good morning on this holiday saturday and welcome to the dinery garden at canterbury cathedral welcome wherever you are in the world i'm sitting here this morning in front of this huge magnolia solangiana the last of the historic magnolias to come into bloom and many of its buds are still waiting to come this is a day of quietness and also of deep grief for the friends of jesus but we ourselves are feeling grief because i've spoken about wendy white thompson whom with her husband ian planted these great trees magnolias in 1967 part of the historic pickard collection and i've said also that she was very ill we've been able to spend some time with her and with members of her family in holy week and she died yesterday on good friday and we feel that we've lost a very very dear friend not only of the two of us and support in all kinds of ways but also someone who held the vision of this place as a place of hospitality and also joy during her and her husband's years living in this scenery between 1963 and 1976. her own house at the village of y which is only about 20 minutes drive away from here on the ashford road but deep in the countryside was the same kind of house of hospitality and together with the children as they were when they lived here and enjoyed this place in no particular order we think of lucy and morwenna and stephen and john and their families this morning but gathering with them recreated something of the atmosphere which caused this house during their years to be called the wendy house i don't know if in the parts of the world where you are you use that word for a toy house which is used by children to enjoy themselves in and people felt that that wendy created with ian that sense of joy and hospitality here i'll speak a little bit more about that in our reflection for its suits this day but perhaps ringing in both fletcher in my ears from the last prayers we said with her looking out onto the huge magnolia which is actually in flower outside the big bay window of her bedroom uh in y uh she when we finished our prayers she said quietly what a lovely time of year to die and those those faithful words are in our hearts this morning as we stand beside the disciples of jesus and all those who loved him in this day of grief oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise let your ways be known upon us your saving power among the nations blessed are you lord god of our salvation to you be praise and glory forever as a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief your only son was lifted up that he might draw the whole world to himself may we walk this day in the way of the cross and always be ready to share its weight declaring your love for all the world blessed be god father son and holy spirit blessed be god forever the night has passed and the day lies open before us let us pray with one heart and mind and as we rejoice in the gift of this new day so may the light of your presence o god set our hearts on fire with love for you now and forever amen our psalm on this third morning of the month is psalm 16 preserve me o god for in you have i taken refuge i have said to the lord you are my lord all my good depends on you all my delight is upon the godly that are in the land upon those who are noble in heart and though the idols are legion that many run after their drink offerings of blood i will not offer neither make mention of their names upon my lips for the lord himself is my portion and my cup in your hands alone is my fortune my share has fallen in a fair land indeed i have a goodly heritage i will bless the lord who has given me counsel and in the night watches he instructs my heart i have set the lord always before me he is at my right hand i shall not fall wherefore my heart is glad and my spirit rejoices my flesh also shall rest secure for you will not abandon my soul to death nor suffer your faithful one to see the pit you will show me the path of life in your presence is the fullness of joy and in your right hand are pleasures forevermore our reading on this easter eve this day of quietness which was a sabbath for the disciples and friends of jesus the day following his crucifixion our reading comes from the gospel of saint matthew and it's chapter 27 i'm beginning to read at verse 57 and the first few verses are speaking about yesterday evening and then we changed to today this sabbath day for disciples and friends of jesus at that time when it was evening there came a rich man from arimathea named joseph who also was a disciple of jesus he went to pilate and asked for the body of jesus then pilate ordered it to be given to him and joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen shroud and laid it in his own new tomb which he had cut in the rock and he rolled a great stone to the entrance of the tomb and went away mary magdalene and the other mary were there sitting opposite the tomb the next day that is after the day of preparation the chief priests and pharisees gathered before pilate and said sir we remember how that impostor said while he was stood alive after three days i will rise therefore order the tomb to be made secure until the third day lest his disciples go and steal him away and tell the people he has risen from the dead and the last fraud will be worse than the first pilot said to them you have a guard of soldiers go make it as secure as you can so they went and made the tomb secure by sealing the stone and setting a guard there is an atmosphere not only of grief but also of shame amongst some of them and i'm thinking of peter who was afraid to own his lord and the other disciples who ran from the garden leaving jesus alone but also of fear and in the accounts that we shall read today and tomorrow and through easter week often the scene is set in an upper room the upper room with locked doors of fear this day is almost a silent day we shall say quietly in the cathedral matins just in a few um hours time and then apart from that nothing will happen here until even song which still will have the atmosphere of this day and after that we shall wait until the proclamation of easter itself which comes in the dark hours and a different atmosphere is proclaimed but for today let's remember this atmosphere remember those who are really not knowing at all what to make of everything that has happened everything that will happen and there is a sense of the deepest grief amongst them human grief can be one of the most creative times for from the depths of sorrow and realization of that and pondering on that sorrow can come many wonderful gifts this is a day when we remember this april the 3rd the death of johannes brahms the great german composer and i want to reference just three of his works we could reference so many for his creativity knew no bounds and in so many way he ways he he bridged traditions and created beautiful music but he also plumbed the depths of grief and also made of that something that reached out for that which was beyond our humanity and entered into infinite realms at the death of his mother he wrote his german requiem which is one of the great choral works performed so many times in this cathedral church there is one piece in that which is regularly sung as part of the repertoire how lovely are thy dwelling lord of hosts but there's another which really rings my heart every time i hear it sung and in german you have non-traurik height the words in english mean you now have sorrow but i shall see you again and your heart shall rejoice and your joy no one shall take from you behold me i have had for a little time toil and torment and now have found consolation i will console you as one is consoled by his mother it's a soprano solo and there are wonderful renditions of that solo by so many great sopranos it never fails to move me but it reaches out in creative grief to that which is beyond and has echoes of the morning in it after the short time of sorrow there are two other works by brahms which have the same effect on me one of them is the alto rhapsody and i played it earlier this morning you can do that now quite easily by putting in brahms alto rhapsody we used to have the record of kathleen ferrier singing that it has the backing also the orchestra and male voice chorus but kathleen ferrier was a voice that my mother who was a contralto singer loved very much and that alto rhapsody in the same way brings grief into creative infinity and reaches out for us in a beautiful way and lastly probably the first piece of brahms i ever knew because i learned to play it on the piano and it was called brahms lullaby vegan lead and that lullaby which so many of you will know guten arpent good nacht let me say it in english and these are the full words of that little lullaby which children learn to play on the piano good evening good night with roses covered with cloves adorned slip under the covers tomorrow morning if god wills you will wake once again good evening good night by angels watched who show you in your dream the christ child's tree sleep now blissfully and sweetly see paradise in your dreams well brahms's music can do that but so many imaginative pieces of creativity can do it too i want to go back to wendy who died yesterday and say that when it was first announced that i was to come here i received a card in my dinner at hereford all those years ago 20 years ago and when i opened it there was a picture of this house which as i say in those in her day was called the wendy house the deanery and it showed in sunny times the front door and the front of the house not this garden side of the house and over it wendy had cut out a little snippet and written on it welcome and stuck that on the card over the door and inside she said this will be your home and you will love it well i had no idea what was uh to come next but the first time i met her was immediately after my installation and we were in the midst of the great festival which happens at our school in most years it couldn't happen last year because of the pandemic and the restrictions imposed but a festival of joy and music and open doors in the precincts and everyone enjoying themselves and meeting old friends and at the great commemoration uh in on the thursday afterwards there was a in so many english ways a tea in the tent and uh i found myself sitting next to someone who introduced herself as wendy white thompson and i said oh you sent me that lovely card and she said yes it feels as though you've been here an age already and held my hand and her creative encouragement to both of us in order to keep this house as a place of great hospitality her creative encouragement over the years has been fantastic she's always been there and her home has always been a place that we've loved to go but it was a home where she kept a household and her companion in those years a lovely lady called ray shared the house with her and for both of them it was always lovely to have hospitality here but also to have hospitality given to us and to so many others but always when we were sitting at a meal and um usually at lunch and sometimes at dinner and i remember two special occasions when this was the case it was uh a question of no doubt who would say grace wendy would say grace as the host of the household bishops might be sitting at the table priests might be there but giving thanks not only for the food but for the hospitality of the house was the one who was the host in the house and whose atmosphere kept that house she was the one who at christmas time uh i think the year before last had cut out a little picture of a a black cat a jet black cat and on a a picture of the crib uh an ancient picture of the crib she had stuck a monkey beside the the ox and the ass and uh sent the card and these little creative snippets caused amusement but also caused us always to know that someone in heart and mind was intuitive with all that we were trying to do to open up this place its gardens its rooms to hospitality for others and to allow people to have that and that we give enormous thanks for and something which will miss but it will be as it continues to be for her children it will be an icon of stewardship and hospitality of what we're given the psalm we said this morning talked about a goodly heritage but at the same time a goodly heritage is nothing if it's not shared so we give it intense thanks for her this morning and how she kept on that atmosphere the other thing she said just after our prayers on wednesday was not only this is a lovely time what a lovely time of year to die but she said ian will say when i get there what took you so long and then a smile came across her all those things we remember on this day of grief and many of us will have other griefs and in so many ways we'll be reminiscing this morning as we go forward another thing that happened on this day i noticed is that in 1933 everest was conquered for the first time not by climbers that had to wait until the early 1950s but in fact at the uh by two little aeroplanes uh two british planes flew for the first time over the summit of the highest place on earth one was flown by the marquis of doug's dale and clydesdale and the other by flight lieutenant david mcintyre how they must have felt as they looked down from the heavens onto that and it reminds you how short of time it is that uh aircraft travel has happened in human history so it gives us chance also to to mention two anniversaries that we weren't able to mention in the last few days because we've been so busy with other things at easter one was a centenary of the royal australian air force on the 31st of march which which became the royal australian air force in 1921 so a complete centenary and you will have perhaps seen in the news that was the day that our queen first made her public appearance outside windsor castle to celebrate that day and then in the year 1918 on the 1st of april as two days ago the royal air force was founded and we give thanks for the long service of the royal air force which was made out of uh different sections for aircraft were at that time very new they were ways in which experiments would be made and now we take them absolutely for granted but we give thanks for that ability to fly above the mountains and to reach out physically for infinity but we give thanks even more so for doing it in heart and mind to traverse the physical bonds with those glimpses of paradise which brahms has given us in his music and the words he chooses to set all occasions by the deep love of his mother and his deep grief into a requiem which he crafted with his own words and it's almost a gift to us in any kind of grief together with the little lullaby to be sung around a child's cradle wishing the child even at that age dreams of paradise let's give thanks for all that on this day of quietness and of waiting and standing beside the disciples and friends of jesus on this holy saturday our prayers this morning uh are particularly for the diocese of bauchi in the church of nigeria in the jos province and come on tiger you come and say hello um and uh we're also in this diocese praying for justin our archbishop for rose bishop of dover and for tim bishop at lambeth and for the ministry of christopher chapman our discipleship and spirituality consultant and so we say our prayers with the special collect for this particular day easter eve grant lord that we who are baptized into the death of your son our savior jesus christ may continually put to death our evil desires and be buried with him and that through the grave and gate of death we may pass to our joyful resurrection through his merits who died and was buried and rose again for us your son jesus christ our lord amen so we say the prayer that our lord taught us and we've been joined for that prayer by tiger this morning in whatever language you like to say it on this day we join together saying the prayer our savior taught us our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom the power and the glory forever and ever are men moment of silence on this quiet day of shall we call it creative grief when we ponder and look on to the way ahead christ crucified draw you to himself to find in him a sure ground for faith a firm support for hope and the assurance of sins forgiven and the blessing of god almighty the father the son and the holy spirit be upon you upon those whom you love and those whom you would pray for today and always are men well now here you are where have you come from chilly day but it's lovely to see you all right