Through a glass darkly – 143

My diary says that we are going to Grenoble this week, for another locum job. But we’re not going. Which I’m sorry about. Partly because St Marc’s is a diverse and welcoming congregation. Partly because Grenoble is an attractive city, surrounded by snow-topped mountains. [A city where our daughter Joanna lived for a year back in the 1990s.] And partly because this mobility problem [an arthritic hip] probably brings to an end a decade of locum work within the Diocese in Europe.

ICS conference, Beatenburg, 2013

You could say it is all [Bishop] Robert’s fault. At an ICS conference at Beatenburg, near Interlaken, in the spring of 2013, he asked me if I had any plans for life after retirement from Lyon. Specifically if I might be available for work in chaplaincies in Europe. As a result of that conversation I subsequently spent 18 months at Holy Trinity, Brussels, in 2013-15.  Robert Innes was then the Chancellor [Senior Pastor] and John Wilkinson the Canon Pastor, and I enjoyed the new-to-me experience of working in a chaplaincy team. Which began most days with Morning Prayer in the church building. At which we were joined one day by Archbishop Justin and his wife. Susie’s old friend Liz kindly lent me her house in Etterbeek, as she was away living in Switzerland; and I had an opportunity to get to know a city [Brussels] and a country [Belgium] which I had only previously passed through on the way to somewhere else.

In those days I was a bit obsessed with questionnaires. So I set up meetings with as many of the congregation as possible, and used a questionnaire to have structured conversations about their faith journeys and involvement in church life. Some of the conversations took an hour, some were much longer. The longest as I recall took all day. In the end, after 150 interviews, with help from a statistically literate member of the congregation, I produced a detailed church profile. But for me the richness of some of the conversations was of more value than the raw data.

Baptismal candle, Holy Trinity, Brussels, 2014

It rained a lot in Brussels. In Ibiza where we did a holiday chaplaincy later in 2015 it didn’t rain at all. We enjoyed the beaches and enjoyed swimming, at least until Susie was stung by a jellyfish. But the  chaplaincy model which had been launched in conjunction with Young at Heart package holidays, with chaplaincies organising Songs of Praise events in hotel lounges on Sunday afternoons, was past its sell-by date. Susie and I hovered around holiday companies’ Welcome events like time-share sales reps. And attendance at Sunday services was disappointing. 

Notre-Dame, Paris, 2016

In 2016 I made a brief trip to St Michael’s, Paris, as a substitute for James Buxton who was ill. [ “I’m a substitute for another guy … … “]. It was my first visit to St Michael’s since I had passed through in pre-ordination days back in 1983. And I had the pleasure of getting to know Alyson Lamb, the then chaplain, whose early death last year was a great loss. Later that year we spent ten weeks in Strasbourg, staying in the chaplaincy flat in the centre of town. The congregation  worships in a Dominican chapel close to the university. For many churches there is a strong feeling that the ‘Golden Age’ lies in the past, and my recollection is that Strasbourg were struggling to  find their way alongside some newer and more dynamic English-speaking churches. [But a glance at the church website suggests that the church now is again flourishing.]

Early in 2017 Susie and I made our first visit to Chantilly, following the departure of Nick Clarke. It is a welcoming congregation, worshipping in what looks and feels like a rural English parish church. With a purpose-built chaplaincy flat and church centre next door. The church and the plot of land on which it stands were a 19th century gift from the Doc d’Aumale, a fabulously wealthy anglophile who had inherited 66 million lives and the estate of his god-father the last Prince of Condé. From the late 19th century there was a substantial English-speaking community in Chantilly, many of them connected with the horse-racing industry.

Chateau, Chantilly, 2017

We made further visits to Brussels in 2017 and 2018. Liz had sold her house in Etterbeek, and the church found us accommodation in apartments linked to members of the congregation. It is always easier going back to places. At Holy Trinity I knew where the key was kept, which was invaluable for the early Communion service. Paul Vrolijk had succeeded Robert Innes as the senior Chaplain, but many of those whom I had interviewed in 2013-14 were still in place.

The first of several visits to St Marc’s, Grenoble, came in the summer of 2019. Grenoble is an attractive city in south-east France, surrounded with a succession of snow-capped mountains. I knew this congregation a little in Roy Ball’s time, but more recently the church had struggled a bit against a newer American-led congregation. St Marc’s is made up of a handful of long-term British expats. a sizeable group of Africans, mainly from Nigeria and Cameroon, and a clutch of PhD students from a variety of different countries. We did two spells at Grenoble in 2020, preached for them on line during the COVID lock-down in 2020, and returned for what looks like a final visit in February-March 2024. Returning home to Edinburgh late on Easter Day.

All Age Worship, St Marc’s, Grenoble, 2024

Further afield we spent Advent and Christmas 2020 with the congregation of St Nicolas, Ankara. The congregation worships in a chapel within the Embassy compound, which means that entry is tightly controlled. It was a complex situation as there had been big group of Iranian refugees in the previous year, but rifts and tensions and aggressive behaviour had led to all Iranians [and Russians] being banned from the compound. Celebrating Communion with a group of Farsi-speaking Iranians in a chapel in the former French Embassy was a very moving experience. We were also delighted to have an opportunity to spend a couple of days in Istanbul, a city which I first visited as a hitch-hiker more than fifty years earlier. And also to visit Konya, the Iconium visited by Paul and Silas in Acts 14, but also the home of Rumi [of the Whirling Dervishes], the Sufi poet and mystic

When the COVID lock-down eased, we were able to spend Advent and Christmas 2021 at Christ Church, Kyiv. In Ukraine we were well out of our comfort zone, but we were warmly received by Christina, the church Warden, and by Kate Davenport, then working in the British Embassy. During our time there I was pleased to baptise the young son of one of the military attachés, Tam, a gunner from Fife. And we took the opportunity to visit Lviv, formerly known as Lwow, a delightful, historic city in the far west of Ukraine. Tam assured me that Russia did not need to invade Ukraine, but the Russian troops invaded a month after we left. And suddenly the city from which we had just returned was all over the television news.

Christmas Day, 2021, Kyiv

In the autumn of 2022 I was back in Chantilly again, following Sarah’s departure. This time it was just me as Susie was in Wycombe with our daughter Joanna who was severely ill. Queen Elizabeth died while I was in Chantilly, and we held a memorial service which was very close in time to the funeral of the long-serving Church Treasurer. [And then very sadly Joanna died too. A loss with which we continue to struggle.] Early in 2023 I had the pleasure of baptising two teenagers.

Baptism at St Peter’s, Chantilly, 2023

After Easter 2023, as we came towards the end of our locum work, we returned to Ankara. During our time there I was asked to judge a scone-making contest at the Embassy Coronation Garden Party, something for which theological college signally failed to equip me. And during the past fifteen months we have made final return visits to Chantilly and to Grenoble.

Ankara congregation, 2024

A decade of locum work around the Diocese in Europe has exemplified Jesus’s words “in my Father’s house there are many rooms”. It has been a rich experience. I am immensely grateful for the hospitality we have received; in particular from Peter and Carole Ludlow, and from Susan Hudson, in Brussels; from James and Julia Howes, and from Ann and Alain Bouchardon, in Chantilly; from Christina and her family in Kyiv; from Stefan and Kaska Michaelis in Ankara; and from Zaz and Jean-Claude in Grenoble. And I have enjoyed hearing some of the stories of a wonderfully diverse group of people in this amazing diocese.

Vicar for hire

I am quite happy worshipping here in Edinburgh on Sunday mornings, in St Peter’s, Lutton Place, and in the nascent Newington Trinity. But I continue to miss the particular dynamic of these gathered, multi-cultural, multilingual congregations around Europe.

January 2025