A Word about the John Rylands Library and Enriqueta Rylands

One of the most important places from my sabbatical journey, the John Rylands Library, has received very little attention from me in this blog.  Part of the University of Manchester Library system, it was created over 100 years ago by the generosity of Enriqueta Rylands to honor the memory of her husband John Rylands, Manchester's first multi-millionaire. Rather than spending all that textile-industry money on herself, Enriqueta Rylands determined to give a lasting gift to the people of Manchester, a public library like no other.  During her lifetime, she spent hundreds of thousands of pounds to purchase books and manuscripts, and upon her death, bequests from her will enabled the library to continue expanding and adding to its collections.  Note that the last line of the above plaque states that "Enriqueta invites you to your library." (Emphasis mine)

Work on the building began in 1890, and the library opened on 1 January 1900, becoming part of The University of Manchester in 1972.  It holds the Special Collections of the University of Manchester, and most importantly, for my purposes, it houses the world's largest collection of Methodist archives. The Methodist Church of Great Britain established the Methodist Archives and Research Centre (MARC) in 1961 at John Wesley's Chapel in London, but in 1977 it was transferred to the John Rylands. MARC holds the world’s largest collection of manuscripts relating to the Wesley family, including approximately 5,000 letters, notebooks and associated papers of the period 1700–1865. According to their website, the John Rylands is part of the third largest academic library in the United Kingdom, with over 250,000 printed volumes, and well over a million manuscripts and archival items.  You can see that this was an exciting place for me to visit and explore!

In 1843, Enriqueta was born in Havana, Cuba to Stephen Cattley Tennant, an English sugar merchant, and his Spanish wife, Juana Camila Dalcou. Enriqueta grew up in New York, London, and Paris, and she moved to Manchester to be a companion to Martha Rylands, marrying John Rylands some eight months after Martha's death.  Enriqueta and John shared a passion for education and were members of the Congregational Church rather than the established Church of England, so she decided a public library that leaned towards collection of Nonconformist religious literature would be a fitting memorial to him.

She was the very opposite of the Rich Fool in Luke 12: 13-21 who decided that the crops and money and other riches that came his way belonged to him and him alone.  That young man pulled down his small barns in order to construct bigger, better ones, only to find that his wealth counted for nothing in the eyes of  God and that he could not take it with him upon his death.  Enriqueta no doubt enjoyed the perks of marriage and widowhood to a wealthy industrialist, but she saw clearly that the way of love, the way of the Christ she worshipped, demanded that she give freely, liberally, graciously to others rather than hoarding her money and spending it lavishly on things that do not last.  She believed in the kind of gift that keeps on giving, the kind of legacy that blesses others even more than the giver herself.

The top floor of the John Rylands is the research area/Rare Book Room, and I spent many hours hunched over precious letters written to and from John Wesley, Susanna Wesley, and others.  There I discovered Charles Wesley treasures, manuscript hymns written in his spidery but precise hand.  And there I felt my heart strangely warmed by the ongoing gift of a woman long dead, a woman whose love for her husband and for her God still extends an invitation to the people of Manchester and from far beyond to come and study and read. Enriqueta holds a special place in my heart for her generosity and her good stewardship of the resources that came into her life.   As you think about the stewardship of your own resources, how do you think  God might be calling you to bless others?  Are you listening for the Spirit's voice?

And just for fun, enjoy this picture from the main floor of the library.  Many different figures from the world of religion and education are found there, including these two.

John Calvin (left) and John Wesley (right) playing together nicely at the John Rylands

The Second Breath/Practicing the Pause

Flowers at the Old Rectory, Epworth

I mentioned in an earlier post that my readjustment to life back at home and at work is tougher than I had anticipated.  Well, the book my two book groups are reading this fall is called Wrestling with Grace:  A Spirituality for the Rough Edges of Daily Life by Robert Corin Morris.  One of the first things he emphasizes is taking a second breath before reacting, before speaking, before well, just about everything.  It's sometimes called "practicing the pause," and it's an invitation to stop that immediate response that arises when we stub our toe, get stuck in line, or feel insulted. It's about taking a moment to allow the Spirit of God to enter in and help us settle into a different mode of being, of being present in the moment and allowing blessing to flow instead of cursing.

The picture of flowers in this blog is one small gift from my sabbatical that is helping me to take a second breath.  I have no idea if Susanna and the Wesleys had flowers in their yard.  They certainly had crops like barley and wheat, but I'd like to think that the shade trees and masses of colorful blooms that are there now might be representative of what her yard might have looked then.  And I'd like to think that she occasionally went outside to escape her brood of energetic children to consider the lilies or daisies or phlox of her field.

If you are feeling harried or stressed out, sit with this picture and imagine walking in the soft green grass under the lovely shade trees, taking in the glory of these waving blossoms, feeling a gentle breeze waft across your face and tousle your hair.  May the Holy Spirit help you to be still, to be present, to be filled with peace as you picture yourself quietly being receptive to God. Practice this daily, for just a few moments, with or without words, and let Christ be formed in your heart, and you may find that you are being shaped and remade into his image, completely filled with love for God and neighbor.

Real People

When I first started thinking about my sabbatical, it was with vague thoughts of making some small contribution to the field of Wesley studies, but that probably isn't going to be the outcome of this venture.  I simply didn't have time to explore the masses of material held at the John Rylands, but being there whetted my appetite, and I learned new things, and perhaps I will write some sort of devotional rather than an academic piece.

One thing I discovered is real people.  Remember the TV show by that name in the late 1970's/early 1980's?  Well, these were real people who struggled with their health and worried about their children and prayed for God to be real to them.  John Wesley, while a gifted and Spirit-filled preacher, had a wretchedly unhappy marriage, and as is the case with most things, there was plenty of blame to go 'round.  Charles Wesley thought his brother was going too far with some of his actions that took the Methodist movement slowly but steadily out of the Anglican fold, and he blasted him in verse, and oh, yeah, he didn't exactly help with John's love life.  (That is perhaps the subject of another post sometime later.) 

Sarah Ryan had a bit of a checkered past, rather like the Samaritan woman, a bit like Charles and John's sister Hetty, and she became a leader of a class, a surrogate mother in an orphanage, a preacher, and a Mother in the faith to other preaching women like Mary Bosanquet Fletcher, who was before, during, and after her marriage an example of a woman exhibiting a gospel-changed, Christ-focused life.  She was half of a clergy couple before such things even existed, and between her preaching, pastoral care, and spiritual direction (especially of women), she became known as a "Mother in Israel," high praise from Wesley and other Methodist leaders indeed!  She left masses of written material, a treasure trove of letters, manuscripts of a sermon or two, an account of the life of her friend Sarah Ryan, and more.  Someday, perhaps, I will revisit the John Rylands and delve more deeply into the riches of her written legacy.

And then coming back again to John Wesley.  Here was a man whose passion for  God sustained him through threats of violence, pain and heartbreak, grief, loss, and spiritual uncertainty, taking him in directions he never imagined or even wanted. He sometimes gave rough, seemingly unfeeling counsel, yet he ruthlessly applied the same to himself.  Into old age, with fading eyesight, wavering hand-writing, quavering voice, and failing physical strength, he could write in a letter at age 86, a few months before his death,"But all is well:  I can still write almost as easily as ever, and I can read in a clear light; and I think, if I could not read or write at all, I could still say something for God."

His voice and hands are now stilled in death, yet he still has something to say for God.    Among his last words were these:  "The best of all is, God is with us."  And the epitaph on his tombstone, not written by him, contains these words, after several glowing, mellifluous phrases --
"Reader, if thou art constrained to bless the instrument, give God the glory."  To that, he would heartily agree because even in death, he is still pointing to the one his brother called the Lover of our souls.  And for that, and so much more, thanks be to God!

Living in the Midst of So Much History

If you have ever been to England or Scotland, you know that there's a lot of old stuff there -- houses, statues, graveyards, churches, castles, papers, etc.  It's always a bit of a shock to me as an American where "old" is anything 200 years old to come face to face with a parish church built in the 1400's (Theddlethorpe St. Helen's) or a document (Magna Carta) dating back to 1215 or a castle from the 1000's (Lincoln Castle).

When I was in Epworth, Lincolnshire, I stayed for twelve days at the Red Lion, a a coaching inn so old that it is mentioned in the Domesday Book of the 11th century, and it just happens to be where John Wesley slept whenever he returned to preach in his hometown.  After his father's death in 1735, the family had to vacate the Old Rectory, so when he came back to Epworth, this was pretty much the only place to stay. His first visit to the Red Lion was apparently in 1742, and this is commemorated by a blue historical placque next to the front entrance.  I jokingly suggested they add one that mentioned my first visit in 2017, but they see far too many odd Methodist types to take me very seriously.  ;-)

                            

Being surrounded by so many visible reminders of people who have gone before was exciting and maybe a bit intimidating, and I wondered how living in that milieu affected those who have never known anything different.  Might it be easy to be a little blasé about seeing venerable buildings day in and day out or to walk the same village streets once frequented by notable people who quite literally changed the world?

As I traveled, I posed that question to people living in various places, and they all stopped to give it some serious thought.  To a person, they all admitted that it's something they almost take for granted.  Scott and I laughed when the young man in Castlebay, Isle of Barra, told us in an offhand way to "have fun at the castle," like it was no big deal to take a small boat into the harbor to explore Kisimul Castle, but he's probably seen that tiny fortress every day for all of his 19 years, so it doesn't hold the mystique it surely did for us!

                              

It made me ponder the things back home that I don't really see or appreciate nearly often enough. I may not have an ancient cathedral in my backyard or own a chair that Susanna Wesley sat in, but what is unique and special in my life? And who is unique and special in my life?  Tragedies and accidents and losses usually make us stop for at least a moment, but it passes, and we go right back to acting the same old way.

But what if we made a conscious effort to remember how short and precious life is?  What if we developed a habit of not only thanking God for the blessings in our lives but of expressing our love and delight to those significant people who grace our existence?  What if we saw that we, too, live in the midst of history, common-place though it may seem?  With the Apostle Paul, let us pause to say, "I thank my God every time I remember you" whenever we reflect on the gifts of life and love and laughter shared with others.  Thanks be to God!

Homecoming

                   
                      The exterior of Theddlethorpe St. Helen's Church, Lincolnshire

Many years ago, a distant cousin on the Fowler side of the family researched and wrote a history of the family, tracing them back to Nansemond, Virginia, and someone else figured out that the William and Margaret Fowler who traveled across the Atlantic on the ship Abigail in 1621 almost certainly originally came from a tiny settlement called Theddlethorpe St. Helen in Lincolnshire, England.  As Lincolnshire just happens to be the county where the Wesleys lived in a market town called Epworth, I had hoped that I'd get to visit the spot for a homecoming of sorts, but given the difficulty of transportation, it didn't look likely.  However, my friend Louise Howard (mentioned prominently in another post) talked with the Rev. Stuart Gunson and his wife Marion who are very active at Wesley Memorial Methodist Church, and they took me on a whirlwind tour of the Lincolnshire countryside and into Lincoln itself.

Theddlethorpe St. Helen was originally built in the 14th century but was largely rebuilt in 1866, and it is located near Mablethorpe, not far from the coast.  Still in use, it offers a service of Holy Communion once a month and a service of Evensong the fourth Sunday of each month.  The interior shows inevitable signs of wear and tear from centuries of use, and there were tarps over some of the furnishings, but there were also fresh flowers in front of the baptismal font and paraments on the altar and pulpit.  We walked around and looked, and I took some pictures.

Then we went outside to poke around in the graveyard to see if we could locate any long-dead Fowler ancestors, but the headstones are so ancient that many have disintegrated into the earth or become impossible to read, but once we stomped down some of the high grass, we did find a couple of tombstones from the 19th and 20th centuries, so I figured they must be distant cousins and snapped a picture anyway.

Stuart offered to take one of me standing next to the church after jokingly asking me if I felt my heart strangely warmed, if I felt any sense of homecoming or belonging there.  I had to say that I didn't feel any particular pull towards the place, but it was undeniably beautiful in its faded Gothic splendor, set in the shade trees in a sea of green.  Even though I didn't find the graves of my great-great-zillions of times back great-grandparents or get some eerie sense of coming full circle, it satisfied a deep yearning on my part to stand where they might have stood, where they were probably baptized and almost certainly were married.

Everyone wants to feel part of a story bigger than her/himself, and this was more than likely a piece of my family history, a piece of ground into which my roots were planted, but you know what?  Even if it wasn't MY set of Fowlers, in a sense it doesn't matter because this was a church, a place of Christian worship, a sacred site where down the years, countless knees have bent in prayer, voices have been lifted in song, hands have been clasped in supplication.  These are my foremothers and forefathers, even if there is no genetic tie between us, and their faith is my faith, even all these centuries later in a land they could never have imagined.  And that is homecoming enough for me.

Wee Mr. Wesley

Several people have asked me what was my favorite thing about my sabbatical, and I can't narrow it down to just one thing because the entire experience was a gift from God, filled with such grace.  So I decided instead of trying to arbitrarily choose one thing, I would highlight several different aspects of my sabbatical in this blog, so here's the first one not covered in a previous post written while I was traveling.

When I was a teenager, like a lot of other teenagers, I had posters all over the doors of my closet, my walls, inside my locker at school, pretty much everywhere.  They featured cars I wanted to drive, perfume I hoped to wear, and singers I liked to listen to.  That's what you do when you're 16 -- you put posters of rock stars all over the place because you want everybody to know just how special the singer(s) are to you.  Well, in the 18th and 19th centuries, nobody put posters on the wall to show how big a fan s/he was, but after John Wesley's death in 1791, a lot of folks wanted to honor him, to have a little piece of Wesley in their homes, so thousands upon thousands of inexpensive pottery and ceramic and even bone figurines featuring him were created.  Many of these are collectors' items today, and museums like the John Rylands in Manchester have a varied selection, but occasionally, the average person can find one in an antique shop or online.

While I was in Manchester, I posted a picture on Facebook of some of the ones at the John Rylands, and a friend helpfully sent me a link where I could purchase one of my very own.  She convinced me that this would be the perfect souvenir of my sabbatical, and since it wasn't very expensive, I sent the seller my credit card information.  I was about to leave Manchester for 12 days in the Wesleys' hometown, Epworth, and I was staying at the Red Lion, the inn where JW stayed whenever he came back to town to preach, so with childish glee, I gave the seller that address and waited for my wee Mr. Wesley to be delivered.

A few days into my stay, after breakfast, I was sitting in the pub where the wi fi signal was the strongest, and the hotel housekeeper had gone upstairs to "do" my room.  I heard a voice calling, "Hello, hello?"  and since she wasn't back yet, I called out to let the guy know that she'd be right back.  It occurred to me that it might be the post, and when he came around the corner with a stack of mail in one hand and a small box in the other, I told him that it was for me.  "I'm Donna," I said, and after looking curiously at me (the accent gave me away, no doubt), he glanced at the package and said, "OK, sign here."  I did, and right about then, Leslie returned.  "What have you got there?"  "It's Mr. Wesley!"  She rolled her eyes -- but in a friendly way -- and fetched me a knife.  Between the two of us, we carefully cut through the tape, I gently unrolled the bubble wrap and pulled the figurine out.  "Isn't he beautiful?" I asked her.  She shook her head and mumbled something about crazy Methodists and then admired him, probably just to be nice.  I carefully rolled him back up and replaced him in his box and then looked at the address label.  Yep, there it was -- Donna Fowler-Marchant, c/o The Red Lion, Epworth, etc.

So there you have it.  One of the best and most memorable moments of my summer's big adventure, receiving a Staffordshire figurine of John Wesley, delivered to me in his hometown, in the very place he used to stay.  There are many other memories I will share in this space, but for now, I invite you to share with me the simple joy of that happy chain of circumstances.  The picture taken above is of his new home on our mantel.  I think he likes it, and I'm very pleased to have him there!

Labor and Rest

St Moluag's Episcopal Church (Teampall Mholuaidh), Europaidh 

Astronauts and deep sea divers and I have something in common.  We all have to be careful when we return to the point from which we started.  Otherwise we risk burning up in the atmosphere or at the very least, getting the bends.  I'm finding it difficult to re-acclimate to life at home, partly because of lingering jet-lag, partly because of this crazy allergy, and partly because, well, it's hard to think about getting back to work after having enjoyed an extended break from my usual ministry and everything that entails.

As you see, I'm writing this on my first Sunday back at First Prez.  It also happens to be Labor Day weekend, which turns out to be a very good time to return ever so slowly to the usual routine. Because it's a holiday weekend, there weren't many people at church, and I was able to re-enter the atmosphere, so to speak, without too much notice or noise. It was thankfully less overwhelming than I had feared.

This time last week, I was still in Stornoway, the Isle of Lewis, in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland.  It was Sunday, and that means something very specific there.   Many (if not most) people go to church, but even those who don't attend worship have to live into a particular rhythm of things in which pretty much everything stops for the Sabbath.   On the home front, you don't wash clothes that day, but if you do, there is an expectation that they NOT be hung outside to dry.  There is one gas station on the entire island that opens, all the stores are closed, the only open restaurant in Stornoway is attached to a hotel, and if there is any other food outlet doing business, it may be the Chinese takeaway place.  There is also only one ferry the entire day, and that has been operating on Sundays for less than 10 years.  

The stern Calvinists whose varied expressions of Presbyterianism have held sway over this area for a very long time are adamant that this be a day of rest, and if that used to be defined as a grim denial of pleasure and play, it is refreshing to hear a different perspective from one young woman.  She served us tea and coffee late Saturday afternoon, telling us that she was so glad the next day was Sunday.  "It's nice, you know, for everybody to have a rest.  You don't have to be anywhere or do anything in particular."

So, on Sunday, after I preached at St Peter's, Scott and I walked around the nearly deserted streets, watching the tide slowly come in, admiring the colorful flowers adorning the walkway along the harbor, and we took a drive up to Ness, the northern part of the island, to a tiny place called Europaidh.  There is a most unusual church there which dates back to the 13th century.  Dedicated to St. Moluag, a contemporary of St. Columba, it is associated with healing of various ills, including leprosy and mental disorders.  There is even a leper's squint built into the side where the afflicted could view the priest during Holy Eucharist and then partake after everyone else.  To reach it, you have to walk a 300 yard path between two sheep folds to this tiny stone church which has been buffeted by relentless wind and rain for centuries.  It has no electricity, no bathrooms, no running water, only the peaceful interior lit by oil lamps, a sanctuary where regular Christian worship still takes place at least twice monthly.

We walked slowly in and around the tiny church, marveling at the quiet within.  Even as the wind rose and fell outside, blasting into cracks in the stone, there was a sense of peace, of serenity, of rest from one's labor.  Thinking of the many who have bent the knee in prayer, been sprinkled with the waters of baptism, received the body and blood of Christ in holy communion, joined in holy matrimony, and been dispatched to their final resting place from here gave me a feeling of continuity, of belonging, of a kinship that lies beyond blood or adoption or location.  It was a reminder of that love which binds us together as children of the Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer of all that is, and I felt a sense of thankfulness for this chance to rest, not only on this particular Sunday, but for the entire sabbatical that has refreshed my spirit, refueled my intellect, and re-energized my ministry. The rhythm of rest and labor, of labor and rest.  On this Labor Day, may we all have a renewed sense of how to hold those two things together in a way that is life-giving and holy.  Come to me, and I will give you rest, says Jesus.  And he surely will, if we but choose to respond.