Saturday, July 2, 2016

Anglican-Maori Churches in the East Cape

Today we drove around the East Cape, that part of NZ that just out to the northeast in the North Island.  Every turn (and there were a lot of them...) was gorgeous, giving a new vista across a bay or beach or paddock or mountain.  We drive on the left side of the road here and I am fairly well adjusted to it--except for the fact that the turn signal lever and the windshield wiper levers are reversed.  Yikes.  Nothing like signaling a turn by throwing on the windshield wipers...

If you've attended one of our New Zealand Compline services on Sunday evenings you'll remember how the poetic New Zealand Book of Common Prayer taps into the Maori sensibilities of God in all creation.  Maoris traditionally have believed in a Father God in the heavens, the great creator (and a Mother God in the earth).  The Prayer Book here combines the best of the creation-centered mindset with traditional Anglican worship.

And the architecture also combines traditional English with traditional Maori.  First we came across another Christ Church--right on the coast--in the small village of Raukokore.  Here's a photo of today's Christ Church:
Looks a lot like ours on the outside, but this one has been buttressed so as to strengthen it against the winds coming in storms off the Pacific.

Here's the best thing about this church--right as you enter it you see the baptismal font (in the same place where our own Christ Church font was years and years ago.  But it smells a little fishy around it.  Here's the sign for visitors:

OK so I knew there were little penguins on the South Island, but we're still on the north...our B&B owner assured me that there are penguins here, too--little ones called fairy penguins.  So yes indeed the penguins love tunneling under structures like churches on the coastline in order to find shelter!!  That is one way we cannot compete with Christ Church,  Raukokore.  Seems to me that the female priest there now was behind what else sits up near the font, too:

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