04.09.2024
Rekindling Connections in the Church of North India
Archbishop Michael Jackson visited Ranchi in Jharkhand Province in Northern India with the Dublin University Mission to Chotanagpur (DUMCN) in August. He travelled overnight on Sunday August 18 to Ranchi, having celebrated Holy Communion in Christ Church Cathedral in the morning. He arrived late in the evening of Monday 19 and was joined during the week by The Reverend Steven Brunn, Secretary to Dublin University Mission to Chotanagpur. You can read the Archbishop’s diary of his visit and view his photographs below.
DAY 1 – Exploring foundations of early missionaries from Dublin
The first two days were spent in Hazaribagh where there are many foundations named after St Columba, a hospital, a secondary school and a technical university. All of these were founded by the early missionaries from Dublin. All of them are fully functioning today. The hospital, founded in 1895, has been through difficult times on a number of occasions. Now that a Professor of Human Geography in St Columba’s College has taken charge of its organization, it is re–establishing itself and growing from strength to strength. When we visited last year, wards on the ground floor were fully operational. We celebrated Holy Communion together in the Hospital Chapel which is at the heartbeat of the ancient and modern hospital. [You can read the Archbishop’s sermon here.] To the dispensary and consulting rooms on the ground floor have been added the wards on the second floor; they are used for oncological and maxillofacial specialisms. The hospital works in three units: one in the hospital itself, one in the city of Hazaribagh and one in the surrounding villages. This system enables government–supplied medicines to be provided free of charge to those who are needy. It means that they are administered after appropriate medical assessment of need. There are sixteen outpatient doctors working in the hospital at any given time. All infant deliveries are carried out free of charge. The hospital works closely with the Dental University and Hospital situated on the Ranchi Road out of Hazaribagh. Plans are developing to found a Nursing College in the first instance on the St Columba’s Campus. Every day two thousand people from the surrounding areas are given food cooked in the hospital at lunch time at a cost of Rupee 25 which is the equivalent of 30 cent. This is a very modern understanding of on–going mission and local commitment.
I visited St Stephen’s Parish Church and Pastorate which predates DUMCN in Hazaribagh and was originally a military church. The names of those who served the community as part of DUMCN are inscribed on two plaques as you enter the church building. The priest and people were in good heart and spoke positively of the work of the missionaries and of their legacy. I visited also Hamilton Primary School which is right in the middle of the old part of Ranchi, dating from 1892 and also St Columba’s School.
DAY 2 – Celebrating milestones at St Kieran’s and St Columba’s
My journey was delayed considerably because of a well–organized and peaceful protest regarding national rights for specified minorities. The staff and pupils of St Kieran’s Girls’ School were both patient and welcoming on our arrival three hours later than scheduled. This year the school marks its Centenary on St Kieran’s Day in early September but I was able to come only at the end of August. I conveyed greetings from Dublin University and from The United Dioceses. It proved to be a very joyful occasion. [You can read the Archbishop’s sermon here.]
We proceeded to St Columba’s College as this year marks its 125th Anniversary. St Columba’s teaches science subjects, commercial subjects and psychology. Historically, and to this day, its Principal is in holy orders. Our worship was led by students. Following this, I had the chance to address Faculty Members. I began by speaking about St Columba, explaining the story of the origin of copyright and going on to tell of the reviving in new circumstances of a religious community in the Iona Community in 1938 with a constituency of lay people and clergy. The College has more than ten thousand students. There was a great sense of passionate commitment to teaching and learning along with an awareness of the ways in which the missionaries had brought, as part of their charism, a radical sense of the worthiness of each human individual. This enabled the tribal peoples to grow in self– understanding and in self–confidence, qualities that have stood them in good stead to this day. It is a very particular way of empowerment.
It has always been a great pleasure on successive occasions to meet with Bishop Basil Baskey, bishop of Chotanagpur since 2007. This year was special because we were able to talk of the positive developments in St Columba’s Hospital Hazaribagh along with the hopes that he and I share for the development of a Church of North India presence in Dublin. CNI is part of the Anglican Communion, as are we, along with the Church of North India and the Mar Thoma Church. This would greatly be aided and advanced by the presence of a CNI priest working in the diocese. I also heard painfully of the constraints imposed on Christians in India in many ways and of how they have been accelerated in recent years. This made the generous welcome that I have received in Ranchi and Hazaribagh all the more special and memorable. We also discussed a visit that CNI members (clergy and lay people together, involved in education and church life) hope to make to Dublin in May or June 2025.
DAY 4 – The mission of schools and the Irish connections
Day 4 once again concentrated on the mission of schools. St Michael and All Angels’ Blind School, Ranchi founded in 1898 for both boys and girls is a unique institution. It is situated in the grounds of the cathedral compound. It currently has 105 pupils and has maintained a constant link with DUMCN throughout its history along with having links to The Irish Council for the Blind. The children excel in music. They welcomed Mr Brunn and me with many songs and accompaniment on drums and guitar. The school is constantly appreciative of help and support. It remains vitally important as an institution to support and we are always able to supplement its work. We need to remember that when it set out on its path, it genuinely was ground–breaking.
We next went to St Margaret’s School for Girls. It was a foundation of Bishop Westcott in 1885 and was upgraded to High School status in 1915. It has 800 pupils and educates girls and young women from many religious communities. It concentrates much of its effort on the empowerment of women. When invited to speak to the assembled school, I took the first five letters of the English alphabet: acceptance, belief, community, delight and empowerment. It was an unforgettable experience to see the whole school community reverently at prayer. We were treated to a beautiful lunch that had been prepared by some members of the teaching staff and to lively conversation about shared educational ideals.
Dinner in the evening was with Mr Thornton Principal of The Westcott Schools for half a century and with The Schools’ Accountant Mr David Horo who has visited the Dioceses of Dublin and Glendalough and stayed during that time in CITI. The Westcott Schools are five in number and operate as a combined trust. This enables the wealthier members of The Trust to help the schools in the poorer rural areas to have equivalent educational opportunity and experience. The sharing of resources and empowerment is most inspiring and something from which we can learn.
Day 5 was substantially a day of rest and walking around Ranchi. The density of the traffic, with a whole range of rush hours during the day, is breathtaking. You see tiny babies being carried carefully in Moses Baskets on the back of a motorcycle. You see other people running food shops on the side of the road and taking everything away at night and starting up again there or elsewhere on the following day. You see the same sort of food deliveries that we see at home with people weaving in and out of the traffic like ballet dancers on wheels. The Maplewood Hotel, where I am staying, is built on the site of a former mission bungalow. The area is known as The Diocesan Village. There is a German Evangelical Lutheran cemetery nearby together with a Lutheran quarter containing Girls’ Hostels for students in Ranchi along with a Teacher Training College and a Women’s Centre with a Prayer Centre and a number of schools. The oldest churches to come as missionaries to Ranchi were the Anglicans, the Lutherans and the Roman Catholics. Dinner included the rare treat of fish in what is a very landlocked part of India.
Mr Brunn and I worshipped in St Paul’s Cathedral, Ranchi on Sunday morning. I preached at both the 8–30 (English language) and 10–30 (Hindi language) services. The presence of a large baptismal pool in the grounds of the cathedral enabled me to illustrate the Reading for the Epistle – Romans 6 – in a powerful way at the Hindi language service that is not always possible – but today it was! The idea of dying to sin and rising to new and full life in Christ through the waters of baptism was a visual aid that was part of the built heritage of the cathedral and still is in use today. [You can read the Archbishop’s sermon here.]
Dinner in the evening was with the bishop and lay people and clergy of the diocese in The Bishop’s School for Boys. Originally this had been designed as a Theological College but was too large in its scope and expectation. It is our hope to support the revamped work of the successor Theological College in training Catechists for the diocese. This was an opportunity to say Thank you and Farewell to people with whom it had been so easy to take up again a friendship that has become instinctive and reciprocal. I hope that they will be able to come to Dublin in 2025 to enable us to reciprocate something of the goodwill land hospitality that we received in 2024.
DAY 7 – Departure
Departure: this was in reverse order: Ranchi – New Delhi – Dubai – Dublin
Michael Jackson August 2024