Pentecost

As we celebrate the Church’s birthday today, I thought we might consider the birthday of our parish or, at least, the rebirth of our parish after the Reformation. Let’s go back in time to Harrogate in 1842 - the year the Royal Pump Room first opened its doors, a temple to nourish the bodies of the genteel members of British society drawn to the healing waters.

In this flourishing spa town, a quiet but profound vision was stirring that year in the form of a proposal to raise a new Catholic chapel, the first in Harrogate since the reformation, a temple to nourish the souls of the growing Catholic flock. The chapel would stand near the Brunswick Hotel - now known as the Prince of Wales Mansions - at the crest of West Park. The intention that it be served by itinerant priests rather than act as a stand alone parish.

Not all were enamoured by the idea. The Vicar of Low Harrogate rose in vehement opposition using fiery rhetoric to warn the townsfolk against what he called “the blasphemous doctrines of the Church of Rome,” so casting a long and fatal shadow on those fledgling plans. This was only thirteen years after the Catholic Emancipation Act which ended many of the discriminatory penal laws against Catholics in place for centuries. Still, feelings against what was seen as a Church with a foreign influence still ran high in places.

Though it was undoubtedly the Holy Spirit who had breathed life into the proposal, the time was clearly not right. The chapel would not rise - at least, not then and not there. The seed was sown, but the soil needed time to soften. Regular Masses had not been celebrated in Harrogate since Henry VIII’s time and the downfall of a chantry chapel that stood at St John’s well at the beginning of the Wetherby Road, now that ancient little sewing shop on the left as you leave the roundabout. The monks there served the people of what would then have been a sleepy little hamlet sitting in the shadow of its larger and more ancient neighbour, Knaresborough.

Let’s journey forward nineteen years, to the 26th of May, 1861. To the Crescent Hotel in the centre of town, where in a modest rented room, Canon Chadwick had begun to celebrate a regular Sunday Mass. He was the chaplain at Allerton Park and would soon be President of the seminary at Ushaw near Durham, my alma mater, going on to become Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle but in that summer of 1861 that future bishop was instrumental in forging the roots of what would become our parish. I remember as a young seminarian Bishop Chadwick’s portrait frowning down at us outside the refectory as we waited for meals, little knowing the connection with him that would come later in life.

Canon Chadwick’s inaugural Masses were attended by around ninety people – the congregation swelling in the summer months with visitors as ours does here. In that simple hotel, a “pop-up parish” was born, offering solace and sacrament not only to the townspeople and those seasonal travellers, but to the navvies who were toiling away building the railway station that would be opened the following year.

The altar in that makeshift chapel was underwhelming – it was a very simple wooden table, this one here on the sanctuary, left to the parish by the Atkinson family many decades ago.

We can only imagine the soundscape of those days as people gathered around this table - the echo of ancient hymns, the murmur of Latin weaving mystery and majesty through the incense and the liturgy of the old rite. A congregation gathered not by grandeur as in the salons of Harrogate, but drawn together from all walks of life by the simple grace of God.

Surely the Holy Spirit was at work because, within a year, that humble room at the Crescent Hotel could no longer contain the growing flock - our ancestors in faith. A larger space was needed, and found in the Somerset Hotel at the top of Parliament Street - where today The Ivy welcomes diners, a few steps down from Betty’s famous tearooms.

But the Holy Spirit was not content with rented rooms. An attempt to buy the old congregational chapel on James Street fell through but, soon, under the guidance of Fr Goldie, more permanent roots began to be laid here in Robert Street. A school where young minds could be formed was the first building to appear. Now Beverley House on the corner with Station Parade the school also doubled as a chapel. The presbytery was built next.

And then it would fall to Fr James Glover, in 1871, to take on the mighty task of raising the church itself. When the estimates arrived - £3,431 – Fr Glover nearly had a heart attack. The burden of debt would linger for decades, not fully lifted until 1930 when, at last, this church could be consecrated according to custom.

Fr Glover may have hesitated. The cost was immense. The challenge, daunting. But the Holy Spirit was insistent. Grace would not be denied. The third person of the Blessed Trinity had plans far more important than any ledger of cost.

We can imagine the same Holy Spirit descending once more - this time not onto the tousled heads of a bunch of despairing disciples gathered in an upper room on a warm middle eastern night as on the first Pentecost, but into this stone and timber building as on the 5th of June, 1873 this new church was opened with great joy by Bishop Cornthwaite, the day also graced by the presence of a towering figure of the Victorian Catholic revival, a convert with fire in his voice and faith in his bones. Archbishop Henry Manning of Westminster, a man soon to wear the red of a Cardinal, the man who would consecrate Canon Chadwick of the Crescent Hotel as bishop of Newcastle. Manning would have knelt here in this sanctuary, watching as a new era for the Catholics of Harrogate began.

So, at last, those Victorian predecessors of ours, after a long pilgrimage in search of shelter, had found a spiritual home - no longer gathering in borrowed halls, but in a house of God built with hope, sacrifice, and unshakable belief.

Sixteen years later, in 1889 the bishop was to send a convert clergyman to St Robert’s. Canon William Pope, a disciple of St John Henry Newman. He stayed here until he died in the presbytery in 1895 but, in those few short years, Canon Pope wasted no time. He initiated the forerunner of our present St Robert’s school, building it in what is now the car park. Many of our parishioners today have shared their memories of starting their school life there. Canon Pope also invited the Sisters of the Holy Child Jesus to establish their convent, now the site of St John Fisher’s School. He who did so much to build up this parish before being buried in Grove Road cemetery in a great Victorian scene of mourning. Canon Pope left his chalice to St Robert’s - it sits on the old altar table there as part of our history and will be used to consecrate the wine during this Mass.

Years passed, debts were slowly cleared - and then, on the 10th of May, 1930, this church was solemnly consecrated. Bishop Cowgill anointed the altar with fragrant holy oil, the chrism with which Samuel anointed David as king. The Bishop traced the walls with that same sacred chrism, now marked by those candle sconces - a sign that this was no longer just a building, but a consecrated space, alive with the breath of the Holy Spirit and sanctified for all generations to come including ours.

St Joseph’s and St Aelred’s were both established from St Robert’s in 1925 and 1929 respectively, a sign of how significantly the Catholic congregation of Harrogate had grown since those early days gathered around this table in the Crescent Hotel. How busy the Holy Spirit had been.

Since then, He has empowered and inspired priests and people alike in this place, filling hearts and souls at baptism and confirmation, bringing healing in the confessional and solace in prayer. He has inspired converts to come to Christ in this Church, men and women, like Canon Pope and, indeed, Cardinal Manning, who have realigned their spiritual path with that of the Church founded upon the apostle Peter. 

Seven of the eight young men who were received into the Church at Easter gathered for dinner with their catechists in the presbytery on Tuesday evening and the Holy Spirit was tangible as conversations flowed and newfound faith was explored and shared. So too a week before when the candidates to be confirmed at Masses this weekend gathered around the same table in a sometimes emotional and very powerful time of grace. Those four adults and the men who were received into the Church at Easter being part of a startling turnaround, a movement towards the Lord, reversing the trend of the last few years.

As we pray for those to be confirmed and for our newest members, we also remember our wider Church community – those who carry the torch of faith in this part of the world today. On this feast of the Holy Spirit we give thanks for His presence in our lives, for His gifts of wisdom and understanding, counsel and fortitude, knowledge, piety and fear of the Lord, gifts about to be called down upon those to be confirmed.

It is not in stone or stained glass that the Holy Spirit truly dwells, however - beautiful and sacred though these may be. The Spirit’s true dwelling place is deeper still: within our hearts, around the quiet chambers of our lives.

This church, this house of God, matters deeply. It is the sacred stage upon which our faith unfolds - the place where we gather, where sacraments shape our journey: from the waters of baptism to the prayers of requiem. Here, we share the bread of the Eucharist, we witness vows, we grieve, we rejoice and we pray.

But still, the Spirit is not confined to these arches and aisles. The building is a sign - a powerful and visible expression of our shared belief - but it is in our living that the Spirit truly breathes. In kindness offered. In truth spoken. In mercy shown and in courage found.

This is the great mystery and message of Pentecost: that the fire of heaven which came down upon those apostles, descends not upon temples made by hands, but upon hearts ready to burn with love. That the life of the Spirit is not only celebrated here - but carried outward, lived boldly, and spoken in every tongue of compassion, justice, and peace.

And, in a sense, the authenticity of our faith relies upon our ability to make that vital connection between our own faith community here in St Robert’s, with all its history, and link it with that community of apostles in first century Palestine, huddled together in the upper room fearful for a future without Christ. 

To recognise that it is the same Holy Spirit who inspires us all in faith. Who has guided the Church through the centuries and takes us forward, like those apostles, into an unknown future, in worrying global times when, it seems that only God can take us down the paths to peace and reconciliation, only God can inspire good will in all people, only God can unfreeze the hearts of those ‘so called’ leaders who are intent on violence and destruction and those leaders who fail to live up to the dignity to which they are called. Only God can bring real hope to those who are suffering the effects of war and conflict in our world today. We pray for them.

And we pray, today, for our candidates as they are confirmed this weekend. That, as the Holy Spirit inspired the people of this town over those may generations, may fill their hearts and confirm them as they wend their way on their own journey of discovery, we pray He will also continue to guide this community of faith, this parish of Our Lady Immaculate and St Robert, that the fervour and the faith of those Victorian priests and people and those who have worshipped here since may continue to drive us forwards as a community based on love, welcoming back those who have strayed from the fold and providing a spiritual home for all, including those who seek to join us and the worldwide Catholic Church. And so, we pray together…

Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created. And You shall renew the face of the earth. 

O, God, who by the light of the Holy Spirit, did instruct the hearts of the faithful, grant that by the same Holy Spirit we may be truly wise and ever rejoice in His consolation, through Christ Our Lord. Amen.