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Faith and Freedom Spring and Summer 2021

The latest issue of Faith and Freedom (Spring and Summer 2021, Number 192) has just been published.

Cover, Issue 192

Our cover features a striking image that is a piece of ‘discovered art’. A picture by an unknown New Zealand artist which complements so well Wayne Facer’s book A Vision Splendid: The Influential Life of William Jellie, A British Unitarian in New Zealand, which has recently gone into its second edition. The picture also appears on the cover of that book. This publication is the subject of an extensive essay and review by Graham Murphy. In Unitarianism in New Zealand: Essay and Review he uncovers the origins of Unitarianism in New Zealand through the exertions of British and Irish expatriates, most notably Moneyreagh-born William Jellie, and their relationship with Maori culture and the development of the colony right up to the devastating impact of the First World War.

Memorial to Robert and Dermot Neill in Holywood Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church

Colin Walker writes about The commemoration of three Ulster Unitarians who died at the Somme: Captain James Samuel Davidson, Lieutenant James Dermot Neill and Second Lieutenant Ernest George Boas. They were all the sons of prominent Ulster businessmen, all served in the 36th ‘Ulster’ Division and all were commemorated by plaques created by Ulster artist Rosamond Praeger who was herself a Unitarian and probably knew all three of them personally. All were caught up in the Home Rule Crisis immediately before the war and all of them signed the Ulster Covenant, including Ernest Boas who was Jewish by descent but brought up in the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church. Dr Walker skilfully unpacks the connections between them and also Rosamond Praeger (who like Ernest Boas was also from an originally Jewish family) and reflects on their faith and their legacy.

Rev Frank Walker

In Incarnation: the Supernaturalist Story and the Humanitarian Story, a sermon originally preached in Cambridge, Frank Walker assesses the way the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation can be understood in the light of humanity’s repeated cruelty and excesses, seen most notably in the Holocaust. Despite the obvious problems he finds reason to be optimistic: ‘Incarnation is a continuing reality. Creative energy is forever expressing itself in all the glorious and stupendous variety of life on earth and in the whole universe. And life, which often seems so fragile and vulnerable, subject to catastrophes and extinctions, is so tenacious and adaptable, and is constantly renewing itself’.

William Ellery Channing by Henry Cheever Pratt 1857. (Wikipedia, Public Domain)

A Chautauqua performance is ‘a uniquely American dramatic format’ in which is portrayed an individual historic figure, ‘as if returning to life to address the audience’. Back in the Spring and Summer issue of Faith and Freedom in 2019 Kevin Murphy provided us with a Chautauqua performance concerning Francis David. In this issue he does the same for one of the most prominent American Unitarian theologians in history. An Appearance of William Ellery Channing: A Chautauqua Performance is a wonderfully insightful exploration of the theology that Channing came to espouse in the context of the circumstances of his life.

Books Reviewed

Martin Camroux (foreword by David R. Peel), Keeping Alive the Rumor of God: When Most People are Looking the Other Way, WIPF & Stock, Eugene, Oregon, 2020, pp 204, ISBN 978-1-7252-6241-6, £20 pbk.

Accessing a reliable grounding in wonder

Reviewed by BOB JANIS DILLON

Bert Clough, Dancing with Mortality: Reflections of a Lapsed Atheist, Bert Clough, Newbury, England, 2020, pp 111, ISBN 978-1-8381695- 0-3, £10 pbk.

Finding truth through the lives of ‘great souls’

Reviewed by JIM CORRIGALL

Marcus Braybrooke, Meeting Jewish Friends and Neighbours, Marcus Braybrooke, 17 Courtiers Green, Abingdon, OX14 3EN, marcusbraybrooke4@gmail.com, 2020, pp 225, ISBN 9798564270243, £12.50 post free.

A comprehensive analysis of Jewish faith and life

Reviewed by PETER GODFREY

Wayne Facer, Prophet at the Gate. Norman Murray Bell and the Quest for Peace, Blackstone Editions, Toronto, 2021, ISBN 9781775355656, $25 NZD pbk.

Norman Murray Bell – Pacifist and anti-war campaigner in New Zealand

Reviewed by GRAHAM MURPHY

Catherine Robinson (ed.), Fragments of Holiness, The Lindsey Press, London, 2019, pp 205, ISBN 978-0-85319-091-2, £9 pbk.

An anthology for daily use

Reviewed by LENA COCKROFT

Cliff Reed. Beyond Darkness Words for Reflection, Lindsey Press, London, pp 134, ISBN 978-0-85319-095-0, £9 pbk.

Waking up to the Divine within you

Reviewed by DAVID STEERS

An annual subscription for each volume (two issues) costs £15.00 (postage included) in the United Kingdom. Single copies can be ordered at a cost of £8.00 each (postage included). Cheques should be made out to Faith and Freedom and sent to the business manager:

Nigel Clarke,
Business Manager, Faith and Freedom,
16 Fairfields,
Kirton in Lindsey,
Gainsborough,
Lincolnshire.
DN21 4GA.

Email: faithandfreedom@btinternet.com

Alternatively you can pay via PayPal by clicking here.

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Murland Mausoleum, Clough

Churches in County Down are replete with interesting ancient mausolea and tombs and this is especially true in the area around Lecale, most particularly amongst the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian churches, and the churchyard at Downpatrick, for instance, alone has eight or nine large tombs of different designs.

But the most celebrated Mausoleum of all is at Clough.

A view of the now restored Murland Mausoleum at Clough

The Murland Mausoleum was built in about 1860 by a family who were closely connected to the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian congregation at Clough for generations. The Murland family were wealthy local mill owners, they lived at Ardnabannon and it is thought that the architect who designed their house also designed the family mausoleum. This was Thomas Turner, a Dublin-born architect who began his career as an assistant to Charles Lanyon in Belfast and who had a long and productive career designing buildings all over Ireland including Stormont Castle and Coleraine Town Hall.

But it is very clear when you look at the Murland Mausoleum that this was the work of someone steeped in the designs of classical architecture and particularly ancient funerary architecture. The inverted torch is used in Christian iconography to represent the resurrection and the eternal life of the soul. But it actually goes back to ancient Greece where it represented Thanatos the Greek god of death.

It is a very rich design.

Professor James Stevens Curl describes it as

something one might expect to find in the cemetery of Père-Lachaise or in one of the great American cemeteries, rather than in a small rural churchyard in the shadow of the Mountains of Mourne.

The Ulster Architectural Heritage Society list describes the mausoleum as ‘the phenomenal Murland vault of about 1860, furnished with all the pompe funebre of the classical manner, with trimmings.’

For local schoolchildren it is a place well-known for decades as somewhere where the bravest of them could stand near the open grill and peer in at the coffins resting in the dusty gloom.

As such an old structure the building was gradually becoming in need of restoration and to see this done the church was able to partner with the experience and expertise of the Follies Trust, a body set up in 2006 to help, in their own words, with ‘the conservation, preservation, restoration and protection, in their original setting, of mausolea and monuments; follies; grottoes; garden buildings and other structures of particular beauty or historic, environmental, architectural or industrial significance.’

At the church we were very pleased to welcome local expert Dr Finbar McCormick of Queen’s University, Belfast who gave a fascinating talk on the history and development of memorials to the dead in Ireland and beyond, looking at the influence of the Reformation and classical ideas.

This was a prelude to the work being done on the mausoleum. A number of specialists have looked at the building, and the job of restoring the structure was given to Noel Killen, noted for his work in restoring the nearby Mill at Ballydugan.

Work on the restoration getting under way

Generally, considering its great age, the building was in good shape but there was lots to be done to make the structure fully watertight and secure again for the future. Stonework that had crumbled had to be replaced. The iron work in the grills and the heavy door had to be conserved. They were also repainted in the original colour, which had largely long faded from view.

Work commenced in August 2019 and was completed within a few months. To mark the completion of this work and the collaboration that was involved we planned a special service of celebration with representatives of the Follies Trust and others, but this wasn’t to be. Like so many other plans it fell foul of the pandemic and couldn’t be held. But the important thing is that this striking and unique structure is now restored and fit to last for another 160 years.

Short video telling the story of the restoration of the Mausoleum
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In May

The Welsh poet W.H. Davies (1871-1940) lived a difficult life (described in his Autobiography of a Super-Tramp of 1908) but achieved a high level of popular appreciation for his verses during his lifetime. He is probably best known today for his poem Leisure.

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

In today’s service I make use of another of his poems, one that is, perhaps, less well-known – In May. It features in our act of worship from First Presbyterian (Non-Subscribing) Church, Downpatrick.

Click on the video to join our service which goes live at 9.45 am on Sunday, 23rd May 2021

The service is conducted by the minister, Rev Dr David Steers and the organist is Laura Patterson. The reading is Psalm 103 and the hymns played are 10,000 Reasons, Great is thy faithfulness, and Be still for the presence of the Lord.

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Rev Alexander Gordon

Our worship today comes from Ballee Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church and is the first in a new series considering significant Non-Subscribers from history.

Alexander Gordon was born in Coventry on 9th June 1841 and died in Belfast on 21st February 1931. A self-styled Englishman by birth, Scotsman by education and an Irishman by inclination Alexander Gordon was the foremost historian of religious dissent in the British Isles whose influence is still recognized today.

Alexander Gordon arriving at Dunmurry, 18th January 1931

I’ve mentioned before the above photograph of Alexander Gordon, (click here to see the original post) the last known picture of him, arriving at Dunmurry to take the service in 1931 and this and many other images are used in the video for today’s service.

Click on the video to see the latest service (from 9.45 am on Sunday, 16th May 2021)

The service is recorded in Ballee Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church and is conducted by the minister. The reader is Carol Nixon who reads Psalm 100 and the organist is John Strain who plays the hymns Spirit of God, unseen as the wind (Irish Presbyterian Hymn Book 478) and Fairest Lord Jesus (Irish Presbyterian Hymn Book 19). Also played at the beginning and end of the service are As the deer pants and Who is on the Lord’s side.

As well as the images connected with Alexander Gordon the film includes video of the eighteenth-century roof beams of Ballee Church constructed from Memel pine.

Memorial in First Presbyterian Church, Rosemary Street, Belfast

Over the course of a long career Gordon was minister of a number of congregations in England and Ireland and was Principal of the Unitarian College, Manchester and lecturer in Ecclesiastical History at the University of Manchester, in what was then the first free faculty of Theology in Britain. He was also a renowned historian who travelled all over Europe in the course of his work. He regularly travelled between England and Ireland, even throughout the First World War, and always travelled from wherever he was to Dunmurry in order to attend the twice yearly communion services there. He also travelled across Europe visiting record offices and archives – most notably in Poland, Hungary and Transylvania – at a time when such visits were rare and logistically difficult. This is referenced in the service. His researches, whose subject matter stretched over centuries and many areas of religious life, link us with the past and with his life. They set us in context and in time.

Time

Time is the feather’d thing,
And, whilst I praise
The sparklings of thy looks and call them rays,
Takes wing,
Leaving behind him as he flies
An unperceived dimness in thine eyes.
His minutes, whilst they’re told,
Do make us old;
And every sand of his fleet glass,
Increasing age as it doth pass,
Insensibly sows wrinkles there
Where flowers and roses do appear.
Whilst we do speak, our fire
Doth into ice expire,
Flames turn to frost;
And ere we can
Know how our crow turns swan,
Or how a silver snow
Springs there where jet did grow,
Our fading spring is in dull winter lost.
Since then the Night hath hurl’d
Darkness, Love’s shade,
Over its enemy the Day, and made
The world
Just such a blind and shapeless thing
As ’twas before light did from darkness spring,
Let us employ its treasure
And make shade pleasure:
Let ‘s number out the hours by blisses,
And count the minutes by our kisses;
Let the heavens new motions feel
And by our embraces wheel;
And whilst we try the way
By which Love doth convey
Soul unto soul,
And mingling so
Makes them such raptures know
As makes them entranced lie
In mutual ecstasy,
Let the harmonious spheres in music roll!


Jasper Mayne (1604-1672)

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The Free Mind

This Sunday’s online service comes from the First Presbyterian (Non-Subscribing) Church, Downpatrick and is conducted by the minister, Rev Dr David Steers. The reading comes from Luke ch.6 v.43-49. Church organist Laura Patterson plays the hymns and also accompanies Molly McCloy who sings ‘My Lighthouse’ as a solo.

Click on the above video to see the service (available from 9.45 am on Sunday, 25th April 2021)

I call that mind free, which, through confidence in God and in the power of virtue, has cast off all fear but that of wrong-doing, which no menace or peril can enthrall, which is calm in the midst of tumults, and possesses itself though all else be lost. (W.E. Channing)

The service makes use of W.E. Channing’s sermon on ‘Spiritual Freedom’ given in Boston, Mass. in May 1830.

William Ellery Channing (1780-1842) by Henry Cheever Pratt, 1857 (Source: Wikimedia Commons Public Domain)
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The History of the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church of Ireland – part three

Our worship this week comes from Ballee Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church and among other things it considers the next step in our history of the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church. This year is also the tercentenary of Ballee NSP Church building, although the lockdown caused by the pandemic has so far prevented us from celebrating this milestone in the way we had intended.

Artwork at Ballee celebrating the church and its activities made as part of the Neighbours Project organized by Down Community Arts in 2001

Service for Sunday, 14th March 2021. Click on the above video for the service (after 9.45 am on Sunday, 14th March)

The reading is taken from Psalm 145 v.1-9. Church organist John Strain plays the hymns Come let us sing of a wonderful love (Junior Mission Praise 29) and Courage friend and do not stumble (Hymns of Faith and Freedom 329). As well as marking Mothers Day our service also considers the third part of the history of the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church of Ireland.

International Women’s Day

Click on the above video to see Time for a Story: Four Inspirational Women

For this week’s ‘Time for a Story’ Sue Steers has put together this short film for the week of International Women’s Day. It looks at the lives of four women, from different eras, who made a difference to society and the world around them.

In part two of the history of the NSPCI mention was made of Rev Samuel Clarke, Rector of St James’s Piccadilly (or Westminster depending on which location you prefer) who published ‘The Scripture Doctrine of the Trinity’ in 1712. A radical and widely read Anglican theologian in the early eighteenth century, Ballee NSP Church (which has had its own library since the 1830s) actually has eight volumes of Samuel Clarke’s sermons.

But although these were published in 1743 they didn’t come to Ballee then. A signed dedication reveals that they were given by the Rev David Maginnis (who was born in Downpatrick and became minister of York Street in Belfast) to the Rev John Porter, born in Moneyreagh and, in 1850, about to commence his ministry in Ringwood, Hampshire where he stayed for ten years before coming to Ballee in 1860. An interesting indication of a friendship between two radically inclined Non-Subscribing ministers in the mid-nineteenth century, still valuing the works of an Anglican radical of one hundred years before.

It is interesting to note that the volumes originally belonged to an owner who had their own coat of arms which was reproduced in the books as a bookplate. But at some point the name or motto that appeared underneath the coat of arms has been scored out. So, unless an expert in heraldry can tell us who the arms belonged to, we don’t know who the original owner was.

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Let it be so now

This week our service of worship comes from Ballee Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church. The service is conducted by the minister, Rev Dr David Steers, and the reading, from Matthew ch.3 .v.4-17, is given by Carol Nixon. John Strain, church organist plays the hymns In Christ Alone and Take my life, and let it be.

Sunday Worship, 7th February (available after 9.45 am on Sunday)

Today we consider the baptism of Jesus and this encounter related in Matthew’s gospel between Jesus and John the Baptist on the banks of the River Jordan. A moment of revelation – not least for Jesus himself – but also a moment of change where we move from a prophet warning that His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the granary, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire to Jesus’ vision of a kingdom where the least are greatest of all: Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.

You can also listen to our joint service between Ballee, Clough and Downpatrick Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Churches broadcast live from Downpatrick on BBC Radio Ulster on Sunday, 22nd May 2005 here:

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Gladstone’s Library, North Wales

20200212_140253

Along with my friends and colleagues in the ministerial covenant group I had a great time at our meeting at Gladstone’s Library, Hawarden, Flintshire, in February. A unique institution, there is no other Prime Ministerial library in Britain and nothing else like it that hosts all manner of literary and theological courses and meetings.

But I was particularly struck by the words on this postcard on sale at the library:

Gladstone Library 01

The back of the card states: Source W.E. Gladstone, from a letter to Samuel Dukenfield (sic) Darbishire of 2nd January, 1895, quoted in John Morley, Life of Gladstone (1903). Samuel Dukinfield Darbishire and his family were all prominent Manchester Unitarians, members of Cross Street Chapel, so I was interested to see that this quote was in a letter written to him. It makes me want to follow up the 1903 biography and also Roy Jenkins’ biography of W.E. Gladstone, copies of which were available in the library.

But it is a remarkable place. No other Prime Minister has ever been motivated to leave their library to the nation. An impressive legacy and  a marvellous resource.

20200212_140328

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What do those stones mean to you? The 400th anniversary of the Ancient Chapel of Toxteth

“But before he had spent so much time in Oxford as he could have wished that he might have done; the People in Toxteth, whose Children had been taught by him, sent to him, desiring that he would return unto them to instruct not so much their Children as themselves, and that not in meer Humane Literature, but in the things of God. This Call, after due Consideration, for weighty Reasons he accepted of. Being then returned to Toxteth, he Preached his first Sermon November 30. 1618. There was a very great Concourse of people to hear him, and his Labours were highly accepted of by the judicious.”

…part of the reading given by Beryl Black at the 400th anniversary service of the Ancient Chapel of Toxteth on Sunday, 25th November. This section of the reading (from: The Life and Death of That Reverend Man of GOD, Mr. Richard Mather Teacher of the Church in Dorchester in New-England by Increase Mather, Cambridge Mass. 1670) was also reproduced on the back page of the printed order of service.

 

Ancient Chapel 25 November 04

At the opening of worship (Photo: Sue Steers)

It was a tremendous occasion; well attended and enthusiastically received by all who were present. Readings were also given by Graham Murphy, Annette Butler and Leslie Gabriel while Cliff Barton played the organ.

Ancient Chapel 25 November 03

Graham Murphy gives a reading (Photo: Sue Steers)

In addition to the above reading there were readings from T.S. Eliot’s Little Gidding, from Robert Griffith’s The History of the Royal and Ancient Park of Toxteth, Liverpool (1907) and from Joshua ch.4 v.1-9 and John ch.4 v.31-38.

A message was also read from the First Parish Dorchester, Massachusetts, to which place Richard Mather, emigrated in 1635.

Ancient Chapel 25 November 16

Reading the message from Dorchester (Photo: Sue Steers)

The message from Dorchester:

Dear Members of the Ancient Chapel of Toxteth:

First Parish Dorchester sends you our heartfelt greetings and best wishes upon the occasion of your 400th anniversary of your founding. It is rare for us to know a Unitarian congregation older than ours, as we will not mark our 400th anniversary until 2030!  Rev Richard Mather, your first minister and our third minister (1636-1669),  certainly sowed good seeds in our two long-standing faith communities.

It may interest you to know that First Parish Dorchester established the oldest elementary public school in the United States, which is situated right next to the church- and it is called the Mather School!

In our weekly service, we have a time when we light candles of celebration or concern. This Sunday, November 25th, I will light a candle for the Ancient Chapel of Toxteth, in celebration of your four centuries as a gathered community. We rejoice with you in spirit.

Faithfully,

Rev Patricia Brennan

Interim Minister

First Parish Dorchester

Massachusetts

Yo can read more about the Ancient Chapel via these links:

Then and now pictures

Richard Mather and the Ancient Chapel

Jeremiah Horrocks and the Ancient Chapel

Jeremiah Horrocks and the transit of Venus

Two views of a junction in Toxteth

This post has been made on the day of the 400th anniversary of Richard Mather’s first sermon in Toxteth.

With special thanks to Jim Kenny who devised the logo used for the 400th anniversary.

ACoT landscape logo