A permanent memorial to unsung pandemic workers and those who have died with Covid-19 will be unveiled in Barnsley later this month.The £210,000 bronze sculpture will be revealed in the town's new Glass Works square on 22 November.Sculptor Graham Ibbeson's artwork, titled Reverence, was paid for by the council and partners.Key workers and bereaved families will be at the ceremony, led by the former Archbishop of York Lord Sentamu.The Lord Lieutenant of South Yorkshire, Prof Dame Hilary Chapman DBE, will also be at the unveiling.Mr Ibbeson's sculpture depicts ordinary workers, representing those affected by the pandemic.The line "Barnsley's fierce love will hold you forever in its heart" by town poet Ian McMillan will be etched on a plinth on the work.By the end of October, more than 900 people in Barnsley had died with covid. Council leader Sir Steve Houghton said the pandemic continued to affect everyone and urged people in the town to attend the opening ceremony and "reflect on those we've lost and those who work so tirelessly in our communities".
November 14 is Remembrance Sunday when we remember those who have given their lives, and those who have made sacrifices, in service of our country to ensure our freedom.There will be the traditional Remembrance Sunday service at St Mary and All Saints’ Church, Dunsfold. Our service will start at 9.30am.Our worship will be led by Reverend Canon Nigel Nicholson. After the church service Canon Nicholson will head to the Dunsfold War Memorial, alongside the cricket ground, where he will lead the public Act of Remembrance which will start at 10.45am.
THE COP26 climate summit in Glasgow has attracted church leaders from the Anglican Communion’s climate-vulnerable regions, keen to lobby on behalf of their communities.One such is the Archbishop of Central America and Bishop of Panama, the Most Revd Julio Murray (see photo). The part played by faith communities, he said last Friday, must not be underestimated when considering the impact of climate change.“As a representative of the delegation from the Anglican Communion, I believe that COP26 is an opportunity to introduce concrete action in response to one of our mission imperatives: to safeguard the integrity of all creation,” he said. “Governments, private sector business, and multilateral organisations should recognise the strategic importance of faith actors.”Central America is one of the most vulnerable regions to climate change, and contains some of the richest eco-systems, as well as communities living on the front line of the climate crisis. “All the countries in the Central American region are experiencing flooding, and also food scarcity due to climate change. This also results in forced migration, which impacts on the region,” Archbishop Murray said.The part played by church leaders, he said, was not just to raise awareness: it could also be a source of concrete solutions. “Anglicans across the world have long been engaged with environmental concerns. Anglicans are on the front line of the climate emergency, and are also actively involved in shaping solutions. We have the capacity to leverage our shared identity to mobilise our networks for climate justice and climate action.”Among the outcomes he hopes to see is strengthening climate resilience at the local level, providing the latest clean-energy technology and sharing the global burden fairly, as richer nations take their fair share of responsibility for having caused the problem.“These recommendations are meant to offer concrete suggestions to policy-makers,” he said. “They are some of the outcomes that we see can happen as concrete actions once COP26 is over. So we encourage faith leaders in the local context to get in contact with their governments, to find out what are the agreements they have signed on to, and to make a strategic partnership with them in order to follow through and follow up on the commitments made at COP26.”For the Archbishop, the solution also involves a spiritual reawakening. He said: “Not only the Church in Central America, but also the Churches which are part of the Anglican Communion are working to tackle climate change. We express the power of the Holy Spirit at this unprecedented time. This involves more than advocacy and activism: it involves a deeper level of pastoral guidance, innovative approaches to financial and environmental stewardship, and a spiritual and ecological vision, as we organise ourselves better to serve. We encourage governments so that they will be partners along with faith leaders in their different countries.”He continued: “I would ask UK Christians to partner in building resilience and in promoting justice. To encourage their own government to support governments in developing countries in Central America and the world to prepare programmes that respond to the damage and impact caused by the climate change. To join us as we pray and work together to be better stewards of creation, and to make sure that all people have what they need to live as human beings, with dignity and respect.”The need for greater urgency at the Glasgow talks was raised by church leaders from the Amazon. In a joint statement from the Bishops’ Conference of the Amazon and the Pan-Amazon Ecclesial Network, they express their “bewilderment” and “sense of helplessness” in the face of the “catastrophic impact” that climate change is having on humanity and the environment, and plead for “tangible results leading to a change of route once and for all”.On Saturday, the synod of the diocese of Norwich voted by 61 votes to five to disinvest from fossil fuels. The Priest-in-Charge of Martham and Repps with Bastwick, Thurne and Clippesby, the Revd Dr Steven Sivyer, the proposer of the motion, welcomed the outcome. He said: “I am delighted. There was a reasoned and thoughtful debate, and this is just the start of a wider move to look across our investments.“Our Christian duty is to be good stewards of God’s creation. The purpose of this motion is so that we do not profit from the practices that are destroying our environment, so that our actions are informed by our morals, which are guided by our faith.”On Monday, the Christian conservation charity A Rocha announced that it hopes to regenerate 75,000 acres of church land for nature and cutting carbon over the next five years. The Christian community in the UK owns or manages more than 500,000 acres of land, from churchyards and conference-centre grounds to urban community farms and agricultural estates. Twenty-five land managers with more than 1800 acres of land are committed to participating in this initiative, and a further 40 Christian land managers are looking at joining the Partners in Action scheme.Also on Monday, Christian Aid published a study underlining the impact of climate change on the economies of climate-vulnerable nations. The research, led by Humboldt University, in Berlin, showed that, even if the global temperature rise were kept to 1.5ºC, as outlined in the Paris Agreement, vulnerable countries faced an average GDP hit of 33 per cent by 2100. Under current climate trajectories, the damage would be 64 per cent, highlighting the need for both urgent emissions reductions and also financial support.The charity’s climate-justice adviser, Nushrat Chowdhury, said: “Being from Bangladesh, I’ve seen how loss and damage is already affecting my people. Houses, lands, schools, hospitals, roads are being lost and damaged by floods and cyclones. People are losing everything. Sea levels are rising, and people are desperate to adapt to the changing situations.”
In many ways speaking to you about male violence against women as a man feels deeply uncomfortable. It is uncomfortable because so much violence is perpetrated by men, and I am a man. The statistics are shocking and appalling. Of the 87,000 women who are murdered each year across the world, over half are killed by their partner or another family member. That is about 137 women every day. Tragically, this remains the most common cause of violence. And, fewer than 40% of women seek help for the violence they experience. Often, this will simply be because no help is available. Or because the help that is available is unsympathetic, unbelieving, and often also male. Tragically, in many circumstances, violence against women in relationships and marriages is, perversely, seen as acceptable or inevitable. Sometimes it is even legitimised by religious and other cultural traditions. The Bible, for instance, contains many stories of violence against women. Sometimes it is explicit as in the terrible, terrible story of the woman towards the end of the book of Judges who is thrown out into the street, gang raped, killed and mutilated (see Judges 19. 22-30). In the book of Numbers jealous husbands are provided with the means of testing their wives’ faithfulness by drinking poisoned water (see Numbers 5. 11-31)Even Esther is forced into the King's harem, treated like property.Sometimes it is more subtle, such as in Hosea where Israel’s unfaithfulness to God is described as being like a sexually promiscuous wife and must, therefore, be punished in the same way.In many ways, this is the most problematic text of all, because as we read it we are invited and expected to be sympathetic with the way the unfaithful wife is treated, and the violence meted upon them.There are other such passages. The effect of these can be to both condone and even promote the idea that male violence against women is acceptable.But it is not.In recent years feminist critique of these texts has enabled us to see how they inevitably reflect the cultural conditions of patriarchal societies where violence against women was, sadly and tragically, the norm. And just as tragically, that norm continues to this day: in this country and across the world. And, yes, I speak to you as a man, because the whole point of wearing a white ribbon is so that men draw attention to men’s violence. It is men who need to change. It is men who need to repent. It is men who need to lead the way. It is not that women are not also capable of violence. They are. But today we focus on the despicable and pernicious ways in which male violence against women continues to cause such misery and brokenness across our world. And, therefore, we men need to look to ourselves to change and find within our traditions other models for living and behaving. And, of course, we don’t need to look far. Jesus models for us a very different attitude to women. The way he treated women and responded to them was radically different to the prevailing culture of his day and deeply shocking to many who encountered him. It is likely that many women travelled with him in the wider band of his disciples. Martha and Mary were his friends and he was a welcome guest in their house. When he was thirsty, he asked a Samaritan woman for a drink. We can’t realise how scandalous this was. Not only was he approaching a woman in a way that was unacceptable in his time, it was a Samaritan woman, whose religious beliefs were anathema to the Jews. In this way, Jesus crossed boundaries and broke, and challenged those cultural and religious traditions that not only excluded women, but also enabled them to be treated as property and dealt with in the same negligent and wilfully violent way.Then, we have this beautiful story of Jesus honouring and receiving the kindness of the woman who anoints him, shaming the men who had welcomed him in by her profound care born. I suppose, of her thankfulness to him and her recognition of what she saw in him, nothing less than a different way of being human – a different way of being a man (see Mark 14. 3-9).In our society today, the sexualisation of children and the objectification of women and the many ways in which women continue to be treated as property breed and legitimise violence. In the name of Christ, we cry out for an end to this and speak up for a new set of attitudes, those that are given us in Christ. We men need to be liberated form the conditioning, the dis-ease and the insecurities that ferment into violence. Christ shows us the way.Years ago, I remember someone asking me what difference being a Christian had made to my life. I remember saying it had enabled me to get in touch with things about myself as man that were so often denied or belittled in our culture. Like kissing my father in public. Like showing emotion. Like weeping. That these things were also male. And, I didn’t need to prove my manhood by macho posturing and by suppressing emotion. Or by lashing out at someone.This is the way of Christ: who weeps at the grave of his friend Lazarus; who receives the kindness of the women who loved him and served him; who stands up to the mob of men who would stone a woman to death for her failures; who sleeps in the boat when the storms rage around him; who can even quell the storms of anger and violence that could engulf me and could destroy others.I wear a white ribbon today, because men need to change and because in Christ I see what that change could be.St Paul famously challenges us saying that in Christ there is no man and woman. This doesn’t mean that all differences between us are eliminated or insignificant, but it does mean that no one way of being human is superior to another and that in Christ there is this new humanity. It is in the light of that new humanity and in the hope of liberation from all that defiles and corrupts us that we now need to find new ways of living, penitent for the mistakes of the past, crying out for justice in the present, and looking in the future for ways of equality, nonviolence and peace.Stephen CottrellArchbishop of York
