in recreation of the Last Supper, does imply something important about sharing both Bread and Wine, whenever possible. The Lord tells us ‘Drink from it, all of you’ (Matthew 26.27) Because of this, the suspension of the Chalice, must only be an emergency measure and its restoration a matter of great urgency as soon as conditions allow.

Throughout the pandemic, St Michael’s has been careful to follow all laws and guidelines. Where there has been need for interpretation we have followed the spirit of the rules with common sense, carefully considering the science, and always being mindful of those who are most vulnerable in our community. At the same time, as restrictions have lifted, we have also changed what we do in worship, on the basis that it is not our role as a church to impose greater restrictions than in wider society. In all this I have emphasised the importance of courtesy, mutual respect and understanding of different views in the midst of an unprecedented and stressful situation. We will not always agree, but we can disagree with generosity.

The sharing of the Chalice has been permitted in the Church of England for several months now, and some parishes chose to restore it immediately and I am encouraged by the fact that, as far as I’m aware, there have been no significant problems as a result. This is perhaps a good reminder that Covid is an airborne illness and very difficult to spread by contact, even in its most direct form. We appear to be moving towards an endemic situation, in which Covid is like a common cold in the vast majority of people, or possibly flu for a tiny percentage. This is not to trivialise such conditions, or the vulnerability of some, but it is true to say that we have always lived with such illnesses (flu, cold and others) and there is no correlation between them and receiving from the Chalice – Christians are not known to be more unwell than other people!

Bearing all this mind, it feels to me that this is the right time to offer the Blood of Christ once more on an entirely optional basis. Having spoken to a variety of people it is clear that some people are entirely comfortable with this and others are not, and this diversity is to be expected. It is by giving people choice that we are respecting these differing views.

The restoration of the Chalice, even if not all partake at this time, should be a thing of joy and a sign of an improving situation which – God willing – will continue. As I write these words, I am mindful of the words of St Paul’s to the Corinthians about differences over eating and drinking when he says: ‘whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything to the glory God. Give no offence to Jews or to Greeks or to the Church of God, just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, so that they may be saved’. (1 Cor. 10.31-33). Brothers and sisters, I leave you with these reflections, as we continue to celebrate Christ’s presence with us in the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist.