ISSUE SEVENTEEN – FEB/MAR 2012

Diocese of Christchurch

Everything’s Coming Up RosesTeamwork at Anglican Care South Canterbury

Singing the Sacred

A Very Recycled Christmas

AnglicanINVITING / FORMING / SENDING / SERVINGanglicanlife.org.nz

He Oranga Mihinare

AnglicanLife Issue 17

ContentsBISHOP’S ADDRESS: Jesus and Change

FEATURE: Teamwork at Anglican Care South Canterbury

FEATURE: Apartment Dwellers Are Down to Earth

FEATURE: Everything’s Coming Up Roses

EPICENTRE: Design Guidelines

WORKPLACE: Hanging Up the Phone

WORKPLACE: Volunteer Contribution Recognised

DIALOGUE: RCP Project Managers in Post-earthquake Christchurch

LIFESTYLE: Singing the Sacred

LIFESTYLE: NZ Hymns, Songs & Carols

CULTURE: A Very Recycled Christmas

CLOSING ESSAY: An Unaccomodated Lent

Cover: Bishopspark Retirement Village gardener, Stephen Cartwright

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ISSUE 17February/March 2012

AnglicanLife is published bi-monthly by the Anglican Diocese of Christchurch.

ISSN 2253-1653

Editor Philip Baldwin

Contributing Writer Megan Blakie

Contributors +Victoria Matthews, Nick Beale, Hugh Bowron, John Coop, Spanky Moore, Tessa Raing, Marcus

Read, Dave Wethey

Advertising Enquiries Ivan Hatherley – ihatherley@clear.net.nz

Editorial Enquiries Philip Baldwin – editor@anglicanlife.org.nz

Design – www.baylymoore.com

Printed by – Toltech Print

Sustainability – AnglicanLife is printed on recycled paper using vegetable-based inks.

WORDS: +VICTORIA MATTHEWS PHOTO: DAVE WETHEY

Have you ever considered how much change Jesus introduced into his environment?

Bishop’s Address: Jesus and Change

EDITORIAL

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UK Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks has drawn attention to three words that are spoken frequently by Jesus in the New Testament. They are “…but I say…”. (Read Matthew 5 to see what he means.) The Law and the Prophets are eternal authorities, and Jesus was a most faithful Jew who lived the received faith.

But Jesus was able to see in the words of Scripture what others could not. His insights and vision changed the world then, and they continue to transform the world today. It is our calling as Christians to live Jesus’ Kingdom vision, and that means looking forward and growing forward in everything we do.

For the last sixteen months the citizens of Canterbury have been forced to live with change in unprecedented ways. We have lost our homes and churches, landmarks and community centres. We have developed relationships with people we had never previously met, and we are deemed as one of New Zealand’s most exciting cities by the Lonely Planet Guidebook on New Zealand because of the community that has evolved.

But underneath it all there is also a deep desire to go back to the way things were: to rebuild the Cathedral, to save St Mary’s Merivale, and to build new parish churches in all the same locations as before.

Is this God’s will? I believe we need to look ahead not

back. I also believe that looking forward to the future is what God is calling us to do. The Strategic Working Group has identified 44 new housing developments anticipated for the city and Diocese. One of these developments will have 4000 homes. Are we committed to speak the Gospel to those new communities, and more importantly live the Gospel in their midst? We won’t be able to, if every step of the way we are primarily focused on rebuilding the past.

The years 2012 through 2022 will be incredibly exciting and challenging, and 50 to 100 years from now the people of Canterbury will live surrounded by the buildings that we built as part of our response to the 2010-2012 earthquake-initiated crisis. I hope and pray that they will say of us: “They served the people and the Gospel well by building communities of care and buildings that are safe and beautiful.”

Now that is a vision of transformation that I can celebrate.

A N G L I C A N A G E D C A R E

B I S H O P S P A R K • F I T Z G E R A L D

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Independent, semi-independent or24-hour full care.

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FEATURE

Teamwork at Anglican Care South CanterburyAnglican Care South Canterbury has a waiting list for its counselling services. A waiting list at a social service agency is a bit of a mixed blessing: it means people have a slight delay in getting assistance, but it also signals that the organisation’s services are in demand. Megan Blakie finds out more about the agency that is providing social services in the southern part of the diocese.

WORDS: MEGAN BLAKIE

Under the guidance of manager Gwenda Kendrew (who is into her second year with the agency), Anglican Care South Canterbury is adapting and planning for the future. Innovative programmes and partnerships with other agencies continue to be developed to meet growing community needs in the region. Gwenda is also on the lookout for new premises.

“We’re running above capacity at the moment, if that makes sense!” she says.

In the agency’s annual report for 2011, Gwenda lists some of the changes that were implemented during that year: doubling the number of counselling appointments made available in Geraldine, setting up a regular half-day of counselling in

Temuka, and establishing an after-school programme in Twizel to help girls with self-esteem issues.

“Our counsellors all have different ways of working. I‘ve a team who are quite varied in their methods, so we can look at a person and their issues, and know exactly [which practitioner] could be good for them,” she says about her staff of five part-time counsellors.

The team also comprises two community workers, a food bank, an op shop co-ordinator, and two part-time administrative staff.

Professional standards are high and Gwenda encourages on-going training for her team. Staff must adhere to Anglican

Gwenda Kendrew, Manager, Anglican Care South Canterbury

“Our counsellors all have different ways of working. I‘ve a team who are quite varied in their methods, so we can look at a person and their issues, and know exactly

[which practitioner] could be good for them.”

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FEATURE

Care’s code of ethics, and the counselling and social work practitioners maintain registration with their relevant nationwide professional bodies.

Funding for Anglican Care South Canterbury comes from three sources, which may surprise those who assumed that the agency’s running costs were paid by the Anglican Church. A third of its $200,000-plus annual budgeted income comes from government contracts and grants; another third is raised through applications to philanthropic trusts and similar sources; the remainder comes from donations and client fees. The diocesan contribution comes under the third (‘donation’) category.

“The aim is for us to be financially independent of the diocese,” says Gwenda. “At the same time they do contribute to our work,” she adds.

She explains further: “They manage us, and we come under their umbrella. But we’re just one of the parts of the diocese, of the Anglican Church as a whole, and everyone is asking for money from the same bucket. The diocese certainly does give; if I have a project

and I require their support, then I can approach our trust board.”

Alongside that diocesan support is the generosity of local parishioners and individuals. Gwenda can’t praise their generosity enough.

“I’ve been blown away with how much parishioners give. We’ve got faithful parishioners who give regularly to us, both financially and in goods. Most of the parishes here give food for our food bank every week; they do the basket [collection] at church and someone brings it in from the parish. That kind of gift contributes towards our costs.”

The agency sets a fee-level for the counselling services it provides, but Gwenda acknowledges that not all clients are able to pay. She says the agency views each situation on a case-by-case basis. Some funding is available to cover fees on a client’s behalf, and there’s also a dedicated amount to assist rural clients.

With grants and trust funding comes accountability. The Ministry of Social Development, which is a significant funder of the agency’s counselling services, has a three-year contract with the agency.

Gwenda is required to make a detailed audit report each year.

“The contacts and grants that we get—whether from government or other funders—normally come with quite strict stipulations about what the money is to be used for and what the expected outcomes are, particularly around the number of clients [we are to help]. We are attractive to some funders because we specialise in [helping with] grief and loss, and we do quite a lot of work with children,” she says.

Adapting the agency to changing needs within South Canterbury’s communities, and maintaining funding levels, provides Gwenda with plenty of management challenges. However, at no time does she contemplate a re-think of the Church’s involvement in social services.

“Any church should be involved in social services: we should be about caring for people and walking alongside people and whatever is going on for them. It’s about finding out how ‘the Church’ can work alongside ‘this part of the Church’—together—in helping people become well or become strong.”

“We’ve got faithful parishioners who give regularly to us, both

financially and in goods. Most of the parishes here give food for

our food bank every week.”

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Apartment Dwellers Are Down to EarthLiving in an apartment hasn’t stopped residents at Harper Gardens from rolling up their sleeves and tilling the soil.

WORDS: MEGAN BLAKIE

Harper Gardens’ resident Elsie Sanders lives up to her apartment’s name: she enjoys being part of the complex’s new garden club.

Green-fingered retirees from the 29-apartment complex, which is part of the Fitzgerald Retirement Village owned by Anglican Aged Care, have formed a garden club as a way to keep busy and creative.

Elsie Sanders is a member of the group, who’ve called themselves the “Late Bloomers Garden Club”.

“I do as much as I can!” she says, before explaining that it’s hard to keep her away from gardening.

Each member of the garden club takes responsibility for looking after the eight sections of the existing rose and flower garden. Raised vegetable gardens have also been constructed and a garden seat sits in the newly cultivated area called the “Mary Armitage Garden”. This area was created for newly arrived residents displaced from flats at the earthquake-damaged Churchill Courts retirement complex.

The amateur gardeners all have keys to the communal garden shed (which was relocated from Churchill Courts), and can pop down to potter in their allocated patch at any time. Vegetables can be harvested by any of the apartment residents, and club instigator Graeme Stanley says you have to be quick to pick.

“Broad beans are my favourite vegetable. My mother-in-law [who’s also a resident] said, ‘You’d better pick the broad beans or they mightn’t survive the night’; I came down the next morning and they’d all been picked,” he laughs.

Plantings happen almost as mysteriously. Rows of beetroot,

potatoes, and radishes have been known to “appear” overnight.Graeme says activities such as the gardening club have

brought the residents together. Other social activities, which include a monthly barbeque and weekly social gatherings, have been started and are proving popular.

“We found after the [February] earthquake it made a big difference bringing everyone together. People are queuing up at ten to four for 4’o’clock happy hour!” says Graeme.

Rows of beetroot, potatoes, and radishes have been known to “appear” overnight.

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FEATURE

Stephen has transformed the neighbouring flowerbed into a small fruit and veggie plot. He hopes that the proceeds will make their

way into residents’ kitchens.

Beautiful blooms are bringing cheer to residents and staff, thanks to the efforts of gardener Stephen Cartwright, who relocated four beds of roses threatened by demolition works at the village.

“We lost a seven-story mid-rise building but we were able to save all the roses and bag them up over winter. We’ve created a new rose garden in front of the Molly Pyatt complex; it’s like a remembrance garden because these roses were donated many years ago. They’ve been saved and…look lovely at the moment,” says Stephen.

“It’s also a remembrance garden for all the hassle and what we’ve gone through,” he adds, referring to the Canterbury earthquakes.

A shingled area housing a few parked cars takes the place of the high-rise apartment block that was deemed unsafe to live in and demolished last year. Stephen has transformed the neighbouring flowerbed into a small fruit and veggie plot. He hopes that the proceeds will make their way into residents’ kitchens.

“It took a whole day to clear it out before I could put any [plants] in the ground. I had to take away rubble—concrete and rocks and metal and stuff. It was a nightmare!” recalls Stephen.

His hard work has paid off: tomatoes, corn, potatoes, eggplants, and other plants are flourishing. Residents are invited to help harvest the vegetables for a gold coin donation, which will go towards seeds, compost, and other items to replenish the garden.

“It’s been quite a talking point,” says Stephen.

Everything’s Coming Up Roses Everything’s coming up roses at Bishopspark Retirement Village, the Anglican Aged Care complex in central Christchurch.

WORDS: MEGAN BLAKIE

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EpicentreDesign Guidelines

In the aftermath of the earthquakes’ destructive effects on churches in the Diocese of Christchurch, RCP (Resource Co-ordination Partnership Ltd) recommended that the Church consider a Design Guidelines process that would provide a strategic framework for planning new churches, as well as for repairing and rebuilding damaged ones.

STORIES OF HOPE FROM THE FAULTLINE

The development of design guidelines has previously served RCP and the Diocese’s architects Warren and Mahoney well in listening to, understanding, and recording client needs—even challenging those needs—in preparing and defining design briefs for projects.

In consultation with Church Property Trustees, Warren and Mahoney (in association with Tennent Brown Architects) facilitated three public workshops in September 2011 to listen to the ideas of people across the diocese, recording their input in six distinct themes: Sacred Space, Engaging the Community, Transcendence and Intimacy, Sustainability, Envisioning Our Future, and Bi-culturalism/3 Tikanga/Multiculturalism. Church leaders were also interviewed as part of this consultation process.

Collating and interpreting the data from the feedback forms consumed approximately eight weeks, and Warren and Mahoney architect John Coop has been instrumental in producing the document that has developed from the intensive consultation process. He commented: “Listening is important. This is a challenging period for the Diocese and the guidelines process has provided an opportunity for a wide range of ideas to be expressed, and thoughts to be heard and documented.

“Our role is to faithfully summarise the thinking and to express it back to the Diocese as a positive and inspirational future in the form of a strategic brief and set of design guidelines. From there, design briefs for projects at parish level can be developed.”

The Design Guidelines can be an important strategic tool offering back input from the breadth of the diocese and from an independent perspective, as well as suggesting ways of designing buildings that reflect that input. The guidelines can bring together a multitude of ideas that are often talked about, but maybe have not been presented or shown or developed in a systematic way.

RCP project manager Marcus Read noted: “It becomes a really effective way of reviewing the organization’s current position, but also looking to the future of where an organization wants to be. Certainly developing design guidelines for the Diocese has been the most thorough design guidelines process that we have been involved in, and Warren and Mahoney are to be congratulated for that.”

The design guidelines can be thought of as a framework of “building block ideas” that the architect uses for a specific project. The project brief that is created is a local application of suggestions from the guidelines that a parish chooses to emphasise. Every

WORDS: PHILIP BALDWIN WITH JOHN COOP

project has a different answer, because it needs to address different mission goals, community issues, site requirements, and financial realities. A parish can take something from each of the different inputs and bring them together holistically to make the appropriate solution for the given set of circumstances.

Nick Beale, RCP project manager, commented, “The Design Guidelines are not a rulebook, they’re a vision in a way for the project, a strategy and a help to provide guidance. There are options within those outputs and variants, but there’s an overall guide that will take you to a completed space.”

When the process of consultation and feedback is completed, the Design Guidelines will be published on the Anglican Life website (www.anglicanlife.org.nz) and opportunities to give additional feedback will be available there, as well.

“Listening is important. This is a challenging period for the

Diocese and the guidelines process has provided an

opportunity for a wide range of ideas to be expressed, and

thoughts to be heard and documented.”

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sustainability

relevance

sacredspace

community engagement

transcendence

envisioning

our future

intimacy

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Hanging Up the Phone Administrator Roberta Mclennan has hung up her work phone for the time-being. The long-time staff member of Anglican Care finished in December after more than 24 years with the organisation, ten of which were with Anglican Aged Care.

WORDS & PHOTO: MEGAN BLAKIE

“She was an amazing and faithful staff member,” says Anglican Aged Care director Alison Jephson.

Roberta was the first port of call for public enquiries, and was responsible for accounts and billing work. Most recently she, along with Alison, worked out of a flat in the vacated Churchill Retirement Complex; their previous office was in the red-stickered Anglican Centre in central Christchurch.

During her career, Roberta had also been based at Bishopspark Retirement Village and it was there, in particular, that she was able to appreciate daily interaction with the elderly residents.

“Our residents are the highlights of my job; we have some wonderful people who had led some interesting lives. They’re a joy to speak with,” she says.

Roberta intends to spend some of her new-found free time with her two granddaughters but she doesn’t discount the possibility of picking up some part-time work in future.

“I’m certainly going to have a break for two or three months! I’m really looking forward to getting my home garden in order again, and getting back to spinning and pottery,” she says enthusiastically. “I won’t say I haven’t had time for [hobbies] this year, but my mind hasn’t been in the right place, I’m afraid,” she adds, alluding to the after-effects of the earthquakes.

FINANCE / CAREER / STEWARDSHIP / ETHICS

Workplace

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Volunteer Contribution Recognised An Anglican Aged Care volunteer was one of 21 individuals to have their community contributions acknowledged at regional level at the end of last year.

WORDS: MEGAN BLAKIE

Elizabeth Risk received a Volunteer Recognition Award at a ceremony hosted by Volunteering Canterbury, the charitable trust that links people with opportunities to do unpaid charitable work. The award recognised Elizabeth’s 14-year connection with the Fitzgerald and Churchill Retirement Complexes, as well as her earlier position on the Anglican Care Board in the 1970s.

Elizabeth visited the elderly residents, assisted with recreational activities, and helped them to attend chapel services. She recalls with particular fondness one resident who was wheelchair - bound and handicapped.

“We were at the museum one day and it started to rain and…I said to her, ‘Come on, hurry up, you’ll get wet’; I turned round and

she was sitting there with both her hands out and her face up to the rain and she was just enjoying being out in the rain, because it was something she hadn’t experienced for years,” says Elizabeth.

“It was just one of those magic moments,” she adds.

Anglican Aged Care director Alison Jephson says Elizabeth had a “genuine regard” for the residents, added a sense of fun and enjoyment to events, and brought “intelligence and wide experience” to her work as a volunteer.

The damage and closure of the Churchill complex as a result of February’s earthquake ended Elizabeth’s involvement there. She is considering taking up other volunteering opportunities in future.

WORKPLACE

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DialoguePHILIP BALDWIN WITH NICK BEALE AND MARCUS READ

RCP Project Managers in Post-earthquake ChristchurchNick Beale and Marcus Read, Project Managers for RCP (Resource Co-ordination Partnership Ltd) took time out for a conversation with Philip Baldwin about their work and their role in the earthquake recovery process.

WORDS & PHOTO: PHILIP BALDWIN

PB: What is a Project Manager?MR: Project Managers are specialists

hired by clients who want to take a project—in our case, a building project—from the start of an idea, managing a budget, taking it through design and development, the consenting authorities, tendering, getting the right contractors, to the delivery of that idea in its final form.NB: We bring all the various parties in

to deliver their vision…MR: …within the time frame and the

budget that they have.PB: What happens when a client’s

vision isn’t practical or doesn’t really meet their needs?MR: The first part of our engagement is

usually listening, understanding the client and their vision. We feed a preliminary brief back to the client: “This is where we think

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you are trying to get to, and these are the parameters that you want to work within.”NB: Our role is to get the right people

to measure their vision and challenge it, putting up the options and the costs, and the pros and cons.MR: A client may have an idea of what

the building was going to look like at the beginning, and it may turn out to be quite different, because there’s an evolution of thinking through that briefing process.PB: How does one become a Project

Manager?NB: Most building project managers

start somewhere within the broad range of building professions.MR: I studied architecture and came

to project management through a number of design projects with community non-profit organizations. I enjoyed the process of working with people who had a specific problem and needed to find a solution.NB: I started as a civil structural

engineer and learned that a good project manager enjoys the process as much as the delivery of a certain aspect, so I gravitated towards project management. One of a project manager’s greatest skills is building a team to deliver a project.MR: A key part of leading that team

is enjoying working with people, and having really good relationships with them…because usually projects have a number of moments where there’s a hard decision to be made. That’s when a project manager needs to bring together the right relationships, the right parties, and the right knowledge to make that decision.PB: How do you see the role of RCP in

post-earthquake Christchurch?MR: We were employed initially to help

the city and Civil Defence set up a process

for urgent demolitions. Other clients asked us to work through assessing buildings: what can be repaired, what may be replaced, what may no longer have any value. That’s been quite a large portion of RCP’s contribution to Christchurch’s recovery so far.PB: How is your faith as Christians

reflected in what you do?NB: RCP has been founded and run

on Christian values: integrity, honesty, fairness. It’s a mandate that we’ve brought into any project: being even-handed to clients, architects, and contractors, and being fair and reasonable in everything. Especially when the issues of the earthquake are tragic and very difficult, you need a clear and even way to deal with things. Marcus and I were very keen to get involved with the Anglican portfolio. We came down here with the goal of providing a cost-effective service to help CPT, the Cathedral, and the Diocese through very difficult times.MR: As a teenager, I had a vision that I

think was from God, that I would be involved in disaster recovery. I always thought that would be in the Third World. So it was quite interesting that I was in Christchurch, I had specific skills, and in my profession I could offer those to help the community in a disaster recovery situation. I think it’s one of those times where God was having a bit of a chuckle about the differences between my anticipated vision of disaster recovery and His!NB: We’ve very much had a focus of

giving back to the community. After the earthquakes, we said that we proactively wanted to get involved in the recovery process, particularly with CPT and the Anglican Church.

DIALOGUE

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Singing the SacredWilliam L (Bill) Wallace launched his latest book in a most unusual way: the assembled well-wishers at St Andrew’s at Presbyterian Church at Rangi Ruru had a chance to sing a number of his newly published works from the collection Singing the Sacred: A Collection of Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs.

WORDS & PHOTOS: PHILIP BALDWIN

FAMILY / SOCIAL JUSTICE / ENVIRONMENT / SUSTAINABILITY / SPIRITUALITY

Lifestyle

Some people may be intrigued as to how Bill Wallace, a Methodist minister, was able to get this collection of his hymns published by World Library Publications whose mission is “to provide outstanding pastoral resources to strengthen and support the quality of worship and prayer in Catholic parishes and homes worldwide”. The answer according to Bill lies in the mystical dimension that is present in many of his hymns: “While religion may divide, mysticism unites, since its basic understanding is that everything is connected and everything is one. Leading Catholic mystic, Brother David Steindl-Rast, O.S.B. says that Bill “explores the frontiers of spirituality, but his hymns are not esoteric. They speak to the mystic in each of us.”

Acknowledging influences as wide ranging as Hildegard of Bingen, Meister Eckhart, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Karl

Jung, creation spirituality, liberation theology, feminism, and contemporary scientific thinking, Bill notes that his work has sometimes been passed over for publication with the explanation that there’s too much “justice” in his hymns. “In other words”, says Bill, “publishers have become very market-orientated, and the market is not for justice hymns. Most church goers are nice, polite, middle-class people who are doing very nicely and don’t want to be challenged about where their wealth came from.”

Singing the Sacred includes his hymn, “Wealth and Poverty”, with this stanza:

Then how should Christians view their wealth

And what does God condemn?“Both poverty and wealth,” says God,“Will chant Earth’s requiem.”“In other words,” explains Bill, “one

is as bad as the other. This is not a typical

“Bill explores the frontiers of spirituality, but his hymns are not esoteric. They speak to the mystic in each of us.”

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American Protestant viewpoint, which is that wealth is a gift from God….Our whole society in the West is going to be destroyed by its worship of materialism, and its inability to form an economic system that actually relates to the current realities where growth has to be stopped if the ecosystem, including human beings, is to be preserved.”

Like many people today Bill recognises that the crisis in the church, “is not going to be solved simply by amalgamating parishes or creating other forms of ministry. It is a crisis of spirituality and what form of spirituality is relevant to most people today.” He certainly has had some sympathy with attempts to “indigenise” NZ hymnody by setting it in the context of native flora and fauna (think of the NZPB’s “Benedicite Aotearoa”), but he is much more concerned with the widening gap between Christianity and our society which “is much deeper than the irrelevance of Northern hemisphere images to our Southern hemisphere.…The traditional images that Christianity still uses in the main reflect a pre-scientific worldview which growing numbers of Western society no longer accept.”

The songs in Singing the Sacred attempt to bridge the gap between traditional Christianity and a scientific view of humans and the universe by putting basic Christian concepts into language that ties in with contemporary science:

Rejoice, rejoice at Christmas time,All flesh reflects God’s grace.The realm that atoms dance withinIs nature’s ballet space.Another way that Bill sees this gap

between Christianity and modern society being bridged is by adopting a more mystical approach to hymnody. “Mystery lies beyond what can be put into words,”

he suggests—an idea illustrated in the antitheses of his hymn “God Is Beyond All Words”:

God is beyond all wordsYet all the words belong in God,For God is the story and the statement,The journey and the goal,The movement and the resting,The fragment and the whole.When he is composing hymns, Bill

finds that having a traditional tune in mind is an advantage “because that helps with the rhythm of the thing…but I discovered that every set of words has a tune within it.” In creating melodies for his hymns, he is looking for “the pattern of notes that fits in with the words. When there is that complementarity, it’s easy for people to sing [the hymn]. If there is a discontinuity between the tune and the words, then it becomes difficult for people to fit the words in, to see how they go, and [understand] the whole emotional ‘feel’ of those words.”

Part of the attractiveness of Singing the Sacred is the inclusion of alternate hymn tune settings that might match (sometimes even contrast with) the tone of particular hymn lyrics, or the singing ability of a particular church congregation. “The ability of congregations to sing anything difficult is declining, and so, the simpler the tune the better. I’ve been very fortunate having Graham Hollobon and Barry Brinson being prepared to harmonise melodies for me….What I am really writing is hymns for the future. People have told me that probably in my lifetime they won’t be all that popular, but…things are changing.”

One of the ways that Bill sees this change in the style of worship music: “There will be a movement in the future away from traditional hymns to more chant-like things…refrains and antiphons…and more silence between

things.” And here Bill comes back to one of his own refrains: “Mystery does not exist in a vast number of words. Mystery comes in the silence between the words, just as the music comes in the space between the notes, and the variation in the length of that space, which is the difference between a very good artist and one who plays without that slight variation that makes all the difference.”

Bill’s own experience of needing hymns for particular liturgical celebrations has influenced his writing, and can be seen in the inclusion of material for Christmas, Epiphany, Transfiguration, Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter, Pentecost, and Communion of the Saints. The 36 hymns in this publication also encompass contemporary subjects like ecology, inclusiveness, oneness, self-affirmation,

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LIFESTYLE

and wholeness, as well as more traditional hymn themes: the cross, forgiveness, suffering, and wisdom. Parishes, retreat groups, and individuals that are looking for contemporary hymnody with a more challenging expression of spirituality and mysticism will find this collection useful throughout the year.

Singing the Sacred: A Collection of Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs. World Library Publications, 2011.

Available from Ecclesia Books and Epworth BooksBill Wallace’s earlier book The Mystery Telling can now be

accessed from the website of the Methodist Church of New Zealand at www.methodist.org.nz/resources/hymns/index.

Ably performed by the Auckland-based chamber choir, Viva Voce, conducted by John Rosser, and accompanied on organ and keyboard by Michael Bell, organist at St Matthew in the City, Auckland, this recording provides an all-too-brief introduction to Hope Is Our Song’s 158 hymns, carols and songs by 48 New Zealand writers and composers.

Not surprisingly the CD, like the wire-bound book, includes a preponderance of material by Barry Brinson, Colin Gibson, and Shirley Murray. The contents are varied and representative in other ways, including hymns for Christmas, Good Friday, Eastertide, Ascension, Waitangi Day, and Anzac Day, as well as songs based on specific scripture passages (Luke 1: 46–55, Romans 8:35–39, Micah 6:8).

Musical director John Rosser has done his best to avoid the tonal

monotony that threatens most choral recordings, by judicious alternation of unison and four-part harmonies (even when these are not offered in the printed music), accompaniment by organ and piano, and occasional stanzas performed either by the choir unaccompanied or by solo voices. The choir’s diction is exceptional, and almost makes the inclusion of full texts in the CD booklet superfluous.

If there is a musical weakness in the performance of Viva Voce, it is the imbalance among the choir’s voices. Soprano and tenor predominate in the choral sound, particularly with organ accompaniment, where the alto and bass seem to blend too much into the instrumental background. Only in the few unaccompanied tracks is the balance of the voice parts more musically satisfying.

This recording fits in with the Trust’s policy “to publish hymns, songs and carols—with new words and new tunes—

Contemporary NZ Hymns, Songs & Carols Hope Is Our Song, the latest publication of the NZ Hymnbook Trust, is now supported by a CD sampler with 27 representative hymns from the hymn book.

WORDS & PHOTOS: PHILIP BALDWIN

that are ecumenical, contemporary and of Aotearoa New Zealand”, and follows the presumably successful practice of marketing CD samplers for the earlier Alleluia Aotearoa, Carol Our Christmas, and Faith Forever Singing.

The real value in the CD must be to lead the listener and church musician back to the printed music book, whose range of themes for worship, connections with specific scripture passages, and applications to the church year (all amply demonstrated in the indices) can support parishes searching for a more contemporary indigenous musical expression in their worship.

Contacts for the New ZealandHymnbook Trust:PO Box 4142Palmerston North 4442Email: info@hymns.org.nzWebsite: www.hymns.org.nz

16 AnglicanLife Issue 17

CultureA Very Recycled ChristmasCast your mind back to Christmas Day for a moment. It’s easy to recall the highlights: sherried trifle, carol CDs on endless repeat, and that excruciating look of pre-present excitement kids wear on Christmas morning.

WORDS: SPANKY MOORE PHOTOS: TESSA RAING

CultureFILM / MUSIC / LITERATURE / WEB / FOOD / EVENTS

facilities. With new customer bins in action since September, The Palms now diverts half of customers’ waste to recycling. “We were stoked to see The Palms provide recycling bins, especially in time for Christmas. Attitudes of public places towards recycling reflects on all of us,” said Beth Alexander, a student at Riccarton High School.

But not happy to rest on their laurels over the issue, the group came up with a creative way of getting their ecological

However, an oft-forgotten byproduct of all this cheer is…rubbish. Come Boxing Day many households can virtually fill a room with old wrapping paper and short-lived product packaging. Of course most people recycle what they can of this non-edible stuffing, but you may be surprised to learn that not all Christchurch shopping malls, the source of most of this rubbish, have the same attitude.

A group of students from St Timothy’s Parish in Burnside and Riccarton High School were shocked to discover that while some malls were providing recycling bins to help Christmas shoppers do the right thing with their waste, the Westfield Mall in Riccarton wasn’t. Kate Alexander, the group’s organizer, said: “Only The Palms provides customers with recycling bins, and they divert about three tonnes per week from landfill. Meanwhile Westfield has no recycling bins for their customers at all.”

Impressed by The Palms new system, the students organised a visit to the

point across to Westfield Mall. They made their own life-sized costumes of well known recyclable junk—including french-fry packets, coke cans, and, quite literally, the largest milkshake in town—and then strolled through the mall during rush hour Christmas shopping on the prowl for recycling bins. They didn’t find any, but judging from the reactions of shoppers and mall management, they certainly got their point across.

Australian Westfields already provide recycling bins, but Westfield New Zealand has not publicised when it will provide recycling bins for customers, and appears to be falling behind its international counterparts. The students hope light-hearted actions like theirs might push Westfield Riccarton and other malls in the right direction sooner rather than later.

“Christians have the task of protecting and restoring God’s creation. We’re called to be good stewards. Recycling is a great way to protect the environment, as it cuts down the resources, energy, and landfill

17

space we use,” said Kate. “Westfield malls in the US have had exemplary recycling systems since 1995. We hope that sixteen years later, Westfield Riccarton will make recycling a priority. If one mall can put in recycling bins, the others can, too. It’s a pity Westfield and other malls didn’t have bins in time for Christmas shoppers, but we look forward to what they will do in 2012.”

CULTURE CLOSING ESSAY

An Unaccommodated LentA thoughtful recent arrival from overseas reflected on the Anglican Church where he now found himself a member. “Do they realise how accommodated they are?” he asked me.

WORDS: HUGH BOWRON

By that he meant that the Anglican Church here has so bent over backwards to fit in with its surrounding culture that it is often hard to tell the difference between it and its secular matrix. The Church has achieved such a comfortable fit with New Zealand secular society that it has lost its distinctive edge.

This observation resonated with me, because it summed up much of the unease and disquiet I feel about the Church I have belonged to all my adult life. Immediately I felt the temptation to join in condemning the Church that, in its desire to become authentically itself in our contemporary culture, has often seemed to become a pale reflection of whatever current enthusiasm is around.

But the trouble with this sort of analysis is in the assumption that the accommodated Church came about as a result of what others have done to it, and that putting things right would be a matter of pushing those “others” to fix it. It ignores the more disturbing and interesting question of the extent to which I have been complicit in shaping the compromised Church. To

what extent have my decisions, words, and actions been a part of a pattern of collusion with unregenerate ways of looking at the world?

This Lent I will audit myself around the extent to which I am an “accommodationist” Christian. I will review the ways in which I have been complicit in bringing about a compromised Church. I will develop some action points to make me more congruent with the counter-cultural lifestyle that should go with being a convinced Christian.

It is surprising what can become grist to the mill once you start out on this process. Recently I finished reading Richard B Hays, The Moral Vision of the New Testament, and was left wondering if I had ever really been a Christian. And I find the question the Bishop puts to us from time to time a useful starter in considering my associational patterns: “If you couldn’t imagine being comfortable inviting Christ into a particular situation in your life, then what are you doing there?”

I will see if I can keep an unaccommodated Lent.

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