The Messenger The Messenger PARISH OF SAINT MARK REMUERA OF SAINT MARK REMUERA May PARISH 2018 Parish website: www.stmarks.org.nz Editor: Debra Hall
Welcome! Tena koe /Welcome to this Autumn edition of the Messenger. As I write, the Easter Season is drawing to a close and the high, holy days of Pentecost and Trinity Sunday are rapidly approaching. I have had the privilege of being Vicar of St Mark’s for almost three months. It has been a busy time. Moving in to any new location and job involves learning new things and building new relationships, but to arrive on the first Monday in Lent, having celebrated the First Sunday in Lent the day before in Sandringham, ensured that this would be a busy time indeed. I am fortunate to have the love and support of a very capable wife who took the challenge of making a home out of the Vicarage in her stride. I am fortunate as well to have the kind support of many very capable people in this Parish. On my first Friday in the parish, Trevor Brooker and I co-officiated at Beryl Anton’s Funeral. The day after that I baptised Scarlett Ewen, and the following Sunday I took my first 8.00am and 9.30am Services at St Mark’s. There is always a bit of mystery, no matter how prepared one is, about the doing of services in new surroundings, but I felt, from the beginning, well supported by each of the parishioners working beside me in those services. I am impressed by the way that St Mark’s actively connects with the wider community of which it is part. The well-appointed Parish Hall plays an important part in facilitating this connection. Groups such as Communicare, The Remuera Lions, Baby Sensory and Mainly Music each, in their own way, offer care, services and companionship to local people. Some of those folks are Parishioners but the majority are not. That doesn’t matter. Over time they learn to appreciate the work that generations of parishioners have put in to create the facilities we can now offer, and this place becomes their ‘go-to’ place for the marking of life’s milestones. Of course the beautiful church itself is a drawcard for people, for marriages, baptisms, funerals and simply as a place of respite in a busy world.
One of many highlights of my first few months at St Mark’s was the opportunity to be part of the Dilworth Service on 15 March. The boys from the Junior Campus came, as they do each year, to pay tribute to James (1815-1894) and Isabella Dilworth (1828-1910), their benefactors, who were parishioners here. They do so through worship in the church, and via a massed haka in the graveyard where the couple is buried. Another highlight was the ANZAC Day Service organized by the Newmarket Business Association. It began with a parade through Newmarket – from Teed Street, along Broadway and on to Olympic Reserve. We were led by the City of Auckland Pipe Band, in fine form, on what was a gloriously fine day.
On Sunday, 4 March, I formally welcomed Gareth Bezett and his wife Tracey Wakefield to the Parish. Gareth is studying at St John’s College, with the intention of becoming a Lay Theologian, and will be on placement at St Mark’s for the rest of the 2018. Since then Gareth has preached here and been a liturgist, and we look forward to him continuing to bless us in those areas, but also in the area of adult education which he has a passion for. In early April, I was pleased to sign an employment agreement with Anne Driver who has been working as the Children and Families Minister since February of this year. Anne coordinates Mainly Music, the Sunday School and organises the activities that take place during All-Age Worship (at 9.30am on the Third Sunday of the month). In the Parish Profile that was prepared last year there was a clear concern that investment needed to be made in this area of ministry. Anne, I believe, will prove to be a very effective response to that concern. She has a strong faith, creativity, attention to detail and, to top it off, is a registered school teacher. Please support her ministry anyway you can. As Christians we are on a mission that begins and ends in God. Just as our Lord was sent into the world to do the Father’s will, so we who have been baptised into Christ have a mission to carry out. It is important to know what the outlines of that mission are if we are to plan our way ahead effectively. One recent and important definition of the Church’s Mission for Anglicans is the ‘Five-Fold Mission Statement’ agreed by the Anglican Consultative Committee and endorsed by the General Synod / Te Hinota Whanui of our Church, the Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia. 2
These ‘five marks of mission’ are the purposes against which everything we do as faithful Anglicans is to be measured. Over the coming months I will be working with Vestry to Five-Fold Mission Statement examine the ways we are (i) To proclaim the good news of the already meeting these purposes, Kingdom; while at the same time asking (ii) To teach, baptise and nurture new how we might better achieve believers; them. (iii) To respond to human needs by The achievement of these goals loving service; is not easy – in fact it is humanly impossible. (iv) To seek to transform unjust structures of society, to challenge Our faith, however, is in a God violence of every kind and to for whom nothing is impossible pursue peace and reconciliation; (Matt 19:26), who is able to take ordinary people and allow (v) To strive to safeguard the integrity them to do extraordinary things. of creation and sustain and renew In that God, alone, we place our the life of the earth. trust; in Jesus’ name.
Anzac Day 2018 An extract from Tony’s ANZAC Day Homily, preached at Olympic Reserve for the Newmarket Business Association’s ANZAC Service, 25 April 2018, 9.00am
Infantry from the 2nd Battalion, Auckland Regiment, New Zealand Division, Battle of the Somme, September 1916 (copyright status of photograph: public domain)
“I think if you asked many people where God was in the unfolding carnage of World War One, the answer you would get was that God was absent, and that the events of the First World War demonstrate more fully than anything else can that there isn’t a God at all – at least not a very effective one when it comes to protecting millions from suffering and death. 3
I understand that argument. It is a reasonable argument but it has a response and that response is found, for Christians, in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus suffered an agonizing execution not because God abandoned him but because of human choices which individually and collectively conspired against the goodness of God that Jesus’ life revealed. Those choices were influenced by greed, jealousy, lust for power and status – and a raft of other selfish concerns which are common to all human beings and every human society. They are the forces within us, individually and collectively, which lead to conflict, violence, and ultimately to war. We have this potential for destruction, paradoxically, as a consequence of our creation by a God who is concerned to relate to people in a real way, and who wants their relationships with one another to be real, free and meaningful. The downside of maintaining such real relationships is that God cannot step in at every moment to remove the consequences of people’s suboptimal decision making. That principle, you might say, was writ large across the battlefields of Western Europe and the Middle East during World War One. God may not step in to interfere with the effects of poor human choices as often as we might like, but when God does, the effect is felt across ages of time. For Christians, the defining intervention of God was the resurrection of Jesus, which is a sign to us of many things, not least God’s ability to right the wrongs that are perpetrated against individuals as a consequence of human evil. It was in that hope that thousands of New Zealanders were laid to rest in foreign soil a century ago. We honour them today in ceremonial fashion, but we honour them in spirit and truth when we strive, day in and day out, to make wise decisions, as individuals and a society; decisions that rise above narrow selfconcern and are always mindful of the common good of all human beings.”
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Eastertide to Pentecost Many New Zealanders probably think that Easter 2018 is well and truly over – a long weekend that took place weeks ago, since eclipsed by the school holidays which now, themselves, are a fading memory. That perception is unfortunate. The Church has celebrated Easter as an extensive section of time for centuries, and called the period from Easter Sunday through to Pentecost (seven weeks) the Easter (Paschal) Season, Eastertide or Paschal Time. It is a time during which our focus as Christians is on Jesus’ resurrection and the hope that exists in that event for us and the world as a whole. It takes more than one Sunday to unpack the meaning of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and even after the seven weeks of Eastertide are over, we’ve only scratched the surface of what can be said on the topic. The Feast of Pentecost which follows Eastertide is often referred to as the birthday of the Church, because it calls to mind the way that the Holy Spirit transformed Jesus’ disciples into a dynamic, and very effective group of people despite the fact that their leader was no longer with them in bodily form. On Sunday, 20 May we dress the Church in red, and wear as much red as possible to signify the presence of the Holy Spirit with us. We’re hoping for as many of you as possible to be with us to wish the Church “happy birthday”. Significant Services to look forward to: 20 May
27 May 3 June
10 June
Pentecost
8.00am Eucharist 9.30am All Age Eucharist 5.00pm Festal Choral Evensong Trinity 8.00am Eucharist 9.30am Choral Eucharist Te Pouhere /Constitution of our Church 8.00am BCP Holy Communion 9.30am Eucharist with Hymns Second Sunday After Trinity 8.00am BCP Holy Communion 9.30am Choral Eucharist
(Intro of new Eucharistic Setting by Brian Millar, St Mark’s DOM) Messenger by Email: If you would like to receive the Messenger by email in the future please send Diana in the St Mark’s office an email with your name in it. The more we can email, the less cost both in stamps and time. Thank you in advance!! 5
Warden’s report to AGM – A year in review It’s been a year of comings and goings at St Mark’s, as we farewelled Rev. Anne Mills and her family, to take up the role as Dean of Holy Trinity Cathedral, and welcomed our two Interregnum Priests, Noel and David at the beginning of July. Noel, with the assistance of David, provided a steady hand, as we got on with the job of keeping the Parish ticking over. Our Parish Administrator Diana did a wonderful job of keeping the day to day running of the Parish going and supporting the clergy and the Wardens in their roles. We appointed Gae Griffiths, Debra Hall and Elizabeth Driver as our Parish Nominators and they gave up a lot of their time working towards the goal of finding a new Vicar for St Marks. Our wonderful volunteers in the Parish continued to run Mainly Music, Communicare, Friendship Group and all the other Parish activities we all enjoy. We enjoyed our 170th Birthday celebrations, a successful Parish Fair and a very enjoyable Carols on the Lawn towards the latter part of 2017. Our Christmas Services were well attended and we all enjoyed the good weather we were blessed with over the traditional Holiday period. Prior to Christmas, we were delighted when the Bishop advised us that the Reverend Dr Tony Surman had been appointed as our new Vicar and would take up his new role early in the New Year. And so in mid-February, we farewelled Noel and David and welcomed Tony and his family – Bernadette, Catherine and Andrew into our Vicarage and our Parish family. Tony’s installation service was a fine affair, with two choirs and very full attendance.
Sunday School present Noel & David with cards thanking them for steering the ship of St Mark’s through our time of waiting for a new Vicar.
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Nichola Christie, Alan Paterson and Geoffrey Laurence, have continued their work on behalf of the Parish in progressing the project at No 1 St Mark’s. The necessary documents were signed off before Christmas and things are slowly progressing. The Parish should be aware of the enormous contribution of time and expertise put in to the project by these three volunteers. Thank you all for your support and help over the past year. We look forward to the year ahead as we work together for the good of our Parish. Yours in Christ, Peter Allen peterjallen@xtra.co.nz 021 521 149
Christine Koefoed christine.koefoed@bdo.co.nz 021 682 331
Children’s & Families Ministry Children and Families Minister, Anne Driver
Mainly Music We have had some great sessions this term with many of our families who have returned from last year and many new families who have joined us this term. The children love using props to enhance their dancing and singing. At Easter we even incorporated some craft activities. We have added new books and toys to our resources so children have plenty to engage them while parents/caregivers relax and socialise over morning tea after our movement sessions.
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Sunday School We are always exploring different ways to enhance and deepen our faith. At our All Age Worship Service on Passion Sunday Catherine and Isabel presented an amusing thought provoking drama based on our reading for the day. After this many youth and children created an Easter garden. The 'green hill' even sprouted in time for Easter!
At present we are creating a mini play church. After some recent baptisms some of our children recreated the activities using our miniature congregation and mini church furnishings. Our thanks goes to Trevor Brooker who even provided a mini altar cloth and lectern hanging as well as transforming a small table into a splendid font.
At Harvest Festival we gave thanks for the food God has provided by sharing our favourite graces. We then went on to create a delicious fruit salad. Some of our senior youth, Trenyce and Kalem, helped the younger children. We finished by reflecting upon issues of fair trade and justice when we tracked how our food is grown, harvested and made available to us.
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Welcome Gareth and Tracey We’re delighted to welcome Gareth Bezett and Tracey Wakefield to the St Mark’s family. Gareth and Tracey will be with us for at least a year, while Gareth is studying at St John’s College. Gareth will be based at St John's until 2020, engaged in post-graduate theological study through Otago University with a view to a PhD project from 2020. Tracey runs the Tamaki Community Development Trust, leading the team at the Trust that provides a counselling service to the women and children in that community. She has a passion for seeing individuals, whanau, teams and communities thriving and achieving their goals and aspirations. She has sent us this short report on what they do to support the community.
“Tamaki Community Development Trust has been operating for over 20 years and provides a wrap around service to help families and children in Glen Innes, Point England and Panmure. Our focus is on helping vulnerable families reach their goals and aspirations. We do this by providing free counselling, mentoring, advocacy, life skills and parenting support. This includes support with basics like food, clothing and when we can, furniture. In additional to this we take families to exercise and education support programmes, provide cooking classes for girls and boys, maths remedial classes after school once a week at the Trust, and help our families access other after school pro-social activities. We are also an active partner in a number of community-led development activities such as The Heart Movement and the Tamaki Youth Wellbeing Project. For the month of May we are participating the Z-Energy Good in the Hood Programme. If you fill up at the Z-Energy service station in Glen Innes, please pop a token in our token box. If you are interested in how you can help us in other ways please call us on 09 5704314 or email office@tcdt.net.nz
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Matters Musical Brian Millar, Director of Music Well the Easter season has come and gone; our new vicar is installed (and I’m happy to report is singing clearly and in tune!); and as I write this we’re heading towards Ascension and Pentecost, two very important aspects in remembering and celebrating the church’s life. Also coming up – a Sunday where we especially remember John the Baptist (June 24th); and Sea Sunday (July 8th). There’s every chance the recessional music for the latter will be a hornpipe….. Evensong continues to be an important part of the musical life of St Mark’s; I know I’ve waxed lyrical about Evensong before, but there seems to Rev. Dr. Tony Surman; D.o.M. Brian Millar; be fewer and fewer Anglican churches in Rev. Brendon Wilkinson. Taken in St. Auckland offering this rather special aspect of George’s Thames April 22nd 2018. worship. On April 22nd our choir – plus Rev. Tony as Cantor – went to St. George’s Anglican Church in Thames to sing Evensong there. We were most warmly welcomed by Rev. Brendon Wilkinson (who spent some time at St. Mark’s a few years back as he was finishing off his theological training); and I personally was delighted to catch up with an old friend Rev. Peter Philip, and his wife Beth, part of the Thames congregation. And didn’t they feed us well after service!
St Mark’s choir April 8th 2018
Tenors and basses during the Evensong service in Thames.
On July 1st, our choir will be joining with the choir at St. Peter’s Takapuna (directed by Michael Cox, a previous D.o.M. here at St. Mark’s) to sing Evensong, as they celebrate their patronal festival. 10
Then on July 29th we will have yet another “away” Evensong! This time a service with combined choirs, at Holy Trinity Cathedral, to celebrate the work of the Royal School of Church Music (RSCM), of which St. Mark’s has been a part since 1962. Choral Eucharist services at 9:30 am continue (I hope!) to bring a variety of music into our worship; including music by New Zealanders; music ranging from 16th to 21st century; anthems with words in English and (sometimes) Latin (I’ll try and include a translation in the pew sheet, it’s important that you know what we’re singing, it’s not “just another bit of unintelligible sound” but hopefully relevant to the service). An example: May 27th is Trinity Sunday; the anthem for that day will be a Latin motet “Tres Sunt” (meaning: there are three) with music by Tomas Luis de Victoria (1584 – 1611). The translation:
“There are three that give testimony in heaven: the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one. Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of hosts, heaven and earth are full of Thy glory.” (And remember - Ephesians 5:19-20!)
Palm Sunday 2018
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Book Reviews The Journey Home by Radhanath Swami
Reviewed by Annabelle Couldwell “The Journey Home” is a generational classic. It portrays an American teenager’s search for meaning and fulfilment in the turbulent world of the 1960’s and 70’s. He travels across Europe, the Middle East and Afghanistan and into the mystical world of India. His spiritual pilgrimage takes him from the temptations of drugs and marijuana smoking in California to embracing the beliefs and faith of Christians, Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists in his search for faith, providing a rare view of the initiation and process of becoming a swami through the fire of Bhakti, amongst the holy men of India. He endures many hardships and hunger on his journey into the East, with tremendous determination in the face of almost overwhelming obstacles, until reaching the end of his journey “home”. Radhanath Swami’s spiritual memoir is an honest and candid account of his hopes and disappointments, the shock of immersion in cultures very unlike his own, the friendships he made along the way, and most of all, the zeal with which he met and dealt with the privations he experienced in order to find the spirituality and grace he sought through savouring seeing the soul face to face. It is through such moving books that we can realise the power of God throughout the world and the meaning of faith within all cultures and religions. I was enthralled by his story, his spiritual saga and the transformation he made to his life. “The Journey Home” is a remarkable and intimate portrayal of the life and adventures of an American Swami captured in a thought provoking memoir.
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They Came for Freedom by Jay Milbrant
Reviewed by Annabelle Couldwell This is the story of the American Pilgrims, a group of passionate and religious English people who wished to worship God in their own way, and who refused to be bound by the narrow and unpopular edicts of the Anglican Church in the 1700’s. They ventured from Plymouth on the “Mayflower” to a little known continent in search of religious tolerance and freedom. In the retelling of this story, Jay Milbrant brings his lawyer’s skills into establishing the truth underlying the many tales of the European colonisation of North America. While many Americans to this day celebrate the history of the “Founding Fathers” of America, he has painstakingly detailed the true story of their journey to the “New World”, the extreme hardships they faced and the isolation and privations they endured, in order to develop their colony and establish one of the first towns in North America. The Plymouth Experiment survived only barely. By steadfastly facing the seemingly insurmountable challenges they faced and exercising incredible faith in God in the process, they managed to endure their many hardships. Not all of their party survived. A great many perished from cold, starvation and a lack of understanding of the planning required for survival. After many hard years, the younger members of the colony rebelled against the original pilgrims. They saw the religious intolerance that had been the reason for the journey to the New World as also developing in their own place and were dismayed at the controversial actions taken against the Native Americans. Eventually the Pilgrims chose abandonment of their colony over impending dissolution. However, the colony made radical changes to the processes of civil government, forming a democratic self-governing process unknown in the world they left behind. These processes shaped America and the world in the centuries to come. Their faith was steadfast and enduring. Even with the opportunity to return to England, they stayed. Their Harvest Festival – a celebration of God’s gifts to them – set the stage for our own harvest celebrations today and was the foundation of the American celebration of Thanksgiving. This is a fascination commentary on an amazing experiment that has led to the recognition of the Pilgrims as the founding fathers of the American nation. As an examination of enduring faith in the face of great odds, it stands as an exciting and memorable story.
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Parish Life-Social Occasions This year, as a result of questions asked of the Parish at the AGM, we will be having the Quiz night once again in September. This is always a wonderful evening in the pursuit of answers to trivial questions, this time with the added bonus that all contenders will be randomly assigned to a team. So no getting together with the brightest and best of us, you will have to think for yourselves! This should be a great evening of jollity for all. Further details closer to the day. Bishop Selwyn’s consecration of the first church of St Mark on this site took place on 2nd September. It has been suggested that this would be a good day to celebrate our Patronal festival and we will plan to have the Parish luncheon on this date, as it is a Sunday this year. It has been decided that we will not have a Parish fair or garage sale this year. Trevor Brooker is keen to take a Parish group to visit the bush railway west of Hamilton again this year. This was a wonderful day last winter. Again, more of this closer to the time. Special Services: On 20 May we celebrate Pentecost, the “birthday” of the Christian Church. There will be an All Age Eucharist that day to celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit on earth. 1 July the choir will be joining St Peter’s Takapuna in choral evensong to celebrate their Patronal festival. This is also Trinity Sunday. St Peter’s welcomes any of us who would like to join them for this special service.
Your 2018/19 Vestry At our AGM on Sunday 29th April, we welcomed several new Vestry members for the 2018/19 year, and gave thanks to those who have agreed to continue with this important role. 2019/19 Vestry Clive Couldwell Annabelle Couldwell Christine Koefoed Elizabeth Driver
Jan Hames Nichola Christie Peter Allen Maggie Hames Sylvia Rosevear
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From the Registers February–April 2018
Baptisms Harriet Gibbons Evelyn Shipman Brylee Bovill Joshua Clark Hendrix Detman Scarlett Ewen Zahra Orton
25 April 25 April 15 April 15 April 8 April 24 February 4 February
Joined together in Marriage Daniel Freymark & Kate Lumsden
Committed to God’s Care Rona Taylor Angela List Christiaan Vos Graeme Fleet Beryl Anton Faye Lean
17 March
20 April 17 April 4 April 28 March 23 February 22 February
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Parish Contact Details: Ongoing: St Mark’s Parish Office: Our New Vicar: The Reverend Dr Tony Surman Children & Families Minister Anne Driver Director of Music: Brian Millar Lay Minister: Trevor Brooker Parish Administrator: Diana Swarbrick
09 520 2258 021 074 1138 09 849 3538 021 253 1437 021 614 227 020 413 04668
The Anglican Parish of Saint Mark, Remuera. Email: office@stmarks.org.nz Website: www.stmarks.org.nz
@StMarksRemuera
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