Articles - From the Vicar

One of the challenges of my recent period of study leave was how to settle into a different rhythm of work and prayer. Some aspects of the new rhythm I adopted were, I must admit, most welcome: I was not constantly having to refer to my diary, was able to fit more physical exercise into my weekly schedule and had more free evenings than I have had for fifteen years. I also had the opportunity to worship in a different community, in which I found my relationship with God enriched and some of my assumptions challenged.

My experience of needing to establish a new pattern of life, even for just three months, helped me, in a small way, to make sense of one of the comments I sometimes hear from those who have recently retired: that it takes time to adjust to a life without work. This is true at the other end of the life-cycle as well: the bath, story and bed routine is not simply about survival for parents, it also appears to answer a fundamental need for an ordered world in babies and young children. All of us, it seems, benefit from a deep structure to our lives that combines the physical, the mental and the spiritual.

As a Christian my own pattern of life is nourished by the rhythms of the Church's year and these particular rhythms provided a source of continuity during my study leave. As the austerity and desolation of Lent and Holy Week gave way to the resurrection joy and spiritual refreshment of Easter and Pentecost, it was good to know that, during this whole period, I was in fellowship with my brothers and sisters not only in Roundhay but throughout the world. But the great festivals are not the only celebrations that contribute to the rhythm of the Church's year: the saints' days and other holy days of the Church's calendar have an equally important part to play. The Eucharists we celebrate at St. Ed's on each of these days, offered on behalf of our whole community, bring us into a joyful relationship with the whole Church, living and departed, and enable us to play our part in maintaining the rhythm of prayer and praise that has been unbroken through two millennia.

© St Edmund's Church, Roundhay