This reflection was posted on Chris Swift’s blog, at the end of his first week at Leeds Church Institute. He explores Hook’s legacy, and how we meet the challenges of the city today.
When I left my previous employment I had no idea what would come next. One of my colleagues asked me: “what are you going to do?” Without thinking I replied, “God knows!” Perhaps this response emerged out of a rather hollow bravado, or a faith which was more certain in words than it was in reality. In the first instance, rather than look around for another job, I decided to have a sabbatical. These are often taken by clergy every ten years or so but, because I was employed outside the Church, I’d never taken one in the thirty years of my ordained life. In the summer of 2023, I began what became a fruitful, fascinating, and rewarding sixteen months of space, reflection and study. A friend once referred to me during this time as a “flaneur’” which I needed to look up (“someone who saunters around observing society”). Fair point.
One of the fruits of this time was reading and learning more about a figure associated with Yorkshire and York Minster, Laurence Sterne. I knew of Sterne’s writing from undergraduate days and the many links with this mercurial vicar of the 18th century found in Yorkshire – not least the Shandy Hall Museum – became a focus of work to produce a Lent book. I ventured out by bicycle to visit various small churches connected to the novelist, not least Sutton-on-the-Forrest. Its pulpit steps, once used by Sterne, feature on the cover of the book.
While not looking for any permanent role, the post of director for Leeds Church Institute came to my attention. Perhaps this was the answer to “God knows”? In any event, I applied and was appointed. The Institutes were part of a movement in Victorian England which offered education and increased opportunity for people from poorer backgrounds. The first phase of these were the Mechanics Institutes. When the Rev. Walter Hook orchestrated the creation of the Leeds Church Institute it has been suggested that he was building a facility to develop “Anglican Mechanics”. In other words, to equip church people with a greater depth of knowledge about their faith and how to live it.
Arriving early on Monday morning (keen to get started) I walked around the city centre. In a small homage to the original home of the Institute, in Albion Place, I stopped for a few minutes to read the Leeds Civic plaque recording its creation. The Institute was ‘The powerhouse behind the advancement of religious and secular education on the principles of the Church of England’. The former home of LCI is in the main shopping area of the city, now decked out in all its Christmas glitz and glamour. I thought about what life must have been like there in the 1860s, when the building was opened. At that moment someone looking fairly dishevelled, who had perhaps spent the night on the streets, came and asked if I would buy him breakfast. I did. Walking a short distance further another man overtook me, apparently talking to himself, when he suddenly launched into an abusive tirade against a woman walking in the opposite direction. She stopped, I stopped, and we exchanged a look as she shrugged her shoulders and asked aloud: “what was all that in aid of?” The man continued on his way, still talking, gesticulating, and going at a good pace. Having checked that she was OK, the two of us carried on in our separate journeys.
Perhaps things have not changed as much as we might imagine since the founding days of LCI. During a phase of exponential growth in population, the philanthropists and civic leaders of Leeds faced a colossal task in addressing the basic needs of poorer communities. Today we would no doubt find their approach patronising and – possibly – coercive. The workhouses were in full operation and the poor had little access to either education or the opportunities that might change their circumstances. Walter Hook, the celebrated Vicar of Leeds, played his part in helping to found new churches and schools. His approach was allied to the principles of the Tractarian Movement, High-Church Anglicanism, but he had arrived at these independently of the movement. Unlike the dons and academics sheltering in ivory towers, Hook was the most significant figure of Anglo-Catholic reform in the parishes. Firstly, as a priest in Coventry, then in Leeds, he advanced the cause of High-Church liturgy and social action, enduring various attacks while he sought to fulfil his sense of calling. Newman wrote to him:
“You are in the thickest fire of the enemy; and I often think how easy it is for us to sit quietly here…”
Hook had not chosen an easy path, but his dedication to parish ministry and commitment to education has left an enduring legacy. It’s why LCI is still here in Leeds, in 2024, working to advance theological reflection and act as a creative fulcrum where spirituality, justice, and learning, meet and flourish. It’s mission remains both a daunting task, and an exciting enterprise.
Blog Image: Old and new together – Dock Street, Leeds, close to Leeds Church Institute