The Archdeacon: Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

A Meeting with Methuselah

Although he still had two churches to visit, the Archdeacon’s report to the bishop was beginning to take shape.  His visits had been enlightening. While he has some previous knowledge of these places, mostly through interactions with some of the clergy, some stories shared with him by Christa, and from reading their vestry reports, he believed that the personal visits were really important.  The Archdeacon always felt that visits by a cleric to his or her parishioners was the heart of all pastoral ministry, but he now realized how important it was for the diocese, in some form or another, to regularly check in on the parishes and clergy and see how they are doing.  As difficult as his mandate was, he found himself enjoying the visits and learning about what was happening on the ground in this small corner of the diocese.

The Archdeacon was beginning to fall behind, though, in his own parochial duties. He had not stopped being a parish priest, himself. What many people don’t realize is that a good priest is often called upon to take on more responsibility at the diocesan level while still doing their parish work.  Very good priests are asked to take on more and more, until it becomes difficult to keep everything in balance. It can be a struggle for a parish to see their priest leaving the parish regularly and running off to diocesan meetings or to do “tasks” for the bishop.  Parishes get possessive of their clergy when this happens, even when they don’t like their priests very much! But what most lay people don’t fully understand is that a priest has responsibilities to the parish and to the diocese. The priest is not only a “parish priest” but also a “diocesan priest” and is expected to do work for the wider church, as well as the local church.  As our friend Mr. Perkins so aptly put it to the Archdeacon, “we are not a Congregationalist church.”  Mr. Perkins, of course, was pointing out that a priest has a responsibility to the whole of the community over which he or she has the cure of souls, and not simply to the Sunday congregation, or even those that make up the “parish list.” Equally, we must recognize that the parish church is not the only important manifestation of the church.  Yes, it is very important, perhaps even the most important, but we belong to a larger family.  Our priests are members of what we call the “college of presbyters” and are called upon to take their part in the councils of the church, to participate in the wider life of the diocese, the national church, and beyond. The priest is to be concerned with the well-being and building-up of the church at every level, when asked.  The Archdeacon was certainly caught in this tension at the moment as parish life had suddenly gotten very busy while he was “on duty” for the Bishop.  When he lamented to Christa that he was pulled in these two directions, and started going over his responsibility for building up the church both locally and in the diocese, she reminded him, unsympathetically, that the Bishop had given him the task of taking his part in the “tearing down” the church.  He dropped his griping.

His final two visits had been put off for several days because two of his own senior parishioners had died just days apart and he had two very large funerals to plan back-to-back. It was also the week in which his church wardens’ meeting fell, as well as a week in which he took three nursing home services. There was also a personnel matter that he had to deal with, in reference to the underperformance of a church custodian. I shan’t disclose the nature of that disciplinary meeting, but it was time consuming. There was simply no time to add another couple of parish visits into his calendar.

Thus, he went a whole week before making his next visits.  On the one hand, he was somewhat anxious about falling behind. He had several emails from the Bishop asking him for updates.  On the other hand, it put off what was surely to be an unpleasant task: visiting Christa’s parish.  They had not been on the best of terms since the visitation of her deanery began. He wanted to get it over but he was puting off the worst till last.

So, saving Christa’s church for the end, after he had extricated himself from his parochial responsibilities, he made his penultimate visit to the Parish of St. Alfred the Great. St. Alfred’s was located in the west end of Midway. Midway, so named because it was located at precisely the mid-way point between the two old county boundaries, was a large suburban town with a population of over a hundred thousand people.  It was the same town in which Christa’s parish was located, although hers was in the quite affluent east-end.  Like many places, a town of this size could once support two large cardinal parishes, and St. Alfred’s was a cardinal parish.  However, with the sad decline we are all witnessing, Midway was quickly becoming a “one-church town”. St. Alfred’s was fairly stable, which was more than could be said for Christa’s church.  Her church had traditionally been the church for the upper class set in town, and St. Alfred’s was a working-class church.  This distinction had pretty much faded away in the last twenty-five years as people have become much less bound to their neighbourhood church as they were in the old days.

St. Alfred’s was built after the First World War and named after the great and pious English king in a fit of British post-war patriotism. It was quite a decent and attractive building. It still had enough neo-gothic traits to make it pleasing to the eye, for church architecture had not yet become obsessed with gaudy functionality that would happen in the 1950s. The interior was quite lovely. The church had embraced the “arts and crafts” movement and commissioned ecclesiastical objects and interior work in that style. The interior was largely untouched by modern innovation with the exception that the altar was out from the wall so the priest could celebrate the Eucharist facing the people. This move had been resisted by the rector, but an order had come down from then bishop of the day and hesitatingly, the priest did as he was commanded.

What shall I tell you about their rector, except that he was one of the oldest working priests in the Diocese? He was somewhere in his mid-eighties and showed no interest or sign of retiring. You see, a priest is not an employee, but an office-holder, and it takes a lot to get an old priest like the man we are about to meet to “call it a day”. Old Canon T.R. Swiftman had been at the parish for fifty-five years, first as the curate, and then as the rector. Perhaps you might be picturing a rather “grandfatherly” old priest, a saintly old man, beloved of his people, dispensing gentle wisdom and paternal blessings with smiles and laughter. This would in no way characterize him. If he was the oldest working priest in the Diocese, he was also the grumpiest. I can’t recall ever seeing him smile. He had a seriousness that certainly did not exude the love of Jesus. He had once been a fairly portly man, but in his later years he had become quite emaciated.  For a long time it was thought that he had some sort of awful illness that was eating him from the inside out, but he carried on with his work and never complained of any ailment when asked how he was. Clearly, St. Peter was not yet ready for him. When he walked, or shall I say “shuffled”, one was immediately reminded of Tim Conway’s “world’s oldest man” sketch from the Carol Burnett show.

Old Canon Swiftman was a voracious reader, whether it be a theological tome or a novel, he was often found with a book in his hand. He would regularly purge his library and sell off older volumes to used book stores. It became a kind of hunt for many of us younger clergy to track down his old volumes, each of them inscribed “T.R. Swiftman” in his distinct and elegant hand. Many of his wonderful old books in theology, church history, and biblical studies have made their way into the libraries of many clerics in this diocese.  Only the other day, the Archdeacon showed me a few of Swiftman’s volumes that he had acquired over the years.

I’m also told that he used to lecture at Trinity College in his very early days, but gave it up after only a couple of years. It is said that the old dean was a bit afraid of him, but I think it more likely that the weight of his parish responsibilities kept him away from the college he loved so dearly.  I once overheard him telling a subsequent Dean how disgusted he was that “Lux Mundi” was now being kept in storage rather than in the stacks at the college library.  When it was explained to him that it was not much checked out these days by young seminarians, he was thoroughly scandalized. He was, unsurprisingly, very interested in Aquinas and the scholastics and had published a few minor papers several decades ago, but hasn’t written much in the past several years.  One thing I can say about him is that he was a very good preacher and could say a fine mass. 

The parish of which he was the rector had years ago been known as something of a problem parish.  Perhaps because it was working class and filled with people who felt so little power or authority in their own lives, they felt the church was the place to exercise it and lord it over others. Apparently, there were all sorts of conflicts for many years and cleric after cleric ran screaming from the place. In fact, Swiftman’s predecessor, who was the rector when Swiftman was appointed assistant curate died in the saddle from a heart attack shortly after the young curate had arrived. It was presumed to be stress.  Young Swiftman was appointed priest-in-charge after his mentor’s untimely death and eventually became the rector. He has remained steadfast in this post ever since and has ruled over the parish with an iron fist.  He resolved early on that he would not be driven out of the parish, nor would he die in the saddle – unless of old age. And to this promise, he has remained faithful.

As with any place in which the lid is forcefully kept closed, the parish of St. Alfred remains something of a contentious place, but the old Canon just suppresses any form of insurrection with a penetrating gaze over the top rim of his glasses, putting the fear of God into any potential insurrectionary.  If he had a few challengers in his early days, he has since buried them all.  He rules absolutely.

Was he loved? I suppose, if it was that sort of love that one has for their austere old spinster aunt who is there for all the rites of passage from generation to generation, who gives modest and pleasant little gifts, whom you invite for dinner out of sense of obligation, who has always been there and seems like she always will; if this is love, then yes, he was loved, after a sort. I would like to say he was more of a “fixture” and I’m not sure if St. Alfred’s knew how to be St. Alfred’s without him.

He was sitting behind his desk reading a novel when our friend, the Archdeacon, was presented to him. The old man stood, made a bit of a quaint Victorian bow, and gestured the Archdeacon to sit.  He respected authority, but he did not suffer fools.

“Well, Archdeacon…” he began, in his soft but deep baritone voice, “you seem to have been given a most unpleasant task.”

“I would say it has been quite interesting to visit with the parishes in this deanery.”

“Harumph,” he scowled, “‘Interesting’ is such a weasel-word. It means nothing and is used to obfuscate. Lucky for you, I won’t ask you what you thought of those places you have been. I’ve been to them myself. Many times. I’m not much impressed by any of them, but shan’t waste your time or mine by discussing them.”

He then pushed his vestry books across the desk in the Archdeacon’s direction, “I do hope you will look at these, Archdeacon. I’ve been keeping them up for 55 years and do you know that not one bishop has ever asked to see them on an episcopal visit? Now, that’s a scandal, I dare say!”

The Archdeacon did look at them, each one, very carefully. They were, in truth, a works art. The old priest’s penmanship was exquisite. Every entry had clearly been made with such a sense of responsibility and care.  “These are most impressive,” the Archdeacon said.

“Yes, I should think so,” said the old priest. “Hopefully I shall be dead before we are asked to keep them electronically.

After not knowing how to respond to that, the Archdeacon continued to peruse the records for a while longer and then picked up, “Now, Canon, I have a few questions to ask about the ministry that goes on here.”

“Ah yes,” he said solemnly, “I expected that.  Everything you should need is in this dossier I have prepared. Clearly, you’re a busy man, Archdeacon,” the old man gave a little chuckle, the kind made without a smile so that the Archdeacon was not sure if he was being mocked “…and I don’t want to waste your time. I know you surely don’t want to waste mine. I’m an old man, you know. Who knows how long I have left?”

The Archdeacon wasn’t quite sure what to say to that so leafed through the dossier and dropped it into his briefcase. As he looked up again, he could see the old man was staring him down.

“Archdeacon, you have seen this church many times. Nothing here has changed so I have no intention of showing you around. Everything you need is in that dossier. If you have any further questions, although I expect you won’t, you can call me if you must.”

And with that, the old priest stood, gave another slight bow indicating to the Archdeacon that he was dismissed and free to show himself out.

…THE ARCHDEACON CONTINUES TOMORROW.