- Bishops and buses
At 8.30am yesterday morning we arrived at the bus stop for work to be greeted by bishops already waiting to board the coaches – the task was to get all of them there and robed by 11am – and we succeeded! Over 20 coach loads of bishops and their spouses descended upon Canterbury City Centre for the Conference Service at Canterbury Cathedral. As we walked down Burgate towards the Cathedral there were a few quiet protesters lining the streets but causing no harm. It was great – like being royalty! Couldn’t quite resist the tempatation of giving a regal wave everyone now and then so luckily there were people I knew in the crowd!
The Cathedral was completely full – we sat in the quire aisles and couldn’t see much but there was a television screen to allow us to see something. The procession in took an awful long time, as you can imagine with 600 bishops, ecumenical guest and others. The Archbishop sat on Saint Augustines throne behind the High Altar and was surrounded by bishops and primates from across the world. There was a mixture of languages and cultures represented at the service (almost worthy of St C’s 
). The intercessions were led in Hindi, Portugese, Japanese and French.
The preacher was the Bishop of Colombo, Sri Lanka. He spoke about unity and the parable of the seeds and the weeds, growing together in one field, the righteous and the unrighteous. I thought at one point that he may be treading on dangerous ground but he was very good. He pointed at that all of us are unrighteous and that it is only in the crucified and risen Christ, in the bread and wine that we share, that we all united and made righteous together. One image that struck me was that he said how in that morning, the lips of all people from across the world, different nations, cultures, languages, experiences would be sharing from the same cup and sharing unity as children and brother and sisters in Christ.
The highlight of the service for me was the Gospel procession – it was fantastic (and I think we should do it like this at St C’s!). It was led by the Melanesian brothers and sisters dressed in national costume, complete with grass skirts. Two sisters were carrying a wooden boat decorated with flowers into which the Book of Gospels was placed. It was carried inside it, accompanied by singing and dancing, panpipes and drums. As the Gospel was read, the brothers and sisters knelt down in a circle around the reader. On the way back to the High Altar the procession was met by the whole congregation clapping along with the panpipes, drums and dancing - it was a real moment of joy and celebration of the reading of God’s word. I have never experienced anything like it in an Anglican service before!!
In the evening there was an introduction to the conference programme. Rowan Williams began by saying something like “You’ve probably had enough of hearing my voice!” The response to which was a quiet clapping by a few, rapidly spreading across the tent until all were standing clapping.
