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It came to a head in a way. I began to become

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braver in my preaching and began to preach

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more like an Anabaptist from

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the sermon, from the pulpit.

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Did that have interesting results?

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It had profound results. I was in trouble for

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that. From my own congregation, rather

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than... I mean, they probably

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whispered it to those above me.

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Hew, welcome to the podcast. So, you've had an

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interesting story that we want to capture

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in today's episode. You're originally from the UK

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and were part of the Anglican Church,

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I believe.

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That's right.

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And so, let's just start at the beginning and get

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your story. Where were you born and

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what kind of church

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environment did you grow up in?

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I was born in Singapore. My father was in the

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army and the second from last man to leave

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Singapore because it was a colony but had gained

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independence and he was helping their

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army gain the knowledge they needed to stand on

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their own two feet. So, I was there for

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the first three years of my life.

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Now that's... Okay, so that's an interesting time

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in British history, I guess, as that

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colony is becoming independent.

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It was independent already.

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Okay.

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It was...

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Transitioning, I guess.

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Transitioning. And church background: he was

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inclining and in later life confirmed as an

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atheist. His parents would have been reasonably

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regular churchgoers in the Church of England.

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So that was his background and my mother had a

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Catholic education but wasn't from a

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Catholic family. So she went to a Catholic

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school. So she had a knowledge of Christianity

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that kicked in later, bless her, and it helped us

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out of a hard situation.

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And in her teenage years, she was involved with

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the Christian science movement. So, basically,

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that was often her default and she was

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disillusioned with that. So

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religion was not a big part

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or Christian faith was not a big part of our

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family upbringing. But we had lots of stuff

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in our house that was religious. We had plenty of

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little temple bits and bobs that we'd picked

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up in bazaars and thieves markets and things like

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that. So we had Buddhist scrolls on the

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walls and Indian images, copper images or bronze

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images of Indian holy men on the mantelpiece

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and stuff. So we had a lot of Eastern, what I

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look now as unhelpful junk. We didn't know

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where we were. We were just sucking up the

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culture around us and having none ourselves,

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really. That was the way it goes.

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Was there a lot of... Was

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this from your father's travel?

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My father's travels, my parents had been married

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for some time before I was born. I was the

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youngest of five and was 18 years younger than my

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brother. So we had a very spaced family

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and my father had done a lot of traveling with

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the army beforehand. Then life went on

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to Germany. We moved to Germany then and then

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Nepal. It's probably in Nepal that I

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had my first spiritual experience. It was

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basically an out-of-body experience that I

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first had. I was terrified by the whole

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experience. I was only six

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at the time or something like

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that. I would just head into my parents' bed

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after having this dream of just being

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able to push myself around my bedroom wall and

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float and look down upon my body beneath me.

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That was disturbing. When I told my mother this,

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she was quite stricken in some ways,

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because she had messed around with this as a

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teenager. This was back in the... Would've been

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back in the 40s, 50s. She had seen it as a very

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terrifying part of her own life. She just

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realized that it had just transferred down the

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generation to me. She said, "Well, look, Hew,

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there's something that will work. Let's pray the

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Lord's Prayer together." Upon praying the

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Lord's Prayer, that ceased in my life, which

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showed me something positive about Christianity

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that I wouldn't forget.

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This is age six, you said.

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This is age six. Wow. It's a pretty early...

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I had never been baptized. My older siblings had,

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but there was no kind of any Christian imprint on

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me at all. I was untouched basically at that

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point. That was a

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positive impact in my existence.

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Nepal was a pretty frustrating place to a point

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for me. I had difficulties in learning. I suppose

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they would put it down as dyslexia. I was pretty

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low in the class. I'm often being left behind.

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One day, I just banged my head on the floor. "I'm

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just with a load of babies. I want to do

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something else." My mother said, "Oh, well, I

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better send you to boarding school."

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At the age of six, I was sent off to boarding

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school, traveling with my sisters. They were

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living in Nepal, my father and father. My father

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reckoned that it was cheaper to send us to

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boarding school anyway than to feed us at home

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because the army gave such a generous subsidy

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on education at boarding schools. Wow. That's

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fine. Problem solved. Off to boarding school.

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Is this boarding school, it's there in Nepal or

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did you enter somewhere else?

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No, it was in England. In Devon.

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They send you to literally

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the other side of the world.

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Yeah, on the other side of the world.

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For the school term? Then you come back?

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They come back during the holidays. Wow. Quite

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traumatic at the age of six.

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Age six. Yeah, no kidding. That must have been

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confusing at that age or maybe disorienting,

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is a better word.

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It didn't last forever though and the occasion,

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was quite sad. My parents divorced in 1979,

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and then that was the end of the boarding school

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education. The army wasn't there to subsidize it.

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It suddenly becomes a very expensive thing. I go

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home and go to a village school,

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a village government school. I had a big shock

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coming because it was a very different world

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to my boarding school world. Boarding school,

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you've got lots of people like yourself,

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soldiers' children's, diplomats' children's, the

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odd African chiefs' children,

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a huge array of oddballs. You all get on very

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well. Then suddenly, you go to a village school

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and you're this weird guy that everyone picks on

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because you speak differently,

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and you've traveled and they

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haven't. It was a big struggle.

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A certain superstition took part in that. My

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family were pretty superstitious, actually.

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There is a religion in everyone, and they were.

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On one occasion, when we were down in Wales,

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I willfully broke a mirror. My sisters came to me

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and they said, "Ah, you. That's bad." That was

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only 11 at the time or something like that. She

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said, "That's seven years bad luck now."

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To a degree, they were right because it was a

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very dark time in my life and for seven years.

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Things began to change when I went to sixth form

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college in Torlton, a neighboring town.

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There, I met a different girl. She was from a

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Christian family and got to know her.

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But I have to backtrack a little bit here

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because, whilst I was still

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at finishing off at school,

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my brother and his wife had a first child, and

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they wanted to have a Christening ceremony.

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We went down to the local vicar and spoke to him

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about it. He said, "Well,

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the first thing I have to ask you is, have you

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been confirmed and have you been baptized?"

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My mother and I both had to answer that we both

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were not baptized or confirmed.

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We were out of the loop, so to speak, in the

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Anglican mindset. That had to be done. We were

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invited to come along to a confirmation class.

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Can you define, 

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when he's asking you to be confirmed, What does

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that mean? Also, for those who aren't familiar

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aren't familiar with Anglicanism, What is a vicar? Can you define

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that as well? A vicar would be a minister, a

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minister who is responsible for preaching

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and leading out the service prayers, visiting in

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a parish area. Things are changing now because,

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to a degree, in certain parts of the Anglican

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world anyway, numbers are going down, so parishes

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would be getting bigger. Then he would have a

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responsibility of a village and its surrounding

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countryside until the next village is hit. That's

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helpful. Basically, your brother is going to the

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local vicar and this is what he's telling them.

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My brother wanted us to be godparents.

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Well, he needed to be a

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godparent. Of course, I was 15 at the time.

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We went through this confirmation class and I

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came out of it, not as a Christian, but I came

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out of it believing in one God. Because, of

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course, the upbringing we'd

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had, there were gods all over the place,

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in our house. Yeah, interesting. There were

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works of art, let's put it

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that way, but I think it's a

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bit more than that because they would have meant

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something to somebody else in a different way.

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Anyway, as a result, I was going to be confirmed.

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Then the vicar remembered,

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"But you two haven't yet even been baptized."

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Just before we were off to see the bishop to get

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confirmed, he said, "Come over here." He baptized

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both my mother and

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myself. Then we went off to see

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the bishop to get confirmed. The bishop then lays

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hands upon you, which represents the giving of

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the Holy Spirit. You then become a confirmed

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Anglican. Usually at the time of 14 or 15 or

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12 or 13, that's the time as a young person you

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leave the Anglican church. There's a joke about

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this in Anglican circles. Very often church buildings have

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problems with bats and they're flying around

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and dropping droppings on the furniture and what

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have you. One vicar's

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complaining, "Oh, we've got

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a real problem with our bats." The other one says

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to him, "Well, there's a way around that, you know."

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"Oh really?" "But you've got to be careful. You

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can't do things that are to bats because they're

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protected." He said, "We don't. We baptize and

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confirm them, and then we never see them again."

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So that is almost the point of Anglicanism at

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that time and it probably

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still accounts to very much.

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Wow. So it doesn't seem like there was much

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expectation of continual

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involvement after this point for you.

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But having said that, it was an evangelical

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Anglican church. So there was a degree of

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expectation that we would continue and I did. I

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continued to go to church and I would put on a

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suit and a tie and go to church. In fact, I went

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more regularly than my mother. Something was

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drawing me there.

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Could you pinpoint it at the time?

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I think it was probably, there was a certain

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sense of belonging, but what I didn't want to do

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was to talk to anyone after the service. So once

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the service was over, I shot out of there

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straight away before anyone could nab me, because I

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felt someone would gonna, "Oh, nice young person,

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he's still coming to church. Let's go to speak to

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him." And so I would disappear very quickly.

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Anyway, back to the girl I met at Sixth Form

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college. She was different because the young

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bloods went to chat her up because she was

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pretty. And I observed

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this. Interestingly enough,

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they kind of walked off. I thought, "What's this

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girl? She's a Christian. She's not going to be

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doing the things that we'd like to do with her."

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And so, "Well, that's a bit different." And I go

258
00:13:35,189 --> 00:13:40,069
to church. I got to know her, but then pointed

259
00:13:40,069 --> 00:13:42,029
out what my worldview was, and she could very

260
00:13:42,238 --> 00:13:45,908
clearly see. Though I attended church and the

261
00:13:45,908 --> 00:13:47,826
Anglican church, she was a Baptist minister's

262
00:13:47,826 --> 00:13:50,621
daughter. And though I attended, I wasn't a

263
00:13:50,621 --> 00:13:53,666
Christian because I believed that the world

264
00:13:53,707 --> 00:13:57,836
centered around me and others were just cardboard

265
00:13:57,836 --> 00:14:00,798
cutouts that were convenient to help me pass my

266
00:14:00,839 --> 00:14:06,178
time. That was how self-centered and rotten I

267
00:14:06,178 --> 00:14:12,184
was. Anyway, to cut a little story short,

268
00:14:12,184 --> 00:14:14,853
we had a friendship, but she said, "But I'm not

269
00:14:14,853 --> 00:14:21,402
your girlfriend." And we did get pretty friendly.

270
00:14:22,403 --> 00:14:25,614
Anyway, she invited me along to the tail end of a

271
00:14:25,614 --> 00:14:28,784
beach mission service. I have to explain

272
00:14:28,826 --> 00:14:31,412
about beach missions. This is going into the more

273
00:14:31,412 --> 00:14:34,915
of the evangelical circle of nonconformity,

274
00:14:35,165 --> 00:14:40,462
generally, in Britain. And they would, at seaside

275
00:14:40,462 --> 00:14:43,799
resorts, they would have young people

276
00:14:44,967 --> 00:14:48,762
looking after the bored children on the beach

277
00:14:48,762 --> 00:14:51,682
whose parents were just sunbathing and maybe

278
00:14:52,725 --> 00:14:56,103
just letting- the children were a bit unoccupied.

279
00:14:56,729 --> 00:15:00,065
And so this youth group would wear blue shorts

280
00:15:00,065 --> 00:15:05,154
or blue skirts, blue shorts, and yellow or red

281
00:15:05,154 --> 00:15:08,949
t-shirts. So they would be identified as a

282
00:15:08,949 --> 00:15:10,784
team of young people. And they would teach the

283
00:15:10,784 --> 00:15:14,872
young people Bible verses. They would have a shop

284
00:15:15,080 --> 00:15:17,541
where if people had learnt to say so many Bible

285
00:15:17,541 --> 00:15:21,128
verses or achieved certain merits in the games

286
00:15:21,211 --> 00:15:23,589
they did on the beach, they would occupy the

287
00:15:23,589 --> 00:15:25,090
children and they would give a nice place for

288
00:15:25,090 --> 00:15:28,344
they could get out of the sun, sunshade area

289
00:15:28,344 --> 00:15:29,428
where they would meet and

290
00:15:29,428 --> 00:15:31,305
teach them simple songs and

291
00:15:31,388 --> 00:15:33,724
that sort of thing. But then they would invite

292
00:15:33,724 --> 00:15:35,517
the children and the

293
00:15:35,517 --> 00:15:37,770
parents back to a gospel meeting

294
00:15:38,312 --> 00:15:42,483
in a local church that hosted them. And so I was

295
00:15:42,483 --> 00:15:45,819
there at this service where a chap called,

296
00:15:46,403 --> 00:15:50,991
I think his name was Nigel Lee, was preaching and

297
00:15:50,991 --> 00:15:55,079
he gave a very clear gospel message.

298
00:15:56,080 --> 00:15:58,999
And the gist of it to me anyway was that you

299
00:15:58,999 --> 00:16:02,920
can't just walk on the fence.

300
00:16:03,337 --> 00:16:06,548
You have to be for God or against him. He doesn't

301
00:16:06,548 --> 00:16:10,803
take people who run with the hare and hunt with

302
00:16:10,803 --> 00:16:18,394
the hounds. You need to be in his church or out

303
00:16:18,394 --> 00:16:21,522
of it. There is no halfway point.

304
00:16:22,398 --> 00:16:25,901
And I realized that I was attending church, but I

305
00:16:25,901 --> 00:16:27,027
had no knowledge of Christ.

306
00:16:28,904 --> 00:16:30,447
I knew about him, but he certainly wasn't

307
00:16:30,447 --> 00:16:33,951
dwelling in me. And that there was an offer

308
00:16:34,284 --> 00:16:39,206
of salvation if we would come to Christ and

309
00:16:39,206 --> 00:16:43,001
repent from the sins we knew about.

310
00:16:43,877 --> 00:16:49,049
So a gospel call was made and I was invited to go

311
00:16:49,049 --> 00:16:52,177
up if I felt that my life needed to change.

312
00:16:52,428 --> 00:16:59,518
And so that was back in 1988. I think it was on a

313
00:16:59,518 --> 00:17:01,645
Sunday in August of 1988,

314
00:17:01,645 --> 00:17:02,771
I gave my life to Christ.

315
00:17:03,522 --> 00:17:06,150
Initially, there's a lot of work to be done on me

316
00:17:06,150 --> 00:17:10,654
since, a huge amount. But that was a first step

317
00:17:10,821 --> 00:17:16,160
anyway. And I at that point felt the indwelling

318
00:17:16,160 --> 00:17:17,995
of the Holy Spirit. And

319
00:17:17,995 --> 00:17:21,039
though God had to do a lot

320
00:17:21,039 --> 00:17:24,752
more work with me, there was such peace in that

321
00:17:24,752 --> 00:17:27,671
encounter with God. Interesting point though,

322
00:17:27,713 --> 00:17:29,798
you know how self-conscious

323
00:17:29,798 --> 00:17:31,216
you are when you're about 18.

324
00:17:32,676 --> 00:17:36,722
I felt that I was going up with a great company

325
00:17:36,722 --> 00:17:39,850
of others. But when I turned around,

326
00:17:40,893 --> 00:17:45,397
there was nobody else. So God brought me up there

327
00:17:45,397 --> 00:17:47,816
with the thought that there were many behind me

328
00:17:48,358 --> 00:17:51,487
and there wasn't one person. So I'm sure Nigel,

329
00:17:51,487 --> 00:17:54,740
as he preached there, was a bit disappointed that

330
00:17:55,157 --> 00:17:59,453
his eloquent sermon and his forceful preaching

331
00:17:59,453 --> 00:18:03,499
had only produced one person. But thank you,

332
00:18:03,874 --> 00:18:06,126
Nigel, if you're listening out there, thank you.

333
00:18:06,335 --> 00:18:07,711
I'm very grateful for your preaching.

334
00:18:08,378 --> 00:18:12,466
Anyway, about a year before I went up to from

335
00:18:12,466 --> 00:18:17,763
sixth form college, which is up to the age of 18,

336
00:18:17,805 --> 00:18:24,686
19 to university. So I was accepted at university

337
00:18:24,686 --> 00:18:28,649
in Abberistwyth initially to study geology.

338
00:18:30,067 --> 00:18:34,738
But in geology, it was something that I'd started

339
00:18:34,738 --> 00:18:37,533
when I wasn't a Christian and I wanted to do it.

340
00:18:37,533 --> 00:18:40,077
I'm fascinated with it. It helped later on in

341
00:18:40,077 --> 00:18:45,124
life with an interest in creation. But I felt

342
00:18:45,165 --> 00:18:47,251
that the reason I was doing geology was just

343
00:18:47,251 --> 00:18:50,045
about me. And those who are with me

344
00:18:50,963 --> 00:18:56,093
were very much that way focused or on just

345
00:18:56,093 --> 00:18:59,471
themselves. I felt I wanted to do something

346
00:18:59,513 --> 00:19:05,978
better for the world, for God's kingdom, for poor

347
00:19:05,978 --> 00:19:07,187
people. And I thought, well,

348
00:19:08,021 --> 00:19:10,482
what can I do? I need to transfer out of this

349
00:19:10,482 --> 00:19:12,943
geology to do something else. So I actually was

350
00:19:12,985 --> 00:19:15,571
able to switch to doing agriculture with business

351
00:19:15,571 --> 00:19:19,825
studies. And so I spent four years at

352
00:19:21,368 --> 00:19:24,204
university in Abberistwyth. And I'm glad I did,

353
00:19:24,580 --> 00:19:28,292
because I met my wife there who's sitting back

354
00:19:28,292 --> 00:19:37,509
there out of range. And we met at St. Michael's

355
00:19:37,509 --> 00:19:42,306
Church, Abberistwyth. And we had the ministry, the minister

356
00:19:42,639 --> 00:19:47,769
at that time was the Reverend Stuart Bell, a

357
00:19:47,769 --> 00:19:51,815
good, clear preacher of the gospel. And

358
00:19:53,066 --> 00:19:56,904
I grew in my faith there, I have to say. It was

359
00:19:56,904 --> 00:19:59,740
an evangelical,

360
00:19:59,740 --> 00:20:03,702
small-c, charismatic congregation

361
00:20:04,077 --> 00:20:07,956
that was showing some growth. And there was a lot

362
00:20:07,956 --> 00:20:10,792
of outreach to students. So it was very much a

363
00:20:10,834 --> 00:20:14,588
student. It was the hip student church to be in

364
00:20:14,588 --> 00:20:16,924
at Abberistwyth University, very much definitely.

365
00:20:17,132 --> 00:20:19,509
The majority of the students went there. And I

366
00:20:19,509 --> 00:20:21,762
involved myself to a degree with the Christian

367
00:20:21,762 --> 00:20:24,640
Union that was always having spats between

368
00:20:24,640 --> 00:20:27,976
Pentecostals and Calvinists, generally speaking.

369
00:20:27,976 --> 00:20:32,439
There was often flack there, but it was

370
00:20:32,439 --> 00:20:35,442
nonetheless quite formative. Meeting

371
00:20:35,692 --> 00:20:41,531
Jeanette, I met her in the street and it was my

372
00:20:41,531 --> 00:20:48,163
flatmate. I knew Jeanette before I knew her.

373
00:20:48,705 --> 00:20:51,208
And I was looking over his shoulder thinking,

374
00:20:51,833 --> 00:20:54,670
"She's a rather nice girl." But my flatmate  did

375
00:20:55,212 --> 00:20:57,798
thought she was too. And he made no attempt to

376
00:20:57,798 --> 00:21:02,636
introduce me. So it was a couple of years

377
00:21:02,678 --> 00:21:07,891
before we met later. And at the time, our now

378
00:21:07,891 --> 00:21:12,104
brother-in-law was the parish worker,

379
00:21:12,396 --> 00:21:15,941
and he wanted to get us together, didn't he? So

380
00:21:15,941 --> 00:21:19,027
he invited himself to tea and I thought, "Oh,

381
00:21:19,027 --> 00:21:21,697
no, the parish worker's coming." And I was living

382
00:21:21,697 --> 00:21:22,948
with a bunch of non-Christians

383
00:21:23,782 --> 00:21:28,078
in an outlying town called Borth on the coast as

384
00:21:28,078 --> 00:21:33,667
well. And suddenly, in come two parish workers actually,

385
00:21:34,459 --> 00:21:35,419
and a girl with them. And it's

386
00:21:35,419 --> 00:21:37,004
the same girl I saw in the street.

387
00:21:38,130 --> 00:21:42,092
Pretty soon, we were seeing more of each other.

388
00:21:43,010 --> 00:21:46,930
And Jeanette will laugh, but I had to talk to

389
00:21:46,972 --> 00:21:50,684
her mother, didn't I? I got to befriend her

390
00:21:50,684 --> 00:21:53,228
mother securely and then

391
00:21:53,228 --> 00:21:54,354
everything fell together.

392
00:21:54,771 --> 00:22:01,319
I was such a nice boy. Anyway, but when we got

393
00:22:01,319 --> 00:22:02,154
together and we were

394
00:22:02,154 --> 00:22:05,824
talking before we got engaged

395
00:22:06,324 --> 00:22:10,037
about the importance of if we were to marry, we

396
00:22:10,037 --> 00:22:13,123
wanted to be serving God in some form or other.

397
00:22:13,915 --> 00:22:15,751
And what denomination were you at this point?

398
00:22:16,084 --> 00:22:18,336
Still Anglican. We were still attending an

399
00:22:18,336 --> 00:22:23,216
Anglican church. And we have at the time,

400
00:22:24,468 --> 00:22:26,178
another brother-in-law, a future

401
00:22:26,178 --> 00:22:28,805
brother-in-law, and Jeanette's sister,

402
00:22:29,181 --> 00:22:32,184
were serving with an organization called Emmanuel

403
00:22:32,184 --> 00:22:35,937
International. And they are an

404
00:22:36,021 --> 00:22:39,691
interdenominational evangelical missionary agency

405
00:22:39,691 --> 00:22:45,197
based in Canada. And we were very impressed with

406
00:22:45,781 --> 00:22:48,867
Wendy and Glenn, my brother and sister-in-law, in

407
00:22:48,867 --> 00:22:53,288
their work amongst the poor people of Malawi.

408
00:22:54,873 --> 00:22:58,418
Jeanette actually went out to visit them. And I,

409
00:22:58,418 --> 00:23:00,420
at an earlier point, had visited my sister

410
00:23:00,420 --> 00:23:05,300
in Malawi. And so we had another thing in common.

411
00:23:06,176 --> 00:23:10,138
And I actually gave you a radio to give to a

412
00:23:10,180 --> 00:23:14,184
forest ranger I'd been for a

413
00:23:14,184 --> 00:23:17,437
walk with. And so that was little things there

414
00:23:17,437 --> 00:23:21,483
to do things, to make connections. And I

415
00:23:21,483 --> 00:23:22,651
actually, at that time, I was

416
00:23:22,651 --> 00:23:23,902
visiting my father in Malaysia.

417
00:23:24,903 --> 00:23:29,825
And I sent Jeanette a postcard or two. And my

418
00:23:29,825 --> 00:23:33,578
writing is absolutely awful. It's really bad.

419
00:23:33,995 --> 00:23:40,252
So when Jeanette saw my writing on this postcard

420
00:23:40,252 --> 00:23:41,586
that I'd sent her, she thought,

421
00:23:41,586 --> 00:23:46,466
"Oh, this guy must have terrible

422
00:23:46,466 --> 00:23:49,136
disabilities or something like that.

423
00:23:50,011 --> 00:23:52,889
He's got such awful writing and punctuation and

424
00:23:52,889 --> 00:23:53,849
spelling and everything."

425
00:23:54,891 --> 00:23:57,686
Anyway, there you go. But she overlooked that.

426
00:23:58,436 --> 00:24:01,940
And coming to the end of 1992,

427
00:24:03,150 --> 00:24:08,071
I proposed to her and she accepted. And then I

428
00:24:08,071 --> 00:24:10,699
had to ask her father. And very fortunately,

429
00:24:10,699 --> 00:24:15,245
he said, "Yes, that's really good news." And we

430
00:24:15,245 --> 00:24:16,621
got married the following year.

431
00:24:18,123 --> 00:24:21,793
Then, following on from this desire to serve God,

432
00:24:22,627 --> 00:24:23,670
we were impressed with

433
00:24:23,670 --> 00:24:25,046
what Wendy and Glenn had to

434
00:24:25,046 --> 00:24:28,675
say about the Emanuel International. But then, I

435
00:24:28,675 --> 00:24:29,843
was also interested in

436
00:24:29,843 --> 00:24:31,303
Tearfund, which is a British

437
00:24:31,386 --> 00:24:35,640
charity that works overseas. But they said,

438
00:24:36,725 --> 00:24:38,852
"Well, for the first year of marriage, we won't

439
00:24:38,852 --> 00:24:41,271
even consider you because you need to have that

440
00:24:41,271 --> 00:24:45,442
year of living together in your local culture and

441
00:24:46,234 --> 00:24:49,029
getting through the teething problems of

442
00:24:49,029 --> 00:24:52,574
marriage." And then we

443
00:24:52,574 --> 00:24:53,825
asked Emanuel International

444
00:24:54,743 --> 00:24:56,912
and went to some interviews there. And we said,

445
00:24:56,912 --> 00:24:58,288
"Do we have to wait here?" And they'd say,

446
00:24:58,330 --> 00:25:01,833
"Normally we would. Normally we would." But on

447
00:25:01,833 --> 00:25:03,752
this occasion, they bent

448
00:25:03,752 --> 00:25:04,961
the rules somewhat for us.

449
00:25:05,795 --> 00:25:10,508
So we went off to training [in] Canada and Jamaica as

450
00:25:10,508 --> 00:25:12,469
missionaries. And the way Emanuel International

451
00:25:12,636 --> 00:25:16,514
worked, or maybe still works, was that you would

452
00:25:16,514 --> 00:25:20,519
do your training first and then be offered to

453
00:25:20,560 --> 00:25:24,689
churches around the world who like the look of you

454
00:25:24,689 --> 00:25:27,317
and thought you'd be able to fit into

455
00:25:29,277 --> 00:25:32,280
the programs they were offering. So it wasn't...

456
00:25:32,781 --> 00:25:34,449
This was a little different than training to be

457
00:25:34,449 --> 00:25:36,868
a minister, say, or something. This is different

458
00:25:36,868 --> 00:25:39,621
than that. This is a missionary worker. This is

459
00:25:39,621 --> 00:25:41,998
mission. Underneath the local church. So we

460
00:25:41,998 --> 00:25:45,293
weren't going off... It happened to be an

461
00:25:45,293 --> 00:25:48,004
Anglican church that we went to and I'll say more

462
00:25:48,004 --> 00:25:49,756
about that. But before

463
00:25:49,756 --> 00:25:52,050
that, I have to say, because it

464
00:25:52,092 --> 00:25:54,844
was during training that we had our first

465
00:25:54,844 --> 00:25:59,975
encounter with Mennonites. Because we come

466
00:25:59,975 --> 00:26:02,310
from an Anglican background, the mission agency

467
00:26:02,310 --> 00:26:05,563
wanted to shake us up a bit. So they like to put

468
00:26:05,563 --> 00:26:08,692
you with a church that you had no experience of.

469
00:26:09,484 --> 00:26:14,072
And so we were put in this local church of

470
00:26:14,072 --> 00:26:17,367
Mennonites in a place called Stoville, which is

471
00:26:17,367 --> 00:26:21,830
east of Toronto, east of Markham in Canada,

472
00:26:22,455 --> 00:26:27,252
in Ontario. And we were with the First Mennonite

473
00:26:27,252 --> 00:26:30,255
church. And I only discovered recently the First

474
00:26:30,255 --> 00:26:32,841
was actually the name of the

475
00:26:32,841 --> 00:26:34,843
denomination of Mennonites in Canada.

476
00:26:34,843 --> 00:26:35,385
Oh, interesting.

477
00:26:35,635 --> 00:26:35,844
Okay.

478
00:26:35,844 --> 00:26:38,847
I thought it was the first Mennonite church. And

479
00:26:38,847 --> 00:26:41,766
in the UK, we have cub scouts. And if you're the

480
00:26:41,808 --> 00:26:43,977
first troop of cub scouts to be in a certain

481
00:26:43,977 --> 00:26:47,355
village or a town, you get first. And the other

482
00:26:47,355 --> 00:26:50,108
one would have to put second and a third and

483
00:26:50,108 --> 00:26:51,985
fourth if there were more of them being set up.

484
00:26:52,861 --> 00:26:54,946
So it wasn't that. I discovered that recently.

485
00:26:55,280 --> 00:26:56,448
That was the name of the

486
00:26:56,448 --> 00:26:57,490
denomination of Mennonites.

487
00:26:58,366 --> 00:27:01,202
And they would have not been as conservative as

488
00:27:01,202 --> 00:27:05,123
you are, but they still retained. And I hope they

489
00:27:05,123 --> 00:27:06,916
still do. And God bless you if you're listening

490
00:27:06,916 --> 00:27:10,879
from you dear folks in Stoville,

491
00:27:10,879 --> 00:27:14,215
First Mennonite church. You had a big impact on

492
00:27:14,215 --> 00:27:18,553
our lives. And one of the things we remember

493
00:27:19,846 --> 00:27:22,640
very clearly about that was the hospitality that

494
00:27:22,640 --> 00:27:25,769
we were shown. After the end of the service,

495
00:27:25,769 --> 00:27:29,230
we were always invited to someone's house for a

496
00:27:29,230 --> 00:27:31,524
meal. They took us under their wing.

497
00:27:33,360 --> 00:27:35,070
And I'll have to say a very amusing

498
00:27:35,070 --> 00:27:35,945
cross-cultural

499
00:27:35,945 --> 00:27:38,323
misunderstanding, a couple of them which took

500
00:27:38,365 --> 00:27:41,326
place, which were quite telling at the time.

501
00:27:42,786 --> 00:27:45,622
First of all, it was a simple misunderstanding.

502
00:27:46,664 --> 00:27:48,833
Sunday School, for instance, came about in the

503
00:27:48,833 --> 00:27:51,127
service. And for us, Sunday School was something

504
00:27:51,127 --> 00:27:54,297
that those who are perhaps under 12 or under 13

505
00:27:54,297 --> 00:27:55,632
would go to. But the

506
00:27:55,632 --> 00:27:56,883
adults would be in the service

507
00:27:57,467 --> 00:27:59,427
and the children would be out there somewhere.

508
00:27:59,928 --> 00:28:03,515
But here, adults did Sunday School. So that was

509
00:28:03,515 --> 00:28:06,059
something very new to us. So off we went into our

510
00:28:06,059 --> 00:28:09,396
little groups. And we went down into the basement

511
00:28:10,188 --> 00:28:13,983
to a men's group. And there, one of the fellows

512
00:28:13,983 --> 00:28:17,529
leading it said, "Ah, lovely to see you. I've

513
00:28:17,529 --> 00:28:21,282
brought some cider along to drink during Sunday

514
00:28:21,282 --> 00:28:24,160
School." I thought, "Oh my goodness me. It's only

515
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:27,205
10 o'clock half past in the morning and we're

516
00:28:27,205 --> 00:28:32,168
drinking alcohol?" What has

517
00:28:32,252 --> 00:28:37,090
this mission agency brought us to? Oh,

518
00:28:37,507 --> 00:28:38,383
that must have been a

519
00:28:38,383 --> 00:28:39,676
shock. So then here we were.

520
00:28:40,135 --> 00:28:42,470
Okay, well, when in Rome, do as Rome does. So we

521
00:28:42,470 --> 00:28:44,139
were like, "All right, it's only apple juice.

522
00:28:44,139 --> 00:28:46,391
It's okay. That's all right." And then that was

523
00:28:46,391 --> 00:28:48,309
one thing. And the other

524
00:28:48,309 --> 00:28:49,811
one was a bit more serious.

525
00:28:49,811 --> 00:28:53,773
This was towards the end of our stay at the

526
00:28:53,773 --> 00:28:56,484
church. But we were asked to do something that

527
00:28:56,484 --> 00:29:00,071
was a cultural practice from our own countries.

528
00:29:01,239 --> 00:29:05,118
And it happened to be the beginning of November.

529
00:29:06,661 --> 00:29:09,372
There's a tradition in Britain called Guy Fawkes

530
00:29:09,372 --> 00:29:16,713
Night. And it reenacts the time in history when

531
00:29:16,796 --> 00:29:21,301
James I was the king and he had started

532
00:29:21,301 --> 00:29:24,220
encouraging the Bible to be more widespread

533
00:29:24,888 --> 00:29:27,056
and for the country to be generally a much more

534
00:29:27,056 --> 00:29:32,645
Protestant nation. And there were subjects of his

535
00:29:32,645 --> 00:29:36,483
who were Catholic who did not like this. And

536
00:29:36,483 --> 00:29:38,067
among them was a man named

537
00:29:38,067 --> 00:29:40,069
Guy Fawkes who plotted with

538
00:29:40,069 --> 00:29:47,118
about 21 others to rent cellars underneath the

539
00:29:47,118 --> 00:29:51,414
houses of Parliament and then pretend it was for

540
00:29:51,456 --> 00:29:54,209
firewood storage, but actually be putting

541
00:29:54,209 --> 00:29:57,462
gunpowder in there. And then on Guy Fawkes Night,

542
00:29:58,588 --> 00:30:02,800
November the 5th, to ignite it and blow the House

543
00:30:02,800 --> 00:30:05,553
of Lords/ Commons to smithereens with the

544
00:30:05,553 --> 00:30:10,433
King. Then there could be an invasion because

545
00:30:10,725 --> 00:30:12,435
everyone would be in disorder because all the

546
00:30:12,435 --> 00:30:15,104
royalty and the nobles would have been wiped out with a

547
00:30:15,104 --> 00:30:17,482
great explosion underneath the Houses of Commons/

548
00:30:18,149 --> 00:30:25,156
Lords. And one of the plotters warned a

549
00:30:25,156 --> 00:30:27,659
Catholic nobleman to, you know,

550
00:30:29,035 --> 00:30:31,829
"You're one of us, don't be there tonight." But he

551
00:30:31,829 --> 00:30:34,457
was a loyal subject to the King, warned the King.

552
00:30:35,375 --> 00:30:40,338
And then the plotters were arrested and for their

553
00:30:40,338 --> 00:30:42,549
treason, horrible things happened to them.

554
00:30:43,508 --> 00:30:48,680
And so on Bonfire Night, an effigy of Guy Fawkes

555
00:30:48,680 --> 00:30:50,890
is made in some places

556
00:30:50,890 --> 00:30:54,561
and a big bonfire is put up

557
00:30:54,727 --> 00:30:59,023
and the effigy is burned. And so we had plenty of

558
00:30:59,023 --> 00:31:03,027
things to burn around the mission buildings in

559
00:31:03,611 --> 00:31:07,156
Stoville. And we thought, well, let's do a

560
00:31:07,156 --> 00:31:09,534
British cultural demonstration to our Canadian

561
00:31:10,451 --> 00:31:14,414
hosts and friends. And so we had the sausage

562
00:31:14,414 --> 00:31:17,542
sizzle and we had a big bonfire constructed.

563
00:31:18,710 --> 00:31:23,131
And the accountant of the mission had this very

564
00:31:23,131 --> 00:31:25,508
involved little daughter and she was really into

565
00:31:25,508 --> 00:31:29,012
it as well. So we got some old clothes and

566
00:31:29,012 --> 00:31:30,096
stuffed them with old wet

567
00:31:30,096 --> 00:31:31,431
leaves that were lying around

568
00:31:31,431 --> 00:31:35,476
because it was autumn or fall. And we made this

569
00:31:35,476 --> 00:31:39,355
effigy of Guy Fawkes with a big floppy hat and

570
00:31:40,023 --> 00:31:42,817
you know, big, big, big, small, moustache and

571
00:31:42,817 --> 00:31:45,320
beard. And we had them all the time on fire. And

572
00:31:45,695 --> 00:31:48,531
we invited the local churches that hosted us

573
00:31:48,531 --> 00:31:50,283
because a lot of us were from Britain as well,

574
00:31:50,283 --> 00:31:52,785
no others. So we all took part in it. And we had

575
00:31:52,785 --> 00:31:54,996
this, you know, sausage sizzle and

576
00:31:55,538 --> 00:32:00,126
big bonfire. And one of the guys from our church,

577
00:32:00,126 --> 00:32:04,714
a young man, was a part-time fireman. And

578
00:32:05,214 --> 00:32:10,928
he was absolutely disgusted and said, "This is

579
00:32:10,928 --> 00:32:12,472
sickening." He was a Mennonite.

580
00:32:13,848 --> 00:32:18,061
"This is sickening. I'm a part-time fireman and I

581
00:32:18,061 --> 00:32:21,898
have seen humans burn in cars, in houses,

582
00:32:21,898 --> 00:32:24,525
when I haven't been able to rescue them. And here

583
00:32:24,525 --> 00:32:26,235
we are burning an image,

584
00:32:26,778 --> 00:32:28,988
an image of a human being

585
00:32:28,988 --> 00:32:32,075
that's made in the image of God." And I never

586
00:32:32,075 --> 00:32:33,660
thought the same about fireworks night or

587
00:32:33,910 --> 00:32:39,957
Guy Fawkes night from there onwards. Something of

588
00:32:39,957 --> 00:32:43,252
his conviction made him brave enough to speak

589
00:32:43,252 --> 00:32:49,217
out and challenge what had just happened. But the

590
00:32:49,217 --> 00:32:51,552
two women spoke out as

591
00:32:51,552 --> 00:32:52,679
well in the church service,

592
00:32:53,054 --> 00:32:55,848
giving thanks for the way the church had helped

593
00:32:55,848 --> 00:32:57,600
them. One of them's husband had broken his leg

594
00:32:57,642 --> 00:33:02,230
badly and couldn't get the harvest in. And

595
00:33:02,230 --> 00:33:05,400
basically the church people who could, pitched

596
00:33:05,441 --> 00:33:10,154
in and brought in the harvest and helped out. And

597
00:33:10,154 --> 00:33:11,572
another one, whose  husband

598
00:33:11,572 --> 00:33:12,657
actually tragically died.

599
00:33:14,200 --> 00:33:18,329
The same thing happened. The congregation pitched

600
00:33:18,329 --> 00:33:20,665
in and the harvest was taken in,

601
00:33:20,957 --> 00:33:23,793
the day was saved. An immediate relief was given

602
00:33:23,793 --> 00:33:25,670
to a problem that faced both women.

603
00:33:26,629 --> 00:33:32,009
And to us, from our church backgrounds, that

604
00:33:32,009 --> 00:33:35,388
spoke volumes. For you coming from

605
00:33:35,388 --> 00:33:37,223
Mennonite backgrounds, that's just what you do.

606
00:33:37,724 --> 00:33:39,517
But it wasn't something that happened

607
00:33:40,017 --> 00:33:42,520
from our backgrounds. Yes, if there had been a

608
00:33:42,520 --> 00:33:43,187
bereavement, you would

609
00:33:43,187 --> 00:33:44,188
have had a very compassionate

610
00:33:44,397 --> 00:33:48,776
visit from the vicar. And maybe there would be

611
00:33:48,776 --> 00:33:51,237
some help from a neighbor farmer,

612
00:33:52,238 --> 00:33:55,783
but the church would not have acted as a body to

613
00:33:55,783 --> 00:33:59,871
help do what's done in the general sense of

614
00:33:59,871 --> 00:34:05,001
our experience. That would have been neighbors

615
00:34:05,001 --> 00:34:07,545
who may have been, but it just wouldn't happen

616
00:34:07,628 --> 00:34:09,505
together. Not like a church, an

617
00:34:09,505 --> 00:34:11,966
actual church unified in this way.

618
00:34:12,550 --> 00:34:14,552
Is that just culturally or

619
00:34:14,552 --> 00:34:15,928
traditionally? That's just the way it is?

620
00:34:16,637 --> 00:34:21,517
I think it's something deeper than that. I think

621
00:34:21,517 --> 00:34:27,398
it's something whereby faith and practice go hand

622
00:34:27,398 --> 00:34:32,195
in hand in the Anabaptist setting. And they don't

623
00:34:32,195 --> 00:34:35,907
always do that--not to say they never do that--in

624
00:34:36,324 --> 00:34:42,246
Protestant/Anglican circles, but it's not

625
00:34:42,246 --> 00:34:44,457
so common. It's very rare.

626
00:34:44,999 --> 00:34:46,125
Well, it definitely made an

627
00:34:46,125 --> 00:34:47,168
impression on you. It did.

628
00:34:47,627 --> 00:34:50,588
Powerful. So you continue on from

629
00:34:50,588 --> 00:34:53,341
this point, and you're still Anglican.

630
00:34:53,925 --> 00:34:54,967
I'm still Anglican.

631
00:34:54,967 --> 00:34:56,886
Basically, you've been Anglican this whole point

632
00:34:56,886 --> 00:34:58,846
from when you became a

633
00:34:58,846 --> 00:35:01,390
Christian on. Do you return

634
00:35:01,390 --> 00:35:05,144
to the UK and continue life there then in the

635
00:35:05,144 --> 00:35:06,395
Anglican church? Or what happens?

636
00:35:07,271 --> 00:35:11,359
After that, we had some time building up our

637
00:35:11,359 --> 00:35:15,196
funds. We went back to the UK for a while.

638
00:35:17,073 --> 00:35:20,701
At the time, we discovered we were going to have

639
00:35:20,701 --> 00:35:22,995
a baby. It was Richard, our first son.

640
00:35:23,746 --> 00:35:29,627
He was born in England, in southwest England. Our

641
00:35:29,627 --> 00:35:33,589
funding did come in. It did mean that we

642
00:35:33,631 --> 00:35:39,595
went to Uganda. In Uganda, we were teaching as

643
00:35:39,595 --> 00:35:41,097
well as being tutor for agriculture,

644
00:35:41,514 --> 00:35:42,473
because we had to grow

645
00:35:42,473 --> 00:35:44,308
our own food at the college.

646
00:35:47,270 --> 00:35:52,608
Anyway, that was a long story. So it was suddenly

647
00:35:52,608 --> 00:35:54,861
we're thrown into missionary life there.

648
00:35:55,778 --> 00:35:58,447
Added to that, in northern Uganda, there was a

649
00:35:58,447 --> 00:36:01,409
war zone. We were generally kept within the

650
00:36:01,450 --> 00:36:05,329
confines of Gulu, but it was a very dark time.

651
00:36:06,414 --> 00:36:07,039
You would often be

652
00:36:07,039 --> 00:36:08,499
hearing gunfire in the distance.

653
00:36:09,125 --> 00:36:12,295
And sometimes the conflict came very close, and

654
00:36:12,295 --> 00:36:16,632
we would have bullets raining down on our roof

655
00:36:16,716 --> 00:36:19,552
sometimes. And sometimes we had, on one occasion,

656
00:36:19,552 --> 00:36:23,264
we had a tank fire outside our house, which

657
00:36:23,764 --> 00:36:24,974
was quite... That's an experience.

658
00:36:24,974 --> 00:36:26,809
That was an experience. It brought a lot of dust

659
00:36:26,809 --> 00:36:27,518
down from the roughness.

660
00:36:27,560 --> 00:36:32,190
Yes, it does. There's a lot of percussive force

661
00:36:32,190 --> 00:36:34,108
behind a weapon like

662
00:36:34,108 --> 00:36:36,903
that. So, wow. Okay, so yeah,

663
00:36:36,903 --> 00:36:39,572
you're definitely getting a variety of experience

664
00:36:39,572 --> 00:36:41,324
here. But it's

665
00:36:41,324 --> 00:36:42,658
interesting. I didn't know Anglicans

666
00:36:42,658 --> 00:36:45,411
were in Uganda, so you were connected with a

667
00:36:45,411 --> 00:36:46,621
church that was already established.

668
00:36:46,829 --> 00:36:47,496
They were already established.

669
00:36:48,122 --> 00:36:50,625
Yeah, they had the first missionaries who'd come

670
00:36:50,625 --> 00:36:53,377
in in 1911 to northern Uganda.

671
00:36:53,669 --> 00:36:55,087
So that's just over 100

672
00:36:55,087 --> 00:36:56,464
years ago. So not that long, man.

673
00:36:56,964 --> 00:36:59,383
And they had tried to bamboozle the Africans with

674
00:36:59,383 --> 00:37:03,179
technology initially by filming them,

675
00:37:03,888 --> 00:37:07,433
doing dancing and throwing spears and what have

676
00:37:07,433 --> 00:37:10,770
you. And that actually backfired badly,

677
00:37:10,978 --> 00:37:12,730
because once they were shown the films of

678
00:37:12,730 --> 00:37:16,317
themselves, they thought their spirits had

679
00:37:16,317 --> 00:37:20,196
been trapped upon the screen. And so they thought

680
00:37:20,196 --> 00:37:22,031
the missionaries were sorcerers and

681
00:37:23,115 --> 00:37:27,203
kept well away from them. So it was actually a

682
00:37:27,203 --> 00:37:30,248
long time that the trust was built up again.

683
00:37:30,665 --> 00:37:34,168
Yeah, that wasn't a good plan. So

684
00:37:34,168 --> 00:37:36,504
how long were you in Uganda, then?

685
00:37:36,545 --> 00:37:39,215
We were there for two years.

686
00:37:39,757 --> 00:37:41,425
Okay, so you went back to...

687
00:37:41,425 --> 00:37:43,886
We went back to the UK and then did our second

688
00:37:43,886 --> 00:37:50,726
year. So we were in Uganda from 1995 to 1997.

689
00:37:51,352 --> 00:37:54,605
So after Uganda, you end up back in the UK and at

690
00:37:54,605 --> 00:37:57,024
some point you become an Anglican vicar

691
00:37:57,149 --> 00:38:00,111
yourself. So now that's a change. So what

692
00:38:00,111 --> 00:38:01,779
happened there? What was the process?

693
00:38:03,197 --> 00:38:04,490
Why did you become a vicar?

694
00:38:04,490 --> 00:38:05,700
Why did I become a vicar?

695
00:38:05,950 --> 00:38:06,158
Yeah.

696
00:38:06,617 --> 00:38:12,540
Well, we had some shining examples of Anglican

697
00:38:12,540 --> 00:38:14,166
ministers in northern Uganda.

698
00:38:14,709 --> 00:38:20,715
They were working for a pittance. Sometimes they

699
00:38:20,715 --> 00:38:22,925
would not be paid. They'd often have to

700
00:38:22,925 --> 00:38:27,763
grow their own food to survive. And they were

701
00:38:27,763 --> 00:38:31,434
godly men and still are as far as I'm aware.

702
00:38:32,059 --> 00:38:33,853
That must have left quite an impression, because

703
00:38:33,853 --> 00:38:35,688
you're describing an environment that

704
00:38:36,355 --> 00:38:38,149
maybe we read about it in books or something, but

705
00:38:38,149 --> 00:38:40,860
those of us living in the West just never

706
00:38:40,985 --> 00:38:43,487
experienced chaos, like what you're describing,

707
00:38:43,487 --> 00:38:44,989
and for someone to live in that environment.

708
00:38:45,865 --> 00:38:48,534
It was the example of the men who

709
00:38:48,534 --> 00:38:52,371
we knew there that made me think,

710
00:38:53,831 --> 00:38:56,625
"Perhaps I should do that when I go back to

711
00:38:56,625 --> 00:38:59,503
England and take up the calling of becoming

712
00:39:00,004 --> 00:39:02,465
a clergyman in the Church of England, which is

713
00:39:02,465 --> 00:39:04,592
what I know of. I know nothing else, really."

714
00:39:04,633 --> 00:39:07,261
Yeah. I'm realizing that's a thread through your

715
00:39:07,261 --> 00:39:09,889
story. The Church of England or the Anglican

716
00:39:09,930 --> 00:39:15,227
Church. Yeah. It's definitely a large impact on

717
00:39:15,227 --> 00:39:17,480
your life and these ministers you knew.

718
00:39:18,105 --> 00:39:20,357
So becoming a vicar, what is that

719
00:39:20,357 --> 00:39:22,568
process like? You go back to school.

720
00:39:23,110 --> 00:39:27,990
You go. First of all, I have to see the Warden of

721
00:39:27,990 --> 00:39:31,577
Ordinance. They are called a prebendary.

722
00:39:32,411 --> 00:39:37,333
I visited a prebendary in the Church of England to

723
00:39:37,333 --> 00:39:38,501
begin with in my diocese.

724
00:39:40,169 --> 00:39:46,258
I told him what I was planning and why I would

725
00:39:46,258 --> 00:39:48,594
like to be ordained and that sort of thing.

726
00:39:49,637 --> 00:39:52,807
I had the experience in Africa. Basically, I

727
00:39:52,807 --> 00:39:55,267
didn't realize there's a bit of a game to test

728
00:39:55,309 --> 00:39:57,978
your calling. He kind of pooh-poohed everything I'd

729
00:39:57,978 --> 00:40:03,526
done. I thought, "Why am I wasting my time?

730
00:40:04,276 --> 00:40:06,612
I should ask the Church in Wales." This is

731
00:40:06,612 --> 00:40:07,530
another Anglican sister

732
00:40:07,530 --> 00:40:08,989
church to the Church of England.

733
00:40:09,990 --> 00:40:11,033
Okay. I didn't know that.

734
00:40:11,700 --> 00:40:15,371
So I said, "You're just wasting my time. Why

735
00:40:15,371 --> 00:40:17,414
should I be trying to

736
00:40:17,414 --> 00:40:18,707
prove to you that I want to...

737
00:40:20,084 --> 00:40:22,962
when you're mocking me?" So I just left off and

738
00:40:22,962 --> 00:40:24,380
then he's running after me and saying,

739
00:40:24,422 --> 00:40:27,591
"No, come back. Come back." I said, "No. I'm

740
00:40:27,591 --> 00:40:30,136
going to go to the Church of Wales now.

741
00:40:30,427 --> 00:40:33,514
I'm not going to bother with this anymore." So I

742
00:40:33,514 --> 00:40:35,766
didn't realize that it was a "test your

743
00:40:35,766 --> 00:40:42,356
vocation to make you grovel." Now, my

744
00:40:42,356 --> 00:40:45,568
brother-in-law who was

745
00:40:45,568 --> 00:40:50,114
already ordained as a deacon

746
00:40:50,447 --> 00:40:53,409
in the Anglican Church told me,

747
00:40:53,409 --> 00:40:55,536
"That's what they do." So he said,

748
00:40:56,328 --> 00:40:57,580
"Next time you go in for an

749
00:40:57,580 --> 00:40:59,790
interview, don't be so quick to walk out."

750
00:41:01,834 --> 00:41:03,502
So you stuck with it though.

751
00:41:03,502 --> 00:41:07,923
So then I went to visit the similar setup because

752
00:41:07,923 --> 00:41:09,758
I'd been going to college in Abberistwyth,

753
00:41:10,634 --> 00:41:12,970
and going to attending an Anglican Church there.

754
00:41:14,054 --> 00:41:17,266
I needed then to work through the

755
00:41:17,308 --> 00:41:20,769
Diocese of St. David's, which was in West Wales.

756
00:41:22,354 --> 00:41:27,109
And so I visited the Warden of Ordnance there,

757
00:41:27,860 --> 00:41:34,450
and I met the bishop who questioned me. And I

758
00:41:34,450 --> 00:41:36,869
went to a panel aboard and

759
00:41:38,412 --> 00:41:41,081
I remember my own doubts being honest with him. I

760
00:41:41,081 --> 00:41:46,128
said, "Well, I am dyslexic. I'm not really

761
00:41:46,795 --> 00:41:49,548
great with those things." And there was some

762
00:41:49,548 --> 00:41:51,675
retired major or something on the board. He said,

763
00:41:52,426 --> 00:41:53,636
"Don't worry about that. You've

764
00:41:53,636 --> 00:41:55,095
got a degree. You'll be fine."

765
00:41:56,472 --> 00:42:02,061
So that was a part of the story. So then you're

766
00:42:02,061 --> 00:42:04,355
then sent to Theological College where your

767
00:42:04,813 --> 00:42:07,816
calling is tested still for three years if you're

768
00:42:07,816 --> 00:42:10,694
under the age of 30. And I was under the age of

769
00:42:10,736 --> 00:42:12,947
30. So I had to do a degree

770
00:42:12,947 --> 00:42:15,241
again. So I went to the...

771
00:42:15,241 --> 00:42:16,325
So you got another degree?

772
00:42:16,325 --> 00:42:18,953
I got another degree in practical theology.

773
00:42:20,329 --> 00:42:22,081
That'd be a four-year degree?

774
00:42:22,289 --> 00:42:25,709
It was a three-year degree. It was basically in

775
00:42:25,709 --> 00:42:28,087
an Anglican college being released into the

776
00:42:28,087 --> 00:42:31,548
university to do the theological side. And some

777
00:42:31,548 --> 00:42:32,424
of it would be in-house

778
00:42:32,424 --> 00:42:34,301
training, and then going out

779
00:42:34,343 --> 00:42:38,430
to preach in different parishes. You'd have an

780
00:42:38,430 --> 00:42:41,642
experience of a wide range of churches in the

781
00:42:41,642 --> 00:42:43,978
Anglican setup. And that was in the city of

782
00:42:43,978 --> 00:42:45,729
Cardiff. So that's where I was based.

783
00:42:46,897 --> 00:42:49,358
And so for three years I was there and it was

784
00:42:49,358 --> 00:42:53,070
a... In the Anglican church, you've got

785
00:42:53,862 --> 00:42:57,241
four groups within it that bicker and fight

786
00:42:57,241 --> 00:42:58,701
amongst each other often enough.

787
00:42:59,285 --> 00:43:00,869
You have the Anglo-Catholics

788
00:43:00,869 --> 00:43:03,038
who are very like Roman Catholics.

789
00:43:04,123 --> 00:43:08,794
They would perhaps have images and statues in

790
00:43:08,794 --> 00:43:10,587
their churches. They would swing incense.

791
00:43:11,338 --> 00:43:14,300
Some Roman Catholics would say, "That was like we

792
00:43:14,300 --> 00:43:16,093
used to be before Vatican II."

793
00:43:16,969 --> 00:43:17,177
Wow.

794
00:43:17,886 --> 00:43:21,807
So quite medieval in their way of doing things.

795
00:43:22,474 --> 00:43:24,977
But amongst them I've met men of great faith.

796
00:43:25,269 --> 00:43:28,689
So I don't want to poohoo them too much. Some of

797
00:43:28,689 --> 00:43:30,357
them are just in it for the theatricals,

798
00:43:30,357 --> 00:43:33,152
which is very sad. So you have that group. Then

799
00:43:33,152 --> 00:43:35,904
you have the liberals, as you do usually in any

800
00:43:35,904 --> 00:43:39,325
denomination. They're often actually aiming to

801
00:43:39,325 --> 00:43:42,244
change culture, the culture that's around them,

802
00:43:42,953 --> 00:43:45,873
as much as they want to change those who are

803
00:43:45,873 --> 00:43:47,833
being ministered to by them.

804
00:43:49,960 --> 00:43:51,628
And you have them in the

805
00:43:51,628 --> 00:43:53,130
Mennonites as well in their setup.

806
00:43:53,422 --> 00:43:57,092
Yes. Then you have the Charismatics. Do I say more?

807
00:43:57,843 --> 00:44:01,764
Okay. I've just never thought of Anglican

808
00:44:01,764 --> 00:44:04,975
Charismatic combination. I don't know why.

809
00:44:05,309 --> 00:44:07,269
I guess that makes sense now as you say it, but

810
00:44:07,269 --> 00:44:08,228
whoa. Okay. That's interesting.

811
00:44:09,605 --> 00:44:12,608
And then you have the evangelicals. Within the

812
00:44:12,608 --> 00:44:14,777
evangelicals and the Charismatics, there's often

813
00:44:15,110 --> 00:44:17,696
hybrids between the two. And likewise, between

814
00:44:17,696 --> 00:44:19,198
the Charismatics and the Anglo-Catholics,

815
00:44:19,281 --> 00:44:21,700
there's hybrids between them too. And maybe the

816
00:44:21,700 --> 00:44:23,535
Charismatics and the Liberal system hybrids,

817
00:44:24,328 --> 00:44:28,582
but generally the evangelicals and theologically

818
00:44:28,582 --> 00:44:31,210
the evangelicals and the Anglo-Catholics will

819
00:44:31,210 --> 00:44:33,670
probably have more in common than the

820
00:44:33,670 --> 00:44:34,672
Charismatics and the

821
00:44:34,672 --> 00:44:37,591
Liberals. So it's a bit of a muddle.

822
00:44:37,591 --> 00:44:38,967
It's a bit of a muddle, but you're born into

823
00:44:38,967 --> 00:44:41,261
that. And our church was

824
00:44:41,261 --> 00:44:44,181
conservative Anglo-Catholic

825
00:44:44,264 --> 00:44:48,352
and the Catholic changing to Liberal Catholic.

826
00:44:50,437 --> 00:44:52,356
Oh, so you're in interesting transition.

827
00:44:52,356 --> 00:44:54,525
I was from an evangelical background and

828
00:44:54,525 --> 00:44:57,152
observing all this going on in the college,

829
00:44:58,195 --> 00:45:01,031
the bickering and the fighting and the meanness

830
00:45:01,031 --> 00:45:05,536
that was going on between the ordinands and the

831
00:45:05,536 --> 00:45:08,247
ordinands and the staff. And it was pretty ugly

832
00:45:08,247 --> 00:45:12,167
stuff, but part of spiritual formation, I'm told.

833
00:45:13,127 --> 00:45:17,089
Wow. Yeah, because that's interesting to me

834
00:45:17,089 --> 00:45:18,215
because what you're describing,

835
00:45:18,715 --> 00:45:20,676
so many different churches denominations go

836
00:45:20,676 --> 00:45:22,928
through that process where you have this old,

837
00:45:23,137 --> 00:45:25,139
traditional old conservatives way of doing it,

838
00:45:25,139 --> 00:45:28,434
and then it's changing and being updated or going

839
00:45:28,434 --> 00:45:31,103
more liberal in certain ways. That causes all

840
00:45:31,103 --> 00:45:33,230
kinds of, yeah, like you said, bickering.

841
00:45:33,564 --> 00:45:36,108
Yeah, it certainly does. It's quite emotional,

842
00:45:36,108 --> 00:45:37,609
emotionally charged atmosphere.

843
00:45:38,152 --> 00:45:40,904
So once you complete your three years there and

844
00:45:40,904 --> 00:45:43,073
you say you were preaching some in different

845
00:45:43,073 --> 00:45:44,450
parishes, things like that, so you're getting

846
00:45:44,450 --> 00:45:48,036
some experience, at that point then, are you now

847
00:45:48,328 --> 00:45:49,621
officially a vicar or do

848
00:45:49,621 --> 00:45:50,122
you have to go through more?

849
00:45:50,122 --> 00:45:50,998
It doesn't happen so simply.

850
00:45:50,998 --> 00:45:52,332
There's some more hoops to get through.

851
00:45:54,084 --> 00:46:00,215
You are then assigned to a placement, a

852
00:46:00,215 --> 00:46:05,387
teaching, a parish where you are ordained deacon.

853
00:46:05,929 --> 00:46:10,392
And so as a deacon, you can preach and you help

854
00:46:10,392 --> 00:46:12,561
with communion, but you cannot administer

855
00:46:12,811 --> 00:46:16,440
communion to the congregation. You have to wait a

856
00:46:16,440 --> 00:46:18,901
year and then after a year you're priested,

857
00:46:19,443 --> 00:46:20,652
and then you can give communion.

858
00:46:21,278 --> 00:46:22,404
You said "priested." I'm not

859
00:46:22,404 --> 00:46:24,114
familiar with that term. What is that?

860
00:46:24,573 --> 00:46:31,371
That would mean that you undergo a ceremony and you

861
00:46:31,371 --> 00:46:33,582
become, and you're given a charge

862
00:46:34,249 --> 00:46:38,462
by the bishop and hands are laid upon you

863
00:46:38,462 --> 00:46:42,674
and you make a vow of obedience

864
00:46:42,674 --> 00:46:51,433
to the 39 articles of the Anglican faith. 

865
00:46:51,433 --> 00:46:55,229
You then are allowed to conduct a communion service

866
00:46:55,354 --> 00:47:00,859
after being a year of a deacon and observing it

867
00:47:00,859 --> 00:47:04,655
happen, but hands off you're not able to do it

868
00:47:04,655 --> 00:47:10,494
yet. Now you continue being a curate in your

869
00:47:10,494 --> 00:47:13,330
position, so you've now been ordained,

870
00:47:13,789 --> 00:47:15,666
you can take communion, you can go to old

871
00:47:15,666 --> 00:47:17,251
people's homes and give people communion,

872
00:47:17,751 --> 00:47:19,545
you can visit the sick and give them communion.

873
00:47:20,295 --> 00:47:22,297
You have the power. Some would say "you're a magic

874
00:47:22,548 --> 00:47:27,094
man now." No, I'm being a bit facetious, but

875
00:47:27,094 --> 00:47:31,390
you're suddenly empowered.

876
00:47:32,641 --> 00:47:35,269
Yeah, interesting. Now would you be called a

877
00:47:35,269 --> 00:47:36,436
priest at this time? Is

878
00:47:36,436 --> 00:47:37,229
that the wrong terminology?

879
00:47:37,563 --> 00:47:39,231
No, it's the right idea to use that, but

880
00:47:39,231 --> 00:47:40,607
generally if you're from an

881
00:47:40,607 --> 00:47:42,609
Anglican evangelical background,

882
00:47:43,151 --> 00:47:46,780
you generally prefer to use the term minister. A

883
00:47:46,780 --> 00:47:49,449
priest often is, and you

884
00:47:49,449 --> 00:47:49,658
might be called reverend,

885
00:47:49,700 --> 00:47:52,578
whereas if you're from the Anglo-Catholic

886
00:47:52,578 --> 00:47:53,662
tradition in the Anglican

887
00:47:53,662 --> 00:47:55,706
Church, you like to be known as

888
00:47:55,706 --> 00:47:58,667
father. So you could have chosen a number of

889
00:47:58,667 --> 00:47:59,835
different title options here. If I wanted to,

890
00:48:00,002 --> 00:48:03,255
I could have been a reverend father. Which one

891
00:48:03,255 --> 00:48:04,548
did you choose? I was reverend.

892
00:48:04,881 --> 00:48:10,387
Okay, so this is a process, but this is really

893
00:48:10,387 --> 00:48:13,098
interesting because I'm not familiar with this.

894
00:48:13,890 --> 00:48:15,642
Of course, being an American, not much

895
00:48:15,642 --> 00:48:17,519
interaction with Church of England. So you

896
00:48:17,894 --> 00:48:22,316
go through this process and you're now a priest

897
00:48:22,316 --> 00:48:23,358
or a reverend or a father

898
00:48:23,358 --> 00:48:24,901
or a vicar or whichever term

899
00:48:24,901 --> 00:48:28,238
I guess we want to pull in here. So what's that

900
00:48:28,238 --> 00:48:30,490
like now? That becomes your life.

901
00:48:30,490 --> 00:48:34,369
Well then you're suddenly there and I was, I have

902
00:48:34,369 --> 00:48:36,413
to say I was probably rather naive.

903
00:48:38,874 --> 00:48:41,710
I realized I was now managing decline. Oh, that's

904
00:48:41,710 --> 00:48:43,670
gotta feel not fun at all. 

905
00:48:43,920 --> 00:48:46,465
And it wasn't great, but I was doing my best to

906
00:48:46,465 --> 00:48:48,050
preach the gospel in that situation.

907
00:48:50,135 --> 00:48:57,809
And the inertia was tremendous. And I began to

908
00:48:58,977 --> 00:49:01,813
rattle cages by speaking of the need to be born

909
00:49:01,813 --> 00:49:06,485
again in my sermons and sometimes in the

910
00:49:06,485 --> 00:49:12,449
parish magazine. That was something that ignited

911
00:49:12,449 --> 00:49:16,161
an interest because someone who read an article

912
00:49:16,161 --> 00:49:19,373
I'd written in the parish magazine was a Baptist

913
00:49:19,373 --> 00:49:24,127
minister from a nearby town and he'd somehow read

914
00:49:24,127 --> 00:49:27,547
what I'd said and he understood the reaction that

915
00:49:27,547 --> 00:49:28,507
I'd got, which was pretty

916
00:49:28,507 --> 00:49:31,051
bad. I think my training

917
00:49:31,134 --> 00:49:35,722
vicar was a bit irritated with that. There was

918
00:49:35,722 --> 00:49:39,976
someone lodging with the hairdresser up the road

919
00:49:39,976 --> 00:49:43,146
in the terraced houses we lived in, in Pembroke

920
00:49:43,146 --> 00:49:47,567
in South Wales by the name of Brendan. Brendan,

921
00:49:47,567 --> 00:49:50,779
if you're out there, God bless you. I have to say

922
00:49:50,779 --> 00:49:52,614
you used a sledgehammer to crack a nut,

923
00:49:52,656 --> 00:49:56,410
but you got your point across. And your point

924
00:49:56,410 --> 00:50:00,872
was, Brendan, that as a born again man,

925
00:50:01,415 --> 00:50:05,711
I was in the wrong place. Some would argue

926
00:50:05,711 --> 00:50:06,586
against that. Someone

927
00:50:06,586 --> 00:50:07,587
would say you were in the right

928
00:50:07,587 --> 00:50:10,632
place, you, because you're in it to win it. That

929
00:50:10,632 --> 00:50:12,759
was what my evangelical

930
00:50:12,759 --> 00:50:15,053
Anglican brethren would say,

931
00:50:15,429 --> 00:50:21,810
"Hew your in the church to win it." 

932
00:50:21,810 --> 00:50:25,522
They wouldn't be saying the same thing now with what's happened

933
00:50:25,522 --> 00:50:30,318
to the church. But anyway, this man Brendan

934
00:50:30,318 --> 00:50:33,363
basically metaphorically took me by the scruff

935
00:50:33,363 --> 00:50:38,368
of the neck and he told me in no uncertain terms

936
00:50:38,368 --> 00:50:42,706
that I was absolutely wasting my time

937
00:50:43,707 --> 00:50:51,131
administering in a church that was simply a

938
00:50:51,131 --> 00:50:52,132
daughter of the whore of

939
00:50:52,132 --> 00:50:56,595
Babylon. That was his reaction.

940
00:50:57,262 --> 00:51:03,268
Now that's Plymouth Brethren speak. But he had a

941
00:51:03,268 --> 00:51:06,438
reason for that because he had actually become

942
00:51:06,480 --> 00:51:10,692
a Christian from a Catholic background and he was

943
00:51:10,692 --> 00:51:14,404
originally Irish, interesting enough, and his

944
00:51:14,821 --> 00:51:17,949
mother had been so annoyed by him becoming a

945
00:51:17,949 --> 00:51:21,828
Christian that she had ordered his brothers to

946
00:51:21,995 --> 00:51:26,583
beat him black and blue and there was no love

947
00:51:26,583 --> 00:51:29,169
lost. So he was a man who

948
00:51:29,169 --> 00:51:30,796
was wounded and bleeding, I believe,

949
00:51:31,046 --> 00:51:34,591
from that traumatic experience of him becoming

950
00:51:34,591 --> 00:51:38,804
born again and being rejected by his family.

951
00:51:39,679 --> 00:51:42,057
So the Plymouth Brethren was all to him. But in

952
00:51:42,057 --> 00:51:43,266
the conversation he had,

953
00:51:44,351 --> 00:51:48,855
he mentioned the suffering of the Anabaptists in

954
00:51:48,855 --> 00:51:51,107
Europe under the Catholic Church.

955
00:51:52,108 --> 00:51:52,734
Well now that's

956
00:51:52,734 --> 00:51:56,071
interesting. Why did he bring that up?

957
00:51:56,822 --> 00:51:59,157
Because if that was his background and the

958
00:51:59,157 --> 00:52:03,161
background of his upbringing had been Catholic

959
00:52:03,453 --> 00:52:06,832
and he had suffered and come out of Catholic and

960
00:52:06,832 --> 00:52:08,291
going into the Plymouth Brethren.

961
00:52:08,500 --> 00:52:12,629
I understand now. Yeah. Oh yeah. Okay. So he

962
00:52:12,629 --> 00:52:13,839
could empathize with

963
00:52:13,839 --> 00:52:15,632
suffering for what it had been,

964
00:52:15,632 --> 00:52:19,177
the cost of his faith moving out of that. But

965
00:52:19,177 --> 00:52:21,847
with the mention of Anabaptists in Europe,

966
00:52:22,806 --> 00:52:27,185
a light bulb came on in my mind and I began to

967
00:52:27,185 --> 00:52:29,396
remember our time in

968
00:52:29,396 --> 00:52:31,231
Canada, which was about eight

969
00:52:31,231 --> 00:52:34,568
or nine years before. I thought they were

970
00:52:34,568 --> 00:52:36,653
Mennonites. They're

971
00:52:36,653 --> 00:52:39,322
Anabaptists. That got me thinking,

972
00:52:39,322 --> 00:52:41,658
do they exist in England? Do they exist in Wales?

973
00:52:42,284 --> 00:52:43,910
Are they around? Are Anabaptists there?

974
00:52:44,619 --> 00:52:46,079
The early days of the internet, type it in

975
00:52:46,079 --> 00:52:49,749
Anabaptists and what pops up, there's the

976
00:52:50,166 --> 00:52:53,712
Anabaptist network in London, Wood Green

977
00:52:53,712 --> 00:52:57,090
Mennonite Church and the Bruderhof pop up.

978
00:52:58,049 --> 00:53:00,510
I didn't have a number for the Bruderhof, so I

979
00:53:00,510 --> 00:53:06,016
contacted the Wood Green Mennonites and

980
00:53:07,058 --> 00:53:09,561
said, "Could I have a number for the Bruderhof

981
00:53:09,561 --> 00:53:11,813
because you might have as your both Anabaptists?"

982
00:53:12,814 --> 00:53:15,942
They somewhat reluctantly passed it on. Anyways,

983
00:53:17,861 --> 00:53:19,696
they did. Thank you. And so

984
00:53:21,197 --> 00:53:23,491
in the great scheme of things, but I have to say

985
00:53:23,491 --> 00:53:28,121
at the time, the neighboring Baptist minister

986
00:53:28,121 --> 00:53:32,417
had given me this book to read. And I don't know

987
00:53:32,417 --> 00:53:34,669
if you've come across this one. I've heard of it,

988
00:53:34,794 --> 00:53:37,964
but I'm not... How do you pronounce their name?

989
00:53:38,882 --> 00:53:41,426
The Broadbent. The Pilgrim

990
00:53:41,426 --> 00:53:43,511
Church by E.H. Broadbent.

991
00:53:45,722 --> 00:53:50,185
This would have been produced by the... But I

992
00:53:50,185 --> 00:53:52,520
think the man was Plymouth Brethren. He's passed

993
00:53:52,520 --> 00:53:58,068
away now. But in the 1930s and 20s, he did a lot

994
00:53:58,068 --> 00:54:00,153
of traveling throughout Europe and Asia,

995
00:54:00,278 --> 00:54:06,409
making contact with surviving churches from

996
00:54:06,409 --> 00:54:11,623
historical links and in the States as well,

997
00:54:12,415 --> 00:54:14,960
Mennonites and Amish. So he spoke about the

998
00:54:14,960 --> 00:54:19,506
continuation of the Pilgrim Church from the

999
00:54:19,506 --> 00:54:22,676
Acts of the Apostles through history. So that

1000
00:54:22,676 --> 00:54:27,013
book opened my eyes to the existence of a

1001
00:54:28,014 --> 00:54:34,854
non-sacramental form of Christianity that existed

1002
00:54:34,854 --> 00:54:37,607
from the time of the Apostles.

1003
00:54:39,025 --> 00:54:42,320
And that was a really encouraging read. And to

1004
00:54:42,320 --> 00:54:44,406
anyone who's on a journey like me,

1005
00:54:44,823 --> 00:54:53,289
do read it. That was very helpful. That led me to

1006
00:54:53,289 --> 00:54:59,254
a point where I actually, for the first time,

1007
00:54:59,254 --> 00:55:05,051
resigned from the Anglican Church. I was probably

1008
00:55:05,051 --> 00:55:07,429
a little bit early in doing that.

1009
00:55:08,013 --> 00:55:09,347
But you had been a vicar

1010
00:55:09,347 --> 00:55:10,390
for how long before you did?

1011
00:55:10,890 --> 00:55:15,145
I had been a curate and that was someone who was

1012
00:55:15,145 --> 00:55:17,480
a priest in training, put it that way,

1013
00:55:18,106 --> 00:55:21,526
doing practical work. So I was resigning. But

1014
00:55:21,526 --> 00:55:24,863
that led me to a point

1015
00:55:24,863 --> 00:55:27,240
of, "Okay, so I've resigned.

1016
00:55:27,949 --> 00:55:30,910
Where do I go now?" "Yeah, where did you go?"

1017
00:55:30,910 --> 00:55:33,288
"Where do I go now?" We'd already visited the

1018
00:55:33,288 --> 00:55:37,125
Bruderhof. And my dear wife had made it very

1019
00:55:37,125 --> 00:55:39,794
plain to me that our family would have suffered

1020
00:55:40,086 --> 00:55:44,424
greatly if we'd gone to the Bruderhof because

1021
00:55:44,424 --> 00:55:47,218
community is valued at a higher standing

1022
00:55:47,594 --> 00:55:50,889
than family. So our family would be restructured

1023
00:55:50,889 --> 00:55:53,808
in a way that would have been too painful for us.

1024
00:55:54,392 --> 00:55:59,773
But what we did do at that point was to decide

1025
00:55:59,773 --> 00:56:02,400
that we would home-educate because we realized

1026
00:56:02,442 --> 00:56:05,945
that there was a change in the culture of...

1027
00:56:07,363 --> 00:56:08,448
because as we were

1028
00:56:08,448 --> 00:56:09,783
getting more spiritually aware,

1029
00:56:10,033 --> 00:56:12,744
I suppose, we were realizing that there was a

1030
00:56:12,744 --> 00:56:15,955
change in the culture of Wales,

1031
00:56:16,915 --> 00:56:19,959
that it was drifting away from its Christian

1032
00:56:19,959 --> 00:56:23,046
foundations and becoming

1033
00:56:23,379 --> 00:56:28,259
steadily more pagan and secularized. And this was

1034
00:56:28,259 --> 00:56:31,846
coming through to us in the state school

1035
00:56:31,888 --> 00:56:34,891
that our children were going to. My ---- view

1036
00:56:34,891 --> 00:56:38,144
somewhat naively was that I thought that

1037
00:56:38,353 --> 00:56:44,567
education should lift children above the level

1038
00:56:44,567 --> 00:56:46,069
that their parents achieved.

1039
00:56:47,529 --> 00:56:51,741
And that's something I hope that our school is

1040
00:56:51,741 --> 00:56:53,118
doing here in Dunwall East,

1041
00:56:54,702 --> 00:56:58,456
lifting children above to where their parents

1042
00:56:58,456 --> 00:56:59,916
have achieved to go beyond,

1043
00:56:59,916 --> 00:57:04,212
in a positive way, to the point which their

1044
00:57:04,212 --> 00:57:07,757
parents have. Anyway, I could see that in some

1045
00:57:07,757 --> 00:57:14,139
ways the schools were failing. How in their own

1046
00:57:14,139 --> 00:57:16,474
views, they were probably doing just fine,

1047
00:57:17,600 --> 00:57:21,229
managing difficult situations and compromising

1048
00:57:21,229 --> 00:57:23,523
where they had to and that sort of thing.

1049
00:57:23,565 --> 00:57:26,609
But it led me to be in a position where I was

1050
00:57:26,609 --> 00:57:32,866
still the curate, but taking devotions in these

1051
00:57:32,866 --> 00:57:35,493
schools and my children had been taken out of

1052
00:57:35,493 --> 00:57:37,996
them. So we were

1053
00:57:37,996 --> 00:57:40,206
home-educating and the Bruderhof had

1054
00:57:40,206 --> 00:57:42,959
helped us see that there was another way of doing

1055
00:57:42,959 --> 00:57:45,044
things. So that was

1056
00:57:45,044 --> 00:57:47,255
great. And there was an option

1057
00:57:47,297 --> 00:57:51,342
to home-educate thanks to the work of Winston

1058
00:57:51,342 --> 00:57:56,848
Churchill, who when he was a student, he had a

1059
00:57:56,848 --> 00:57:58,725
horrible time in the boarding school he was sent

1060
00:57:58,725 --> 00:58:00,810
to. And he would have

1061
00:58:00,810 --> 00:58:02,604
much rather had a home tutor

1062
00:58:02,729 --> 00:58:08,109
in his home and he didn't like school. And he

1063
00:58:08,109 --> 00:58:11,988
made a provision in the Education Act of 1945

1064
00:58:13,198 --> 00:58:16,534
that there would be an education at school or

1065
00:58:16,534 --> 00:58:19,245
otherwise. So within law...

1066
00:58:20,663 --> 00:58:22,540
That's on British law right now.

1067
00:58:22,540 --> 00:58:24,709
Yeah, in British law now. So there's a freedom to

1068
00:58:24,709 --> 00:58:26,794
home-educate in Britain.

1069
00:58:27,170 --> 00:58:29,464
I did not know that about Winston Churchill, but

1070
00:58:29,464 --> 00:58:31,549
that doesn't actually entirely surprise me,

1071
00:58:31,758 --> 00:58:32,550
now that I think about it.

1072
00:58:32,550 --> 00:58:37,138
He was quite insightful. And he said of

1073
00:58:37,138 --> 00:58:38,848
education, "The sad thing

1074
00:58:38,848 --> 00:58:40,308
is about education in Britain

1075
00:58:40,934 --> 00:58:45,104
is its main design is just to create workers for

1076
00:58:45,104 --> 00:58:47,398
our factories and soldiers for our empire."

1077
00:58:49,525 --> 00:58:49,692
Ow.

1078
00:58:51,611 --> 00:58:52,320
That's brutal.

1079
00:58:52,612 --> 00:58:55,240
That is brutal. I mean, that's what... And we

1080
00:58:55,240 --> 00:58:55,907
thought, "Well, education

1081
00:58:55,907 --> 00:58:56,908
should be more than that."

1082
00:58:58,618 --> 00:59:01,079
So that's an interesting piece of the story

1083
00:59:01,079 --> 00:59:04,791
because it feels like oftentimes home schooling

1084
00:59:05,208 --> 00:59:08,795
or home education or whatever is usually part of

1085
00:59:08,795 --> 00:59:11,798
the story for people that are going down paths

1086
00:59:11,798 --> 00:59:15,051
similar to what you've went down. And that's, I

1087
00:59:15,051 --> 00:59:17,887
think, an important piece because of how valuable

1088
00:59:18,263 --> 00:59:20,390
or important I should say education can be, what

1089
00:59:20,390 --> 00:59:21,849
an influence that can be on children.

1090
00:59:23,643 --> 00:59:26,271
At this point, you've resigned from

1091
00:59:26,271 --> 00:59:28,106
your position in the Anglican Church.

1092
00:59:28,648 --> 00:59:31,401
You're doing some exploring, I guess, testing

1093
00:59:31,401 --> 00:59:33,820
options. You're going down the path of home

1094
00:59:33,861 --> 00:59:38,283
education. Where do you choose to go from there

1095
00:59:38,283 --> 00:59:40,326
as far as church goes? This must have

1096
00:59:40,326 --> 00:59:41,619
been a pretty lonely time.

1097
00:59:42,412 --> 00:59:45,081
Well, having resigned, I was given a month to

1098
00:59:45,081 --> 00:59:48,459
think about it. And on the last day of the month,

1099
00:59:49,669 --> 00:59:52,672
I went to my bishop and said, "I think I made a

1100
00:59:52,672 --> 00:59:55,383
mistake. I can't see where I'm going to go."

1101
00:59:56,467 --> 01:00:00,346
And he said, "Well, we'll see if we can find a

1102
01:00:00,346 --> 01:00:03,141
square peg for you to go into rather than a round

1103
01:00:03,224 --> 01:00:08,688
hole." But at the moment, you need to spend some

1104
01:00:08,688 --> 01:00:14,277
time out. So I spent four months outside of the

1105
01:00:14,277 --> 01:00:19,115
Anglican Church. And I worked for a government

1106
01:00:19,115 --> 01:00:22,243
agency finding people jobs on the telephone,

1107
01:00:23,661 --> 01:00:26,998
which was an insight into how some people live,

1108
01:00:26,998 --> 01:00:30,376
which is a telephone operator. And

1109
01:00:30,418 --> 01:00:34,297
it was an interesting time to be out of the

1110
01:00:34,297 --> 01:00:37,258
church. So I came back in

1111
01:00:37,258 --> 01:00:40,511
and I was then sent for further

1112
01:00:42,972 --> 01:00:46,225
parish training, I suppose, as a curate in an

1113
01:00:46,225 --> 01:00:49,687
evangelical parish in a town called Aberaeron 

1114
01:00:50,563 --> 01:00:54,817
on the coast of Wales, further north than

1115
01:00:54,817 --> 01:00:58,529
Pembroke. And there, I

1116
01:00:58,529 --> 01:00:59,947
found a different situation

1117
01:01:01,240 --> 01:01:05,411
but one that was somewhat... at face value, it

1118
01:01:05,411 --> 01:01:09,916
was a great relief. But I still had that feeling

1119
01:01:10,500 --> 01:01:14,170
that there was something better. And inside, I

1120
01:01:14,170 --> 01:01:19,258
was an Anabaptist still, though I had come back

1121
01:01:19,258 --> 01:01:23,304
into the Anglican Church. And I remember someone

1122
01:01:23,304 --> 01:01:26,307
saying to me, "Oh, it's good. It's really good

1123
01:01:26,349 --> 01:01:34,607
to come back to Mother Church." So I would have

1124
01:01:34,607 --> 01:01:36,192
gone somewhere else had

1125
01:01:36,192 --> 01:01:37,443
there been somewhere else.

1126
01:01:38,027 --> 01:01:39,987
So that's, I think, an important piece there,

1127
01:01:39,987 --> 01:01:40,905
right? Because there was this,

1128
01:01:41,989 --> 01:01:45,410
"You don't know where else to go." That had to

1129
01:01:45,410 --> 01:01:48,413
not have felt good. Did that feel, I mean,

1130
01:01:48,413 --> 01:01:50,873
almost like you're trapped. We don't know where

1131
01:01:50,873 --> 01:01:52,583
to go. Not trapped, but

1132
01:01:52,583 --> 01:01:53,501
we don't know where to go.

1133
01:01:54,168 --> 01:01:59,132
Or stuck. Having said that, there was Wood Green

1134
01:01:59,132 --> 01:02:01,467
Mennonite Church in London.

1135
01:02:02,468 --> 01:02:04,470
Are they still... But they're not there anymore.

1136
01:02:05,054 --> 01:02:07,849
No. But they did exist. So I kind of...

1137
01:02:08,307 --> 01:02:12,186
They sent some of the mailings to me and I saw

1138
01:02:12,186 --> 01:02:13,729
the books that they were encouraging.

1139
01:02:14,689 --> 01:02:18,484
I thought, "Wow, they're more liberal than many

1140
01:02:18,484 --> 01:02:19,235
of the liberals in the

1141
01:02:19,235 --> 01:02:20,486
Anglican Church that I know."

1142
01:02:20,987 --> 01:02:24,574
Oh, no. And I thought, "I can't go there." And

1143
01:02:24,574 --> 01:02:27,493
the Bruderhof, "I can't work with the Bruderhof.

1144
01:02:28,119 --> 01:02:29,704
What am I going to do? Where am I going to go?"

1145
01:02:29,996 --> 01:02:32,415
So I was in an evangelical parish in

1146
01:02:32,665 --> 01:02:36,711
Aberaeron and I moved there in about November. It

1147
01:02:36,711 --> 01:02:40,298
was during my second son's birthday and we moved

1148
01:02:40,631 --> 01:02:46,721
in November 1994. I knew eventually at some point

1149
01:02:46,721 --> 01:02:49,765
I would no longer be a curate and I would

1150
01:02:50,057 --> 01:02:54,479
become a rector/ vicar of a parish and no

1151
01:02:54,479 --> 01:02:57,982
longer be number two, but number one

1152
01:02:58,149 --> 01:03:07,158
and where the decisions were made. So I knew this

1153
01:03:07,158 --> 01:03:10,244
time was coming and I was wondering,

1154
01:03:10,953 --> 01:03:13,789
"What do I do in a decline?" I feel the church is

1155
01:03:13,789 --> 01:03:16,209
declining. I know that there's movements on the

1156
01:03:16,250 --> 01:03:21,214
way. They're going to make it a very difficult

1157
01:03:21,214 --> 01:03:25,092
place to work. It began with the blessing of

1158
01:03:25,092 --> 01:03:27,553
same-sex marriages and I knew it would go

1159
01:03:27,553 --> 01:03:29,889
further. What year did that happen?

1160
01:03:31,307 --> 01:03:35,061
It actually happened after I left. Okay. But you

1161
01:03:35,061 --> 01:03:36,437
saw that that was coming.

1162
01:03:36,812 --> 01:03:41,025
I saw it was happening and someone close to me,

1163
01:03:41,400 --> 01:03:43,277
who I was very disappointed in,

1164
01:03:44,237 --> 01:03:46,489
actually took part in the ceremony doing that

1165
01:03:46,489 --> 01:03:48,324
with the knowledge of his bishop,

1166
01:03:49,367 --> 01:03:52,620
but it was just done for a pastoral reason. I

1167
01:03:52,620 --> 01:03:54,080
think of the same-sex relationship.

1168
01:03:56,666 --> 01:04:06,676
It really saddened me and in a way propelled me

1169
01:04:06,676 --> 01:04:09,262
to seek for something else. I thought,

1170
01:04:10,096 --> 01:04:12,890
"This is going in a bad way. I can see the

1171
01:04:12,890 --> 01:04:14,850
writing on the wall. If

1172
01:04:14,850 --> 01:04:16,102
these things are happening and

1173
01:04:16,102 --> 01:04:18,938
they're being tolerated, then sooner or later

1174
01:04:18,938 --> 01:04:19,814
they're going to be the norm."

1175
01:04:22,149 --> 01:04:26,195
And Jeanette will remember, I was on my knees by the

1176
01:04:26,195 --> 01:04:30,741
bed for many, many, many nights just wrestling

1177
01:04:30,825 --> 01:04:37,039
with the Lord, wondering what to do. You see, as

1178
01:04:37,039 --> 01:04:38,332
an Anglican vicar at the time,

1179
01:04:39,000 --> 01:04:44,547
I would be required to remarry divorcees, to

1180
01:04:44,547 --> 01:04:49,010
baptize infants who had no clue about what they

1181
01:04:49,010 --> 01:04:51,971
were entering and whether they would ever enter

1182
01:04:51,971 --> 01:04:55,182
it anyway. Many times a baptism service or a

1183
01:04:55,224 --> 01:04:58,477
"Christening," as it's called, would be no more

1184
01:04:58,477 --> 01:05:01,564
than an excuse to get drunk by the families

1185
01:05:01,564 --> 01:05:04,108
participating and have some photographs taken

1186
01:05:04,108 --> 01:05:07,528
with the baby in the Christening garb that had

1187
01:05:07,528 --> 01:05:12,366
been passed down the generations. There was a lot

1188
01:05:12,366 --> 01:05:19,582
of feeling of deep pain and concern.

1189
01:05:19,999 --> 01:05:22,668
Through the homeschooling

1190
01:05:22,668 --> 01:05:26,130
channels that we had came a leaflet about

1191
01:05:29,383 --> 01:05:32,595
an Anabaptist conference that was going to be held in

1192
01:05:32,595 --> 01:05:36,182
Oxford by the Nationwide Mennonite Church.

1193
01:05:37,058 --> 01:05:38,976
Now, they didn't have a presence in the UK, but

1194
01:05:38,976 --> 01:05:41,896
they were seeing what the interests would be.

1195
01:05:42,647 --> 01:05:47,443
And so I thought, "Well, let's go and find out."

1196
01:05:47,443 --> 01:05:48,694
I phoned first of all and said,

1197
01:05:49,236 --> 01:05:51,656
"What do you believe in? What are your standing?

1198
01:05:51,947 --> 01:05:54,742
What do you stand for the Bible? What do you

1199
01:05:54,742 --> 01:05:58,204
stand for?" As he spoke, I thought, "Well, I

1200
01:05:58,204 --> 01:06:00,039
could have truck with these people. I could

1201
01:06:00,790 --> 01:06:03,084
find out more about them because at least it

1202
01:06:03,084 --> 01:06:05,044
sounds more like the Anabaptists that I've read

1203
01:06:05,044 --> 01:06:08,255
of in history than the guys I'd heard of in

1204
01:06:08,255 --> 01:06:13,386
London." So we went along to the conference.

1205
01:06:14,512 --> 01:06:20,685
And at the conference, we encountered a lot of

1206
01:06:20,685 --> 01:06:23,145
other homeschooling families who were having

1207
01:06:23,145 --> 01:06:27,066
similar ideas. And there were even some people

1208
01:06:27,066 --> 01:06:31,654
from Ireland there. Now, Jeanette met Barbara

1209
01:06:31,779 --> 01:06:36,867
and Dan Yoder who are based here. And in my

1210
01:06:36,867 --> 01:06:38,452
speaking, I never actually spoke to them,

1211
01:06:39,370 --> 01:06:45,418
but they had a church up and running. And as I

1212
01:06:45,418 --> 01:06:46,711
went through life in the parish,

1213
01:06:47,753 --> 01:06:50,756
being the number one from where the buck stops,

1214
01:06:50,756 --> 01:06:55,177
so to speak, I was now in charge of the parish.

1215
01:06:55,219 --> 01:07:00,015
And I had my struggles. I wanted to see what was

1216
01:07:00,015 --> 01:07:01,809
happening in the churches

1217
01:07:01,809 --> 01:07:04,854
before I got inducted to

1218
01:07:04,854 --> 01:07:09,150
become the rector of the three churches they had

1219
01:07:09,150 --> 01:07:13,863
given me in that group of parishes. And so I just

1220
01:07:13,863 --> 01:07:17,867
went along in ordinary clothes to sit in the

1221
01:07:17,867 --> 01:07:20,870
congregation to see what was going on the week

1222
01:07:21,370 --> 01:07:27,501
before I was due to be inducted. And at one of

1223
01:07:27,501 --> 01:07:29,336
the churches, I was approached by two men

1224
01:07:29,545 --> 01:07:33,924
at the end of the service and they said, "We hope

1225
01:07:33,924 --> 01:07:36,802
you don't mind. We're in a partnership."

1226
01:07:38,387 --> 01:07:44,143
And I thought, "Oh, oh." And I was thinking about

1227
01:07:44,143 --> 01:07:45,686
what sort of partnership is that.

1228
01:07:46,562 --> 01:07:57,072
So I went and had a visit with them before my

1229
01:07:57,072 --> 01:08:00,242
induction and said, "You spoke of being

1230
01:08:00,242 --> 01:08:02,870
in a partnership. What sort of partnership are

1231
01:08:02,870 --> 01:08:06,290
you in? And is it a business partnership or

1232
01:08:06,290 --> 01:08:07,666
something else?" And they said, "Oh, it's

1233
01:08:07,666 --> 01:08:09,919
actually a civil

1234
01:08:09,919 --> 01:08:11,921
partnership." Oh, I said, "That's a

1235
01:08:12,880 --> 01:08:16,217
difficult one. There's a difficult one for me. I

1236
01:08:16,217 --> 01:08:19,386
will have a problem with that. Let me explain.

1237
01:08:20,221 --> 01:08:23,099
I'll be as clear as I can. I'm not going to drive

1238
01:08:23,099 --> 01:08:26,811
you away. I'd love it if you continued to come to

1239
01:08:26,811 --> 01:08:29,230
the church, but what I can't do is to give you

1240
01:08:29,230 --> 01:08:31,982
communion because in your

1241
01:08:31,982 --> 01:08:33,275
current state, that would

1242
01:08:33,275 --> 01:08:40,866
be causing you harm." And to begin with, they

1243
01:08:40,866 --> 01:08:43,452
said, "Well, where do you get that from?" And I

1244
01:08:43,994 --> 01:08:45,746
flicked into the Bible and showed them the

1245
01:08:45,746 --> 01:08:48,457
passages that were relevant to that topic.

1246
01:08:49,166 --> 01:08:50,960
And so I thought, "Oh, they understand. They've

1247
01:08:50,960 --> 01:08:52,545
taken it well." But then there was a letter

1248
01:08:52,545 --> 01:08:55,005
to the bishop and letters going back and

1249
01:08:55,005 --> 01:08:59,844
forth. And then the harvest service happened

1250
01:08:59,927 --> 01:09:01,262
where they were going to be playing. One was

1251
01:09:01,262 --> 01:09:02,096
playing the organ and the

1252
01:09:02,096 --> 01:09:03,514
other one was going to be

1253
01:09:04,807 --> 01:09:09,603
doing a reading. And one of them played the organ

1254
01:09:09,603 --> 01:09:12,273
very badly and the other one refused to do the

1255
01:09:12,273 --> 01:09:13,691
reading and walked out of the church. And that

1256
01:09:13,691 --> 01:09:15,818
was the last that we saw

1257
01:09:15,818 --> 01:09:18,028
of them. But it wasn't the

1258
01:09:18,028 --> 01:09:21,866
last of the letters going back and forth. It

1259
01:09:21,866 --> 01:09:24,368
wasn't the main church, but the church,

1260
01:09:25,035 --> 01:09:29,081
it was the second biggest church in the group.

1261
01:09:30,291 --> 01:09:33,586
And the parishioners wanted me to explain what

1262
01:09:33,586 --> 01:09:36,422
had gone on, why I'd taken the stand I had taken.

1263
01:09:36,797 --> 01:09:41,260
So there I was in my black cassock with a table

1264
01:09:41,260 --> 01:09:43,721
in the church and the church group assembled

1265
01:09:43,721 --> 01:09:47,016
around me, having taken advice from a senior

1266
01:09:47,933 --> 01:09:51,228
evangelical clergyman to explain to them the

1267
01:09:51,228 --> 01:09:59,778
history around the church's view on same-sex

1268
01:09:59,778 --> 01:10:03,449
relationships and the biblical view, the

1269
01:10:03,449 --> 01:10:06,201
traditional view, the line that was taken

1270
01:10:06,869 --> 01:10:10,748
historically hadn't just changed. And their view

1271
01:10:10,748 --> 01:10:12,249
was you must change with the times and

1272
01:10:12,249 --> 01:10:16,587
it'll be okay. So the couple actually went to a

1273
01:10:16,587 --> 01:10:19,381
neighboring church down the road where they made

1274
01:10:19,381 --> 01:10:23,510
a home for themselves. Sadly, one of them passed

1275
01:10:23,510 --> 01:10:27,389
away and the rumor went round that I had refused

1276
01:10:27,389 --> 01:10:31,185
to bury them. So there are lies and there are sad

1277
01:10:31,185 --> 01:10:34,104
things that go on. But throughout this

1278
01:10:34,980 --> 01:10:38,025
difficult time, brothers and

1279
01:10:38,025 --> 01:10:41,445
sisters from the Mennonite church, from

1280
01:10:43,781 --> 01:10:47,242
the Nationwide Mennonite church visited and encouraged me

1281
01:10:47,242 --> 01:10:50,871
in this time. So I have a lot of respect for the

1282
01:10:50,871 --> 01:10:54,750
nationwide Mennonite church in their outreach and

1283
01:10:54,750 --> 01:10:57,753
we make it a practice to visit their conference

1284
01:10:57,753 --> 01:11:02,883
annually in the UK each year to support them in

1285
01:11:02,883 --> 01:11:08,222
their work in the UK. At this time, as well,

1286
01:11:08,806 --> 01:11:16,730
was a shift in my thinking as regarding the age

1287
01:11:16,730 --> 01:11:19,566
of the earth and what the

1288
01:11:19,566 --> 01:11:22,277
Bible says and the order

1289
01:11:22,277 --> 01:11:27,574
of creation and the trustworthy of the scriptures

1290
01:11:27,574 --> 01:11:30,452
from the very beginning. I should have mentioned

1291
01:11:30,577 --> 01:11:33,998
this earlier because that would have... we've shot forward

1292
01:11:33,998 --> 01:11:37,960
a bit. But it became more

1293
01:11:37,960 --> 01:11:39,545
and more clear to me that

1294
01:11:40,129 --> 01:11:43,882
if I could trust through organizations like

1295
01:11:43,882 --> 01:11:47,594
Answers in Genesis and the Creation Ministries

1296
01:11:47,594 --> 01:11:50,472
International and their view and their scientific

1297
01:11:50,472 --> 01:11:57,646
proof and evidence that the world is much younger

1298
01:11:58,397 --> 01:12:02,526
and the Bible story fits much more easily in that

1299
01:12:02,526 --> 01:12:07,156
young earth situation. If I'm to trust that,

1300
01:12:07,156 --> 01:12:11,243
and I did, then the words of Jesus in the New

1301
01:12:11,243 --> 01:12:15,998
Testament, which back up the creation model,

1302
01:12:16,457 --> 01:12:20,419
need to have special attention to them. So I was

1303
01:12:20,419 --> 01:12:23,255
now looking at the New Testament through the eyes

1304
01:12:23,297 --> 01:12:25,382
of someone who'd been convinced of the validity

1305
01:12:25,382 --> 01:12:30,721
of the old with a completely new set of eyes.

1306
01:12:31,513 --> 01:12:34,308
I was looking at the commands of Jesus, the Son

1307
01:12:34,308 --> 01:12:38,228
of God, in a way that I'd

1308
01:12:38,228 --> 01:12:39,271
never really looked at it

1309
01:12:39,271 --> 01:12:41,398
before. I'd looked at it as a sort of… I'd

1310
01:12:41,398 --> 01:12:42,232
looked at scripture in a

1311
01:12:42,232 --> 01:12:45,027
flat way. It was all sort of one

1312
01:12:45,027 --> 01:12:48,238
and you kind of blended the commandments together

1313
01:12:48,238 --> 01:12:52,409
and what Jesus said was sometimes trumped by the

1314
01:12:52,409 --> 01:13:00,542
commandments and the law. But then when I seen

1315
01:13:00,542 --> 01:13:05,297
how the Old Testament could be trusted,

1316
01:13:06,340 --> 01:13:08,425
I thought, "Well, now let's look at the New with

1317
01:13:08,425 --> 01:13:12,888
fresh eyes." So in a way, my contact with

1318
01:13:13,305 --> 01:13:15,182
would probably generally be more mainstream

1319
01:13:15,182 --> 01:13:19,978
Protestant in their line with creationist views,

1320
01:13:20,729 --> 01:13:25,025
open my eyes to Anabaptism in a very fresh way.

1321
01:13:26,193 --> 01:13:30,906
So the teaching on the two kingdoms

1322
01:13:31,990 --> 01:13:37,704
became more of the bedrock of my faith now. And I

1323
01:13:37,704 --> 01:13:39,957
could see that the mingling of the church,

1324
01:13:40,499 --> 01:13:41,792
the Anglican church with the

1325
01:13:41,792 --> 01:13:46,547
world was something that was toxic.

1326
01:13:46,588 --> 01:13:49,716
When you… It sounds like you were right in the

1327
01:13:49,716 --> 01:13:51,969
mix of all of that. You know that

1328
01:13:53,679 --> 01:13:56,306
managing decline is something you said and then

1329
01:13:56,306 --> 01:13:57,850
these other changes and

1330
01:13:57,850 --> 01:13:58,892
shifts that were happening

1331
01:13:58,892 --> 01:14:00,477
and how the church was approaching things, "Oh,

1332
01:14:00,477 --> 01:14:01,353
we need to change with the

1333
01:14:01,353 --> 01:14:03,313
times," things like that.

1334
01:14:03,313 --> 01:14:06,150
And you're right in the middle of that. And you

1335
01:14:06,150 --> 01:14:08,569
mentioned two kingdoms, which is a foundational

1336
01:14:08,569 --> 01:14:11,655
piece for the Anabaptist worldview. How did you

1337
01:14:11,655 --> 01:14:13,448
hear about that for the first time? Was it like

1338
01:14:13,532 --> 01:14:14,992
you read the Sermon on the Mount and you're

1339
01:14:14,992 --> 01:14:16,743
looking at it with different eyes now and saying,

1340
01:14:16,743 --> 01:14:19,705
"Oh, wait a minute," or do you read a book about

1341
01:14:19,705 --> 01:14:21,707
it? How did you encounter that teaching?

1342
01:14:21,707 --> 01:14:26,086
It would have been a very helpful book that was

1343
01:14:26,086 --> 01:14:30,591
passed on to me by a Nationwide brother,

1344
01:14:30,591 --> 01:14:33,844
now brothers, but they did say at the front that

1345
01:14:33,844 --> 01:14:36,972
they didn't believe everything that David Bercot

1346
01:14:37,514 --> 01:14:40,934
spoke of in the book. They weren't completely on

1347
01:14:40,934 --> 01:14:42,603
board with him, but there's an overall framework

1348
01:14:42,769 --> 01:14:46,231
of what this book spoke of, The Kingdom that

1349
01:14:46,231 --> 01:14:47,191
Turned the World Upside Down.

1350
01:14:47,191 --> 01:14:49,109
And the way Christ's

1351
01:14:49,109 --> 01:14:54,448
teachings do that to a human life and even to a

1352
01:14:54,448 --> 01:14:58,535
society, if the society allows that, are immense.

1353
01:14:59,203 --> 01:15:02,456
And the idea of the two kingdoms became very

1354
01:15:02,456 --> 01:15:05,542
apparent in the reading of this book and opened

1355
01:15:05,626 --> 01:15:08,378
my eyes up and made Scripture much more clearer

1356
01:15:08,378 --> 01:15:13,008
and plainer in my understanding of it. So yeah,

1357
01:15:13,008 --> 01:15:17,387
that was another influential book in my walk.

1358
01:15:20,140 --> 01:15:25,562
Another book and film that I would recommend.

1359
01:15:28,315 --> 01:15:31,026
Our church doesn't encourage film watching, but I

1360
01:15:31,026 --> 01:15:31,902
wasn't in it at the time.

1361
01:15:32,903 --> 01:15:37,324
It's like a documentary, but there's a book as

1362
01:15:37,324 --> 01:15:40,536
well that goes with it. And it's by a man I have met,

1363
01:15:40,536 --> 01:15:44,206
actually, a Myron S. Augsburger, and the book is

1364
01:15:44,206 --> 01:15:45,874
about the life of Michael Sattler,

1365
01:15:46,875 --> 01:15:50,337
called Pilgrim of Flame. And that's a very good

1366
01:15:50,337 --> 01:15:54,508
read. Michael Sattler's life was an inspiration

1367
01:15:54,800 --> 01:16:02,307
to me in the way he lived and died. And in the

1368
01:16:02,307 --> 01:16:05,769
capacity of someone who was ordained within a

1369
01:16:05,894 --> 01:16:09,856
Reformation church, I empathize so much with this

1370
01:16:09,856 --> 01:16:14,903
man. I wasn't suffering the way he was,

1371
01:16:15,279 --> 01:16:18,657
but spiritually I was. It came to a head in a

1372
01:16:18,657 --> 01:16:24,788
way. I began to become braver in my preaching.

1373
01:16:25,539 --> 01:16:29,042
And began to preach more like an Anabaptist from

1374
01:16:29,042 --> 01:16:31,503
the sermon or from the pulpit.

1375
01:16:31,795 --> 01:16:33,422
Did that have interesting results?

1376
01:16:33,714 --> 01:16:40,470
It had profound results. I was in trouble for

1377
01:16:40,470 --> 01:16:42,681
that. From my own congregation,

1378
01:16:44,308 --> 01:16:46,184
rather than... I mean, they probably whispered it

1379
01:16:46,184 --> 01:16:48,353
to those above me. And

1380
01:16:48,353 --> 01:16:49,604
the Anglican Church is very

1381
01:16:49,604 --> 01:16:53,400
hierarchical. You have to remember that. It's not

1382
01:16:53,400 --> 01:16:55,736
a local body of believers, such as the one

1383
01:16:55,944 --> 01:16:58,447
that I'm part of here in Ireland. It is quite

1384
01:16:58,447 --> 01:17:01,325
hierarchical. So what's said is monitored. 

1385
01:17:04,828 --> 01:17:07,706
There's a series of sermons that I preached on

1386
01:17:07,706 --> 01:17:10,208
the Beatitudes called God's Manifesto. I seem

1387
01:17:10,208 --> 01:17:12,294
to remember that. So I preached through the

1388
01:17:12,294 --> 01:17:16,798
Beatitudes. And I'm very sad to say, but I did

1389
01:17:16,798 --> 01:17:23,055
make enemies of my congregation. Not all of them,

1390
01:17:24,723 --> 01:17:26,516
quite a few of them who were influential.

1391
01:17:28,477 --> 01:17:36,068
And one day after speaking out at a larger church

1392
01:17:36,068 --> 01:17:38,862
gathering called the synod,

1393
01:17:38,904 --> 01:17:43,909
because we were then told at the particular Synod

1394
01:17:43,909 --> 01:17:46,370
about what we could and couldn't discuss

1395
01:17:46,370 --> 01:17:52,250
anymore in regards women in ministry. We were

1396
01:17:52,250 --> 01:17:54,878
told it was no longer a negotiable or something

1397
01:17:54,878 --> 01:17:59,049
for discussion. It was to be taken as norm now.

1398
01:17:59,758 --> 01:18:00,509
And anyone discussing

1399
01:18:00,509 --> 01:18:02,719
that would not be considered

1400
01:18:02,719 --> 01:18:08,517
to become an ordinand in the up and coming years

1401
01:18:08,517 --> 01:18:11,645
to come. So I just felt that was incredibly

1402
01:18:11,645 --> 01:18:15,941
draconian. Even if I hadn't at the time had any

1403
01:18:15,941 --> 01:18:19,569
strong views on it, for that to be said

1404
01:18:19,569 --> 01:18:27,661
was pretty draconian. So as a result of my

1405
01:18:27,661 --> 01:18:30,956
speaking out against that in the Synod,

1406
01:18:32,582 --> 01:18:37,045
one of the influential people in the church was

1407
01:18:37,045 --> 01:18:42,008
doing the congregational prayers. And I was,

1408
01:18:43,218 --> 01:18:48,598
again, in the front of the church. And I found

1409
01:18:48,598 --> 01:18:50,559
that I was being prayed

1410
01:18:50,559 --> 01:18:54,354
against by my congregation.

1411
01:18:55,814 --> 01:18:57,149
Okay, so that was probably

1412
01:18:57,149 --> 01:18:58,400
a disconcerting experience.

1413
01:18:58,733 --> 01:19:01,153
Yeah, it was disconcerting. And then at that

1414
01:19:01,153 --> 01:19:04,781
point, I realized this was the end of it,

1415
01:19:04,781 --> 01:19:08,869
but it was a curious sensation. I was kneeling at

1416
01:19:08,869 --> 01:19:13,999
the prayer desk in the front of the church,

1417
01:19:14,791 --> 01:19:19,045
as the prayers were being said. And as I was

1418
01:19:19,045 --> 01:19:24,050
praying, I felt that I was being lashed on the

1419
01:19:24,092 --> 01:19:28,805
back as each prayer was prayed, that I was being

1420
01:19:28,805 --> 01:19:32,893
beaten. But the wonderful thing about it was that

1421
01:19:32,893 --> 01:19:37,272
I felt a peace that Christ was with me in that

1422
01:19:37,272 --> 01:19:40,650
time. And I suppose at

1423
01:19:40,650 --> 01:19:43,069
the time, I had been reading

1424
01:19:43,069 --> 01:19:48,116
this book as well. And this book caused action.

1425
01:19:48,366 --> 01:19:51,661
It's called the Anabaptist Vision. And it was

1426
01:19:51,703 --> 01:19:56,333
written many, many years ago, in a very short

1427
01:19:56,333 --> 01:19:58,793
period of time, it was written overnight by a

1428
01:19:58,793 --> 01:20:01,463
man called Harold S. Bender, because he had to

1429
01:20:01,463 --> 01:20:05,550
explain the Anabaptist position to the President

1430
01:20:05,550 --> 01:20:08,678
of America and various military officials as

1431
01:20:08,678 --> 01:20:12,390
regards the stance of non-resistant Christians,

1432
01:20:12,557 --> 01:20:17,729
of the plain variety, the Anabaptist variety. And

1433
01:20:17,729 --> 01:20:22,484
this book encouraged me to act upon my

1434
01:20:22,484 --> 01:20:28,406
convictions. And I phoned up my bishop and handed

1435
01:20:28,406 --> 01:20:30,992
in my resignation. Normally, you have to wait

1436
01:20:30,992 --> 01:20:33,495
three months before you can leave. He allowed me

1437
01:20:33,495 --> 01:20:36,081
to go in two. We then

1438
01:20:36,081 --> 01:20:38,583
came to Ireland. The thought

1439
01:20:38,667 --> 01:20:41,044
was that after six months, there would be a

1440
01:20:41,044 --> 01:20:43,630
church in England to move to,

1441
01:20:43,630 --> 01:20:45,006
and that our time in Ireland

1442
01:20:45,006 --> 01:20:47,425
would be six months of living in an Anabaptist

1443
01:20:47,425 --> 01:20:52,097
community and preparing ourselves for a life in

1444
01:20:52,097 --> 01:20:57,185
the UK, in an Anabaptist community, church. But

1445
01:20:57,185 --> 01:20:59,980
as it was, the Nationwide

1446
01:20:59,980 --> 01:21:01,314
Mennonites took 18 months

1447
01:21:01,481 --> 01:21:04,776
to come. And after 18 months had been and gone,

1448
01:21:05,360 --> 01:21:08,280
our savings was spent. The children had settled,

1449
01:21:09,447 --> 01:21:12,784
and I had five children at the time. They had

1450
01:21:12,784 --> 01:21:15,120
settled in the community here as much as they

1451
01:21:15,120 --> 01:21:19,124
could. And we'd run out of money, and I was

1452
01:21:19,124 --> 01:21:20,792
working. I formed a little

1453
01:21:20,792 --> 01:21:23,128
business. We were baking and

1454
01:21:23,169 --> 01:21:30,552
gardening, and life in Ireland was for us. So six

1455
01:21:30,552 --> 01:21:32,512
months turned into you live here now.

1456
01:21:32,512 --> 01:21:35,432
We live here now. Yeah, six months came and went.

1457
01:21:35,765 --> 01:21:36,641
A year came and went.

1458
01:21:37,350 --> 01:21:38,560
Eighteen months came and went.

1459
01:21:38,768 --> 01:21:41,187
And when we were asked to come over, I had to

1460
01:21:41,187 --> 01:21:41,980
say, "No, I'm afraid.

1461
01:21:42,480 --> 01:21:43,857
We've made our home in Ireland

1462
01:21:44,024 --> 01:21:50,280
now, and we have been blessed. We've been living

1463
01:21:50,280 --> 01:21:55,285
here for nearly 15 years now." I have to say that

1464
01:21:55,702 --> 01:21:57,996
life in an Anabaptist church is not a bed of

1465
01:21:57,996 --> 01:22:02,876
roses. There are times when you'll be frustrated

1466
01:22:03,043 --> 01:22:05,378
and you'll be annoyed with your brothers and

1467
01:22:05,378 --> 01:22:12,552
sisters. But you know deep down that you will

1468
01:22:12,594 --> 01:22:17,807
never find the perfect church in this world. But

1469
01:22:17,807 --> 01:22:21,519
I would say that in the scheme of things,

1470
01:22:22,103 --> 01:22:27,609
I'm not condemning other Christians in the church

1471
01:22:27,609 --> 01:22:29,819
denominations they find themselves in.

1472
01:22:30,695 --> 01:22:35,784
But I find as a Christian, it's more easy to live

1473
01:22:35,784 --> 01:22:40,288
within the structure of scripture

1474
01:22:40,580 --> 01:22:46,294
in an Anabaptist church than I would in a

1475
01:22:46,294 --> 01:22:51,383
Protestant or a Catholic or Orthodox church.

1476
01:22:51,966 --> 01:22:56,179
That would be in my readings and studies. But

1477
01:22:56,179 --> 01:22:58,932
within those denominations and movements,

1478
01:23:00,392 --> 01:23:05,355
there are Christians who I respect highly. So

1479
01:23:05,355 --> 01:23:07,273
it's a strange position to be in,

1480
01:23:08,108 --> 01:23:13,196
but there I am. And the other thing is that I

1481
01:23:13,196 --> 01:23:16,241
wanted salvation for my children.

1482
01:23:17,909 --> 01:23:20,537
And that's something both of us have wanted, both

1483
01:23:20,537 --> 01:23:24,916
Jeanette and myself. That if we have to sacrifice

1484
01:23:24,958 --> 01:23:29,629
something, some comfort, some privilege, some

1485
01:23:29,629 --> 01:23:34,676
entitlement for the sake of our children's faith,

1486
01:23:35,135 --> 01:23:39,639
we will do it. Even if it means leaving the

1487
01:23:39,639 --> 01:23:42,225
safety net of a golden cage.

1488
01:23:43,351 --> 01:23:46,730
And that brings us to today essentially. Yeah.

1489
01:23:47,522 --> 01:23:50,525
Wow. Yeah, what a journey. Like

1490
01:23:51,109 --> 01:23:52,819
one of the things that stands out to me in this

1491
01:23:52,819 --> 01:23:55,363
is how it wasn't just a

1492
01:23:55,363 --> 01:23:56,990
straight linear path. It's

1493
01:23:56,990 --> 01:23:59,117
like you're here, we need to be here, take the

1494
01:23:59,117 --> 01:24:03,580
steps, arrive, here we go. It seems there was

1495
01:24:03,621 --> 01:24:05,707
a lot more to it than that where you're

1496
01:24:05,707 --> 01:24:06,791
exploring, you're learning.

1497
01:24:06,791 --> 01:24:08,501
Could be here a week. Yeah.

1498
01:24:08,877 --> 01:24:12,964
Yeah. And I think it's easy to want to try to

1499
01:24:12,964 --> 01:24:16,050
rush things sometimes. We hear from a lot of

1500
01:24:16,092 --> 01:24:18,344
listeners and it's like, "Okay, great. I'm going

1501
01:24:18,344 --> 01:24:20,096
to go join a Mennonite church and we're just going

1502
01:24:20,096 --> 01:24:21,598
to do this right now." You're getting to a point

1503
01:24:21,598 --> 01:24:24,058
and I'm looking towards my wife now.

1504
01:24:25,435 --> 01:24:28,104
And I don't know. And part of me is like, "Okay,

1505
01:24:28,104 --> 01:24:29,522
that's great. They're looking for a church to

1506
01:24:29,564 --> 01:24:33,693
join wonderful, but these things do take time." And

1507
01:24:33,693 --> 01:24:35,361
your journey, Emily, was years.

1508
01:24:37,197 --> 01:24:41,618
I would say that it took me seven years to leave

1509
01:24:41,618 --> 01:24:45,246
the Anglican Church and five years before we

1510
01:24:45,246 --> 01:24:50,710
joined this one. So we took a process. It's a

1511
01:24:50,710 --> 01:24:57,050
process. And I would recommend anyone going

1512
01:24:58,092 --> 01:25:01,012
on a pathway like we have gone on to take your

1513
01:25:01,012 --> 01:25:03,890
time. Take your time, but

1514
01:25:03,890 --> 01:25:04,974
don't take too much time.

1515
01:25:05,809 --> 01:25:08,853
I think there was a point in our life. We

1516
01:25:08,853 --> 01:25:11,356
realized the age of our children was rising

1517
01:25:12,148 --> 01:25:15,235
and it's not easy to do something as we have done

1518
01:25:15,235 --> 01:25:19,364
if your children are in their teenage years.

1519
01:25:20,323 --> 01:25:23,701
It's not easy. It's not impossible, but it's not

1520
01:25:23,701 --> 01:25:27,497
easy because their way of thinking will have been

1521
01:25:27,789 --> 01:25:31,209
majorly influenced by the world. Even if it's the

1522
01:25:31,209 --> 01:25:33,711
homeschooling group you're part of,

1523
01:25:34,420 --> 01:25:38,258
it's something that I certainly felt was

1524
01:25:38,258 --> 01:25:42,136
important to mention. Now, I

1525
01:25:42,136 --> 01:25:43,346
mentioned earlier that I had

1526
01:25:43,388 --> 01:25:47,058
come from a military background. Both my father

1527
01:25:47,058 --> 01:25:53,231
and my brother were in the British army. When you

1528
01:25:53,231 --> 01:25:55,567
come from a background like that, you think

1529
01:25:55,567 --> 01:25:57,819
rather like that. That had

1530
01:25:57,819 --> 01:26:00,029
been a goal of mine at one

1531
01:26:00,029 --> 01:26:02,490
point when I wasn't a Christian to just follow in

1532
01:26:02,490 --> 01:26:04,325
my brother's and my father's footsteps and

1533
01:26:04,325 --> 01:26:09,497
become a soldier. Some of that thinking needed to

1534
01:26:09,497 --> 01:26:15,879
be challenged. A book, if you're coming from

1535
01:26:15,879 --> 01:26:19,090
a military background, because sometimes the idea

1536
01:26:19,090 --> 01:26:21,301
of joining a community like the Anabaptists,

1537
01:26:21,301 --> 01:26:22,594
you think, "Well, they're all wearing uniforms.

1538
01:26:23,094 --> 01:26:25,013
Women are wearing this and men are wearing that."

1539
01:26:25,513 --> 01:26:27,015
It's all tickety-boo. Just because you're wearing

1540
01:26:27,015 --> 01:26:29,517
those same uniforms, you'll get on all right.

1541
01:26:30,310 --> 01:26:35,315
It's not that way. We don't operate like the

1542
01:26:35,315 --> 01:26:37,025
military. We are on the

1543
01:26:37,025 --> 01:26:38,443
side of the kingdom of God.

1544
01:26:41,029 --> 01:26:46,534
Prayer and love are our weapons. A wonderful book

1545
01:26:46,534 --> 01:26:51,247
to look at is A Change of Allegiance by Dean

1546
01:26:51,289 --> 01:26:57,629
Taylor. I've met Dean. We had time together in

1547
01:26:57,629 --> 01:27:00,840
Lesbos working with refugees there.

1548
01:27:02,425 --> 01:27:08,264
Dean is a former US military soldier who managed

1549
01:27:08,264 --> 01:27:12,352
to sign out as a conscientious objector,

1550
01:27:12,936 --> 01:27:16,314
but he had to go and think deeply. He's now a

1551
01:27:16,314 --> 01:27:18,691
bishop in an Anabaptist church in the States.

1552
01:27:19,275 --> 01:27:23,529
But in his time in Germany, he was deeply

1553
01:27:23,529 --> 01:27:26,199
challenged about what he was doing and whose

1554
01:27:26,199 --> 01:27:30,912
kingdom he was in in the military. It's a

1555
01:27:30,912 --> 01:27:34,040
profound book, and it's helped me on my journey

1556
01:27:34,415 --> 01:27:37,877
from the background that I was part of to coming

1557
01:27:37,877 --> 01:27:44,717
into the Anabaptist world and what I believe is a

1558
01:27:45,677 --> 01:27:50,723
helpful way of living the Christian life. Dean is

1559
01:27:50,723 --> 01:27:53,726
quite the man. I had the honor to

1560
01:27:53,726 --> 01:27:57,605
interview him a few times. Quite the story, and I

1561
01:27:57,605 --> 01:28:01,901
think it's stories like that that are very

1562
01:28:01,901 --> 01:28:04,487
helpful for others because they can find pieces

1563
01:28:04,487 --> 01:28:08,408
like, "Oh, yeah, that's something I'm struggling

1564
01:28:08,408 --> 01:28:09,993
with," or, "I'm trying to understand that too."

1565
01:28:11,244 --> 01:28:13,287
That's why I'm glad you're willing to share your

1566
01:28:13,329 --> 01:28:15,707
story too because I don't know who else is

1567
01:28:15,707 --> 01:28:18,167
listening. I know we have Anglicans listen to

1568
01:28:18,167 --> 01:28:20,670
this podcast for sure. We hear from them, and

1569
01:28:20,670 --> 01:28:23,548
they have questions sometimes. "Well, have you

1570
01:28:23,548 --> 01:28:25,633
thought about this or what about this?" I think

1571
01:28:25,633 --> 01:28:29,929
as well. There are some Anabaptists

1572
01:28:30,388 --> 01:28:33,016
who think that grass is greener on the other side

1573
01:28:33,016 --> 01:28:39,605
and think perhaps that Anglicanism is for them,

1574
01:28:40,189 --> 01:28:44,902
and maybe it is for a while. But if you are an

1575
01:28:44,902 --> 01:28:47,238
Anabaptist and you're thinking about becoming an

1576
01:28:47,238 --> 01:28:51,117
Anglican and you've heard of some good Anglican

1577
01:28:51,117 --> 01:28:54,454
Christians, and there are plenty of good Anglican

1578
01:28:54,454 --> 01:28:57,290
Christians, and some of their teaching is very

1579
01:28:57,290 --> 01:29:02,253
wonderful, but consider

1580
01:29:02,253 --> 01:29:05,298
this. You may be satisfied,

1581
01:29:05,882 --> 01:29:10,053
but what will it do to your children, your wife,

1582
01:29:10,720 --> 01:29:13,723
and in the long run your

1583
01:29:13,723 --> 01:29:16,017
family? Bear that in mind

1584
01:29:16,184 --> 01:29:18,436
if you're considering the leap in another

1585
01:29:18,436 --> 01:29:21,439
direction from a former Anglican.

1586
01:29:22,523 --> 01:29:27,278
So that's something I wanted to ask you. Who

1587
01:29:27,278 --> 01:29:28,029
knows the different

1588
01:29:28,029 --> 01:29:29,530
journeys everyone is on that's

1589
01:29:29,530 --> 01:29:32,784
listening to this. Maybe they're very satisfied

1590
01:29:32,784 --> 01:29:34,535
with their church situation. They found a good

1591
01:29:34,577 --> 01:29:36,829
community to plug into. But my guess is there's a

1592
01:29:36,829 --> 01:29:38,498
lot of people who don't have that.

1593
01:29:38,790 --> 01:29:40,333
I can believe that, and they may have had some

1594
01:29:40,333 --> 01:29:43,836
very negative experiences from their church.

1595
01:29:45,296 --> 01:29:51,511
But I would say, don't give up on the Anabaptist

1596
01:29:51,511 --> 01:29:54,722
way of living. And in the States,

1597
01:29:54,722 --> 01:29:56,057
particularly if you're coming from the States,

1598
01:29:56,057 --> 01:29:57,308
you have a lot of options

1599
01:29:57,308 --> 01:30:00,228
to move to, whether it's

1600
01:30:01,062 --> 01:30:04,148
slightly more progressive or slightly more

1601
01:30:04,148 --> 01:30:06,901
conservative or a degree greater in either

1602
01:30:06,901 --> 01:30:14,033
direction. But bear in mind that there is a

1603
01:30:14,033 --> 01:30:17,578
temptation if you go too far in a progressive

1604
01:30:17,620 --> 01:30:20,248
direction, then you'll begin to surrender

1605
01:30:20,248 --> 01:30:26,254
biblical standards. And that's a dangerous point.

1606
01:30:26,754 --> 01:30:28,589
But if you go too far in the other direction, you

1607
01:30:28,589 --> 01:30:30,466
can end up entangling

1608
01:30:30,466 --> 01:30:31,926
yourself with man-made rules.

1609
01:30:32,385 --> 01:30:35,680
So yeah, there are some which are helpful, and

1610
01:30:35,680 --> 01:30:39,142
there are some which need to be adapted for a

1611
01:30:39,142 --> 01:30:44,397
changing circumstance. And so it sounds like what

1612
01:30:44,397 --> 01:30:47,483
you're saying, don't be too hasty.

1613
01:30:48,359 --> 01:30:51,237
Don't be too hasty. Yeah, it's a serious thing.

1614
01:30:51,237 --> 01:30:54,323
And you think it through, you know, as I mean,

1615
01:30:54,448 --> 01:30:57,493
in your story, you know, it was some time of

1616
01:30:57,493 --> 01:30:59,245
really wrestling through this.

1617
01:31:00,079 --> 01:31:02,707
Yeah. Yeah. I would like to leave any of you

1618
01:31:02,707 --> 01:31:06,169
listeners with these words of Scripture. They

1619
01:31:06,169 --> 01:31:10,089
spoke to me very strongly as I wrestled with God

1620
01:31:10,089 --> 01:31:12,049
over the decisions I'd make in my life.

1621
01:31:12,800 --> 01:31:19,682
And this is taken from the Gospel of Luke. And

1622
01:31:19,682 --> 01:31:24,979
it's chapter 14 and reading from verse 23

1623
01:31:25,605 --> 01:31:29,775
to verse 34. "Now great multitudes went with

1624
01:31:29,775 --> 01:31:32,278
Jesus, and he turned and said to them,

1625
01:31:32,778 --> 01:31:35,573
'If anyone comes to me and does not hate his

1626
01:31:35,573 --> 01:31:37,658
father and mother, wife

1627
01:31:37,658 --> 01:31:39,493
and children, brothers and

1628
01:31:39,535 --> 01:31:44,081
sisters, yes, and his own life also, he cannot be

1629
01:31:44,081 --> 01:31:47,835
my disciple. And whoever does not bear his cross

1630
01:31:48,002 --> 01:31:52,506
and come after me, he cannot be my disciple. For

1631
01:31:52,506 --> 01:31:54,967
which of you, intending to build a tower,

1632
01:31:55,509 --> 01:31:58,596
does not sit down first and count the cost,

1633
01:31:59,388 --> 01:32:01,891
whether he has enough to finish it? Lest,

1634
01:32:02,558 --> 01:32:06,062
after he has laid the foundation and is not able

1635
01:32:06,062 --> 01:32:08,439
to finish, all who see it

1636
01:32:08,439 --> 01:32:09,982
begin to mock him, saying,

1637
01:32:10,483 --> 01:32:12,693
"This man began to build and was not able to

1638
01:32:12,693 --> 01:32:15,196
finish." Or what king, going

1639
01:32:15,196 --> 01:32:16,614
to make war against another

1640
01:32:16,614 --> 01:32:19,367
king, does not sit down first and consider

1641
01:32:19,367 --> 01:32:21,953
whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him,

1642
01:32:22,370 --> 01:32:25,248
who comes against him with twenty thousand, or

1643
01:32:25,248 --> 01:32:28,542
else, while the other is still a great way off,

1644
01:32:28,584 --> 01:32:31,254
he sends a delegation and asks conditions of

1645
01:32:31,254 --> 01:32:33,047
peace. So likewise,

1646
01:32:33,839 --> 01:32:35,591
whoever of you does not forsake

1647
01:32:35,675 --> 01:32:40,304
all that he has, cannot be my disciple. Salt is

1648
01:32:40,304 --> 01:32:43,391
good, but if the salt has lost its flavor,

1649
01:32:44,141 --> 01:32:47,311
how shall it be seasoned? It is neither fit for

1650
01:32:47,311 --> 01:32:48,854
the land nor for the dunghill, 

1651
01:32:48,854 --> 01:32:51,190
 but men throw it out.

1652
01:32:52,149 --> 01:32:58,447
He who has ears to hear, let him hear.'" Those are

1653
01:32:58,447 --> 01:33:06,289
verses that help me to rather set my face like

1654
01:33:06,289 --> 01:33:13,087
flint and make a move. And I would say, my wife

1655
01:33:13,087 --> 01:33:14,547
isn't next to me at the moment, but she's

1656
01:33:14,588 --> 01:33:17,675
supportively sitting just out of shot from the

1657
01:33:17,675 --> 01:33:24,432
camera. It wasn't easy making the move to come

1658
01:33:24,432 --> 01:33:31,814
away from the Anglican Church. It was a sweet

1659
01:33:31,814 --> 01:33:34,275
setup we had. We had a home. It was our home.

1660
01:33:35,151 --> 01:33:39,113
We had a beautiful Georgian house that we lived

1661
01:33:39,113 --> 01:33:42,325
in. We had a field and we had

1662
01:33:43,284 --> 01:33:44,785
sheep on that field and the

1663
01:33:44,785 --> 01:33:47,121
children would help me tend their hooves.

1664
01:33:49,707 --> 01:33:58,966
We had a life... that was a stressful life, but it

1665
01:33:58,966 --> 01:34:00,426
was a position in society.

1666
01:34:01,761 --> 01:34:07,892
There's a certain pride in it still. You went

1667
01:34:07,892 --> 01:34:09,018
through a lot of giving up,

1668
01:34:09,060 --> 01:34:13,481
a lot of grieving even of things that you had to

1669
01:34:13,481 --> 01:34:17,151
leave behind. It would be easy to package a story

1670
01:34:17,151 --> 01:34:19,153
like this where, "Oh, everything's wonderful

1671
01:34:19,153 --> 01:34:22,656
now. We came through that

1672
01:34:22,656 --> 01:34:24,825
and we landed it where we

1673
01:34:24,825 --> 01:34:28,287
need to be." That's not the full story. Another

1674
01:34:28,287 --> 01:34:31,540
thing is that you may have come from quite

1675
01:34:31,540 --> 01:34:34,293
a pronounced or prominent worldly position and

1676
01:34:34,293 --> 01:34:38,005
coming into an Anabaptist church. You might think

1677
01:34:38,047 --> 01:34:40,841
that you have all the answers and you're the

1678
01:34:40,841 --> 01:34:42,551
bees' knees. You are the

1679
01:34:42,551 --> 01:34:43,594
one who can actually solve

1680
01:34:43,594 --> 01:34:47,390
some of their problems. Maybe they should put you

1681
01:34:47,390 --> 01:34:48,849
in a position of leadership because you've just

1682
01:34:48,849 --> 01:34:52,061
come from a position of leadership, but don't

1683
01:34:52,061 --> 01:34:54,814
think that way. You need to humble yourself

1684
01:34:55,773 --> 01:35:02,655
and learn from them. Just take

1685
01:35:02,655 --> 01:35:07,701
time to find your true position and to

1686
01:35:10,746 --> 01:35:13,874
not rush into a situation, but to humble yourself

1687
01:35:13,874 --> 01:35:18,629
under the brotherhood and not think that you have

1688
01:35:18,671 --> 01:35:23,884
all the answers because when you realize there

1689
01:35:23,884 --> 01:35:27,179
have been a fair number of splits in the

1690
01:35:27,388 --> 01:35:29,932
Anabaptist movements and painful things like

1691
01:35:29,932 --> 01:35:32,393
that, and whilst that's a

1692
01:35:32,393 --> 01:35:34,395
weakness, it's also a strength

1693
01:35:35,354 --> 01:35:39,984
because it has allowed a continuation of the

1694
01:35:39,984 --> 01:35:44,280
original dream of the Anabaptists

1695
01:35:44,822 --> 01:35:50,202
from the time of the radical Reformation. You've

1696
01:35:50,202 --> 01:35:52,121
given us a lot to think about in this

1697
01:35:52,121 --> 01:35:54,123
episode and I think that the piece that sticks

1698
01:35:54,123 --> 01:35:57,793
with me is I was born into the Anabaptist

1699
01:35:59,378 --> 01:36:04,633
churches and that's what I know. It's easy to

1700
01:36:04,633 --> 01:36:06,760
just be okay. That's just kind of what we have.

1701
01:36:06,760 --> 01:36:09,305
You take it for granted, I suppose. For someone

1702
01:36:09,305 --> 01:36:11,432
like yourself who had to go through a much

1703
01:36:12,183 --> 01:36:16,520
longer process, a pretty difficult process, you

1704
01:36:16,520 --> 01:36:19,565
bring a perspective for people like me

1705
01:36:19,690 --> 01:36:22,985
that I think we really need to hear. There is

1706
01:36:22,985 --> 01:36:24,487
value here and don't just quickly,

1707
01:36:24,987 --> 01:36:26,655
as you were saying earlier, don't just quickly

1708
01:36:26,655 --> 01:36:29,909
jump ship and "Ah, we're just kind of done with that."

1709
01:36:30,951 --> 01:36:33,120
I think that that's a really valuable piece that

1710
01:36:33,120 --> 01:36:33,913
we need to keep in mind.

1711
01:36:34,455 --> 01:36:34,663
Yeah.

1712
01:36:35,122 --> 01:36:37,875
Well, Hew, thank you so much for being willing

1713
01:36:37,875 --> 01:36:39,126
to share your story with us today.

1714
01:36:39,168 --> 01:36:41,712
Mm-hmm. Thank you for listening. I hope it's a

1715
01:36:41,712 --> 01:36:43,214
help to someone out there.

1716
01:36:43,464 --> 01:36:44,882
God bless you for listening.

1717
01:36:45,674 --> 01:36:47,760
And I just want to say too, we have a lot of

1718
01:36:47,760 --> 01:36:51,347
listeners, at least over the years, from the UK.

1719
01:36:51,722 --> 01:36:53,307
So hopefully if some of those are listening to

1720
01:36:53,307 --> 01:36:55,059
this, maybe we'll reach out and we can find some

1721
01:36:55,059 --> 01:36:58,687
more people there that have these questions. It

1722
01:36:58,687 --> 01:37:00,147
is possible, you've shown that it is,

1723
01:37:00,648 --> 01:37:02,775
to walk this path. So yeah,

1724
01:37:02,775 --> 01:37:04,151
thank you again for sharing today.

1725
01:37:04,485 --> 01:37:06,987
It's been quite

1726
01:37:06,987 --> 01:37:10,282
soul-searching, but quite cathartic too.

1727
01:37:13,118 --> 01:37:15,287
Yeah. Wow. Well, thanks again.

1728
01:37:15,287 --> 01:37:16,080
Well, thank you very much

1729
01:37:16,080 --> 01:37:17,414
for listening. Thank you.

1730
01:37:18,707 --> 01:37:20,793
Thanks for listening to this episode with Hew.

1731
01:37:21,252 --> 01:37:22,836
If you found this interesting, you should check

1732
01:37:22,836 --> 01:37:25,422
out this episode we did with David Bercot, where

1733
01:37:25,422 --> 01:37:27,591
he describes how he used to be an Anglican priest

1734
01:37:27,675 --> 01:37:30,177
and then explains why he left. And you can find

1735
01:37:30,177 --> 01:37:32,513
that linked in the description down below.

1736
01:37:32,721 --> 01:37:35,099
We also have a whole separate second YouTube

1737
01:37:35,099 --> 01:37:37,768
channel and podcast called Developing As A

1738
01:37:37,768 --> 01:37:40,104
Servant, which is a class that Frank Reed taught

1739
01:37:40,104 --> 01:37:43,315
at SMBI back in 2014. All of that is freely

1740
01:37:43,315 --> 01:37:45,442
available as a podcast and on that YouTube

1741
01:37:45,442 --> 01:37:47,236
channel, which again, you can find in the

1742
01:37:47,236 --> 01:37:49,863
description down below. Thanks again for

1743
01:37:49,863 --> 01:37:51,031
listening and we'll catch

1744
01:37:51,031 --> 01:37:52,032
you in the next episode.