St Peter's Chapel Bradwell: Summer Sunday Evening Services 2018

During July and August, reflective evening services with prayer for healing are held in St Peter's Chapel, at the place where the land meets the sea and the sky comes close. A place where the distance between heaven and earth is tissue thin. Enjoy the deep peace of the running wave, the flowing air and the gentle earth, while worshipping at the oldest church in England, founded by St Cedd in 654. All services start at 6.30 pm.

JULY

• 1st Evening Worship with the parishes of Bradwell; St Lawrence; Tillingham & Dengie and the Ven. Elizabeth Snowden
• 8th Evensong Led by Camerata. Music by Martin Taylor
• 15th A feather on the breath of God. Reflections from Hildegard of Bingen
• 22nd The music of silence
• 29th The poetry of healing

AUGUST

• 5th Mindfulness for the soul
• 12th Music & Healing
• 19th Healing the land
• 26th A celebration of Wholeness

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Hildegarde of Bingen - A feather on the breath of God.

commission4mission's creative retreat 4

The worship at commission4mission's creative retreat included poetry readings using poems by Pierre Jean Jouve, Edwin Morgan and John O'Donohue. Jean Lamb and I also shared poems we wrote during the retreat. I also brought poetry by John F. Deane, David Gascoyne, Jouve and Gabriela Mistral to read while on the retreat.

Edwin Morgan is an interesting poet, who 'had his own disagreements with organised Christianity, both in its Protestant and Catholic forms' but who, nevertheless found that 'the powerful persona of the Jesus of the gospel narratives continued to niggle him, and to fascinate by his difference.' This led him, in the year 2000, to write a trilogy of plays on the life of Jesus, entitled AD. Morgan was a concrete poet, like Ian Hamilton Findlay and Dom Sylvester Houédard (aka dsh).

I finished reading Deane's Give Dust A Tongue, in which he shares aspects of his life and work which influenced his faith and his poetry using a combination of memoirs and poems. The culminates with meditations on Christ's question to his disciples, 'Who do you say that I am?', which Deane explores through an edition of Poetry Ireland Review and a sonnet sequence entitled 'According to Lydia'.

Our retreat ended with a special Communion Service at St Peter's Chapel led by Revd Brigid Maine which had Mary Fleeson's 'Remember Me' as it's centrepiece.

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Live - Heaven.

commission4mission's creative retreat 3

I led Compline for commission4mission's creative retreat this evening and began by reading Pierre Jean Jouve's 'Evening Prayer' and ended with a poem I began composing this afternoon drawing on the liturgies we used and poems we read:

We awaken to the presence of God here
in this ordinary place, yet make our Morning Prayer
in the spirit of Anglo-Celtic Saxon saints. We seek
the thin thread of grace by which God holds all
knowing that love of victory or profit and pride,
even in our perceived holiness, will close our
ears to his call. Like guilty Pilate washing and
watching, washing and watching, we need grace
and confession. Our Evening Prayer in the sacred
dark closes the ragged wound, as soft curtains
drawn on a day when healing and hope are welded as one.

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Jeff Buckley & Elizabeth Fraser - All Flowers In Time Bend Towards The Sun.

commission4mission's creative retreat 2

Thanks to Mark Lewis, who has organised our creative retreat, we have been using liturgy from Rex Hunt in our services at St Peter’s Chapel combined with poems from Jean Lamb, Edwin Morgan and John O’Donohue. Last night we shared the drawing, paintings and photography we had worked on during the day. This morning we shared a walk together around the Bradwell Ring.

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Delirious? - Show me heaven.

Café Musica & The Secret Chord

It was over one of the Mersea Art Café’s delicious cappuccinos that James Weaver and Peter Banks discovered their mutual pasts, treading the boards on the professional music trail, were both similar and so very nearly collided. Now, teamed up, the combination of their two voices provide a rich emotion, drawing out the best in both the quirky covers and original songs they perform. With an essentially acoustic multi-instrument approach, Café Musica are captivating audiences and listeners alike. Café Musica's take on music is classic, yet fresh and they appeal to such a broad spectrum. They definitely have the cool factor, along with a respect for music which makes them popular across multiple genres and audience ages.With the backing of GingerDog Records, they have now released their first official album 'Learning to Breathe’. Featuring a surprising mix of songs, you can't help but get hooked on Café Musica.

Café Musica and friends are providing the music for an Evening Service this Sunday, 6.30pm, at St Peter's Chapel, Bradwell-on-Sea, which will focus on 'The Secret Chord', the book co-authored by Peter Banks and I, which is an impassioned study of the role of music in cultural life, written through the prism of Christian belief.    

Covering a range of musical styles and influences, from gospel music to X Factor, 'The Secret Chord' conveys enthusiasm for music and its transformative powers. While a significant number of books have been published exploring the relationships between music, art, popular culture and theology - many of which we have enjoyed and from which we have benefited - such books tend either to academic analysis or semi biography about artistes whose output the writers' enjoy. By contrast, 'The Secret Chord' is an accessible exploration of artistic dilemmas from a range of different perspectives which seeks to draw the reader into a place of appreciation for what makes a moment in a 'performance' timeless and special.

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Café Musica - Little Help From Our Friends.

Light the Well and The Secret Chord

I will be giving the reflection for Bread For the World, 6.30pm, at St Martin-in-the-Fields on Wednesday 28 June. Everyone is welcome at our weekly informal Eucharist, an evening service with prayer, music, word and reflection. 

I will be reflecting on our ‘treasure in clay jars’ project, a community art installation. ‘Light the Well’, is a community art project which Anna Sikorska is undertaking together with the artists and craftspeoples group. The project involves making porcelain lanterns (glazed ceramic globes). The size, surface decoration and character of each lantern will differ, although the base material - and overall look - is consistent white ceramic, roughly made. The lanterns are made by laying strips of porcelain onto a round support. Porcelain clay glows with a transparency individual to itself. Once made, they are fired and the lanterns are then suitable for being outside. They develop cracks in the firing, through which the light inside will also be seen. In the Light Well at St Martin's these lanterns will be joined together with cord covering the stone floor in a random constellation. The cord also connects a light bulb within each lantern, so each one will shine from within. There will be a lantern-making workshop with Anna Sikorska after the service.

In my reflection I will refer to Leonard Cohen's 'Anthem' which includes the line 'There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in.'

I will refer to another Leonard Cohen song on Sunday at St Peter's Chapel Bradwell-on-Sea at 6.30pm, Peter Banks and I will lead an Evening Prayer based on themes drawn from our co-authored book, The Secret Chord. The book takes its title and key theme from Cohen's 'Hallelujah'. 

James Weaver and Peter Banks are Café Musica, who will provide music for the service. The combination of their two voices provide a rich emotion, drawing out the best in both the quirky covers and original songs they perform. With an essentially acoustic multi-instrument approach, Café Musica captivate audiences and listeners alike.

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Café Musica - Dark Side.

St Peter’s Chapel Bradwell: Music for the Soul

In Bradwell, Essex, stands a chapel built by Cedd in 654 on a mission to convert people to Christianity. It is the oldest Church still in use in the UK today. Bradwell is a place of pilgrimage as well as a place for quiet and reflection.

During July and August, the evening services at Bradwell-on-Sea are held in St Peter's Chapel, at the place where the land meets the sea and the sky comes close. A place where the distance between heaven and earth is tissue thin. All services start at 6.30 pm.

The theme of this year’s services is Music for the Soul where music flows from heaven to the soul.

JULY

2nd - The Secret Chord with Revd Jonathan Evens and Café Musica and Friends
9th - Evening worship with Lynne Creasy, Harp and Harvey Nightingale, Baritone
16th - Taizé Service
23rd - Evening worship with John Glynn. John is a singer and a songwriter - A former Roman Catholic Priest in the United Kingdom with a talent that spans the world.
30th - Revd Dr. Jenny Williams. Following the Quiet Day on July 29th Jenny will lead our worship reflecting on the words of the Aramaic Lord’s prayer.

AUGUST
6th - Evening Worship with Canon Ivor Moody – Songs for the Soul
13th - Reflective Worship with The Asaph Ensemble with support from the Asaph Christian Trust
20th - A service of Music & Healing with Revd Brigid & Laurie Main
27th - Music for the soul. A celebration of the summer evening services

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Cafe Musica - Time To Think.