Ordination and Induction of Heather Cadoux
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On Saturday October 22nd, we were blessed with glorious golden sunshine and a perfect blue sky, just the weather for some Autumn gardening, planting bulbs to flower in the year ahead. So it was all the more fitting that Revd. John Proctor, Heather’s tutor at Westminster College, Cambridge, should have chosen as the text of his sermon a metaphor from the second reading, I Corinthians 3. 5-9, describing the new joint pastorate of Epsom, Ewell and Tolworth as a garden, with Heather called to sow and water, so that God can make the plants grow. And there were signs of God’s new growth already: in the eager anticipation on all the faces of those streaming in from car, bus, train and on foot; in the warmth and attentiveness of all the greetings at the doors; and in the new friendships forming between the three churches in the shared organisation, the shared duties in kitchen or car park, and across the tables generously spread with celebratory sandwiches and cakes. And despite the despondency we sometimes feel, nobody passing could have doubted the vibrancy of our faith and our denomination. Clerical collar after clerical collar arrived, not to mention the ministers in mufti! Ewell’s sanctuary was packed, with all the borrowed chairs necessary to seat the very many friends and supporters of all the stages in Heather’s life which have brought her to this moment, as well as the host of members and friends of her three new churches. The combined voices singing, ‘Praise to the Living God’, were rousing enough to raise the rafters. Heather’s own words were eloquent and warm in thanks for the past and commitment to the present and future. Indeed the whole service, gracefully led by our Moderator, Revd. Nicola Furley-Smith, was testimony to the hope, love and power of Christ in which we all stand, words from the powerful third hymn, ‘In Christ Alone’. If many might have confessed to being more than a little tired afterwards, all the painstaking organisation was justified as every aspect went without a hitch. At the end, it was lovely to see Heather receiving the Right Hand of Fellowship not only from her own three churches, but also from the wider church, as representatives from Churches Together in the three areas welcomed her and expressed their enthusiasm to begin working with her. The skies will not always be as cloudless as they were that wonderful day, but as we listened to the choir singing Matt Redman’s ‘Never Once’ and saw Heather singing along with the words she had chosen and knew by heart, we were once more assured that as we go forward together ‘never once will we ever walk alone, never once will God leave us on our own, every step we’ll be breathing in Your grace, evermore we’ll be breathing out Your praise. You are faithful, God, You are faithful.’ |
