Page 57 - OR-2014

The Old Ratclifan 2014 | Introductionhe Old Ratclifan 2014 | Obituaries The Old Ratclifan 2014 | IntroductionThe Old Ratclifan 2014 | Obituaries T saving to the Catholic community. On his retirement, he was a Trustee of St Mary’s College and remained one for eleven Fr Jean-Marie Charles-Roux IC given the OBE, an honour which he shares with his father and years, until 2007. his uncle, and was also made a Knight Commander of the In June 2006, Richard moved from West Park Road to December 12th 1914 - August 7th 2014 Order of St Gregory by the Church. Gloucester Court, and it was there that he met Verna Parsloe. In September 1959, just before he joined the Catholic Verna already lived there and was, and still is, a parishioner Education Council, Richard married Shirley Ward, a very of St Winefride’s. They became good friends and enjoyed very I first met Fr Charles-Roux sixty years number of toy Swiss Guards had stood effervescent person, who was a journalist and Deputy Editor much each other’s company, so much so that Verna is now ago when I was at Ratcliffe as a boy: on duty for the last 96 years. of the Ideal Home magazine. They came to live in Kew, regarded by all as part of the Cunningham family. We would he appeared to me to be a bird-of- The child is father to the man. To where Richard lived ever since, apart from three years when like to thank Verna for all the kindness, devotion and friendship paradise among a flock of sparrows. defend things ancient and sacred they lived in Chislehurst. Their first child, David, was born in she showed to Richard over his last few years. Later, we were both together at was deeply rooted in Jean-Marie’s December 1962 and their second, Richard, in February 1966. Wadhurst Novitiate and, finally, here psychology, and he lived to see the Very sadly, Shirley died in July 1982 as a result of an accident Richard was a very clever, but also a very kind and loving man. in Ely Place. I often served his Mass, collapse of so much that he held dear. in the home. Richard married again in May 1986, to Sheila He was generous and would always be willing to help. He was and being the server of Fr Charles- Quigley, who was the sister of several Old Ratcliffians and who a loving husband, father and grandfather. Roux gave one a glimpse into eternity, This experience is not unique to had worked at the Catholic Education Council. Equally sadly, Richard is now gone to a far, far better place, where hopefully in more senses than one. Jean-Marie; it is the universal human Sheila died in May 2005. we will all join him in due course. However, he leaves behind When I was a boy, I was always condition. The classic expression of a legacy to the Catholic community in England and Wales, to this reality is the sermon preached by After his retirement, he continued to serve the Catholic the Catholic education system, to the Cunningham family and, puzzled by the Liturgy of Good Friday, St Augustine when the City of Rome education community. As the Secretary of the Catholic particularly, to his children, David and Richard, Richard’s wife, where there was a prayer for the was destroyed in December 410 Education Council, which had both bought and set up St Rebecca, and his grandchildren, Beatrice and Arthur - a legacy Holy Roman Emperor. The prayer AD by the Visigoths. He preached Mary’s College in Strawberry Hill, he had also served as the which will not be forgotten, and which will undoubtedly benefit even remained after Pius XII reformed to his people in the Cathedral at Secretary to its Board of Governors. In 1996, along with future generations. the Easter liturgy in the 1950s, but Hippo in the wintry sunlight about Lord Nolan and Bishop Jukes and O’Donoghue, he became the rubric said this prayer is omitted the catastrophe in distant Rome. He John Cunningham (54) because the office of Holy Roman told those who had come to listen to Brother Emperor is currently vacant. What I him that the news had just arrived John Francis Bunce utterly failed to grasp at that time was that Rome had been sacked by the that this position had only become Barbarians. St Augustine began his Old Ratcliffian 1945 - 1951 vacant just over twenty years before I sermon by asking the question: ‘How was born. The office of Holy Roman Died on December 22nd 2013 Emperor was created in the year 800 could God allow the Christian Empire were said every day by Fr Jean-Marie to be destroyed?’ He went on to say, AD, when on Christmas Day, the Pope as he celebrated Mass. Fr Jean-Marie John Francis Bunce (Father Cyril to so many) was born in However, John did struggle with his vocation and, in 1985, crowned Charlemagne as the Christian ‘God does not raise up citadels of remained young in spirit, even in his Dudley, the fourth of five sons of Cyril and Elfreda. At his it was not an easy choice to ask for twelve months outside Emperor of Western Europe, and for stone and marble for us; outside of hundredth year. When he retired from first school, Belmont Abbey, he was known for reading to the Order to see what he should do with the rest of his life. the next 1100 years, his successors this world he raises up citadels of Ely Place over twenty years ago, he the boys at bedtime. He was later Head Boy at Ratcliffe During this time, and in a small ecumenical lay community claimed to be Heirs to the Caesars. the Holy Spirit for us, citadels of love went to Rome, allegedly to die, but College, where he enjoyed Rowing and Drama. He had at Minstead in the New Forest, he adjusted from monastic The world of Emperors, Czars and which could never collapse, which will he said he was unable to do so, as fond memories of sea holidays and sailing with his cousins life to living and ministering among laypeople. He was Kings had been destroyed totally by for ever stand in glory when this world Rome is the Eternal City! He went in North Wales. The family also stayed on the monastery helped and loved by someone as caring as he had been to the First World War. has been reduced to ashes…..Rome to live in our house at Porta Latina, Island of Caldey, off Tenby, in 1949, where he later others – this was Audrey, whom he had first met on Caldey. has collapsed and your hearts are where the community is composed returned in 1980. Jean-Marie Charles-Roux was born in outraged by this. Rome was built by Some of John’s last words were: ‘She had, for a long time, Rome just after the First World War men like yourself … since when did largely of students from the emerging John felt called to the Cistercian Mount Saint Bernard Abbey encouraged me in my vocation, but when she saw that this had broken out. This war destroyed you believe that men had the power non-European church. Newman said: in Leicestershire and gave up a scholarship at Oxford to was leading nowhere, she was very supportive in my search much of what he was later to hold to build things that are eternal? Your ‘Change is a sign of life: to change become a novice monk in 1951, aged 18. In 1959, he was for the right thing to do. Eventually, I asked her to marry dear. This process in his mind began souls, filled with the light of the Holy often is to be perfect’, and Fr Jean- ordained and later, in 1974, aged 40, he was elected Abbot me. Since then life has gone on very happily during all our with the French Revolution, and Spirit, will not perish’. Marie was capable of great change, of Mount Saint Bernard Abbey, after studying in Rome with years together’. left a scar in his imagination as one even in the last decade of his long life. a future Abbot of Caldey, Samuel Wickstead. who believed, at least in part of his Twenty years later, the same John and Audrey helped in many ecumenical communities, Augustine lay dying on the floor of this There, in this new community in As a Deputy Novice Master and Guest House Master, including Horsley Woodhouse in Derbyshire, and in mercurial mind, the Divine Right of same Cathedral, in which the people Rome, he formed a friendship with John gave clear spiritual guidance and comfort to those Nazareth, Palestine. He also led the Welshpool Retreat, Kings. of Hippo were seeking refuge from the Fr John Fortune. Fr Jean-Marie had finding their way in life. Although the monastic routine was where he preached and read. Just months before he died, I visited Vandal horsemen who were laying specifically and repeatedly asked Fr rigorous, he always found time for others; visitors, his family John had a chalice, given to him by his Uncle Cyril, which Fr Jean-Marie in his sister’s flat siege to the city, having swept through John to be the celebrant at his funeral, and relatives. His family have many fond memories of visits he passed on to the poor of Africa. Not only had he and in Rome, which was filled with Spain and across the sea to Africa. and we thank Fr John for doing this. to Mount St Bernard Abbey. John always found time for us, Audrey helped a group to decorate a Palestinian community portraits of his formidable-looking Soon, Hippo would be no more. The For many years, when he was in his showing us the Abbey, the farm animals and the mounds to house in Nazareth, but, at the request of a Nigerian ancestors, going back to his great- Cathedral would be destroyed, but nineties, Fr Jean-Marie would fly to climb, and especially the Stations of the Cross and its hill. great-grandparents. These portraits the reality behind the Alpha and the Nairobi to celebrate the Easter Liturgy fellow novice from Mount Saint Bernard, Fr Cyprian Tansi with his African brethren. He said he John adored the creative practicalities of the self-sufficient Ekwensi, they also twice visited the Bamenda in Cameroon, must have looked down at Jean-Marie Omega inscribed on the floor of the had never appreciated the wonder of community, growing its own food, building and mending a Cistercian foundation. It was Fr Ekwensi to whom John as a child. I was then shown a letter Cathedral where he was dying is the Holy Week liturgy so profoundly without help from the outside world. He worked the donated his uncle’s chalice for it to be used once more. written by the four-year-old boy to eternal. as he did on the soil of Africa when orchards with Father Hilary, bound books and wrote great Father Christmas, dated December That reality was far greater to Fr Jean- the liturgy was celebrated in Kiswahili hymns, which are still sung to this day. All his interwoven Someone said, ‘John had innocence about him; he was not 1918. It was written in perfect Marie than his political opinions. ‘I and English. On Good Friday, he spirituality, practicality and appreciation for the beauty of distorted in any way by the nasty things in today’s world. English, requesting Father Christmas will go to the altar of God who gives walked the Stations of the Cross in the the natural world, creativity and craftsmanship hallmarked He was such a kind, faithful and gentle man. The light of to send him a set of toy soldiers - to joy to my youth’ (Ps. 42). These burning sun; during the Masses, he the rest of his life. God’s love shone through him so very much’. defend the Pope! There was a little words (‘introibo ad altare dei, ad knelt throughout in the tropical heat. Matthew Bunce shelf below the framed letter where a deum qui lætificat iuventutem meam’) Nephew Register o 57 56 56 Register online at www.ratclifanassociation.co.uknline at www.ratclifanassociation.co.uk 57