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GRAHAM –
In October
2009. Revd Peter B Graham
(E 1936 – 1941).
Extract taken from The Guardian.
When the Spitfire pilot Peter
Graham, who has died aged 86,
proposed to his sweetheart Sylvia
Patteson at the height of the
Second World War, he promised
her – like him, the child of a cleric
– that he would never become
a “bloody priest”. They married
immediately after his return from
Stalag Luft 1 in May 1945 and then,
after finishing university at King’s
College, Cambridge, he became
a French master at Haileybury
school, in Hertfordshire, in 1948,
where he taught his own younger
brothers, Stephen and Martin.
Teaching kept his interest for
less than two years, and he decided
to go back on his former promise
and apply for the priesthood. His
parish work led him from the
village of Eaton Bray, Bedfordshire,
in 1955, to the town of Harpenden,
in 1964, where he took part in CND
demonstrations. He subsequently
flew again, in a glider. The instructor
commented that the severely
arthritic 85-year-old seemed to be
a “typical power pilot, hard on the
rudder but a natural flyer”.
Peter had been planning a
huge family gathering for the
65th anniversary of his wedding
to Sylvia. She survives him, along
with his four children, Michael,
Rachel, Tony and Patrick, and
many grandchildren and great-
grandchildren.
GILLING –
On 28 March
2010. The Reverend John
Reginald Gilling (C 1939 –
1942).
Extract taken from The Times,
12 May 2010.
John Gilling, known as Father
John, was a remarkable priest and a
delightful man who exercised great
influence over undergraduates at
Oxford and over his parish church
in London.
John Reginald Gilling was born
in 1925 in Chelmsford, where his
father was the local bank manager.
From Chelmsford Grammar School
he went to St Edward’s School,
Oxford, where he was fortunate
to have an outstanding history
teacher. Hence, in 1942, he went to
Trinity Hall, Cambridge, but was
quickly taken into the Army as a
member of the Signals Regiment.
Posted to India, he enjoyed the
faded grandeur of the Raj and
just avoided being sent to Burma
when the Americans dropped the
first atomic bomb. He returned
to Cambridge, where he took his
first degree in 1949. Transferring to
Downing College, he began to work
for his PhD but was awarded an
MA, partly, he believed, because
he did not get on with Nikolaus
Pevsner who, he thought, never
took much interest in his work.
From Cambridge he went
to Cuddesdon College to
prepare for ordination
and was made deacon
in 1955 and priest
in 1956. He had
two curacies, the
first at Romford
and the second
at Little St Mary’s,
Cambridge, with Edward
Maycock as his vicar, and in 1962
was appointed chaplain of Christ
Church, Oxford, following the
great scholar priest Eric Mascall.
Oxford at that time still had
theologians as its chaplains and
Christ Church had a formidable
array of high-powered canons
led by the redoubtable Cuthbert
Simpson. At first, they were not
sure that they had appointed the
right man, as Gilling wanted to be
a pastoral chaplain with a college
Eucharist and college Evensong,
which at first they found intrusive
in the cathedral’s life. These
became popular, however, and
the dons realised how well Gilling
got on with undergraduates. They
enjoyed this unusual, somewhat
informal, and even slightly risqué
priest, who was prepared to spend
hours sorting out the messes
that students so often
make of their lives.
He became a close
friend of many of
them, especially Carl
MacKenzie and his
family, spending a
month every summer
at their villa on Lake
Orta in northern Italy, painting
watercolours.
In 1971 he was appointed
vicar of St Mary’s, Bourne
Street, London, a church with a
great Anglo-Catholic tradition.
He followed a great, though
somewhat stern priest, Donald
Nicholson, who had not enjoyed
his time there, and Gilling came
as a breath of fresh air. Although
he could be firmwhen necessary,
his somewhat casual style,
offbeat humour and keen sense
of the ridiculous soon endeared
him to the congregation, which
took the somewhat unfashionable
parish of Aylesbury in 1972,
revitalising it and pushing for
the restoration of the crumbling
landmark church, which became
a thriving centre for the whole
community.
His final clerical job, in Elford,
in the Diocese of Lichfield, began
in 1982 and its main attraction
was that it included a special
role of counselling fellow clergy,
something he had long felt was
needed. He commented: “At last,
some recognition that help is
needed with the stresses of the
vocation.” Peter was a strong
advocate of clinical theology and a
believer in psychotherapeutic
approaches to helping
people, leading to a role in
retirement that included
supervision of priests and
psychiatrists, who greatly
valued his guidance.
He was a keen solver of
the Araucaria crossword in The
Guardian, commenting that he
felt he knew the writer’s mind. It
was only after several years that he
discovered that Araucaria was his
elder brother, John, who had been
writing secretly, while still serving
as a parish priest himself.
Peter’s autumn years brought
increasing deafness and disability,
but he used his new-found
computer skills not only to write
his (sold out) autobiography
Skypilot
(the term for a chaplain
in the RAF), but also to rediscover
many wartime pilot friends from
41 squadron. At Christmas 2008, he
increased greatly under his benign
leadership.
His tolerance and positive
thinking — “very good” was
a typical phrase — and his
scholarship and Oxbridge
background attracted many.
He was much resorted to as a
confessor by both clergy and
laity, making them see the often
ridiculous nature of their sins,
frequently resulting in laughter
in his confessional. From his
father, Gilling had inherited a sure
touch with finance and helped St
Mary’s to a more stable financial
position. From 1979 to 1985 he
was area dean of Westminster,
St Margaret’s, a post in which he
performed well.
Gilling, a bachelor, retired
in 1990 and went to live in
Chichester, where he helped in
various local churches. In 2008 his
health began to fail and he moved
to St Mary’s Convent and Nursing
Home in Chiswick, where he died.
He was an excellent priest
and pastor who many thought
would have been a truly pastoral
suffragan bishop; the Church did
not even make him a prebendary.
Reverend Peter Graham
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He
followed a
great, though
somewhat stern
priest...and Gilling
came as a breath
of fresh air.
...he
promised
her...that he
would never become
a “bloody priest”.
He decided to go
back on his former
promise