What a child saw
The St Jude’s
Anglican Church from whence my ancestry emanates conveys a great sense of
community and service, that I witnessed just over a generation ago. My first
view of the church was on our return from the UK, I was a precocious boy full of
opinions that never failed to find a voice, as I was observed by many who
wondered about this little alien utterly different from his peers.
I had a great-grandmother
and she probably had many ahead of her in age and status, it was a village that
sat on the hopes that grew from the successes of its many sons and daughters
educated for professional lives never stinting in their generosity to improve their town. Electrification, piper-borne water, a new church building,
improved school buildings, scholarships, and much else came with their desire
to lift their humble village.
A church on the lurch
Being of the Anglican
faith, I returned there to be confirmed. Everything our parents
did was to encourage our love of the village. The big difference is, that they had
their childhood there, we only had short breaks, and what represented our innate
childhood was elsewhere.
We could not
cultivate our parents' childhood memories of their village; maybe if
they had shared some of their hair-raising stories, we might have been
intrigued and more invested. Alas!
I have for too long overlooked another
issue that had surrounded the church; but a seething rage welled up in me when
I caught the glimpse of a missive of mendicancy imposed on the mainly influential
octogenarian parish members, many of whom have settled into retirement for
decades, but the parson is unrelenting.
Vicar on a venal
trail
When a parishioner
passes on, despite all the dearly departed might have contributed to the town
and the church, a venerable preys on the vulnerable with extraneous and outrageous
demands. If the stated requirements are not met to his satisfaction, he devotes the
homily that is supposed to honour the departed to excoriating and embarrassing
the bereaved for not pulling their weight.
It is a merciless abuse
of position that reeks with venality and these expressions are at the most
charitable end of the scale. The love of money is said to be the root of all evil,
to suggest that he personifies the inordinately untenable quest for filthy
lucre at the expense of those in need of succour does not begin to describe the
circumstances for some of the recently bereaved that I am acquainted with.
How such manifestly
disreputable conduct has been allowed to thrive in that church community where
the bereaved are left bereft of dignity or respect under the watch of a
thriving bishopric and a congregation that seems to condone, tolerate, or just
be resigned to these macabre machinations is daunting and baffling.
He has become a
potentate, probably untouchable and certainly unaccountable for his excesses.
This is not village talk, the reputation is known and has festered with
lascivious abandon.
Better is quite
expected
I am a steward at the
Manchester Cathedral, at the end of last year, we had two funerals of prominent, if not national figures. The organisation of the events was to the
highest professional standard, the Prince of Wales was in the congregation; I
did not once see any of the bereaved being put upon, we gathered to celebrate
the lives of their dearly departed and they received much Christian comfort and
consolation.
They would have felt
they had done well by their patron and the clergy did not insert themselves
into the ceremony in any way, they gave tribute and honour and showed
compassion and understanding.
Obviously, it is my
hope that there is an improvement in the conduct of the venerable but by his antecedents,
I find it impossible to support any fundraising activity he might champion as
he has sown seeds of discord and acrimony, the people he besmirched at the
funerals of their loved one still hurt from his villainy. They have received
neither apology nor appreciation.
Even from England,
who would have thought there was a highwayman at the gates of the temple? Yet,
like a Pharisee, he brings the adulterous woman to be stoned and tithes the
widows, the widowers, and the poor, to the minutest thing while preventing the
adherents from the kingdom of heaven.
If anyone might have
the thought, they should not remotely be persuaded of it. This is written that it might
be on record. The spirit of Pontius Pilate compels me. Thank you.