Photograph by Jonathan Neale Photography
http://www.jnimages.co.uk/

Saturday 1st November, from 10am until 1.30pm, sees our Coffee Morning and stalls in St Stephen’s Church on the High Street, Exeter. Cakes wanted on the day. Please support this fund-raising and outreach event. Visit the recently restored St Stephen’s, browse and buy, or simply relax and enjoy the refreshments.

Sunday 2nd November, the Calendar this year means we mark All Saints at 10.45am and All Souls at 6pm, with beautiful music at both services.

The weight of music to practise means the Mass setting written when Alex West was Organ Scholar at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, is held over to next quarter. The Motet is still Bainton’s ravishing “And I saw a new heaven” and a Plainsong Sequence will be sung.

In place of “First Sunday Evensong” at 6pm, we will sing Requiem Mass for All Souls using the music of Gabriel Fauré, plus Justorum Animae by Byrd and the Russian Kontakion.

Remembrance Sunday, 9th November, will be marked with special music and sermon during our 10.45am Mass, and the Act of Remembrance at 11am. The Anglican Folk Mass was composed by Martin Shaw at St Mary’s Primrose Hill, London, in 1917. The music of our motet “For the Fallen” was written a couple of years ago by choir member, Graham Keitch.

Tuesday 11th November at 6pm, in place of Vespers, CBS Mass in commemoration of St Martin, Bishop of Tours (397), NOT the Patron Saint of Travel Agents, but as he was born in Hungary, spent much of his childhood in Italy, and lived most of his adult life in France, he is considered a spiritual bridge across Europe. This Roman soldier cut his cloak in half to share with a beggar and eventually renounced the military life to become a Bishop.

Wednesday 12th November at 7.30pm. Recitals @ St Michael’s. The Exeter Singers, directed by Tony Yates, present a varied programme of a cappella music, from Madrigals to Modern! Tickets on the door: £5 (£3 concessions).

Please Note, Wednesday 19th Nov at 7.30pm, the St Michael’s Remembrance Lecture (previously scheduled for 3rd/30th Nov) is given by Suzanne Steele (Official Canadian War Poet; Department of English, University of Exeter) – Bearing Witness to those who Bear Witness.

In St David’s Church at 2pm on Saturday 22nd November there is a Memorial Service for John Hughes. A service of words and music, remembering a dearly-loved former curate of this parish. It is an opportunity for John’s many friends from the congregations at St David’s & St Michael’s, and around the city and Diocese of Exeter to give thanks for John, priest, pastor, scholar and friend, and remember him with love and gratitude.

Stir-up Sunday, 23rd November, the last Sunday before Advent is also a celebration of Christ the King, Jesus as the just ruler over all the Universe. The Anthem by Sir John Stainer is “I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, and his train filled the Temple.”

Advent Sunday, 30th November, at 10.45am Mass, we sing The Litany published by Thomas Cranmer in 1544, the earliest officially authorized vernacular service in English. The 1st candle of the Advent wreath is lit.

So as not to clash with the Cathedral one on Advent Sunday, our own beautiful Advent Procession at St Michael’s is on Sunday 7th December at 6pm. Prayers, Readings, Hymns and Carols illuminate the 7 “Great O” Antiphons, which comprise the Advent Hymn “O come, O come Emmanuel”, and culminate in a choral setting of the Magnificat.

Richard Barnes.

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Flowers by Stephanie

Thank you to well over 100 in the congregation at St Michael’s representing also St David’s, former clergy colleagues, and John’s family and many friends. Welcome visitors augmented the choir to 30, with Jason, Emily and Fiona as soloists, Neil working the large new pipe organ to great effect and Erika returning to conduct fine performances of the Fauré Requiem and Bainton’s anthem “And I saw a new heaven … And I John saw the holy city”. (We wish Erika well and every blessing as she takes up a teaching post in Cheltenham in September.)

The bell was tolled 35 times by Olive. The beautiful and moving service was presided over by Fr David Hastings with Fr David Walford and out Servers. Fr John Henton’s excellent and personal address will be printed in the September Parish Magazine. But there is space here for Canon John Thurmer’s insightful tribute which was printed in the Service booklet.

“John Mark David Hughes was a Devonian, from Kenton where he is buried. But he rejoiced in his Welsh ancestry and in the dedication of the parish church to St David, his own third name.

This Requiem at St Michael’s recalls not only his memorable ministry here, but also those rather eccentric weekday evening masses of the 1990s, to one of which he came as a schoolboy and reckoned it a turning point in his life.

At his death he was Fellow, Dean and Chaplain of Jesus College Cambridge, where Thomas Cranmer was a Fellow when he was called in 1533 to be Archbishop of Canterbury with momentous results.

John’s chaplaincy at Jesus embraced the whole College, Fellows, undergraduates, college servants and their families, and he had heavy teaching commitments in the Faculty of Divinity. His doctorate thesis on the theology of work was the basis of his book with the teasing title “The End of Work”.

He combined with unforgettable grace the work of the scholar and the loving kindness of the pastor. To each and every one according to need he was son, friend, father and teacher.

Give rest, O Christ, to thy servant with thy Saints where sorrows are no more, neither sighing, but life everlasting.”

It seems that the love of God first touched John, not through a book or an evangelist, but through the warm welcome of those cleaning and arranging flowers when a curious schoolboy made a detour into Kenton Church on his way home.

We now look forward to Friday 15 August, the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, celebrated at St Michael’s with a Sung Mass at 7.30pm. Music will include the Setting Missa “Dixit Maria” by Hans Leo Hassler (1564-1612) and the Motet Ave Maria by Jacques Arcadelt (1505-1568).

Please join us; whatever your view of the theology of this Feast, the unique place of Mary in the Christian story of salvation is a cause for celebration.

Also Sunday 17th August, 6.30pm Evensong at St Martin’s in the Cathedral Close, EX1 1EZ.
Canticles: Gibbons Short Service. Anthem: Ave Maria, by Arcadelt.

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The Preacher will be Fr John Henton, who was John’s training priest for his curacy at St David’s & St Michael’s here in Exeter. The Service will include the Requiem by Gabriel Fauré sung in its liturgical context.

There will be drinks and time for conversation afterwards.

St Michael’s other Services and Music for August are listed below.
N.B. No Tuesday or Thursday Vespers during August, but Wednesday Morning Prayer & Said Mass continue.

Last Sunday, there was strong congregational singing, while the holiday-depleted choir of 9, with Alex doubling as conductor and organist, enjoyed singing William Byrd’s sublime 4-part Mass from 1592, and William Sterndale Bennett’s best known anthem, God is a Spirit, from his 1867 Cantata, The Woman of Samaria.

Sunday 3rd August, Trinity VII, 10.45am Mass. NEH:436:295:368
Setting: Anglican Folk Mass, Shaw. Motet: O taste and see, Vaughan-Williams.

Sunday 3rd August. NO Evensong.

Wednesday 6th August, 7.30pm, Requiem Mass in memory of Fr John Hughes. Music will include the Requiem by Gabriel Fauré and the Preacher will be Fr John Henton.

Sunday 10th August, Trinity VIII, 10.45am Mass. NEH:338:353:464
Setting: Mass in the Dorian mode, Tallis. Motet: How beauteous are their feet, Stanford.

Fulda Cathedral – Assumption of Mary
Dom zu Fulda – Mariä Himmelfahrt

Friday 15th August, Feast of the Assumption, 7:30pm Mass. NEH:188ii:161t385:185
Setting: Missa “Dixit Maria”, Hassler. Motet: Ave Maria, Arcadelt.

Sunday 17th August, Trinity IX, 10.45am Mass. NEH:332:324:480
Setting: Mass in F, Sumsion. Motet: O Lord, increase our faith, Loosemore.

Also Sunday 17th August, 6.30pm Evensong at St Martin’s in the Cathedral Close, EX1 1EZ.
Responses: Smith. Psalm 90. Canticles: Gibbons Short Service. Anthem: Ave Maria, by Arcadelt.

Sunday 24th August, St Bartholomew the Apostle, 10.45am Mass. NEH:333:216t433:179t357
Setting: Sarum Mass, Plainsong. Motet: (Give us the wings of faith, Bullock.) Late change: Holy is the true light, Harris.

Sunday 31st August, Trinity XI, 10.45am Mass. NEH:452:408:449
Setting: Mass in A minor, Casciolini. Motet: Christus factus est, Bruckner.

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By 2pm on Saturday 12th July, All Saints’ Church, Kenton, was filled with over 200 mourners from the village and farther afield,
for the Burial Service for John Hughes.

Altar piece, All Saints’ Church, Kenton

We sang, O God our help in ages past,
giving a mental NO to the line, They fly forgotten as a dream,
and said together Psalm 23
The Lord is my shepherd: therefore can I lack nothing.

The Readings were Wisdom 3:1-5,
The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God
and Matthew 6:25-34,
Do not be anxious about your life,
affirmative and true to John’s character.

The Tribute, a combination of the Church Times Obituary and personal reflections, was movingly given by Fr Robert Mackley, Vicar of Little St Mary’s, Cambridge, and one of John’s close friends.

After the Prayers we sang the great hymn,
How shall I sing that majesty,
with its surprisingly modern imagery written by the 17th century English priest and poet, John Mason,
to the soaring tune Coe Fen.

As John’s coffin was carried from the church, all said,
Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace:
according to thy word.

Many people went up to the peaceful hillside cemetery for the Burial Prayers. It was John’s wish to be buried in Kenton.

John’s parents were wonderfully composed and afterwards expressed the comforting thought that John had already in his life achieved more, and touched for good more people, than most of us do in a full lifespan.

May he rest in peace, and rise in glory.

“Chalice & Host” by Eric Gill

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I travelled to Ely, first stop on our honeymoon many years ago and where I have sung with visiting choirs on several occasions, with a heavy heart last Thursday (10th July) for the Requiem Eucharist for Fr John Hughes.

God opened his heavens to weep in Ely for the Funeral of John Hughes, Priest.

Ely Cathedral nave was filled with many hundreds touched by the full but all-too-short life of Fr John Hughes. The feelings of restrained sadness and the quiet conversations with friends before the service were helped by the sensitive organ music.

The booklet told us that with characteristic thoroughness most of the service had been planned and written down by John himself well in advance; John loved feasts, both sacred and secular, indeed, the best in life was all holy to John, so the Eucharistic Feast, foretaste of the heavenly Banquet, was the right form for his Funeral. God had started his work in him and brought it further than most of us in just half a lifetime; John was very Christlike. We were there to pray for John and that God would complete that life in heaven.

The 30 students of Jesus College Chapel Choir processed in silently, followed by at least 100 clergy representing every facet of humanity, united by black stoles. A bell sounded and the organ and choir began the heartbreakingly beautiful Introit from the Durufle Requiem.

The Altar party and John’s family preceded his coffin, simply adorned with a cross of white flowers, arriving under Ely’s octagonal lantern with the emotional Christe eleison.

Ely Cathedral Lantern and Roof

The Bishop of Ely, Rt Rev Stephen Conway, welcomed all “much too soon” with barely contained emotion and conducted the beautiful service with quiet dignity.

The First Lesson, Isaiah 25:6-9, was least familiar but wonderfully appropriate so I quote it in full, read by a colleague, Prof Janet Soskice.

“And in this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined.
And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations.
He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for the Lord hath spoken it.
And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”

1 Corinthians 15:20-58, the promise of resurrection, was read by John’s cousin, Stephen Gilbert MP, and the Gospel promise that nothing is lost, John 6:37-40, by the unnamed Deacon.

The hymns, well sung by the large congregation, were a pilgrimage of faith:
I heard the voice of Jesus say – Kingsfold,
All people that on earth do dwell – Old 100th,
Guide me O thou great Redeemer – Cwm Rhondda
with a different emotional intensity and closer attention to the words than normal,
Now the green blade riseth from the buried grain – Noel Nouvelet,
Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of Creation – Lobe den Herrn.

The Sermon, by Rev Dr Jeremy Morris, Dean of King’s College Cambridge, avoided any platitudes and was sprinkled with words like disbelief, anger, senseless and too soon, which will have been in many minds.

In an image both Biblical and Dr Whovian, he said that John’s death has torn a hole in the fabric of reality, across many groups; Cambridge colleges, Church of England, wide networks of friends, students and colleagues, and above all for his parents. (This will take time, prayer and work to mend, and will leave scars.)

The loss to theology, where John’s distinctive and creative ideas were already being noticed and admired by many, was immense. (There are too few young catholic theologians with his intellect, rigour and application to major issues in our society, along with such a broad, inclusive view.)

But that is the least of our losses, for John was above all a priest and pastor, a teacher and spiritual guide, a friend and helper, full of hospitality, and a beloved son.

There were a few smiles; were John’s first words to quote from Thomas Aquinas? His great love of people and parties, of feasts and good wine, as in Isaiah. His humour and wit, always with kindness.

Adjectives abounded, friendly, fun, genuine, generous, holy, humble, intelligent, inclusive, open, passionate, thoughtful, wise, broad in his interests and so well read.

Beyond John’s deep personal faith in Jesus Christ, he knew that religion, and Christianity in particular, was social, sociable and about society, focused on the sacramental meal which unites all the communion of saints, living and departed. And John was always giving himself to communities in college, church, friends, society.

Our Prayers, led by Rev Jeremy Caddick, Dean of Emmanuel College, were equally apt and sensitive, remembering the injured survivors of the road accident and all casualties, as well as John’s many circles of influence.

Ely Cathedral window

At the Offertory, according to John’s wishes, the collection was taken to support the church, religious eduction and the poor. Sanctus, Benedictus and Agnus Dei, were beautifully chanted by the Choir from the Missa Pro Defunctis.

During Communion, the College Choir, who were close to John’s heart and whose singing was confident, beautiful and sensitive throughout, sang Bainton’s great anthem from Revelation 21 “And I saw a new heaven … And I John saw the holy city” and Croft’s setting of the Burial Sentences from the Book of Common Prayer.

John’s coffin was sprinkled with holy water, censed and prayed over – Go forth upon thy journey, Christian soul – and carried to the west doors of the Cathedral during the Durufle In Paradisum, feelings rising especially for John’s parents. There the plainsong, Salve Regina Mater misericordiae, was sung; then all stood in silence.

The Lamb redeems the sheep

I was reminded that another gift that John was blessed with was a beautiful voice for singing the Liturgy, which he had used as a Curate with us at St Michael’s, intoning the Gospel, and singing the Exsultet for the Easter Vigil.

Meeting friends in the packed Lady Chapel over a cup of tea, we remembered St Michael’s choir tours to Norfolk, including Walsingham, and West Wales, including St David’s, with John as our chaplain equally at home over the kitchen sink, the communal meal and the communion altar.

To the implied question, how God could be so foolish as to take from us decades too early “the brightest and best …”, “the one whom we thought would …” to echo the Road to Emmaus, there is no rational answer, except to believe that John, like Job, would have asked it too, but continued serving the same God and his people whom he loved.

Sed signifer sanctus Michael repraesentet eas in lucem sanctam.
Hostias et preces tibi, Domine, laudis offerimus.

A link to the Church Times Obituary.

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From the website of Jesus College, Cambridge, “The College has been shocked at the death in a car accident of The Rev Dr John Hughes (1997), the Dean of Chapel at the College. The loss of John Hughes is acutely felt as the life of the College was greatly enriched by him. A former undergraduate of the College, he was both an outstanding academic who inspired the students he taught, and a faithful priest and pastor who touched profoundly all those with whom he came into contact. He will be deeply missed.”

“The Funeral Service, at which all are welcome, will be held at 1.30 pm on Thursday 10 July in Ely Cathedral.”

And from Ely Cathedral, “Please note that on Thursday 10 July there will be no visitor access to the Cathedral between 12.45pm and 3.15pm due to a Requiem Eucharist taking place at 1.30pm.”

It has also been announced that there will be a Service and the Burial, which anyone is welcome to attend, at All Saints’ Church, Kenton, Devon, EX6 8LU, on Saturday 12th July at 2pm.

From St David’s Exeter website, “A Requiem Mass for Fr John Hughes will be celebrated at 7.30 pm on Wednesday 6th August at St Michaels Mount Dinham, Exeter. We hope that this will be a fitting tribute to John, a sign of our gratitude for all that he did in our parish and community and a opportunity for us all, together, to remember him before God. All are welcome to attend.”

More moving tributes to the life of John Hughes were given here, “The Cambridge Student”

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We at St Michael’s are shocked and devastated at the death of Rev Dr John Hughes, Dean of Chapel at Jesus College, Cambridge, aged 35, in a car accident last Sunday.

We extend our prayers and sympathy to John’s family and many friends at this tragic loss. We shall sing Vespers for the Dead in memory of Fr John Hughes at 6pm tonight 1st July in St Michael’s.

(Over two dozen attended at short notice and Psalms 116, 120, 121, 138 & 146 were sung.)

John Hughes came to the Parish of St David with St Michael & All Angels, Exeter, as our Curate in 2005. He was ordained Priest on this day eight years ago in Ottery St Mary and celebrated his first Mass here in St Michael’s.

Hugely loved and admired as a pastor and preacher, John had a mind that could think and articulate the deep issues in theology and society, and also a heart with time and love for each person he met, as so many of us know and remember. John was one of the most Christ-like people I have known. Leaving for Cambridge in 2009, he returned to Exeter to take Weddings, and to give a St Michael’s Lecture in September 2012 entitled ‘What do the Pope and the Archbishop say about the Economic Crisis?’

David Beadle writes, “During his time as Curate he coordinated the St Michael’s Lectures. He was a huge gift to the Parish, to which he devoted great time and energy, to his very wide circle of friends and acquaintances, and to his field in academia.”

Richard Parker, Warden at St Michael’s, says, “I am devastated to have to report the death, in a motoring accident, of our beloved friend and priest Fr. John Hughes. He was one of the kindest and loveliest men I have ever met, and one of the brightest hopes of our church. May he rest in peace and rise in glory.”

Among the many reports and tributes, here is a Cambridge link “Jesus mourn” and locally “Express&Echo” “Mid Devon Gazette”

And if I may re-post two more that speak for all of us. Jana Howlett said: “John was a born pastor: enquiring, understanding, compassionate. He communicated this, as well as his enormous enjoyment of life, to all who met him. This is such a shock to all of us who knew him and worked with him.” Tom Bradshaw added: “The premature death of a person as kind, thoughtful, intelligent, modest and warm as John is hugely sad and I am deeply shocked.”

John Hughes taught philosophy, ethics, doctrine, and social thought in the Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge. He had studied Theology in Cambridge and Oxford, completing his PhD on nineteenth and twentieth century Romantic and Marxist philosophies of labour, published as ‘The End of Work: Theological Critiques of Capitalism’ (Blackwell, 2007). He trained for ministry at Westcott House, Cambridge. He edited a collection of sermons ‘The Unknown God: Responding to the New Atheists’ (SCM Press, 2013), and had recently written and spoken about the renewed interest in Civil Society and Roman Catholic and Anglican Social Teaching, particularly in relation to the Economic Crisis. He was part of a project on Anglican Social Thought organised by the Mission and Public Affairs Division of the Archbishops’ Council.

The whole Church has tragically lost one of its brightest and best teachers and priests. Requiescat in pace.

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