LORD MAYOR AT A CIVIC RECEPTION TO WELCOME DELEGATES TO THE 13TH MEETING OF THE ANGLICAN CONSULTATIVE COUNCIL ON JUNE 26TH 2005
Welcome to The Council House.
I trust you are enjoying your stay in Nottingham.
Nottingham - home to a most famous “man of the cloth”.
Friar Tuck.
I searched the web to see if any of his sayings and deeds might be pertinent today.
A search reported 66,000 entries of his name.
But none of his theology.
So I regret,
I can report no fresh angle on the issues,
sometimes challenging,
many of which are attracting media coverage,
that you are considering at your Council.
And what a colourful start to the conference –
walking down to St.Peter’s church.
It was wonderful to see the delegates
from across the world,
walking through our streets in national dress
and carrying banners,
with the common purpose of worshipping the one God who created all that is.
Today you worshipped at St.Mary’s, a church which is very important to the history of Nottingham.
And Nottingham has contributed to the history of churches.
Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, the author of Book of Common Prayer, was born and bred in nearby Aslockton.
The great missionary Baptist,
a cobbler,
William Carey,
preached a famous sermon here in Nottingham -
“Expect great things from God,
Attempt great things for God.”
Nottingham is the home of William Booth,
baptised in St.Mary’s church,
founder of the Salvation Army.
Only this week,
we mourned a former City Councillor and Lord Mayor,
Vernon Gapper,
life-long Salvationist,
who was “promoted the glory” 2 weeks ago.
The venerable Mary Potter,
was the founder of the Little Company of Mary,
a nursing order of nuns,
who ministered to the sick and needy;
this order now serves various countries throughout the world.
The relationship between the churches,
and indeed all the faith communities in Nottingham,
represented by our Inter Faith Council,
and their contribution to the life of the City
is something of great importance
to me personally
and to many of my colleagues.
And we seek their help and guidance
when we face challenges of modern age.
Our response to these challenges
is called “Respect for Nottingham”.
Recognizing that in tackling our problems,
yes, we want to provide more public services,
but we also want a values-based approach
to reduce that scale of the challenge we face.
Our city slogan is “virtue lives on beyond death”;
a plain English equivalent would be “Be Good”,
a famous saying of our passed Freeman, Brian Clough.
The church plays a very positive role
in drawing our diverse people together,
and helping us all
to find a common vision for our diverse community.
This year
St Peter's Church has collaborated closely with the City Council
in promoting an Arts Festival entitled
'Celebrating One City, One World'.
That is what we wish to achieve here in Nottingham
– a celebration of the richness of our diversity,
and through celebrating together,
discovering and promoting
a common vision for our community life.
Your Grace,
I have no doubt that this lies at the heart of your conference too.
Holding people together
and building that common vision for humanity,
is perhaps the hardest challenge there is.
But for those of us who are people of faith,
we can trust in the One who will lead us into all truth.
The City of Nottingham is delighted
that you chose to come here
for this very important conference,
and we all join together
in wishing you a successful conclusion,
and when the time comes,
safe journeys back to your homes and loved ones.
And please be assured that you will always be welcome back.
Thank you.
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