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Welcome to this special issue of the URC Palatinate Partnership newsletter.
In response to the Covid-19 emergency, there are lockdown stories from both Germany and the UK as well as reflections from our November 2019 'Fall of the Wall Conference in Frankenthal to celebrate 30 years since the Berlin Wall came down.
There is also an invitation to join a unique joint Pentecost service on Zoom on Saturday 30 May 5.00 pm, British Summer Time.
As always, if you have any comments, queries or contributions for future issues, please do not hesitate to contact us here. If you no longer wish to receive further newsletters, you can unsubscribe at any time by scrolling to the bottom of the page and clicking 'unsubscribe'.
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Revd Martin Heninger and Revd Philip Brooks
Joint Pentecost Virtual Communion Service between the United Reformed Church and the Evangelische Kirche der Pfalz
When the Covenant of Pulpit and Table Fellowship was signed between the two churches in 1957, surely no-one could have envisaged the type of technology or the challenging circumstances which have prompted this special service to take place on Saturday 30 May at 5.00 pm British Summer Time (6.00 pm in Germany).
Using Zoom video conferencing, it will be led live by Martin Henninger, Minister at the Lutherkirche and the Friedenskirche in Frankenthal, alongside the URC’s Secretary for Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations, Philip Brooks. Martin and Philip are the co-leads for the Partnership. German and UK volunteers are due to take part in the service, to be conducted in English and German, so that language does not present a barrier to people joining. Choir members and musicians from the Lutherkirche in Frankenthal, will be recording two well-known hymns especially for the service. URC General Secretary, John Proctor will offer a Pentecost message, as well as his ecumenical counterpart Manfred Sutter from the Evangelische Kirche der Pfalz. Because it is a virtual communion, we ask that people have ready a small glass of wine (or equivalent juice) and a piece of bread if they would like to receive communion. This is not compulsory of course as some may feel more comfortable simply to observe. The online congregation are invited to stay behind for a virtual coffee time after the service, using the Zoom break-out room facility.
Thanks to the long-standing partnership between the two churches, this service offers a unique opportunity to share in fellowship between the UK and Germany in the face of a world-wide crisis. Celebrating Pentecost together in this way therefore feels particularly apt. So, it is hoped that members from German and UK churches, regardless of whether they have a twinning arrangement or not, will log on for the service:
Joining instructions for the Zoom service
Host: URC Mission
Topic: Pentecost service
Time: May 30, 2020 05:00 PM London
Join Zoom Meeting by clicking on the link below:
https://zoom.us/j/94916698036?pwd=alRqbkZ5OTJNY25HSUdBaUxwbGdadz09
Meeting ID: 949 1669 8036
Password: 941242
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Fall of the Wall Conference November 2019
The URC group travelled by train for the entire outward and return journeys, allowing plenty of time for friendly discussion. Pictured in the foreground are Patricia Akoli (Global and Intercultural Ministries representative) and Natalie Gibbs (URC Youth representative), Camilla Veitch (East Midlands Synod) and Angela Bogg (North Western Synod) are deep in conversation just behind them. Augur Pearce (Eastern Synod) can be seen seated in the background immersed in his papers for the Conference.
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Exchanging thank you gifts at the close of the conference
Celebrating the Fall of the Berlin Wall - Neil Parfitt from St Andrews Roundhay
I greatly enjoyed our visit to Germany last November for the Fall of the Wall conference. The group were very friendly and got on well together. The conference in Frankenthal was extremely well organised and the hospitality was superb. The wall of cardboard boxes was a brilliant idea (Editor's note - One of our tasks during the Conference was to build a large wall using cardboard boxes. On one side we wrote about the cause of physical and imaginary barriers. On the reverse we thought about how to overcome these walls). A shared worship was very moving and the contribution from the two people from Bernburg in the former GDR (the former East Germany) greatly enhanced our appreciation of what it was like for the Wall to come down.
The visit provided a unique opportunity for UK churches in partnerships to exchange ideas with each other.
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Members of the 50-strong group from the UK and the Pfalz in front of the Lutherkirche, Frankenthal, where the conference and Celebration Service were held
URC Visit to the Palatinate 7-11 November 2019
I was privileged to be part of the visit to Frankenthal in the Palatinate, South West Germany. 23 URC representatives travelled there by train to join members of the Evangelische Kirche der Pfalz (EKP) to mark the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989. We heard memories from those who lived in the former East Germany of the days leading up to the fall of the wall and explored how walls are being built today both literally and in our minds. We looked at ways to find strategies to break down psychological walls which then become physical walls between people and looked for practical solutions and actions for our two churches. During the two days we had time to talk, do Bible study and worship together as well as a wine tasting evening!
On 9 November 2019, this day marking 30 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, 29 years since the reunification of Germany and 81 years since Kristallnacht (Editor's note - The Germans now use the term 'Pogromsnacht'), Revd Nigel Uden led a communion service at Lutherkirche, Frankenthal, along with his counterpart from the EKP, Revd Manfred Sutter and a statement agreed at the conference was signed. This acknowledges with sadness that around the world, physical and imagined walls are once again being built. This statement has been adopted by the URC Mission Council and by the EKP Synod meeting.
During and after the conference we stayed in the homes of church members and members of the community. I was privileged to stay for two nights with Karin and Klaus Petry in Grunstadt and was able to go to church with them on both Saturday evening and Sunday morning when there was an ecumenical peace service. It was also great to find that Karin and Klaus had lived a few miles from me in Manchester in the early 2000s and had been members of a URC church. All our hosts were extremely hospitable, and we enjoyed the wonderful wines of the Pfalz. I was also taken to visit Worms Cathedral and saw the Jewish cemetery and the memorial to Martin Luther.
A number of the UK members of the conference were from churches which had active links with churches in the Palatinate. Activities include exchange visits, contact through social media and youth visits which are all a practical expression of the two churches’ unity. The conference agreed that links should be encouraged and I’m trying to encourage churches in North Western Synod to develop these.
Angela Bogg
Member of Assembly Mission Committee
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Walls
What strikes me, if this conference was being planned now, is how different the session on 'walls' would be. Walls could still feature but, while we are currently confined within our four walls, other kinds of walls have come down in recent weeks – between neighbours, acquaintances and strangers, between technically-minded and less technically-minded people, and in some cases across national boundaries through the use of technology which didn’t even exist a few years ago: you might almost say that physical barriers have led to better personal communication! However, we also recognised that enormous walls continue to exist, even at this critical time across the world. In that respect, the Declaration to which both our churches committed themselves remains relevant and pertinent.
Felicity Harris, Purley URC
Reform Magazine featured an excellent article about the Fall of the Wall Conference, written by URC Head of Communications, Andy Jackson, who travelled to Frankenthal as part of the URC contingent.
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Lockdown stories from UK and Germany
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A report from Newport Pagnell URC.
We have been unable to physically meet as a congregation since mid-March.
We have been recording worship and sending it out, sending written copies and posting it on our Youtube page each week. We have set up online Coffee and Chat, a children's Zoom and a Bible Study. We have also set up systems to ensure everyone in our congregation gets a call or some contact regularly.
We are part of the Newport Pagnell Covid-19 Response Group supporting people in the town, collecting for the Foodbank and ensuring help is at hand (including helping to fund and distribute craft packs for children via local schools).
BUT the most innovative thing we have done is: THE GREAT NEWPORT PAGNELL ZOOM BAKE OFF!
The idea came from our Church Treasurer (she had done a family Bake Off) and the theme was 'Things we like to do but cannot at the moment'. The teams met on Zoom, were given their instructions and then went away and baked and created and met up at the end for judging. Winners were Afternoon Tea, Sub Aqua diving (pictured) and Karate Club. Other entries were travelling, Morris Dancing, Rock Choir, visiting family, singing, caravanning and travelling. The only downside was they could not taste each others' creations, but we hear that many neighbours and friends were gifted cake that day!
Jenny Mills
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West Derbyshire United Reformed Church
On Easter Sunday we normally decorate a cross with daffodils during the service and then place outside the building for all to see. As we couldn’t meet in church we held an Easter service on Zoom, including communion, which was wonderful. My husband and I also made a cross from branches and placed it in the manse garden, decorated accordingly for Maundy Thursday and Easter Sunday. Other church members made Christian symbols of Easter and placed them in their gardens or windows.
Camilla Veitch, Minister
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United Reformed Church Youth
I am in a group of young people who have started conducting our own Sunday services together. It's really informal, but we decide on a theme together and divide up the 'jobs', ie prayer / reading / talk / activity. We then all come together on a Sunday afternoon for a service on Zoom followed by a time with cups of tea and a chat. It's a really lovely way for young people, who may already feel isolated from their churches, to stay connected and support each other during this difficult time. Plus, we don't have to wake up early! It might be worth encouraging your young people to do something similar?
Natalie Gibbs
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St Peter’s Church, Manchester
I’m a member of an ecumenical church with members from the Anglican, Baptist, Methodist and United Reformed Church traditions. Our church is situated in the heart of the Manchester Higher Education Precinct, so we have some student members, in particular international postgraduate students. Following the lockdown in the UK we have been holding our Sunday morning services via Zoom and have held seven services in this way. For some of these we have based the service on a Methodist service produced each week for those not able to go to church and we have asked ministers booked to lead services if they were willing to do this on Zoom or if not would they produce a short reflection. Our usual Sunday morning congregation is between 20 and 25. Our first Zoom service had 22 people and now this has risen gradually to 40. How did we do this?
* We invited past members who had moved away to other parts of the UK and indeed of the world.
* We connected with students at Manchester who have now travelled home temporarily.
* We invited friends and relations who did not have a live service at their churches.
Three of our members don’t have access to wifi so each week, I copy the service sheet for them and post this so they can join in at 11 00 am. They are also phoned each week.
Our last service included people from China, Egypt, South Korea, India, York, Cambridge and London as well as Manchester. This has increased our sense of community and we’ve got to know each other better.
Our usual pianist who is a student at the Royal Northern College of Music plays the hymns from her flat and plays before and after the service. There is a chat time after the service and we also have a short chat session via Zoom two evenings a week. During Lent we had a discussion group based around environmental issues and Ruth Valerio’s book ‘Say Yes to Life’.
I've set up a WhatsApp group of church members where people can post messages, facebook posts, information and news, even jokes. Someone posted palm crosses and Easter cards to members. I’ve been keeping in touch by phone with a blind student from Uganda isolated in one of the halls of residence and two younger members are doing shopping for him. We’ve also had our Church Council meeting via Zoom which worked well.
This is all very positive but of course we miss the physical contact especially those of us who are alone at home. We are also now trying to encourage more members to take part in services and our Area Mission Mentor is helping with training. We agree that we must learn for the future from this new way of conducting worship and when the lockdown ends not simply return to old ways of doing things.
Angela Bogg
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Palatinate Lockdowns by an Oxford ‘Don’
It should be easier for a retired Oxford cleric to cope with the Coronavirus Lockdown than it is for younger folk who normally go out to work and most of the time it is. I can’t make my usual morning visits to the Bodleian Library because it is closed but I can sit at home in my own front room library surrounded by books I never read. A sermon about the Atonement I was looking forward to preaching and had spent months in preparing was cancelled because most churches are closed for the time being. Instead the sermon has become a 25,000 word essay, ‘Reformed Reflections on Theories of Atonement’. That great 4th century Creed tells us that Jesus came among us ‘for our sakes and for our salvation’ but the Church wisely has never attempted to specify how Jesus’s life, death, resurrection and ascension makes a world of difference to us now. I am finding it an inspiring exercise just having time to think more deeply about what matters most.
The essay might become published in a book alongside the lecture I prepared for the Palatinate consultations in 2018 and another about Nathaniel Micklem and Adam von Trott, members of my Oxford College, and their resistance to Hitler. Those talks would be better had I read more German and could do so more quickly. I was taught German at school and this has helped with our Oxford Bonn Churches study links but this year’s visit by our many friends in Bonn has, like much else, been cancelled. We miss you good German folk more than we can say. You have never been more needed. In my opinion our government has been isolating us from Europe just when all peoples of all nations need to pull together to fight a disease which does not respect our borders. Your President is often commended in our Press because she analyses problems like a scientist but has the heart and compassion of a pastor’s daughter.
As for light reading or at least a sense of perspective, I have read Daniel Defoe A Journal of the Plague Year that afflicted London and beyond in 1665 and Albert Camus La Peste 1947. Both wrestle with the big question why such things happen. Defoe nearly became a Reformed minister but took to writing instead. One of Camus’s controversial characters is the parish priest, Father Paneloux, whose initial response to the plague is to call people, even children, to repent. Camus leads us to admire the people who simply get on with what needs to be done and stay in the town because that is where they are needed most. Remember Jeremiah’s advice to the exiles: ‘Seid um das Wohl der Stādte besorgt, in die ich euch verbannt habe, und betet fűr sie! Denn wenn es ihnen gutgeht, dann geht es auch euch gut’. Unlike this Oxford Donald, Jeremiah spoke gut deutsch! Gott sei Dank!
Revd Dr Donald W Norwood is a Reformed pastor currently engaged in Ecumenical Research in Oxford. He led the Oxford Bonn Churches exchanges from 1980-1995
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Stories of lockdown – Purley URC
Sunday worship has remained at the heart of our activity, with a weekly service circulated on email to all who have internet access. It includes links to video recordings of hymns, and audio files with some elements of the service for those who want to use them. The service goes in hard copy to the few who don’t have access. Sadly our other weekly worship activity, bible study etc are on hold at the moment.
We are all finding it helpful to make much greater use of the phone as speaking is so much more satisfying than communicating by e-mail, WhatsApp, Facebook etc, although that is happening widely as well. Elders and other church committees are meeting on Zoom.
Our monthly magazine Reflections continues to appear: but in addition, the editor is producing a weekly newsletter, Keeping in Touch (KIT), which is proving to be an extremely enjoyable way of maintaining contacts. Many members are sharing personal news, stories, anecdotes, poems, memories and pictures. It’s turning into a lovely mixture of the serious and the humorous, the profound and the not-so-profound, and some of the items give everyone insights into the lives and interests of others that we probably would not otherwise have had.The editor has also dug through her archive of magazine material and is circulating a daily ‘Brainflex’ in the form of a word puzzle of some description.
Our International Church Partnership
The most immediate consequence of the current situation is that our triennial conference, scheduled for this July in Dessau, has been called off. Uncertainty over international travel, as well as the ability of our hosts to commit to elements of the week’s programme (eg restaurant and coach bookings) meant this had become inevitable some time before they took the decision. A little further down the line, we shall have to start to think about what the future of our links may look like.
Felicity Harris
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Report from Winnweiler in the Pfalz - 'Rediscovering at-Home Devotions'
Since our community does not have a homepage, we were bound to organise offline options for our congregation. The first was a guide to holding an at-home service, published in our newsletter. On Easter Sunday, the parishioners could pick up a devotions leaflet and Easter candle at the church, which was well received. The Protestant tradition of holding devotions in one's own home has come in handy, so to speak! In Winnweiler and all across the country, Catholic and Protestant church bells toll at 7:30 pm and we also follow the call to put a candle in the window - the 'light of hope'.
We firmly believe that we will weather these strange times and fervently hope that we can carry over some of those new forms of practising our faith into post-corona times, even though we collectively long for regular contact and worship again!
Maike Kraus
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St Andrews, Roundhay
Our church has been making extensive use of modern technology. A Sunday morning Zoom service, with Communion as appropriate, is conducted by our Minister, Tim Lowe, and members of the worship group. This is followed by ‘coffee’, and the service can be accessed later on Facebook. Tuesday evening and Thursday morning prayer times, Elders’ meetings and other meetings are also held on Zoom. Activities for children are on the website and we have set up a ‘chat wheel’ to maintain contact between members of the congregation by telephone.
Neil Parfitt
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Challenges during Covid 19 - a German perspective
For me, as someone who, thank God, only in February this year visited our partner church in Hartford, it even more astonishing the insane speed at which the virus has spread. How quickly our world has had to change.
There, after a wonderful service for Black History Day, we planned our upcoming partnership conference with the congregations from the UK, the US and the Czech Republic, set to take place in Dessau. We discussed flights, airfares, routes, programme, youth events and much more. Then suddenly it is just Schall und Rauch - smoke and mirrors. Hard to imagine. There has never been anything like this in my lifetime. Unbelievably, even the Oktoberfest in Munich has been cancelled. Those who have been to this big German folk festival (it is not everyone’s cup of tea) will understand my incredulity.
For weeks now, every news report has had a coronavirus special. Sometimes people tell me they can't take it any more. The virologists do a fantastic and important job but still we see unbelievable numbers of infected, sick, recovered and deceased; images of tower blocks with overwhelmed parents who can no longer tolerate working from home; bored children and locked playgrounds; domestic violence and a lack of sufficient social service provision; short-time working bringing massive fears for livelihood. Then we see images from areas in the world where social distancing cannot work at all, pictures from Mumbai, Rio and Cape Town, where people have neither water nor enough soap, let alone sanitisers.
In the face of all this, we are all trying to cope with a new normal. No meetings, everything is cancelled. At first, this slows us down and, concerned about a total lockdown, we bring our daughter Muriel from Stuttgart so that she does not have to sit alone in a shared apartment for weeks or months working from home.
In the early days, there was a lot of organisational work to do for my school duties. There was a good deal of computer work and familiarisation with new programmes. We are all having to learn at home and the more experienced colleagues help me over the phone, and it works! Thanks to the Internet, good connections and improved PCs. What would this pandemic have looked like 10 or even 15 years ago? So much working from home would have been unthinkable and impossible.
This week we returned to school again, making tentative attempts to operate at an absolute minimum and find workarounds. First it will only be students with exam classes who urgently need preparation for their final examinations. Religious education has been cancelled, as well as German and PEs. I have been teaching at this vocational school for over 25 years now and it is such an empty, sad feeling without the young people and a reduced number of colleagues. I have never had such a strange experience. I love my school and its vibrancy with all the many students rushing around!
The big fear is that we haven’t opened too early and and so have to face a new shutdown.
Everything is so different, quieter and more lonely. The streets and highways are empty and the traffic reports lack the classic reports of 8-10 km tailbacks (just like your M25) around Karlsruhe. The streets, buses and trains seem ghostly.
There has been a wave of solidarity and offers of help. At the Stiftskirche in Kaiserslautern we had the Gift tree campaign. People hung durable food in clear bags from the trees in the courtyard of the Stiftskirche. As a result, those who are stuggling could receive essential provisions. The newspapers repeatedly point out people in need can find help, and sometimes it seems there are more helpers than those looking for help!
The Evangelische Kirche der Pfalz has also introduced several wonderful initiatives, such as putting a candle in the window for all the everyday heroes, balcony singing and applauding. For five weeks my friend and colleague, a pastor in Mackenbach in the West Palatinate, has been playing songs on various instruments with his three daughters and his wife, first in front of the manse, and then through the village every evening. The residents of the village now wait for it and are very moved. It is a good gesture, to forget social distancing and sad thoughts for a moment with the sounds of spiritual or secular songs.
Many concerts, cultural performances and church services are streamed, although it is honestly not my favourite format. We found ourselves attending the church service late on Sunday morning and at the same time eating our breakfast – nothing wrong with that, just unusual and funny.
Of course, we spend a good deal of time on the Internet, and social media takes on a whole new dimension. It's good to be well connected with friends, family and colleagues, although sometimes difficult if the technical equipment is not available or does not work. We are also networked with our partner communities, and yet the face to face encounter is very different – not to be able to touch, hug or comfort anyone. How bizarre and difficult this is can be seen in funeral services, which are limited to 10-15 people, depending on the location. Saying goodbye to a loved one, I can only stay at a reasonable distance and not hug anyone. I have to make the hard decision of who is allowed to attend the funeral and who has to stay at home. This is a desperately sad experience for so many people. No neighbours, social acquaintences or work colleagues are allowed to pay their last respects. This is a very unusual situation here in the rural Palatinate. You don't want to think about how people elsewhere may have died lonely and alone, without a last handshake or last prayer, not to fate but to the virus.
Elsewhere in the world people are turned away at clinics because they are poor, black or for other reasons. There is a president who shouldn't be taken seriously; health systems that are collapsing in Europe and heads of state who are becoming dictators. For my part I feel deeply grateful in this crazy time in Germany, to live in the beautiful Palatinate, in a large house with a terrace and garden, to be able to go shopping for others, to be self-reliant and live without fear of shortages.
Coronavirus is opening new dilemmas where doctors have to decide, despite their Hippocratic oath, who can have a ventilator and who is left to die. Who has a life worth living – the 60, 70 or 80 year old?
As Christians, it has become particularly clear to us that the message of love for our neighbour is our foundation. In the time after Easter, which shows that life triumphs over death, I wish all of us good courage, open ears and helping hands to overcome this crisis. Be protected and stay healthy!
Nomi Banerji-Gévaudan - Kaiserslautern. Pfalz
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STRANGE TIMES in 2020
(A personal viewpoint)
Normally I would have been very busy at Church this time of the year, with a Holiday Club for children and a visit from our German partners in Mussbach, not to mention the normal weekly things we do such as a Lunch Club for the Elderly and Toddler Group sessions. But this year I look at the garden and the world and see them in a totally different light. Normally I would wonder at the beauty of our world and how everything is blossoming and blooming. This year, in the eerie quietness, I listen to the birdsong which has never been more vibrant, with nothing else to detract from it. It is strange how one’s senses are heightened in times of trouble.
I see the colours of the flowers and blossom with even greater clarity, and the green of the grass, and rejoice that even in isolation we have much to be thankful for. How blessed we are to have a roof over our heads, food in our cupboards (even if it is hard won, at times) and for many, gardens in which to relax or work, family who are well and thriving as yet, even if we are not having physical contact with them. Thank God also for technology. Those of us who are able are keeping in contact with church, friends and family far and wide with email, online or on the phone.
Just as our gardens resurrect themselves each year, our lives will ultimately do the same. We must just be patient and pray that our families stay intact. Never have we needed our faith in God more, and Easter reminded us of that.
I hope in a lot of ways that our lives change, because I think there is a lot to be learnt from this current situation. It would be a shame if we lost the lessons that are being taught to us right now. Lessons such as being kind to one another; telephoning someone who we know is housebound or alone in their isolation and letting them hear a friendly voice; shopping for those who have had to isolate; abiding by the rules so that the NHS is not overwhelmed; walking or cycling more and using our cars less – the peace and lack of pollution are already noticeable – and being satisfied with our lot, even if it is imposed.
Another bonus with this glorious weather is that I am enjoying all this free time to be in the garden, to paint, to write, to read, to walk, to meditate, to tidy the house – so many things that I rarely have time for normally.
We pray that this dark time will soon be over, we feel and pray for those whose dark time continues, but there are blessings in adversity if we care to look for them, and I have never felt more blessed.
Heather Barnes
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