The Anglican Church of All Saints

It is with pleasure that we welcome the Revd Rachel Ganney to All Saints Tenerife.  Rachel will be working with me and our team, and joining us as an Assistant Priest in order to continue to develop her ministry.

I am delighted to be welcoming Rachel to our church as she moves from Tenerife South where she will be greatly missed.

With Blessings
Fr. Ron Corne
Chaplain

Dear Friends,

I have mentioned that I have a certain amount of Scottish, Welsh and Irish blood in my veins, which I think is why I am quite attracted to the Celtic Christianity of the those shores. The damp, the winds, the rain and the harsh crashing of the seas can be invigorating and inspiring. Even the heat of the desert has its place in Celtic spirituality. It was born in those rugged and wild places and developed in the early fifth century during the development of the monastic tradition. Many of these practices have roots in desert spirituality; Celtic monks considered the teachings of the desert fathers essential wisdom. Celtic Christianity can be characterized by a strongly incarnational theology: The natural world, in particular, reveals the sacramentality of all creation. Hence when I see the peregrine falcons dipping to and throw in the sky I am aware of the Holy Spirit which blows where it will and sustains us as the birds are sustained in flight. Therefore Matter is infused with the divine presence and offers glimpses of the world behind the surface of things. This spirituality celebrates the human imagination, cultivating creativity through various art forms such as manuscript illumination and vibrant metalwork. The Winchester Bible is full of gorgeous illumination held in Winchester Cathedral; although medieval it has flamboyant illuminations one is the Morgan Leaf, and fantastic would be an understatement.

As I walk my dog and look at the surface of water, I am aware that there is a surface a threshold which must be broken to enter the world of the water. The Celts referred to thresholds. Thresholds are the spaces between when we move from one time to another, as in the threshold of dawn to day or dusk to dark; from one space to another, as in times of pilgrimage or in moving from secular to sacred space; and from one awareness to another, as in times when old structures start to fall away and we begin to envision something new. This surely is happening after the pandemic that has inflicted us all. The Celtic peoples had a love of edges and boundary places, most likely as the result of living on an island, but they also held a keen sense of the Otherworld as a place just beneath the veil of this one.
Celtic Christian monks were also drawn to edge places, inspired by those who fled to the desert. Indeed in daily life becoming aware each time you cross a threshold. This might be across a doorway, in moving from one activity to another, or the thresholds of the day, especially at dawn and dusk. Pause at each of these and offer a short prayer of gratitude. As the Lord says, Thus says the Lord: Stand at the crossroads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way lies; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls —Jeremiah 6:16.

As we prepare to enter our Church of All Saints in Tenerife after a long absence, remember we are entering a Holy Place and a Holy Space. But remember spiritually it is cleansed and a consecrated place and space to the Lord. It is a place where our ancestors of the 1880’s had a dream and built a place of worship and fellowship, a thin place, which exists between heaven and earth and rejoice that you are soon to enter it again.

Fr. Ron Corne
Chaplain.