The Archdeacon - Chapter Five

Chapter Five:

A Visit to St. David's

 

The Archdeacon’s second visit was to the small parish of St. David’s-by-the-river.  It was an old village church, situated in what had once been a farming settlement but was now a kind of artsy little enclave, inhabited by potters, print-makers, and other creative types. They had turned the post office into a pottery studio, the general store into a new age shop, and the grain mill into a painter’s gallery. I don’t believe that any of these “newcomers” were members of St. David’s, although typically, they all claimed to love the “quaint little church”, and always referred to it as the centre of their little community.  Beyond supporting the occasional church supper, or contributing handicrafts to the annual church silent auction, I don’t think that it occurred to a single one of them that the “quaint little church” had bills to pay and might need their ongoing support. The people who did support the church were the half-dozen senior ladies who kept it running, and made their modest financial contributions with religious regularity.

It was a lovely little church. Not much had changed in it over its lifetime, except for the addition of gas heating and electric lighting. Oh, the altar had been pulled out from the East Wall in the 1980s so that the priest could celebrate the Eucharist in the westward position facing the people, but unlike St. Anskar’s, everything was pretty much where the founders had placed it.

The priest-in-charge, for that is what he was, not an incumbent, for he had been placed there by direct appointment by the bishop, was an earnest young man. The bishop had appointed this fairly newly-minted priest because his stipend would be affordable for the cash-strapped church, which was deeply in debt to the diocese. There was the usual hope that some young priest might draw in those who had previously not given church a second look.  I suspect you are probably familiar with the type of priest young Fr. Fairview was. He was good-looking and all the old ladies fawned over him. They attended his Bible studies not out of any interest in the Bible, but because he was fine to look at.  He was hopeful, joyful, and loved being a priest. He was also naïve and in way over his head.

The parish was nearly four hundred thousand dollars in debt to the diocese due to some serious and substantial building issues that had accumulated over the years and had been neglected.  I need not enumerate them here, but the diocese had bankrolled these capital repairs under previous diocesan administrations, hoping to save the beautiful old historic building and keep it going. The parish never caught up. The old-timers began to die off, the young people mostly moved away, the arsty types never bought in, and the “givings” began to dry up.  When a diocese bails out a church so many times, the people sometimes forget that they have a financial responsibility for it. They also had a payroll debt and assessment debt that had accumulated since Fr. Fairview had arrived. The diocese continued to pay the priest through central payroll, but the parish was always behind on its payments. It was a parish in serious trouble but they had been bailed out so many times that the parish came to believe the apocalypse was still far off in the distant future.

 

As it turned out, their priest was not of much help, either.  Now, please don’t misunderstand me, he was a very talented young man and a remarkably good priest for his age and given his lack of experience.  Yet, he was one of those young priests that had it in his head that he could singlehandedly save the church. I think many of us amongst the clergy have been that young priest at one point or another in our ministry.  We think we can do it and we happily face the enormous task self-confidently. But over time the burden becomes real, and we begin to lament that “it’s all riding on me.” We work ourselves to the point of exhaustion and breakdown, and then comes a catastrophic failure. We blame ourselves. And if we end up managing to stay in ministry after our failure and salvage our careers, after that, with age, and hopefully maturity, we let go of the striving, ambition and self-importance. Then we find a quiet little corner of the vineyard and settle down and our own thing, quietly, to the best of our ability.

Young Fr. Fairview, was not yet there; nowhere near there, in fact. He still believed he had the power to save the church based on his charm, charisma, and good looks. The young man had not a clue of the true peril in which his parish hung when the Archdeacon arrived for his visitation.

“Good afternoon, Archdeacon,” Fr. Fairview greeted him heartily, trying to elicit a camaraderie that did not exist between the two.

“Good afternoon, Father.”

“I’m so glad to see you. I’ve been so looking forward to our visit.” This was the sort of pious sychophantry the Archdeacon could do without.  It only made his task less agreeable.

As the young priest led his senior to his little office off the narthex and invited him to sit, the younger offered him a drink:

“Would you like a scotch, Archdeacon?”

Good Lord. The Archdeacon was embarrassed by how hard this kid was trying. “I think not,” he replied, “I would rather get down to business.”

“Umm, okay. A-alright…” the young priest stammered, the fog of his naiveté beginning to clear for the first time and realizing this might not be the friendly “check-in” that he thought it was.

“Father.  Let me be perfectly honest: Your parish is nearly four hundred thousand dollars in debt to the diocese, you have an average Sunday attendance of fifteen people, there is no visible ministry happening here.  How do you mean to go on?”

Young Fr. Fairview, having for a moment been taken aback, was suddenly possessed of a remarkable self-confidence, and immediately began rhyming off his plan for two or three new “Fresh Expressions of Church” that he was contemplating.  He was clearly giving the Archdeacon a dry run of some nebulous grant proposals for diocesan funding that were floating around somewhere in his head. It was all a jumbled idea-soup full of catch phrases like “missional” and “mixed-economy” and “seeking God already at work in the world.” The Archdeacon had sat through enough seminars in which this nonsense had been forced upon him and spoon-fed to him like he was an idiot, that he was not prepared to have it all regurgitated back to him by this novice.

“Father,” he stopped him in his tracks, “that is all well and good, but any of those initiatives will take at least 2-3 years to get off the ground and will involve a significant investment of time and money before they become self-sustaining, much less reap any signs of growth.  What are you doing…now?”

“Well, we have a good Bible study.”

“Okay…and?”

“…a turkey dinner before Christmas…and a roast beef dinner in the spring.”

“How much do these fundraisers bring in?”

“About 900 dollars and about 1000 dollars, respectively.”

“I see. So you need to do roughly, about 200 more dinners to pay off your debt.”

The young man coughed and added, “…and we have a very successful silent auction every year that brings in about 1500 dollars.”

“I see,” the Archdeacon said solemnly. After a moment of silence between them, he looked the young man directly in the eye, “Father, just how do you propose to pay off this debt?”

“Umm, well,” he paused, “I was hoping, considering all the good ministry that goes on here, that the diocese would forgive it.”

“Forgive it?”

“Yes,” he said, straightening his back and sitting up confidently, “Yes. Forgive it.”

They sat in silence for a moment more and then Fr. Fairview spoke, “Archdeacon, may I show you something?”

He got up and led the Archdeacon down a narrow staircase into the basement and the tiny church hall. What the Archdeacon beheld was a room filled with all manner of second-hand goods.  There were dishes and kitchen-ware piled on tables, clothes of all sizes hanging on racks, children’s toys and children’s books. There were men’s shoes and ladies shoes, winter coats and summer hats.  Each items had a little sticker on it, and as near has he could observe, nothing was much more than about four or five dollars, and much of it, a lot less. There were shoppers examining the items carefully and placing them in little baskets that were provided for them to shop. The shoppers were clearly those who were struggling through life.

“Archdeacon, this is our little second hand shop. This is our ministry.  We are open Monday through Saturday from noon to 4 pm. We have so many generous donors that we have to use one of our parishioner’s garages for storage space.  We help dozens of people every day from all around the area who have nowhere else to go and no substantial income. We are a little village. We have no Sally Ann stores, or Value Villages within walking range. There are some real social needs in this community, Archdeacon, and we are here to help.”  He then introduced the Archdeacon to Rose. “Archdeacon, this is Rose McManus, and she runs this little ministry.”

“With the help of all my ladies!” she said proudly. It was explained to him that Rose was helped by a half dozen senior ladies, the core members of the congregation, who each took an afternoon shift helping to run the shop, restock, and price new items. Most of them were widows and helping the patrons of the shop was the highlight of their week. They were so enthusiastic and felt they had a real purpose and a real ministry.

“Everything here is affordable,” Rose chimed in. “…nothing over five dollars. But if they can’t afford it, we just give it to them. We put prices on things not to make money, but to offer the patrons dignity, so that they don’t have to feel like they are asking for handouts. We treat them as if they were shopping at Tiffany’s.”

The Archdeacon was genuinely moved by this demonstration of Christian charity and ministry.  The two senior ladies who happened to be helping Rose at the moment seemed to be in their glory, chatting with each other, and with customers they seemed know by name. They were folding clothes cheerily and enjoying themselves thoroughly.  Rose had a kettle boiling and told them that tea would be ready shortly. She asked if any of the customers wanted tea, as well. There was a real sense of community in this little shop amongst the church ladies, and amongst the patrons.

Just then, he heard heavy footsteps coming down the stairs and a male voice singing, “I’m wearing second-hand hats, second hand clothes; that’s why they call me second-hand Rose…”

In walked a tall, stocky man in his seventies carrying a big box of items. “Here you go, honey, I just picked this stuff up from the Morton’s. There’s some really nice things in here.”

“Thank you, Michael. Archdeacon, this is my husband. He is the chief gopher and lifter for the shop.”

Up until this point, there had been no evidence of any male parishioners.

“Nice to meet you, Michael.  Are you a regular church-goer?”

“Nah,” he laughed, “I only come to church about three times a year,” and then he added, “but my wife is here three times a day, so I think I’m covered.”

After exchanging a few more pleasantries, the young priest and the Archdeacon ascended the stairs and went back to the office. They spent the rest of their time together going over the vestry book, the parish finances, and the dire situation the parish was in. Yet, the Archdeacon could not get that little shop out of his mind – how alive it was, and the good it was doing.

After about an hour of tending to business the Archdeacon got up and shook Fr. Fairview’s hand.

“I hope you will speak well of us to the Bishop,” the young priest said.

“I will. You are doing good work here. I have to be honest, I don’t know if we can afford it, but you…all of you…are doing very good work.”

 

…THE ARCHDEACON WILL CONTINUE ON MONDAY.