On Saturday, 28 January, Abba Seraphim led a group of pilgrims from London and Lincolnshire, on a visit to Croyland Abbey at Crowland in Lincolnshire.

In the 8th century the area was wild fenland in one of the remotest and mostly desolate parts of the Saxon Kingdom of Mercia. It was here, that Guthlac, a young nobleman and monk at the monastery of Repton in Derbyshire, decided to establish an island hermitage. Although he died quite young in 714, his sanctity and ascetic life had a considerable impact on his contemporaries and, within two years of his death, a monastery was built on the island and survived for more than eight centuries until its suppression by King Henry VIII. After that the magnificent Abbey fell into ruins, with only the 15th century tower and the north aisle surviving as the present-day parish church. After viewing the many fine surviving architectural features of the church and the ruined remains of the old monastery, including the Parvise Chapel above the porch, where is kept a skull, believed to be that of Abbot Theodore, martyred by the Danes whilst at prayer in 870; Abba Seraphim led the pilgrims in prayer honouring St. Guthlac and invoking his patronage. The courtesy and assistance of the small team of volunteer guides, who are available every day to assist pilgrims and other visitors, was greatly appreciated. After leaving the Abbey, Abba Seraphim led the pilgrims into the town, where they also viewed the “Trinity Bridge”, built between 1360-90, to replace one built by King Æthelbald of Mercia at the same time as the original monastery. It is an unique three-way stone bridge, which once spanned the confluence of the River Welland and one of its tributaries. Now marooned in the centre of town some way from the river-front, it is a reminder of how the drainage of the fens transformed the wilderness to which St. Guthlac retreated and made the area habitable.

On 23 December, Father David Seeds conducted two funerals on the same day; one for a local resident and another for a neighbour in the adjoining county. Graham Moore, aged 68, of Cusworth, was cremated at the Rose Hill Crematorium in Doncaster, followed by his family attending at the Cusworth Church for the burial of his ashes. Later that day, Father David had to travel to Chesterfield to conduct the funeral of a neighbour from Ashover in Derbyshire, the village where Father David lives.

On 17 January, following a request from a Greek Orthodox family for an English-speaking Orthodox priest to conduct their mother’s funeral at Rose Hill, and having met with the family, Father David conducted the funeral of Mrs. Lita Brelsford. She came to Britain after the Ionian earthquake (also known as the Great Kefalonia earthquake) in August 1953. Damage was very heavy in Zakynthos’ eponymous capital city. Only two buildings survived there; the rest of the island’s capital had to be rebuilt. Argostoli, the capital of Kefalonia, suffered substantial damage and all of Kefalonia’s buildings were flattened except for those in Fiskardo in the far north. As well as causing major destruction on the two islands, the economic impact was far greater, and damage was estimated to have totalled billions of Drachmas. Many people fled the island: but the majority emigrated from Greece entirely leaving both the islands and their economy in ruins. All her large family were British-born. Father David commented that it was a privilege to support her family in this way.

On New Year’s Day, at the Church of St. Mary and St. Felix at Babingley, Norfolk, during the celebration of the Divine Liturgy, Abba Seraphim ordained Monk Alexis Raphael to the Order of Subdeacon. Father Alexis assists at the Cusworth Church under Father David Seeds but will now also establish a British Orthodox Mission in Lincoln, under the patronage of Saint Guthlac  (674-714), a Mercian nobleman’s son, who was professed as a monk at Repton but later settled at Croyland (now Crowland in Lincolnshire).

St. Felix, writing of Guthlac shortly after his death, described his ascetic life style and ministry of prayer; “Now there was in the said island a mound built of clods of earth which greedy comers to the waste had dug open, in the hope of finding treasure there; in the side of this there seemed to be a sort of cistern, and in this Guthlac the man of blessed memory began to dwell, after building a hut over it. From the time when he first inhabited this hermitage this was his unalterable rule of life: namely to wear neither wool nor linen garments nor any other sort of soft material, but he spent the whole of his solitary life wearing garments made of skins. So great indeed was the abstinence of his daily life that from the time when he began to inhabit the desert he ate no food of any kind except that after sunset he took a scrap of barley bread and a small cup of muddy water. For when the sun reached its western limits, then he thankfully tasted some little provision for the needs of this mortal life.”

Father Alexis will inaugurate St. Guthlac’s British Orthodox Mission in Lincoln with a series of weekly services of prayer and intercession during Great Lent.

On 14 December 2016 it was with great joy that Abba Seraphim welcomed to the Church Secretariat three grandsons of a former British Orthodox bishop. Frederic Charles Aloysius Harrington (1879-1942) was consecrated to the episcopate in 1935, following the death of his wife, and largely ministered in the Islington area of London, where his service was based on a Chapel dedicated to St. Ignatius of Antioch. His early death was a great loss to the church, but he was greatly loved and his memory has always been cherished. His three grandsons, Leslie, Michael and David Harrington, who have been researching their family history, visited Abba Seraphim to hear about their grandfather’s  church ministry and to share family stories and memorabilia. Among the items preserved at the Secretariat is the pastoral staff made by their father, the late Patrick Harrington (1916-1989) for their grandfather’s consecration.

The news that a bomb containing 12 kilos of TNT and filled with ball-bearings had exploded in St. Peter’s Coptic Orthodox Church in Abbeseya, Cairo, during the morning Liturgy on Sunday, 11 December, only broke for many people after they themselves were leaving their churches. Such an atrocity, committed with blasphemous and evil intent, whilst pious souls – including many women and children – were struck down as they met together for communion with their God. The response, not only of churchmen, but of senior Muslim clerics, is universal horror and revulsion, recalling the late Pope Shenouda’s saying that religion has no part with violence. Speaking after hearing the news, whilst leaving the Church at Chatham, Abba Seraphim commented that this was clearly a “Satanic attack, the fruit of hatred, cruelty, intolerance, strife and every evil which foments violence.”

The Coptic Church has a long history of being the victim of violence, which has produced a multitude of glorious martyrs, but like the Crucified Saviour, has never responded in kind. The Egyptian government acted promptly by offering facilities for the injured at military hospitals whilst the public sympathy of the President, President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, and other ministers recognises and respects the unity of all Egyptians, regardless of their religious affiliation. The proclamation of three days of national mourning invites all Egyptians to unite in condemning such violence.

St. Peter’s Church (al Boutrosiyah) forms part of the Cathedral complex of the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate and stands next to St. Mark’s Cathedral, although its entrance is on Rameses Street. It brings violence very close to the heart of the Coptic Church, although His Holiness Pope Tawadros II was absent at the time on a pastoral visit to Greece, from which he immediately returned home to share the grief of his people.

The British Orthodox Church shares the grief of the worldwide Coptic Community and prays for the injured and the departed, as well as praying that peace and prosperity may soon be restored to Egypt, a country which has many historic links with the British Isles, whose past has so richly contributed to the civilisation of the world.  Abba Seraphim has sent a message of condolence to H.H. Pope Tawadros and on Sunday, 18 December Requiem Prayers for the departed victims will be prayed in all British Orthodox churches.