Weekly Notices | Sunday, 6 March 2022
A reflection from Canon Kathryn
The resonant name of the Ukrainian poet Irina Ratushinskaya has stayed with me ever since I was a schoolgirl and heard of her release from a labour camp, where she had been sentenced to seven years’ inhuman treatment for ‘anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda’.
While imprisoned, she was denied paper, so she wrote with matchsticks on bars of soap, memorised the poems, and washed them away. In due course, she copied them in tiny handwriting onto four-centimetre-wide cigarette papers, passing 250 of them to her husband, who smuggled them to Western journalists. (‘All poets should have such a school’, she said, ‘It taught me to be very spare and concise’.) Refusing to renounce her Christian faith, she later published a memoir entitled ‘Grey is the Color of Hope’. Grey was the colour of her prison garment, which she would put on in years to come as a tangible reminder of her experiences.
As we enter Lent, the grey of ash mingling with the clouds of destruction and horror being visited upon Ratushinskaya’s homeland, we are starkly reminded of Christ’s call to us to reframe our identities as people of hope in every time and place, and of his promise, through wilderness and starvation, through temptation and betrayal, torture and death, of love that is unconquerable. In these forty days, we have the opportunity through prayer and worship, art and music, to inhabit that hope for ourselves – and the imperative to be its bearers to those around us through our words and our actions.
This is the Lenten grace, of love through suffering, which Irina Ratushinskaya knew and felt in her prison cell, and which we pray will be known and felt by her people now:
Believe me, it was often thus:
In solitary cells, on winter nights
A sudden sense of joy and warmth
And a resounding note of love.
And then, unsleeping, I would know
A-huddle by an icy wall:
Someone is thinking of me now,
Petitioning the Lord for me…
‘Believe me’ - Kyiv, October 10 1986
Community News
Bishop Jonathan’s Installation
Next Saturday we are hosting the Installation of Bishop Jonathan as the Tenth Bishop of Portsmouth. This important occasion in the life of our Diocese will see Bishop Jonathan formally robed as our new bishop and taking his seat – his ‘cathedra’ – in our cathedral. The service will showcase some of his priorities, with the role of children and young people and the important of prayer given special prominence. We are delighted that, alongside our Girls’ Choir, singers from our choral outreach project Cathedral Sing and from Choir Church will be involved in the service.
Stream online
Tickets to attend the service are limited but we are working with a professional broadcast company to livestream the service. Everyone is very welcome to join online from our website, Facebook or YouTube.
Request a ticket
If you would like to join us at the Cathedral, you can request tickets on our website – this form will close at 12pm midday on Tuesday 8 March 2022. Once requested we will let you know whether your spaces are confirmed, via an e-ticket sent to your email. You will need to bring your e-ticket with you to the service, ether on your phone or printed, unfortunately we will be unable to accept anyone without an e-ticket.
Choral Eucharist – 13 March, 11am
Bishop Jonathan will also be joining us the day after his Installation to preach and preside at the 11am Choral Eucharist on Sunday 13 March. Please do come along to this service where there will be an opportunity to meet Bishop Jonathan afterwards.
Do keep Bishop Jonathan in your prayers this week as he prepares for his Installation.
Lent Group: Art Tuesdays starts this week
OurArt Tuesdaysseries starts this Tuesday 7 March at 7:30pm via Zoom. Over the coming weeks, a diverse range of speakers will invite us to explore a variety of art works as we consider this year’s Holy Week theme: Signs of Glory.
This first session, led by the Revd Howard Barker, is entitled Contemplating the Christ: the cell frescoes of Fra Angelico. We will look at the skill of Fra Angelico, who produced this unique collection of paintings, consider the pattern of Dominican prayer which undergirded it all, and see how the paintings may have something to say about Signs of Glory and contemporary views of prayer and spiritual life. Howard Barker spent 20 years teaching History and History of Art, and 40 years serving as a priest in this diocese.
Find out more and sign-up here →
Portsmouth Cathedral – an Inclusive Cathedral
As members of the Inclusive Church network - Inclusive Church, we at Portsmouth Cathedral have been deeply concerned to read a widely-published letter from Christian ministers urging the Government to drop its current proposals for banning conversion therapy for LGBTQ+ people.
Members of our Cathedral clergy have joined thousands of other Christian leaders in signing this letter to the Rt Hon Liz Truss MP - supporting the ban.
The letter contains the following statement:
We believe that lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer peoples are made fully and beautifully in the image of God.
If you would like to discuss the letters with a member of the clergy, or need to speak to one of us in confidence at any time, please don’t hesitate to do so.
Canon Kathryn
We’re looking for Volunteer Event Assistants
Over the coming months Portsmouth Cathedral be hosting more events as we head towards Easter and beyond. We are therefore looking for new and existing volunteers to join us supporting our upcoming events from taking tickets and helping prepare the space, to serving refreshments and much more.
Whether you already volunteer with us in another capacity, or would like to join our team– please email events@portsmouthcathedral.org.uk to express your interest and find out more information.
Help us find our two new team members!
We're recruiting for two vital posts, a new 30 hour verger post and a 40 hour verger post maternity cover. The role covers a wide range of activities at the Cathedral from involvement in worship and services, to setting up for events and working alongside our volunteer teams.
The application deadline for both posts is 11:00pm, Sunday 20 March 2022. Please help us to find some brilliant candidates by sharing these opportunities with friends, family and your wider networks.
See further information on our careers page →
Worship and Visiting
Portsmouth Cathedral is open daily for prayer, services and visiting. Booking is not required for services, unless otherwise indicated. You can find out more about visiting on our website, where you can also download orders of service or find our Covid-19 visitor information.
Prayers and Intercessions
We pray for Bishop Jonathan as he prepares for his installation.
We remember the following for whom prayer has been asked by members of the Cathedral Community: Beverley, Richard, Jane, Alan, Stan, Amanda, Wendy, Derek, Denise, Debbie, Jane, Patricia, Margaret, Rachel, Lucy, and all those in need.
Long-term sick including: Alison, Christopher, Clifford, Jane, Johnny, Melissa, Jenny, Suzy, Sarah, Bob, Michael, Rita, Izzy, Graeme, Clare, Libby, Hilary, and Andrew.
We pray for those who have died recently: Hildegard Lowe, Keith Burnham, Jean Frost, Mervyn Banting, Danny McCauley, Jean Palmer, and William Deery RIP.
Upcoming Services & Events
Getting in touch
Please feel free to get in touch if we can help in any way, or if you just want to hear another voice!
Get in touch with us by email to pastoral@portsmouthcathedral.org.uk or leave a message via phone on 023 9282 3300.