Easter Messages Abound in the Work of The Mission
Reverend Chris Orczy outside St Lukes, Christchurch City Mission’s Chapel.
Easter messages abound in the work Reverend Chris Orczy sees at the Mission.
Chris is the St Luke’s Inner-City Chaplain and while his parish is the streets, the Mission’s chapel is a place to linger and connect with its clients and staff. “It’s that sense of resurrection and new life,” he says of Easter meanings.
“That's really what a lot of these people are going through. Society has given up on them and they might as well be dead according to society. But if they can come to the Mission and be told they're actually in some way valuable and they don't have to live this life of addiction or violence or whatever they can come here, then a new life is possible.”
He says the chapel is a place where they will always be accepted. His regular appearances at the chapel come on Tuesday mornings and after he arrives, he settles on his favourite seat just inside the door and waits to see who will turn up to talk and pray. He never knows who will come, but he knows it will always be interesting, grounded and often very profound.
There is a little strategy going on with Tuesdays because the City Mission’s men’s day programme puts on a lunch that day and numbers are up, but every time it is different.
Our chapel is 136 years old and has a special charm and in some way it is quite powerful in how it can open people up and peel back layers.
City Mission clients include people who have had some of the most traumatic lives it is possible to have. The City Mission cares for the hardest-hit people and it shows among those who walk through the gate, go up the steps and into the chapel on Tuesday mornings.
“Some of the insights that have been shared with me through clients have been incredible, they have made me look at the saying of Jesus in a different way”
“Some of insights that have been shared with me through the clients have been incredible, they have made me look at the sayings of Jesus in a different way,” Chris says.
He tries to explain, “you can read a passage in a standard Anglican church, and it might be saying ‘we have to look after those unfortunate people’. But if the people you're reading it to are ‘those unfortunate people’, it doesn’t work. It changes the whole angle.”
Reverend Chris Orczy
The chapel’s effect carries across the year. On the weekend before Christmas, the City Mission Chapel was used as a toy grotto where children from needy families came to collected presents donated by City Mission supporters. Chris was there too and several times he was overcome by emotion at what he was seeing.
“I was crying,” he admits. “And it's the mothers looking so happy for their children that was getting to me.”
“But a dad turned up and I saw him sitting in the car. He sat there for a bit and there was a big bunch of pride that had to be swallowed for him to come in, and to witness that and then see him go out with the toys was incredible. He thanked us all, but I said to him ‘You're a really brave man. You are a man of great strength’.”
You can connect with Chris: www.facebook.com/icchaplainchch