Jane Cook, Adult Formation Adviser for the Middlesbrough Diocese, writes,

Rev Christopher Humble, Minister at Central Methodist Church on St Saviourgate in York, is a long-standing friend of mine. He is a great enthusiast for ecumenism and church unity, and also for excellence in liturgy and worship.

I bumped into Christopher in the coach park after the Beatification Mass at Cofton Park, Birmingham, where he had travelled with our pilgrims from York and represented the Chair of the York and Hull Methodist District. We shared our excitement at the wonderful event in which we had just been privileged to partake.

Christopher has subsequently written about how the Mass has ‘touched his life’ and that it is surely something he will never forget. He also believes that the Papal Visit brought ‘encouragement and enrichment’ to all Christians in these shores.

Just a few weeks after we met at Cofton Park, Christopher contacted me to share his delight at a special gift, which had come to him from Cardinal Walter Kasper (former President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity). The gift is one of the pewter chalices which were used at the Papal Mass at Bellahouston Park, Glasgow. It seems to me to be an extraordinarily beautiful and sacred object, and the giving of it to be a generous and heartfelt ecumenical gesture.

The photograph shows Rev Christopher Humble with the Papal Chalice as he prepares to celebrate the Christmas Eve Eucharist at Central Methodist, York.