David Sheppard: Trailblazing and Hope

Article for the Good Friday 2005 edition of the Highbury & Islington Express

'I don't think I have ever read such unmixed admiration and affection across so many very long obituaries. They painted a portrait of a man who made the very best of his gifts by constant application.' Andrew Brown of the Church Times, whose offices are on Upper Street, was commenting about the response to the life and death of David Sheppard.

Kathleen Read, currently deputy warden at St Mary Islington, still remembers his time here as curate with great affection: 'He was well known as an England cricketer and spoke about Christ at an Islington Town Hall meeting with Don Bradman and Colin Cowdrey, but he also had time for people and their needs. He was a pioneer with the boys club.'

David Sheppard, the former England cricket captain, evangelical trailblazer for urban mission, and Bishop of Liverpool, died of cancer on 5 March, aged 75. He was ordained 50 years ago, in 1955, and served as a curate at St Mary Islington for three years. Then he created the new 'Mayflower Centre' in Canning Town, East London from 1958 to 69. His vision and compassion attracted funding, staff, and worshippers to this new project of 'church for the community'. He followed John Robinson, of Honest to God fame, as Bishop of Woowich from 1969 to 75, and published Built as a City (1974).

He served as Bishop of Liverpool from 1975 to 97, writing Bias to the Poor (1983), and was the main architect of the Church of England report on urban priority areas, Faith in the City: A Call for Action by Church and Nation (1985). In Liverpool his profound friendship with Derek Worlock, the Catholic Archbishop, reduced religious tension and produced Better Together: Christian Partnership in a Hurt City (1988). In retirement he reflected on his life committed to Christ, since a student at Cambridge, and to the poor, from his time here in Islington, in his autobiography Steps Along Hope Street: My Life in Cricket, the Church and the Inner City (2002).

Lord Sheppard of Liverpool followed his ultimate Lord, Jesus of Nazareth, whose first sermon began: 'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor' (Luke 4:18). The death threat after that sermon foreshadowed the events of Good Friday. This Easter weekend, as we think about death and resurrection, we may remember the ultimate statistic: one out of one people die. We can swerve to avoid many things but the only way to cope with death is to face it, go through with it and through it.

David Sheppard, facing cancer, believed that in this confrontation with death we are not alone. We can follow in the wake of Christ who has gone before us and come out the other side, transformed. In thinking about this, I imagined a cyclist tucked in behind a colleague, following in his slipstream; a group of people walking behind a leader who has slashed a way through nettles and branches in a wood; a boat cutting through the water, leaving an arrow shape behind it. After meditating on these, I wrote this Easter prayer:

We follow in your trail,

blazing through life;

we sail in your wake,

surging through death;

we are your body,

you are our head;

ablaze with life,

awake from the dead.

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