Teeside: ecumenical service for steel industry
Catholics were represented at a service of thanksgiving and hope for the future of Teesside's steel industry yesterday.
Bishop Terry Drainey, Bishop of Middlesbrough, was present on the sanctuary at Christ Church, Redcar, when Archbishop John Sentamu, Anglican Archbishop of York, led the hour-long service.
Mgr Gerry Dasey, vicar-general, was in the 200-strong congregation, which included several lay Catholics who had been associated with the local steel industry. One was Norman Evans MBE, who raises money for charity by busking on Redcar High Street.
The Rev Malcolm Jackson, vicar of Kirkleatham, which covers half of Redcar, specially wrote a hard-hitting hymn Lord of Our Town for the service. He got the idea from Gloucester where a similar hymn was written about the `Lord of Our City,' sung to the tune of Lord of All Hopefulness.
It referred to the "boredom of children with nowhere to play" and the jobless waiting on "pie in the sky" promises. The hymn was sung with gusto by the 200-strong congregation to the tune of the hymn Lord of All Holiness.