MISTS AND MELLOW FRUITFULNESS

O, GIVE ME A HOME…

We have a Harrow Road Ministers’ Fraternal, which basically means that a bunch of us meet for lunch every six weeks or so, and arrange an ecumenical service for Good Friday (the one that attracted a noise complaint this year) and another for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (which is at the end of January). The make-up of the group is quite fluid, because it’s not as though we live in an area with clear boundaries; essentially it’s the northern half of the Anglican Deanery of Paddington (the ancient parish and former London borough of Paddington). Except that the two furthest parishes, St John’s, Kensal Green, in the west, and St Augustine’s, Kilburn Park, in the north, are not usually part of it, because they do ecumenical things with nearer neighbours in other boroughs (Kensal Town, in Kensington, and Kilburn, in Camden or Brent).

The choice of ecumenical partners is also a bit eccentric: at the heart of it is the Methodist Church in Fernhead Road (which we might call West Kilburn), whose former church is now the Maida Vale public library (in Shirland Road), which gives them a sort of sense of ownership of the whole area (and there isn’t another Methodist church for some distance). The other major partner is Our Lady of Lourdes and St Vincent de Paul, the Roman Catholic bunker on the Harrow Road, just across from Maida Hill Market, but the peculiarity there is that they are never actually represented by the parish priest; the ministers’ fraternal is attended by a Catholic layperson. We don’t include West Kilburn Baptist Chapel (a traditional-looking building on Carlton Vale, who would surely look towards Kilburn if they felt like being ecumenical) or the independent chapel on Kilburn Lane. My neighbours at Westbourne Park Baptist Church are felt to be out of the area (south of the railway) and their focus is definitely different from ours. Nor do we include my Roman Catholic neighbours on the Warwick Estate, Our Lady of Sorrows, but I’m not sure that Fr Sharbel, its Maronite priest, would find much need to work with us. We all (I think) have tenant churches who use our buildings, and we periodically talk about inviting them to things, but we all know that they wouldn't come to the Fraternal because they're all doing normal jobs as well as ministering to their congregations. We used to include the Queen’s Park United Reformed Church, in its modern building on the Harrow Road corner of Third Avenue, but sadly they have closed down; we didn’t get a chance to explore this with their last minister, who came and went quite quickly. 

So the Fraternal met the other day, at the Manse (for the very first time). The old Methodist minister, Alan, always entertained us in a room at the church, which felt very characteristic of its type, with formica surfaces and mismatched chairs, but Paul, the new man, invited us to his house.  Now the Manse is not adjacent to the Methodist church, oh no. The Manse is in Queen’s Park, but not “our” Queen’s Park, the Westminster ward of that name, basically comprising what people call “The Avenues”, the Artisans’, Labourers’ and General Dwellings Company estate of 1875-81, which is a planned estate of little gothic artisans’ cottages most of which are still social housing, and which is somewhat oddly in the W10 postcode. No, the Manse is in Queen’s Park NW6, north of the West Coast Main Line, and facing onto Queen’s Park, the Corporation of the City of London’s thirty-acre park dating from 1887. To avoid confusion, I call that Brondesbury, but estate agents insist on Queen’s Park. Anyway, Paul’s manse is a very fine late Victorian villa, beautifully presented (as the estate agents say), and he told us that he has a high court judge as a neighbour, and that the house next door went for £5.5 million the other week. The parakeets were screaming in the park. I had a sense of how the other half lives. That must actually be a bit of a challenge for Paul, who is a good guy, and thoroughly grounded. It is a charming house, but I can’t help feeling more comfortable here on the Warwick Estate.

ALL CHANGE

 The Indian restaurant across the road from St Peter’s has had a makeover, and has clearly changed hands. Opening offers are advertised. It used to be the Maida Vale Tandoori, but no longer. I saw people up ladders taking down the big white letters that proclaimed that name, and repainting the fascia board (curiously almost the same colour). I wondered what the new name would be; four letters were re-erected (almost straight) reading “Mala”. It’s a Bengali first name, but presumably means something as well, I know not what. But it rather appears that they looked at the array of letters, Scrabble-like, and made something out of what they had.

Curiously the little café in the same block has morphed, almost unnoticed, into a tiny convenience store. Perhaps its reputation will improve. William Hill shows no shadow of alteration.

FAREWELL TO ZEITA

On the last day before the half-term break we said farewell at St Mary Magdalene’s School to the remarkable Zeita, who has been working there, in various different roles, for thirty-seven years. Five years ago the Bishop of London came and dedicated a newly set-out garden at the school as “Zeita’s Garden”, and we all sort of assumed she would soon retire, but she didn’t, because she just loves the children. She has been working in the Nursery for the past few years, where her palpable faith and good nature have been invaluable in giving the children an impression of what a Christian life is meant to be about. That’s real Christian education.  Often in recent years I would see Zeita’s husband, Jody, dropping her off, having driven her over from Barking! For the farewell assembly Jody and other family members came to share the occasion, and everyone sang “The Irish Rover”. It was all terribly emotional. I took family members out to see Zeita’s Garden, and as we crossed the playground we smelt the distinctive scent of weed, presumably drifting down from the flats, but who knows? It certainly didn’t come from the garden, but it is indicative of the environment Zeita has worked in for so long. That sort of quiet devotion to the community is something you don’t see very often.