大象传媒

A place to be

The community has been there on the Blackwater Estuary since 1946 when the Rev鈥檇 Norman Motley was inspired to find somewhere where people could reflect on what had happened in the Second World War and could ask the big questions in an open and accepting atmosphere.聽 It became a place of reconciliation and discussion which continues to this day. How then was this 鈥淎 place to be鈥�?

As we spent time there, we came to realise how this openness was still being developed by the community today.

The area is unspoilt almost to the extent of neglect.聽 The salt marshes are flat and featureless and the water glimmers across the grassland in the sun. 聽The beach is not sand, but mud.聽 There are no concessions to tourism in this stretch of the coast.聽 聽As Bishop Stephen said, 鈥淚t must be a very bleak place in the winter鈥�.聽 It was here that St Cedd travelled down from Lindisfarne in the 7th century to teach and preach Christianity, the good news of God鈥檚 love, to the East Saxons.聽 When he arrived, he found the remains of a Roman fort:聽 Othona.聽 The local people were afraid of the Romans and saw them as devils, so St Cedd would have spent a deal of time praying on the land to redeem it once more for God.聽 Here he founded a community of beehive huts, and there on the coast, he built a small chapel from the ruins of the Roman fort.聽 You can still see the Roman tiles in the walls that he recycled.

As the years went by the chapel fell into disuse.聽 It was used for many years as a barn by local farmers and so it was preserved.聽 Unlike many ancient buildings, it was not dismantled and the stones used for building elsewhere.聽 It was restored at last in the 1920s and when Norman Motley was looking for a place to base his community of reconciliation, this place spoke to him.聽 He said that he felt as if he had come home.

The land here, near the village of Bradwell, is also the place where a nuclear power plant was built.聽 Perhaps the remote area for the power station remained unspoilt because people did not want to build near the power station.聽 Now the plant is being decommissioned.

I wondered, looking at how the land has been used, how this 鈥減lace to be鈥� had been a focus for redemption and reconciliation through time.聽 Cedd鈥檚 chapel, St Peter on the Wall, used stone and tiles from a building that was about power and a conquering nation (the Roman fort) to build a place of peace and community.聽 It stands alone, prominent on the marshes.聽 The power station, with its potential for danger, however conscious and careful its builders were to keep it safe, now needs to be encased in concrete.聽 It stands separate from the local population, standing out in the landscape.聽 Nearby, the Othona community works to build a sustainable community with its solar panels, wind turbines and sensitive care of the natural environment.

The chaplain, the Rev鈥檇 Brigid Main, describes the chapel as one of those thin places where the boundaries between earth and heaven seem to touch.聽 I left with the impression that it was indeed 鈥渁 place to be鈥� 鈥� in the presence of good, caring and open people, and of a God whose longing is for humanity to live in harmony with others and with the earth we are given to care for.

Track 1
Title: I the Lord of sea and sky (Here I am Lord)
Composer: Daniel L Schutte
Choir: Chester Cathedral Choir accompanied by the Pipe Organ
CD: Sing for Joy 鈥� Cathedral Praise
CD No: ICC0858D
CD Label: ICC

Track 2
Title: Brother sister let me serve you
Composer:聽 Richard Gillard
Choir: Northumbria Community
CD: Waymarks, Songs of the Journey
CD No: NCCD102
CD label: 2001 Northumbria Community Trust Ltd


Track 3
Title: Song of the Still heart
Composer:聽 Colin Hodgetts
Soprano: Evelyn Tubb
CD: Othona Psalms
CD No: Unpublished
Contact: colin@hodgetts.me.uk

Track 4
Title: How deep the father鈥檚 love
Composer: Stuart Townend
Choir: The Daily Service Singers
CD: The Daily Service
CD No: KMCD2330
CD Label: Kingsway聽