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Church |
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St Peter’s Church, Barrowden |
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On a recent trip to Middlesbrough to visit my parents I nearly fell out of my chair when I heard a man at 8am bellowing at the top his voice outside the house “Any raa-boh, any raa-boh”.
It was a sound I was very familiar with as a child but had not heard it for years, and certainly never in Rutland! It was the rag and bone man. Once I had steadied myself again, I sprang up and looked out of the window to see if it really was the rag and bone man still doing his rounds in 2010. I peered through the net curtains fully expecting to see the horse and cart, piled high with old washing machines and tin bathtubs, as it always was. Imagine my disappointment when all I could see was a battered white transit van with a man hanging out the window shouting “any raa-boh”. Oh how times change!
However, a couple of things struck me as I reflected on the experience over breakfast. Firstly, it seemed remarkable that there were still rag and bone men doing the rounds in Middlesbrough – though on reflection perhaps not so remarkable. One would have thought the demand for door collections of scrap metal had fizzled out with most people being able to drive to the tip these days.
Secondly, were these men, often maligned and ridiculed in Steptoe and Son fashion, really the pioneers of the recycling business?
I suppose what I was responding too was a bit of nostalgia, triggered by the sound of the rag and bone man’s call, that in an instant had transported me back to my childhood.
There is a lot of nostalgia associated with churches. People re-visiting our churches will often tell me how they remember it as a child, coming to Sunday school, singing in the choir, ringing the bells, getting married and even scratching their name on the back of the organ!
The reality is of course that things have moved on and it is never quite the same as we like to remember it, no longer horse and cart but transit van!
The church wrestles with the same issue of how to be relevant and up-to-date without losing the nostalgia and tradition that has been the stable bedrock for so many centuries. The Church of England is engaging with this very issue as I write, in relation to admitting women to the office of Bishop.
On another level we are also wrestling with it here in Barrowden as the Church Council desperately wants to preserve the church as a living worship centre for the village. They do so in the knowledge that three beautiful ancient Rutland village churches within a stone’s throw from Barrowden are destined for closure. They are also realistic enough to know that, even though we would like to see more people coming to church and work to that end, not everybody in the village wants to but they would like the church to remain open for special occasions, like baptisms, weddings and funerals.
At my ordination I, like every licensed priest, had to swear my allegiance to the Declaration of Assent, a part of which says that we “agree that the Gospel must be proclaimed afresh in each generation”. Given the decline generally in church attendance, we still have a lot to do on that one, but the same spirit may be applied to seeing the church building serve each generation appropriately too.
My plea as the parish priest is to invite people to give time to their spiritual side, perhaps to even consider if the church can help in making it more meaningful, or dare I even suggest, tell us what we could be doing to help nourish it for you!
The last thing I expected to hear on my recent visit to Middlesbrough was “any raa-boh, any raa-boh”. Sadly, the last thing some people expect to hear from the Church is “God loves you, God loves you”. We’d love to surprise you too! Geoff Angell, Priest in Charge |
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Last updated: 6th August 2010 |
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Geoff’s Newsletter |
