On Sunday 4th September the Norwich Spiritualist Church on Chapelfield, held a special service to mark its 80th birthday. The current President of the church, Mrs Linda Smith had invited members of the NHC to attend as guests of honour. This was to re- establish links formed back in 1942 when the Norwich Synagogue was destroyed by enemy action during the war. The Spiritualist Church offered use of the hall beneath their Church to the NHC to hold its services. Indeed, Barry Leveton remembers going there for services and even a Seder night when he was about 8 years old. An interesting fact emerged in that our forefathers were not happy to enter the building under the sign of the cross so the Spiritualist solution was to install an additional door at the side of the building. This door still exists today and is known as the Jew’s door.
Daniel, Clive, Poppy and myself attended and could not of been made more welcome by everyone at the Church. The service included a brief history of the Spiritualist Church in Norwich and included short speeches by a number of invited guests including Daniel and a senior visiting Spiritualist Minister David Bruton and Officer of the Spiritualists’ National Union: both giving very eloquent talks. David Bruton also present a book on the Philosophy of Spiritualism to Daniel for the NHC library.
Pictures:
Above – Poppy & Nick Simons, Linda Smith, Daniel Rosenthall and Avril Noble (interfaith representative)
Left – David Bruton, Minister with Linda Smith, President and Dawn Hanratty, Vice President, Norwich Spiritualist Church.
Following the service we were invited to a splendid buffet in the hall below the church and
we had an opportunity to meet and speak with other members of their congregation. We certainly enjoyed a fascinating visit to the Spiritualist Church and felt honoured to have been included in the celebrations.
Left – Book which was presented to Daniel