installed!

Headed across the road to Chelmsford Cathedral on Monday afternoon to be installed as a Canon of Chelmsford Cathedral by the Dean Peter Judd. I was collated by the retiring Bishop of Chelmsford a few weeks ago and this was the second part of the ceremony. The installation took place during Evening Prayer and I was delighted that family, friends, other Canons and colleagues were able to come along.

My canon stall is St Mellitus and the cushion shows Mellitus putting out a fire threatening Canterbury. Legend has it that he put the fire out by the power of prayer but the cushion shows him chucking a bucket of water over it; difficult to represent prayer pictorially I guess. I'm very pleased to have this particular stall as a member of the faculty of St Mellitus College. It was all very relaxed and we enjoyed a glass of wine in the Cathedral after the service before heading back to the Diocesan Office for some more refreshments.

Some of the College of Canons: Gordon Tarry, Dean Peter Judd, Philip Ritchie, Elwin Cockett (Archdeacon of West Ham) and Roger Matthews.

The best comment of the day came from my two children who wanted to know why all the Canons were in Gryffindor House and when we got our wands; they seem to be under the impression that the Cathedral is another version of Hogwarts!

Many thanks to Jonathan Evens who has posted about the service on his blog Between.