BISHOP INSTALLS NEW DEAN IN GIBRALTAR CATHEDRAL

As he began his new work as Dean of the Cathedral the Reverend Dr. John Paddock was told by the Bishop of Gibraltar in Europe that his role is to be a Jeremiah.

The Installation in the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in Gibraltar was attended by representatives of the Diocese and the Gibraltarian community. The Bishop, the Rt. Rev Geoffrey Rowell spoke about the prophetic ministry of Jeremiah – passing on the words of God – and addressing the topics of the day, including the global financial crisis.

“The Dean, as Senior Priest of the Diocese, has a calling to advise with his counsel, and to speak the truth in love. He is part of the Bishop’s ministry of oversight and pastoral care. He is to be a voice of support, and sometimes of challenge for the Diocese, as he is to be a voice of encouragement and care for the cathedral congregation here and within the community of Gibraltar. Jeremiah was assured that the Lord had put his words into his mouth – there was a gift of speaking to the collapsing world of the Jewish people in Jeremiah’s own day.
Our world today is a world of collapsing confidence, where a recession has come with the suddenness of a tsunami caused by the shaking of foundations beneath the sea. As I have read the papers commenting on the economic situation I have sometimes wondered whether I  was reading about economics or religion with the endless references as to how faith in the banking system might be restored – and even if that were to be restored it is only a faith in penultimate and not ultimate things. I am told that at the recent Synod of Bishops in Rome discussing the Bible, Pope Benedict looked up at one point, and said, ‘My brothers I have to remind you that we are talking about the Word of God, and not banks.’ The fall of Wall Street, if I may use a short-hand, may be as significant as the fall of the Berlin Wall in changing the world, the Europe, in which we live. The financial situation will certainly have an impact on the many to whom we minister in the Diocese and therefore on the Diocese itself.”

The service was attended by the Governor of Gibraltar, who read a lesson, and the Roman Catholic Bishop of Gibraltar as well as some of the Archdeacons and lay leaders from around the Diocese in Europe.

The new Dean has wide pastoral experience after ministry in the armed forces, in education and in parish ministry. 57 year old Dr John Paddock was most recently Vicar of St Georges, Tuffley with St Margaret’s, Whaddon in Gloucestershire (UK). He has moved to Gibraltar with his wife, Jennifer, who herself  had a career in the United Nations and as a Member of HM Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

The Bishop, in his sermon, also highlighted the importance place of the Gibraltar Cathedral within the vast Diocese in Europe.

"The cathedral of a Diocese is to be at its centre – not necessarily geographically, but as its praying heart. This cathedral in terms of geography is on the margins, the margin of Europe, a place on the edge. Gibraltar, one of the ancient pillars of Hercules, guards the straits, which like an hour-glass furrow the narrow and strategic shipping lines. To be a place of prayer in such a setting is to be a spiritual hour-glass, bringing all the concerns of this Diocese, and this continent, and this world in which we live, to a focus before God. Places on the edge, where hermits went to be apart, have sometimes been described as ‘thin places’, places where God breaks in; or where the God who is always there in the undergrowth is discovered and known again, as Gerard Manley Hopkins knew in the silence of a night vigil – ‘over again I feel thy finger and find thee.’ ”

Dr Rowell ended his address with a personal challenge to the new Dean and the wider church.

“We need enlarged hearts if we are to serve the world in which we live. Our lives must be speaking lives, changed and transformed by Christ. As we pray for John in his new ministry, and Jennifer with him, that is not simply a prayer for them, but for each and all of us to be renewed in our Christian discipleship that our words may be Christ’s words of forgiveness, that we speak of the hope that transcends the fragile hopes of the world and offers a firmer foundation than finances, that we can engage in the costly work of reconciliation, and pull down the destructive walls of separation and division.”

The Anglican Cathedral Church of the Holy Trinity serves as both a parish church and the mother church of the Diocese in Europe and is mid-way through a major appeal to raise £850,000 to replace the roof, build an enhanced entrance onto the Cathedral Square to improve access for both churchgoers and tourists and to fund a number of other necessary conservation and restoration measures.

Pictures:

The new Dean, Dr Paddock with the Bishop of Gibraltar in Europe and the Archdeacon of Gibraltar, the Venerable David Sutch.

The new Dean and the Archdeacon of Gibraltar.