An article for February editions of parish magazines from the Dean of Worcester, Peter Atkinson:
I am writing these words on the 90th anniversary of the death of Bishop Charles Gore. If you know St Philip’s Cathedral in Birmingham, then you may have noticed the statue of a tall, thin, rather gaunt bishop outside the main entrance, his hand raised in blessing. That was Charles Gore, the first Anglican bishop of Birmingham. When some of the leading citizens of Birmingham formed a committee to put up a statue to him, he replied, ‘Kindly convey to the committee my mingled feelings of gratitude and repugnance’, and when someone asked him what he thought about the finished product, he said ‘It looks horribly like me’.
Before he became Bishop of Birmingham, he was Bishop of Worcester. He was a monk (he founded the Community of the Resurrection at Mirfield in Yorkshire), a scholar, and a public figure, of the calibre of Rowan Williams in our own time. He could speak to intellectuals in their own words, debate with vigour those who opposed his beliefs, and helped to keep the Christian faith in the forefront of public debate. But at heart, he had a very simple faith. He believed in the love of God. At confirmation services, by way of a sermon, he would march up and down the aisle, saying ‘God will never, ever, give you up’.
God will never, ever, give you up. That is the heart of the Christian faith. That is the message as we continue through this new year, when the world looks bleak, and our country is struggling. For all his wisdom and scholarship and intellectual power, those are the words of Bishop Charles Gore I treasure most.
Peter Atkinson, Dean of Worcester
