A quiet Saturday came and went, marked only by another walk into town, as far as Canton Bridge. We stopped at Pettigrew's Tea Room in Bute Park Gatehouse for tea and cake before walking home. For the first time, we went to a table upstairs, where I discovered the walls were line with paintings by Kevin Strong, the husband of Julie, the CBS administrator. Many of his paintings are of places we know well, in and around Cardiff, beautifully done, but he also paints Tenby and Newquay Cornwall, a gifted artist whose affection for familiar scenes is evident in the way he portrays them.
This morning, we walked to St Luke's church for the United Benefice Eucharist, it was Fr Mark's farewell celebration with the Benefice he has served for the past twenty years, overseeing the union of three Parishes into one. It was one of those occasions when we ran out of hymn books and every seat was taken, about two hundred people present in all. The two most recent Saint Padarn students placed in the Parish for the in situ element of their pastoral training, Fr Dominic and Fr Dylan, both now deacons in St Asaph diocese, assisted at the altar along with Team Vicar Emma. St Catherine's choir, augmented by members of the Elizabeth singers (Fr Mark's daughter's choir) led and enriched the singing of the liturgy with anthems and additional hymns.
This morning, we walked to St Luke's church for the United Benefice Eucharist, it was Fr Mark's farewell celebration with the Benefice he has served for the past twenty years, overseeing the union of three Parishes into one. It was one of those occasions when we ran out of hymn books and every seat was taken, about two hundred people present in all. The two most recent Saint Padarn students placed in the Parish for the in situ element of their pastoral training, Fr Dominic and Fr Dylan, both now deacons in St Asaph diocese, assisted at the altar along with Team Vicar Emma. St Catherine's choir, augmented by members of the Elizabeth singers (Fr Mark's daughter's choir) led and enriched the singing of the liturgy with anthems and additional hymns.
Fr Mark presided and preached with his characteristic warmth and gentle humour. It was lovely to hear him speak thoughtfully on all that his ministry entailed during his time here. He said something which struck me about ministry which I'd not thought of before. "However settled a priest may be in any job, clergy by nature of the vocation have no fixed abode." Yes, this was true in my experience of forty years of work, and although having a permanent home now in Pontcanna, it's still true of much of the work I continue to do as a voluntary priest. Churchwarden Hilary made a presentation and gave a concise and thoughtful speech at the end of the service, summing up aspects of Fr Mark's ministry most valued by fellow church officers. I'd like to believe that both of them spoke in a way that would give much food for thought to many rank and file members and newcomers.
I took my old Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX5 along with me and got consent to take photographs throughout the service. It's not something I'd want to do often. It's as active a part to play as is assisting in leading worship. You can join in all the prayers while your attention engaged with the visual aspect of the liturgy as well as its familiar words. It's important position yourself quietly without getting in anyone's way or disturbing anyone. You don't interact with anyone as you move about. Being unobtrusive requires some concentration, and not worrying about what people think!
Back in 1980 when St Agnes hosted a televised Sunday Mass in the aftermath of the St Paul's riots, a TV cameramen asked if could receive Communion during the service, as this he would have been doing if he hadn't been working on a Sunday. When and how, at the beginning of the procession of communicants or the end? I asked him. He couldn't, however leave his post, as the broadcast director might call on his camera for a shot just then. So, just as one would take Communion to someone immobilised in their seat, I went to the camera and gave him Communion. Simple. He said that for him being on duty at a service was a matter of worship mostly with the eyes, doing what he did best. It made sense to me. I didn't forget this, and thought him as I did my best with a camera.
I bought the LX5 in the John Lewis January sale in 2014. Already two years on the market, it was a quarter of its list price and quite a sophisticated camera for its day, albeit a little old fashioned in its design, with a physical lens cap. It's slightly bulkier than a pocket camera, so I haven't used it as much as my succession of longer pocket zoom cameras. Its wide field of view has been useful for town-scapes and I've taken over four hundred photos of the Cardiff Central Square redevelopment project with it, out of about three thousand. I'm using it more, now that my trusty Sony HX50 is dead. It produces sharp photos in many setting even if it's less responsive than a more modern camera. I've thought about buying one of the recent Panasonic travel cameras, which have the same build quality, but the Sony range still has the edge in terms of pocketable size and weight.
St Luke's church hall was arranged with tables for a Parish Lunch after the service, and I popped in to greet someone I'd noticed at the surface but not seen in the crowd afterwards, but we had decided not to stay for the meal, being unsure how long I'd be able to sit it out. Clare got chilled due to the lack of heating during the service, and left immediately to get home and warm up. I went home by way of St David's hospital where I had a nurse appointment. Later, Clare went off to her monthly study group in Bristol, and I busied myself editing and uploading fifty odd photos from the service, some of which were quite pleasing, though not all. The trouble with more up to date cameras is that you soon get used to their improved performance, even in small ways, and see photo quality differences you were hardly aware of a few years ago.
I had an email this evening for someone called Brendan Skelton, who seems to be engaged in a St Paul's area local history project relating to the Festival, My predecessor Fr Roy Blake was one of its founders, and I took part in some of the planning committee work, though it wasn't as big a priority for me as my involvement with black led churches and inter-faith inclusion activity. His questions set me off thinking about those days for the first time in decades. The process of remembering is a bit like piecing together a jigsaw puzzle. But first, you must look at the picture, if you can find one, to see the whole scene.
I think there are some slides from a 1980s Festival, but I haven't dug these out of storage yet, let alone digitized them to review, so I really had to work my memory hard to produce a reasonable response. It made me realise how much I rely on eighteen years worth of digital photos to prompt recollection of times and places past. Before the millennium, there are photo albums, but these are far from being comprehensive, as there were years when the pursuit of photographic interest apart from family snaps was unaffordable. Nowadays the challenge is to update and organise my ever growing archive of digital images, before they become as jumbled as the space in my head filled with three quarters of a lifetime's memories.
St Luke's church hall was arranged with tables for a Parish Lunch after the service, and I popped in to greet someone I'd noticed at the surface but not seen in the crowd afterwards, but we had decided not to stay for the meal, being unsure how long I'd be able to sit it out. Clare got chilled due to the lack of heating during the service, and left immediately to get home and warm up. I went home by way of St David's hospital where I had a nurse appointment. Later, Clare went off to her monthly study group in Bristol, and I busied myself editing and uploading fifty odd photos from the service, some of which were quite pleasing, though not all. The trouble with more up to date cameras is that you soon get used to their improved performance, even in small ways, and see photo quality differences you were hardly aware of a few years ago.
I had an email this evening for someone called Brendan Skelton, who seems to be engaged in a St Paul's area local history project relating to the Festival, My predecessor Fr Roy Blake was one of its founders, and I took part in some of the planning committee work, though it wasn't as big a priority for me as my involvement with black led churches and inter-faith inclusion activity. His questions set me off thinking about those days for the first time in decades. The process of remembering is a bit like piecing together a jigsaw puzzle. But first, you must look at the picture, if you can find one, to see the whole scene.
I think there are some slides from a 1980s Festival, but I haven't dug these out of storage yet, let alone digitized them to review, so I really had to work my memory hard to produce a reasonable response. It made me realise how much I rely on eighteen years worth of digital photos to prompt recollection of times and places past. Before the millennium, there are photo albums, but these are far from being comprehensive, as there were years when the pursuit of photographic interest apart from family snaps was unaffordable. Nowadays the challenge is to update and organise my ever growing archive of digital images, before they become as jumbled as the space in my head filled with three quarters of a lifetime's memories.
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