Bishop Richard’s Weekly Video Message and Transcript for 29.10.2026

Hello everyone and welcome to this week’s video.

People sometimes ask me whether I enjoy my job – particularly friends from university who retired years ago! It’s a difficult question to answer in the terms they ask it. Am I happy all the time? Of course not. Am I fulfilled and do I feel I am in the place the Lord has put me for this season of my life? Absolutely! But like any vocation or job there are times of joy and times of difficulty. Well-being is about balancing as best one can the joyful and the draining. I confess between returning from Tanzania and last weekend the draining felt like it was winning. In my case that seemed like a lot of external meetings, House of Bishops, House of Lords and a lot of trips to London. Not nearly enough stuff in the diocese and not enough spiritual stuff as opposed to administrative – which is a necessary part of the role – but, like most people, I don’t enjoy it very much.

Fortunately, the Lord is very gracious. He can provide a happy conjunction of things in the diary which taken together are so energising that they remind you why you heeded the call in the first place. Last weekend was one such. On Saturday I led a quiet day for the first pioneers of the Three Saint’s Fellowship. Throughout the day participants were invited to write some answers anonymously to questions about their spiritual journey over the course of the last year. At the final communion service people took them at random from the basket and read them out. Here are some of the quotes:

“I have loved gathering in person & online, to be challenged, encouraged & inspired by others in my own spiritual growth. In Genesis God says, “It is not good for humans to be alone”. We grow spiritually in Christian community.”

“My sense of Jesus has become more tangible, more reliable. I feel I have been able to locate Him in other people more readily. The sense of fellowship & monastic community has been holding me as I explore being more anchored in my faith”.

“By sharing our own stories of faith and our individual perspectives, I have been connected with that sense of God at work in us & through us.”

Please check out the diocesan website if you’d like to know more.

The second thing was Saturday evening and the Hereford Mysteries at the Cathedral. The production was in part the fruit of bible studies and reflection by the cast, although the final the script was written by James Pacey. James and his wife Rachel directed the production. It sought to tell the entire story of salvation from Genesis to Revelation! No mean ambition, but in the hands of a master dramatist and theologian like James it was an unqualified triumph. The setting, the lighting and sound, David Suchet as the voice of God combined for a memorable dramatic experience. All the cast were fantastic, but I give especial tribute to Ben Ford who played Jesus with a compelling mixture of authority and vulnerability and to Alison Fawcett whose portrayal of the Satan character wove her way through most of the scenes with a mixture of guile and menace. She gave a quite astonishing performance. I was immensely proud of all of them and deeply moved by it. I hope it will be shared more widely. It is an important and significant piece of drama.

Reflecting on my own response, its power lay in what it reminded me of at the end of two weeks that had felt full of minutiae. Here in a dramatic way was a reminder of the big picture of salvation. All of us can get so tied up with the immediate and the pressing that we easily forget that as Christians we are part of the much bigger story that God is telling: a purpose that he is working out through his church. The Hereford mysteries gave an overview of the sheer majesty of the drama and all-encompassing glory of God’s plan of salvation. It invited us to raise our eyes from the ordinary and the everyday. We saw a story that began in a garden and ended in a city; joy to tears to every tear wiped from every eye. It is truly magisterial.

And the final joys, a simple communion service on Sunday morning with the good people of Clungunford in the Middle Marches benefice; and presenting the Order of St. Ethelbert to 26 worthy recipients in the Cathedral in the afternoon. Both reminded us that it is through many simple, persistent acts of service and obedience: God’s people gathering for worship Sunday by Sunday and small gatherings for prayer and study like the Three Saints Fellowship, that the big plan grounds itself in the reality of our everyday lives.

So, all in all a very good weekend indeed. May we all see the big picture in the everyday this and every week.

ENDS