19.05.2014
Killiskey Celebrates Restoration Work Which Secures Church for Future Generations
The people of Killiskey Parish celebrated the restoration of the roof of their church in Nun’s Cross, Ashford, with a service of dedication attended by Archbishop Michael Jackson, yesterday morning.
The church, which will celebrate its bi–centenary in 2017, has been undergoing renovations on a phased basis for over a decade. The latest phase involved work on the roof, guttering and down pipes to stop water leaking in.
Patricia Butler, a member of the roof committee, outlined the programme of works at the service. She said a series of challenges had been met by successive select vestries.
The cost of the work was €37,000 and Ms Butler said that there had been a wonderfully generous response from parishioners and the vestry of Killiskey parish with additional funding coming from the Department of the Environment, the RCB, the Churches Fund and private individuals. She added that the parish had received great support from Wicklow County Council’s Heritage Officer, Deirdre Burns and local TD, Andrew Doyle.
Archbishop Jackson pointed o ut that the parish had a tremendous opportunity in the bicentenary of the church and its historical associations. He also praised the Vicar, the Revd Ken Rue for enabling people in the parish to flourish.
In his sermon, the Archbishop thanked parishioners for taking pride in their church which forms an important part of the community.
He spoke about the Resurrection and said: “Resurrection is who we are and resurrection is what we do”. But he pointed out that every Sunday celebrates Resurrection Now and tells the story of who God made us to be and who he wants us to become. For this reason, he said, Sunday is special and should be treated as such.
He said that the dedication of the church prompted questions about who the church is and for whom. He asked if the church could do anything other than point us to Christ. Archbishop Jackson said that while churches were very important to people it was important not to confuse concrete with community.
“The Old Testament witness points us away time after time from faith in shrines to faith in the Unseen God. And this is, surely, a difficult lesson for us today, not least when the reality emerging across our United Dioceses at large is that one in seven of those who claim to be Church of Ireland in fact attends church, as we know it, on any regular basis. Resurrection as a shared and binding reality connects Christians with their Christ; disciples with their Master; humans with their divine. Christ is the capstone and we are knit into this spiritual structure in ways that are very practical, earthly and eternal. It is by deeds and actions, attitudes and generosity that the children of God are known worldwide and in every locality,” he stated.
Following the service, the Archbishop visited Nun’s Cross National School where he was shown around by the principal, Rachel Harper. He also went to the nearby Tiglin Centre which helps people deal with life–controlling addictions where he met manager, Phil Thompson and some of the people using the service.
Photo captions:
Top: Archbishop Michael Jackson with members of Killiskey Parish’s Roof Committee and people, contractors, and people who supported the project outside Nun’s Cross Church, Killiskey.
Middle: Members of staff at Nun’s Cross National School greeted the Archbishop. Pictured are the Revd Ken Rue, principal Rachel Harper, Archbishop Michael Jackson and teachers Lorraine Gannon and Jane Honner.
Bottom: Pictured at Tiglin are the Revd Ken Rue, Ann Newton, Lesley Rue, Archbishop Jackson, Phil Thompson, John Lankaster and Bernadette Glover.
The Archbishop’s sermon is reproduced in full below:
The Fifth Sunday after Easter, Killiskey Church
Readings: Haggai, psalm 84.1–3,1 Peter 3, St John 2
Psalm 84.1: Blessed are they who dwell in your house: they will always be praising you.
A sermon preached by the Archbishop
CONTEXT IN SEASON OF EASTER
It would be a terrible thing, were we to let the riches of Easter simply ebb away as the Season of Easter gives way to Ascensiontide and then to Pentecost. Resurrection is who we are and resurrection is what we do. Easter tells us this in a very immediate and vivid and joyful way. The Season gives us scope to explore and to expand so many sides of the story. Every Sunday, of course, celebrates Resurrection Now and tells us this wonderful story of who God has made us to be in the present and of who God wants us to become in the future. God nurtures us and does not want to leave us behind or leave us fearful or hungry. For this reason, Sunday is special and must be treated as such. I say this in order to honour and not to diminish enjoyment in any way.
Sunday celebrates the relationship of care, nurture and freedom so often given shape by pictures of the shepherd and the sheep. And this picture, this image is itself a gift of Easter to us. It corrects the picture of the bullying devil in the days of fearful and hungry Lent. The personality of The Good Shepherd is of one whose calling is to love the wounded and the innocent, to cherish the vulnerable and the despised and to use these fragile people to challenge and to disarm those who seek to harm them and others. Such is the power of what goodness is and what goodness can do and the changes for good which goodness can make to happen every day of life itself. And that is precisely why it is so terrifying to those who, in modern parlance, don’t ‘get it.’
WHO IS THE CHURCH AND FOR WHOM?
Today’s joyful celebration where we dedicate this House of God and House of Prayer and the work completed in it to the glory of God and for the use of God’s people helps us to ask three simple questions about the church. The church is the people who gather to love God and love one another; to listen to the voice of God through the Scriptures, which are our most precious gift and inheritance, and through personal and communal prayer; to find and to receive our identity in Jesus Christ through the sacraments, particularly those of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion; to respond in action and in encouragement to others who seek the faith which we have to live their lives in the midst of happiness and unhappiness; to trumpet the reality that death is the gate to life eternal. And in our context it requires Episcopal service and leadership by the bishop of a diocese and obedience to God through the mission and the ministry of the bishop on the part of the church therein.
My three questions are the following:
CAN THE CHURCH DO ANYTHING OTHER THAN POINT US TO CHRIST?
The First Letter of Peter talks about building and rebuilding the church. It is, of course, building works that we celebrate here today in Killiskey and building works that hold us in the place of thanksgiving. We rejoice when we can maintain our churches; we begin to panic when we cannot do so. They mean a great deal to us. We are confused when we ‘lose’ them. Attention to Holy Scripture, and in particular to the early chapters of The Acts of the Apostles, encourages us not to fear the loss of buildings and to face four–square the fear deep within us that, without them, we do not have or are not a church at all. The building of Christ Jesus, we are constantly told in Scripture, is not made with hands but with hearts – and we need to be careful all the time not to confuse concrete with community.
The Old Testament witness points us away time after time from faith in shrines to faith in the Unseen God. And this is, surely, a difficult lesson for us today, not least when the reality emerging across our United Dioceses at large is that one in seven of those who claim to be Church of Ireland in fact attends church, as we know it, on any regular basis. Resurrection as a shared and binding reality connects Christians with their Christ; disciples with their Master; humans with their divine. Christ is the capstone and we are knit into this spiritual structure in ways that are very practical, earthly and eternal. It is by deeds and actions, attitudes and generosity that the children of God are known worldwide and in every locality.
Resurrection Now unites us to Christ as stones to the capstone. The building, the construction and the capacity it has to welcome and include everyone all stand in a tension that was once expressed by the then archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Robert Runcie. Preaching at the Lambeth Conference of 1988, Dr Runcie invited the congregation at the Opening Service to look to the arch in the centre of the cathedral church and recognize and reflect upon the fact that an arch is the expression of two shared weaknesses. Without each other they simply are pieces of cut stone that have neither energy nor function. Cooperation, collaboration, connection – these are the binding and the energizing forces of the Church of Christ, the building–blocks of church life and witness.
OUR BEST IS NOT GOD BUT COMES FROM GOD
The Reading from Haggai directs our attention away from ourselves and towards God. Mine is the silver and mine the gold, says the Lord of Hosts. (Haggai 2.8) And this is one of the great things about Holy Scripture. In its original time and place, this phrase refers to the making beautiful of the temple in Jerusalem, recently restored and to the celebration of that fact. It is a day and a time of rejoicing and of wonder and of thanksgiving and of congratulation and of celebration. But like all religious buildings, the Temple in Jerusalem had to take its chance with history and, if you go to Jerusalem today, it is no more. However the message is loud and clear and echoes far beyond the survival of the building in question or indeed of any building made with hands. Mine is the silver and mine the gold, says the Lord of Hosts. The gift that any of us gives is a gift because it has already been given to us by God for our use and we decide to give it back to God with joyful and thankful hears. And I wish to thank everyone here who has given generously and beyond the call of duty. The reason we give back to God what God has given to us provides yet another clue as to what the church is. It is the place where the people give thanks and where the people are re–made in the image and likeness of God, not in the image and likeness of anything that God has made or that they have made. And it is in a spirit such as this that we here this morning thank God in and by our giving.
THE CHURCH TELLS US THAT OUR WITNESS IS FOR ALL NATIONS
St John chapter 2 brings on to our agenda something we should rather not associate with the church today, and that is conflict and violence. In church matters, as in any other matters that moves us deeply, we cannot expect and smooth and unruffled passage. Jesus, on entering The Temple, feels what used to be called: righteous indignation about the abuse of the vulnerable and the exploitation of the poor among those who worship God. Most people actually misunderstand this story. People think it is primarily about selling things in church. It is in fact more about putting a price on access to God in the holiness of life itself and in the holiness of religion that ought to make possible and totally free such spiritual access. This is a continuing challenge to the churches as we know them. Too often churches talk holiness but cannot connect this with the simple things of life. And so openness of access becomes jumbled with the need to exclude what we don’t like, what we can’t handle, what threatens us on the inside. Jesus is careful even when he is angry. He draws attention to the massive building programme which resulted in the Temple which everyone can see and he makes the bold statement: God is here in me; my death and resurrection are what will change the world; make your decision please and make your choice please. This Christ can in fact build his own temple and leave us to our own temple – with him absent – if that is what we really want. And this new Christ–temple is open to all and open to all nations. We belong to them and they belong to us in the love and in the creation of God the Father, the Son and the Spirit.
CONCLUSION
The abiding picture of the shepherd and the sheep in St John 10 tells us about the sort of relationship of knowing and of protecting which sheep and shepherd enjoy when all is safe. The shepherd knows the sheep and has a good and an easy working relationship with them. The Good Shepherd leads and instructs and accompanies the sheep and shows us how both individual independence and communal care enable a flock and a group to survive and to live. This too is who and what the church is. And it shows us that followership is every bit as important as leadership. Now – how does followership appeal to us? Jesus would hope that it would appeal more and more.
St John 10.4: …he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice.