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St Chad - is this where it needs to start?

Our Church building was consecrated on the 2nd March 1964 - St Chad's day. Hence we call our Church Family St Chad's too. Chad is buried at Lichfield Cathedral and on the floor there are four large images from his life. We have a copy of one of them in our main entrance hall at the back.

We don't know much about Chad's early life - and we only really have the one source for the rest, so it is a bit sketchy. However, the 7th Century was not a stable period in British history; these were the Dark Ages, after all.

The key elements for us are that Chad spent time travelling and learning about his faith. We know he went to Ireland at some stage and his elder brother, Cedd, held a key role in the Church in Britain. This suggests that Cedd and Chad may well have come from a quite important family.

Caelin, another brother of Cedd and Chad, persuaded a local king to build a monastery near Pickering in Yorkshire and this became a base for Cedd and Chad. Cedd eventually died of the plague at the monastery in Lastingham and we know that Chad succeeded him in becoming the Abbott. The Venerable Bede's account of this period stresses Chad's commitment to prayer and study.

We know that during the time of the Synod of Whitby in 663/664 many Church leaders died because of an outbreak of plague. Wilfrid was chosen to be the new Bishop of York but needed to find three other Bishops still alive in order to be properly consecrated. He decided to head off for northern France, was successfully consecrated but stayed on there. Because of this delay, King Oswiu invited Chad to become Bishop of the Northumbrians. Chad, like Wilfrid, faced the problem of how to be consecrated. It seems that by then there was only one Bishop in the whole of Britain, so Chad went to find him in Wessex.

Chad was consecrated by Wini and started his ministry. Wilfrid returned to Britain some time later ,and then in 669 the Pope sent Theodore of Tarsus to take over as Archbishop of Canterbury with the main task of regularising the Church following the various deaths and consecrations. Theodore asked Chad to step down and allow Wilfrid to take the role he had been invited to back during the Synod. Theodore was struck by how humbly Chad behaved in making way for Wilfrid. He therefore formalised Chad's consecration as Bishop and allowed him to return to his previous role of Abbott at Lastingham.

Later that year, King Wulfhere of Mercia requested a Bishop for his peoples. Theodore remembered the humble Chad and sent him from Yorkshire to Mercia. Chad was used to walking everywhere, hence the bare feet in the picture and this is Theodore sending Chad to Mercia and insisting he went be horse and not on foot as was his custom (there is a story of Theodore actually having to manhandle Chad into the saddle).

So what can we learn from this, especially as we think about our vision and purpose here in Patchway? I hesitate to suggest there may be links with Chad's living at a time of political turmoil and outbreaks of the plague and where we find ourselves today!

Prayer and study (and worship, of course) are the key parts of the monastic life and sustain a community at work. This is far more than simply coming to Church on a Sunday - or even just being the Church on a Sunday. There is a commitment to the hard work of prayer and the labour of study which we seem to lose sight of very quickly. 

I find the humility of Chad in this account very moving. It represents, I think, a wider question of character.

Chad was willing to be sent in response to the clear need. Being sent out is not the same as being thrown out, or being sent away. It means that there was a clear purpose and direction. I often smile at the representation of Theodore (on the right) in this image as he looks a trifle sullen. But note that his right hand is being raised in the traditional sign of blessing - Chad is being blessed to go. The flip-side of that is surely that Chad wouldn't have found a blessing by staying where he was.

We have much we can learn from this as we follow Jesus, but remember Chad.

Food for thought for a new ECC (section 2)

As promised, the second sectrion to our four-part 'Food for thought" document. This is a summary ofthe group discussion we had during February over meals here at the Vicarage. One question is not really suitable for publising on-line, as it involved asking people to suggest those who might have gifts we can use to build up the Body of Christ.

Download Values vision and growth info for new ECC 7 May 14 part 2

I will be sinding printed copies around the ECC members for them to read and peruse.

At our next ECC we will be looking at part 1 of the earlier document I uploaded and considering the aspects of the four marks of Church that +George challenged us with on our Anniversary weekend at the beginning of March.

Food for thought for a new ECC (section 1)

For our newly elected ECC on Monday evening I gathered together things we had been thinking about over the last couple of months relating to vision and growth. I passed copies round - not for immediate discussion, but to allow people to read and ponder over prayerfully. I left quite a bit of space in the document for people to highlight, scribble, cross out etc as they go through it, so 17 pages is (hopefully) not quite as intimidating as it sounds. It is hoped that these things shape our thinking and agenda in the months ahead.

Download Values vision and growth info for new ECC 7 May 14

This is section 1 and is in 3 parts. Section 2 (still being compiled) is only really one part.

The first part is a single page and is my brief notes of the four headings that Bishop George gave us when he preached on the morning of our 50th Anniversary weekend at the beginning of March. The second part is the next two pages, and this is the ideas that were written on the flip chart paper in the three groups (hence three columns of bullets) in the three areas that Si, the Area Dean, led us in on the Friday evening of the Anniversary weekend - primarily focussing on the question 'What do we value at St Chad's'. Different groups will have highlighted different things, and some groups were more concise than others. What we need to do here is look at the thee columns of bullets and see if we can find common themes across the three. For example, one that jumped out at me was the welcome that St Chad's offers, and I referred to this in an answer to a question at the Annual Meeting. How can we make the best use of the genuinely friendly welcome people receive at St Chad's? As I said in my answer, I noted that and amended my general policy towards Baptism families to take that into consideration.

The third, and by far the longest, part relates to the document produced by the Church of England called From Anecdote to Evidence. I went through the report and noted each of the ingredients that were listed as encouraging Church growth. I copied some quotes from the report, made some comments from my perspective about St Chad's, and then jotted some questions. I invited the ECC to read and make their own comments and questions so we can work through this in the months ahead.

Section 2 of my Food for thought document relates to the discussions we had at the Vicarage at our tea/supper conversations around Discipleship. This will be another set of bullet points from several documents with the need to read through and pick out common themes.

A happy 50th Birthday to St Chad's

We have finally sat down with a cup of tea to reflect back on a wonderful weekend. I tried to describe it in Church this morning as one which was busy and happy, just as I expected, but one which was also deeply rich emotionally and spiritually (which I had not expected).

Today, 2nd March 2014, is 50 years to the day since the Rt Revd Oliver Tomkins consecrated the current St Chad's Church building on Rodway Road in Patchway. There had been a building there previously, as some of the lovely old photos we had collected showed, and a Church in Patchway prior to that further up the A38. We were thrilled to have the Rt Revd George Cassidy with us this morning and what he said to us is available to listen to here.

I tried to sum up how I felt during the service, but did a "rewind" over the weekend.

Saturday evening had been a fabulous "Concert" with some old Patchway lags playing and singing - but the main thrust of the evening had been the welcoming back of many old friends and having time and space to talk. Some of the current crop of Patchway young people did well too, the STOMP Dance Group and a lovely song sung by Chantelle.

There was a lot of talking and mingling and laughter and we finished with some worship - all joining in as we sang "To God be the glory" together.

The evening had taken a lot of organising, even down to the last minute, but it has to go down as one of those simple pleasures that are such a treat.

Saturday tea-time had been a frantic "Cream Tea" fest. I have no idea how many teas and scones were delivered to the tables, and this was our peak time for old friends to be with us - previous Ministers of a variety of types. I knew very few of them, but there were lots of laughs and memories.

Saturday morning had been a really important time prayer walking around parts of the Parish. We had selected four areas to walk and we had a fifth group who stayed in Church but prayer walked with texts and photos. We highlighted our routes on maps, so we know where we've been and we felt quite strongly that this is something we need to do regularly.

The weekend had begun on the Friday with our Area Dean getting us thinking about Values and Vision - and he did it really well. We have pages of notes and flip-chart materials on top of +George's talk to come back to and mull over.

I loved the process of noting down what it was that we valued about St Chad's, and building a description of our values from that. I think we made some great progress, and we have some good stuff for an agenda for an Away Day, perhaps.

 

The final moment of the weekend was the cutting of our 50th Cake. Cyril performed the honours - one of the original worshippers in St Chad's and still with us every week.