The news that His Grace Bishop Angaelos, General Bishop of the Coptic Orthodox Church, has been awarded the O.B.E. in the Queen’s Birthday Honours, has been widely welcomed by those working for reconciliation between faith groups.  In a recent letter, Abba Seraphim wrote, “It is with great pleasure that I congratulate Your Grace on your recent nomination by the Prime Minister for the honour of an OBE in recognition of your services to International Religious Freedom. Your efforts over several years, which have increased in their impact as the situation for Christians in the Middle East and elsewhere has deteriorated so dramatically, are a very necessary witness to our Christian belief in love, forgiveness and reconciliation in the face of such terrible destructive cruelty. In addition to your public testimony, the practical application of our concern, through such bodies as the Asylum Advocacy Committee, with which I have been honoured to be associated since its inception, addresses the reality of human distress and offers compassion and justice to those in need. The widening of our remit to include other religions suffering persecution, rightly demonstrates our belief that God “so loved the world” and that all humanity is precious because of being created in His image. Your example, your vision and your commitment are all worthy of the well-deserved commendation made.”

On 13 June, during the Divine Liturgy at St. George-in-the-East at Shadwell, Abba Seraphim ordained Philip Turner of Burslem as a Reader to serve the BOC Mission at Stoke-on-Trent. Philip, who has a B.Sc in Environmental Science is employed as a Community Support Worker in his home town and was in the first group of converts to join the Orthodox Mission. He will now lead the community in prayer in the absence of a priest. In his homily, Abba Seraphim spoke about the ministries of the church as part of the Ascension gifts of Christ. He noted that it was clear from  his writings that the Apostle St. Paul saw these ministries as protecting the church from error, because if we are built up as the body of Christ we will no longer be children, “tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the cunning of men by their craftiness in deceitful wiles,” but rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way to him who is the head, into Christ “from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every joint with which it is supplied, when each party is working properly, makes bodily growth and upbuilds itself in love.” This image of the joints of the body is organic, just as the church is intended to be. We need to discard the image of an organisation – like some modern international corporation – with its tiered hierarchical structure and its levels of managers reaching to the top. Abba Seraphim noted that although the church possesses an hierarchy, it is one of interdependance not subordination.

He also reminded the congregation that church history from apostolic times speaks of two Philips: Philip, one of the twelve apostles, who was martyred alongside St. Bartholomew; and Philip the Deacon and Evangelist, one of the seven chosen alongside St. Stephen, who converted the Ethiopian eunach by  expounding the Scriptures to him. He prayed that Philip the Evangelist  would be the new Reader’s patron, so that rather than merely being a lover of horses – as the name originally meant – he would be characterised as a lover of mankind – phil-anthropos –  and may be faithful in his ministry, bearing Christ to all whom he meets, so that he might receive God’s mercy along with all those who have pleased God from the beginning.      

Among the clergy assisting at the Liturgy was Father Shenouda Haile, Priest of the free Eritrean Orthodox Church in London, who brought with him some members of his community. There have been warm fraternal relations between the British and Eritrean Orthodox communities dating back to Abba Seraphim’s ordination as a Metropolitan in Cairo in 1994 at the same service in which the late Pope Shenouda ordained the future Patriarch Antonios to the episcopate.   

On 7 June Memorial Prayers for the repose of the late Earl of Leicester were held following the Divine Liturgy at Babingley in the presence of the present Earl, his mother (Valeria, Viscountess Coke), and other members of the Coke family, who also attended the Divine Liturgy, which Abba Seraphim celebrated. The 7th Earl, who died at the end of April, was a leading figure in Norfolk life and had devoted many years to the restoration and modernisation of his ancestral estates at Holkham. Lady Coke has long been a good friend of the Orthodox community at Babingley and values the Orthodox tradition of forty days of mourning and prayers for the departed.  

During the celebration of the Divine Liturgy in the Church of Saint Mary the Mother of God and Saint Moses the Black, Portsmouth, on Saturday 6^, June, five new members of the faithful were received by baptism and chrismation; one adult, two children and two infants.  Rebecca Cole who has been gently, thoughtfully and prayerfully working her way towards Orthodoxy for the past eighteen months and was recently received into the catechumenate was sponsored by Annamarie Ewing who had earlier followed a similar gentle path into Orthodoxy.  As Annamarie could not be present yesterday she was represented by Tasony Sheila Smyth who assisted with Rebecca’s robing in white after her baptism.  Sisters Senyit and Rachel Kebede were resplendently robed in traditional Ethiopian “Sunday best” following their baptisms and likewise both babies, Charlene Nina Lupu and Gebriela Merhawi, were in festal dress appropriate for this wonderful event.  The baptisms were witnessed by a congregation of over eighty.

Father Simon Smyth was assisted by Deacons Antony Holland and Daniel (who, together with his wife Janice, had travelled from London for the occasion) and Subdeacon Nicola Popa (who, together with his wife Diana, had travelled from Poole).

The funeral of Sybil Saunders (1927-2015) took place at the Orthodox Church of St. Mary & St. Felix at Babingley on 5 June in the presence of a large congregation of family, friends and church members. Abba Seraphim officiated, assisted by Deacon Christopher Barnes and Subdeacons Roger-Kenneth Player and Trevor-James Maskery. The weather in Norfolk was warm and sunny with thundery showers, which held off until after the burial. During the service two poems were also read, which had been written by Sybil’s grandchildren and great-grandchildren. 

In his address, Abba Seraphim, commenting on the sentiments of these poems, observed that we were already cherishing the precious memories on which our relationship with Sybil was founded. “They are especially poignant in these days following her repose, but they will remain strong and not fade as the years pass because she has an assured place in our hearts and for her family she will always be of the greatest significance. The power of love is profound, strong and enduring and it comes from God. In her life Sybil played many parts: daughter, wife, grandmother, friend, neighbour and in whatever way we knew her, her character was the same: calm, considerate, kind, dignified, self-effacing, stoical, loyal.” He quoted from the description of the god-fearing women in the Book of Proverbs (XXXI: 10-31), which applied so well to Sybil.

Her almost seventy years of marriage to Deacon Mark was a truly blessed partnership of sharing and commitment through good times and bad. “Two different personalities but a wonderful complementarity, each bringing together their gifts for the enriching of the other and the overflowing of their love with family, friends and church. One of the family described them to me as a ‘double act,’ for truly in their love for each other they became one, yet it was not for the selfish satisfaction of either, but to be shared.  To her descendants, her 4 children, 6 grandchildren and 9 great-grand children, she left a model of family life: happy, loving, committed and caring in which she nurtured each generation, passing to them her values as surely as she passed on her genetic legacy. From her days in the Land army Sybil learned to work with cows and had a real affinity with animals, especially dogs. Home cooked food, surrounded by children and animals, yet all the time exuding an inner contentment; living her life for others and deriving true pleasure from giving, not taking. These are all rare and cherished values which Sybil had in full and why we are here today to honour her memory and to solemnly take our leave.”

However, Abba Seraphim emphasised that this is not the end. “Funerals are solemn occasions in which we share a sadness because of our parting from someone we love but they do not mark a total severance – the curtains are drawn, the door is shut, but for Christians the hope of a future life together, the renewal of profound relationships and a glorious, brighter future, allows us to temper our sadness with hope. The Scriptures speak of the fact that God created man out of nothingness and breathed into him a living soul. In the Old Testament we see our forefathers struggling to come to terms with mortality and the inevitability of death, speaking of going into the darkness, of lives being like water spilt on the ground which cannot be gathered up again, of going the way of all the earth, of the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Yet as God revealed himself more to His people and they became closer to Him, the mood gradually changes. David the Psalmist declared, God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave: for he shall receive me (Psalm XLIX: 15) and by the time of the Incarnation, The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is spring up (Matthew IV: 16). Confronted by the death of her brother Lazarus, Martha was able to declare, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day. Martha made this declaration of faith to the Lord Jesus Christ, who answered her definitively,  “I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.” 

“Within days the Lord Jesus had demonstrated His power over Death: bruised and beaten unjustly, he suffered an agonising, cruel and painful passion and death – his disciples were scattered, terrified of suffering a similar fate – and to all worldly intent his ministry had ended in humiliation and defeat. On the third day, however, as He promised, he arose from the dead – not as a phantom but as flesh and blood – still bearing the scars of his passion – so that His disciples were also transformed by their encounter with the Risen Christ and the Church was born bearing witness to God’s triumph over death.” 

Abba Seraphim concluded by noting that Sybil had died just at the end of the Glorious 50 days of celebration which follow Holy Pascha, when Orthodox still salute one another with the acclamation, “Christ is Risen” – not was risen, although it took place in history, but here and now because He is still the risen Lord and it is in His resurrection that we hope for our own conquest over death.   

Following the service, Sybil’s body was buried in the churchyard, being the first Orthodox burial since the church was  first used for Orthodox worship.