St Joseph's Society
I arrived into Higher Line in 1963 to do “Pots” and “Rhets” before entering the Senior House. I had spent the previous five years at Underley Hall, the then Lancaster junior seminary, so not everything about institutional living was new.
For reasons I cannot now remember we used to stand in line and in silence along the Lower Line corridor before going into lunch. My position in the line was frequently opposite a painting called “The translation of St Cuthbert at Lytham”, depicting the saint’s remains being carried aloft over sand-dunes by fellow monks. Seemingly his remains spent over fifty years in such “translations” through the northern counties of England and the Scottish borders. All this journeying was to protect him from becoming treasure trove for marauding Vikings.
I was reminded of this on a visit to Lindisfarne where I saw the striking life-sized carving of six be-cowled monks starting out on this enterprise with Cuthbert’s coffin resolutely loaded onto their shoulders. I’ve also seen the bronze copy of it in Durham city centre; although I’ve since heard that it might have to be moved to protect it from marauding late-night revellers.
I sometimes wonder whether, like its namesake, the painting itself was ever transported to the North East – Cuthbert’s own part of the world, after all, - as part of Upholland’s own translation to Ushaw. Not that, as things have turned out, it would have found any more of a secure home there, I suppose.
My own life’s journeying took me to Lytham also for two periods in my life. In the mid-eighties I was granted leave of absence from active ministry and landed up on the shores of Lytham (well, St Annes actually, - but a mile or two would have meant nothing to Cuthbert!) Of course, it was a time of translation for me too and I walked many a mile along those same sands wrestling with an uncertain future. At the time I worked with people with learning disabilities who were making their own journey from long-stay hospitals, (i.e. large buildings, set in extensive grounds usually out in the country. Hmm!), to a very different kind of life within the community. But I am not now really sure who was actually supporting whom at the time!
Years later, after laicisation, I worked for the Housing Department of the Church of England Pensions Board. My role was to visit and monitor standards in eight retirement complexes for clergy, their widows and other church workers. These were situated throughout England and so I was constantly on the move. One was at Lytham, just down the road from St Peter’s where Frank Flynn was the parish priest. The local parish church is dedicated to St Cuthbert himself…and I knew why of course, having so often stood and silently contemplated (rumbling stomach notwithstanding) the saint’s translation there!
It strikes me now that one of the gifts of those years was an ability to feel “at home” wherever life subsequently carried me. I feel genuinely grateful that Upholland became my home for those eight years, as did Lytham in its turn, and all the other stops on the journey so far, - probably almost as many as Cuthbert’s own.
Many people, especially as they grow older, seem to dread the thought of having to move into residential care; now, whatever my own worries are about the future, this is certainly not one of them! It might never happen of course, but even to be free of the anxiety about such an event is blessing indeed!