[Ely Events] Flower festival -- Cambridge Leper Chapel

[Simon Kershaw]

       Flower festival
       at the Leper Chapel
      10 and 11 May 2008



The flower arrangements you see today all symbolize in one way or 
another the events of the first Pentecost: the pouring out of God’s 
Holy Spirit upon the disciples.
Jesus  had promised his disciples that after his ascension into heaven 
he would not leave them to their own devices, but would send them a 
‘comforter’  who would be with them always.
And so the Holy Spirit descended on them, with great rushings of wind, 
with tongues of fire, with noise and excitement. From that moment on the 
disciples’  lives changed radically. Their fear left them and they were 
able to speak publicly and courageously about what it meant to be a 
follower of Christ.

These happenings of the first Pentecost, the red of the flames, the 
tongues of fire, the smoke and the rushing of the wind are all found 
back in these flower arrangements. Something of the turning around of 
the lives of the disciples, of new beginnings and promises come true is 
also reflected in them.

It is appropriate that this festival of new beginnings is held here at 
the Leper Chapel, which itself speaks of life renewed, of healing and 
new possibilities,
For it was built in the 11th Century as part of the Leper Hospital which 
stood on this site, a place where those who were outcasts of society 
could find new hope and experience God’s love for them and so build up 
their lives again.

The Chapel itself has undergone a renewal too: after a long period of 
neglect and even decay, it is once again restored to its former glory, 
services are held here regularly, and people come again to experience 
God’s love, and to feel the peace and healing which are so much part of 
this place.


-- 
Simon Kershaw
simon at kershaw.org.uk
Saint Ives, Cambridgeshire