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ANNO: 主播大秀 Radio 4. It鈥檚 ten past eight and time now to go live to the Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King in Liverpool. The service begins with the introit Oculi omnium. The eyes of all wait upon thee, O Lord; and thou givest them their meat in due season.

INTROIT
Oculi omnium 鈥� Charles Wood

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN - WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION -

Good morning and welcome to Liverpool for this choral service of morning prayer. Our Cathedral opened in 1967 and this year has been a special time of celebration and thanksgiving as we celebrate our 50th Jubilee

This month also marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Blessed Oscar Romero. As the Archbishop of San Salvador he regularly defended the rights of the poor and defenceless by speaking out against the corruption, oppression and the killings that were rife in聽聽聽聽聽聽 El Salvador and were sponsored by the police, army and those in authority. He was assassinated in 1980 - being shot while he was celebrating mass in the chapel where he lived.聽
鈥�
Ever since his martyrdom in San Salvador in 1980 we have held a memorial service here each year, keeping alive his memory and the example of courageous witness that he gave in speaking out for the voiceless. Our Service this morning is a celebration of his life and witness. The words of the hymn that we will sing after the opening responses, to a well-known musical tune Blaenwern, are based on some of the phrases from the homilies of Oscar Romero.聽

OPENING RESPONSES (SUNG)
V. O God, come to our aid.
R. O Lord make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
As it was in the beginning
is now and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen. Alleluia.

HYMN: GOD YOU RAISE US TRUE DISCIPLES

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN - PRAYER OF ST IGNATIUS LOYOLA聽
Teach us Lord to serve you as you deserve
to give and not to count the cost
to fight and not to heed the wounds
to toil and not to seek for rest
to labour and not to ask for any reward
save that of knowing that we do your will.

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN
The psalm and canticle for morning prayer, sung by the choir, express our thirst and longing for God, our praise and our desire for his Kingdom

PSALM 62(63) 鈥� sung by the Choir

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN
READING:
These words are from a lengthy homily of St Augustine of Hippo on Love. He argues Christian love is not a weak or timid quality, it should prompt us to speak out against what is wrong or defend what is weak.

Therefore once and for all this command is given to you.
Love and do what you will.
If you keep silent, keep silent by love.
If you speak, speak by love.
If you correct, correct by love.
If you pardon, pardon by love.
Let love be rooted in you and from that root nothing but good can grow.

CANTICLE Daniel 3:57-88,56聽 - sung by the Choir

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN
PRAYER
Spirit of Hope, work within us
just as you worked in Blessed Oscar Romero.
So that we too may work for justice
and spread the good news
by living out the Gospel in solidarity with those living in poverty.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
R. Amen.

[POSS CUT PSALM 149 鈥� IS THERE ANY WAY WE COULD CUT THIS? WORRIED ABOUT TIMING!]

SCRIPTURE READING John 12:20-26
A reading from the Gospel According to John, Chapter 12, beginning at the twentieth verse.

Among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. These approached Philip, who came from Bethsaida in Galilee, and put this request to him, 鈥楽ir, we should like to see Jesus.鈥� Philip went to tell Andrew, and Andrew and Philip together went to tell Jesus. Jesus replied to them:
鈥楴ow the hour has come
for the Son of Man to be glorified.
I tell you, most solemnly,
unless a wheat grain falls on the ground and dies,
it remains only a single grain;
but if it dies,
it yields a rich harvest.
Anyone who loves his life loses it;
anyone who hates his life in this world
will keep it for the eternal life.
If a man serves me, he must follow me,
wherever I am, my servant will be there too.
If anyone serves me, my Father will honour him.

CHOIR: Listen, sweet dove 鈥� Grayston Ives

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN
Listen, sweet dove. George Herbert鈥檚 poem 鈥榃hitsunday鈥� set to music by Grayston Ives. Our preacher this morning is Bishop John Rawsthorne who is the former bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Hallam

HOMILY Bishop John Rawsthorne

Yesterday at Choral Evensong in Westminster Abbey, this morning at Choral Morning Prayer here in this Metropolitan Cathedral in Liverpool we celebrate the centenary of the birth of Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador, martyr.

Oscar Romero died a martyr because he was faithful, to God, to the Gospel message of love, justice and peace, and faithful to the poor and oppressed people of his country.

He was born on the feast of the Assumption, 1917, into a family that just about made ends meet. When he left school at12, he was apprenticed for a short time to a carpenter, but then went to study for the priesthood and was ordained priest in 1942. In 1977, at the age of 60, he was appointed Archbishop of San Salvador.

And in this smallest of all Latin American countries, the world in which he became Archbishop was one where almost all the land was owned by an oligarchy, where there was grinding poverty, and violent oppression by the military.

Within a month of his arrival, as part of a campaign of murder that would go way beyond his own death, his good friend Rutilio Grande, a Jesuit priest and one of the most respected priests in El Salvador, was gunned down in his car with two companions. It was a terrible blow to the new Archbishop.

The Church has always been given life through the blood of those who have died for the Gospel, but Oscar Romero's life and death have had an unusually profound effect both within the Church and far beyond it. While he preached the Gospel to everybody, he spoke first of all to and for his own people. He was their voice; he has been called the voice of the voiceless.

He was a wonderful speaker, indeed his Sunday sermons could last an hour and a half, sometimes longer. But he was also a wonderful listener. First he listened. He travelled the Diocese listening, in remote villages, to the poorest of the poor, always with respect and full attention. They said that he was shaped by his listening. And people would hear their own words when he preached.

But most of all, his preaching was based in prayer. He was always known as a man of prayer. When he had listened, he prayed. One of the lovely stories about his humour concerned the decision he eventually made after the murder of his friend Rutilio Grande to have only one Mass in the Diocese the following Sunday, just in the Cathedral. He looked everywhere for advice on the matter and eventually met a friend who reminded him that the best thing to do was to go to talk with Jesus. He met him later. 'We've talked' he said, 'and he's in agreement too'.

But he was not alone in his prayer. People always held him in their prayers, and told him so. He said: I want to express thanks publicly for the strength that I receive from the prayers of so many. Nothing for me is so beautiful than to hear: 'we are praying for you. You are not alone. We are with you in our prayer.' God be blessed. Thank you.
His Sunday sermons were broadcast on the diocesan radio station. They became a must across the country. Everybody listened, including police and army. Another of those stories, of the young couple listening in their car when a police car drew up next to them at the lights and they hastily switched off, but the Archbishop's voice carried on because the two policemen were tuned in as well. He was a great communicator.

His sermons would be based on the day's Scripture, and mainly that, but always led into the latest examples of oppression from all over the country, naming names and issuing challenges. Even the President was named a liar on one occasion.

Eventually, the radio station was blown up, just a month before his death. By the following Sunday, he had a telephone line to Costa Rica, with an altar server holding the handset to his mouth, and from Costa Rica the homily was broadcast by short wave back to El Salvador and the rest of Central America, even as far away as Colombia and Venezuela!

In the first three months of 1980, there were 800 deaths. They were terrible times and getting worse. On Sunday, 23 March, 1980, the last Sunday of his life, the new radio was working. At the end of the homily he spoke the words which were to finally sign his death warrant. In a special appeal to the security forces, he said:

Brothers, you are part of our own people. You are killing your own brother and sister campesinos, and against any order man may give to kill, God's law must prevail: You shall not kill. No soldier is obliged to obey an order against the law of God. ... It is time now for you to reclaim your conscience and to obey your conscience rather than the command to sin..... We want the Government to take us seriously when we say that reforms are useless when they come stained with so much blood. In the name of God, in the name of this suffering people whose laments rise up each day more tumultuously to heaven, I beg you, I beseech, I order you in the name of God, stop the repression.

The gospel at Mass on the next evening was the gospel we heard this morning: Jesus answered them, 'The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you most solemnly, unless a grain of wheat falls on the ground and dies, it remains only a single grain; but if it dies it yields a rich harvest. ... If a man serves me, he must follow me. Wherever I am, my servant will be there too.'

As the Archbishop began to prepare the wheaten bread and the wine for the Eucharist, a single shot rang out. And he dropped to the ground. The proclamation at his beatification in San Salvador last year said profoundly but simply:

Oscar Romero
Bishop and Martyr
Pastor according to the heart of Christ
Evangelist and Father of the Poor
Heroic witness of the Kingdom of God,
The Kingdom of Justice, of Brotherhood and Peace.

SHORT RESPONSORY
You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Have mercy on us.
R. You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Have mercy on us.
You are seated at the right hand of the Father. R.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. R.
BENEDICTUS (SUNG 鈥� KINGSFOLD)

INTERCESSIONS

The Lord God said: 鈥淚 shall look for the lost one, bring back the stray, bandage the wounded and make the weak strong.鈥�
Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

Lord God, you made us and sustain us with your love: help us to recognise that you are in our midst, even in our divisions.
Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

We pray for your Church, that we may all be one: may our solidarity with the poor be a means of grace and a sign of our more perfect unity still to come, remembering particularly the Christian communities of El Salvador.
Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

We pray that the memory of your servant, Oscar Romero, may continue to inspire all people of good will to work for unity, peace, and justice.
Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

We pray for the people of Mexico in the aftermath of the second earthquake to have devastated the country. We also remember those affected by the recent Hurricanes in the Caribbean.聽 In the face of so much devastation and loss of life may the international community respond generously to offer help and support. Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

We pray for those who find their lives a burden too heavy to bear; those without work, those without food, without shelter, those without a living wage: Lord, be their strength and their hope.
Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

You are the Life, and the One who vanquishes death: we pray for all who have died, working for justice, peace, and unity: that they may inherit joy and peace.
Lord our God. R. Come to save us.

At the Saviour鈥檚 command, and formed by divine teaching, we dare to sing:

THE LORD鈥橲 PRAYER 鈥� sung by the Choir
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come,
thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us;
and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

COLLECT
Almighty God, you called your servant Blessed Oscar Romero
to be a voice for the voiceless poor,
and to give his life as a seed of freedom and a sign of hope:
grant that, inspired by his sacrifice and the example of the martyrs of El Salvador,
we may without fear or favour witness to your Word who abides,
your Word who is Life, even Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom,
with you and the Holy Spirit, be praise and glory now and for ever.聽
R. Amen.

CANON ANTHONY O鈥橞RIEN
As we now conclude our prayers, the choir will lead us in the singing of the聽 laudes regiae.聽 This ancient Roman chant is traditionally sung during the most solemn occasions of a churches life. It was sung at the dedication of this Cathedral in 1967 and on many important occasions since and has, along with our final hymn 鈥楬ail Redeemer, King Divine!鈥� become something of a signature tune for music here in our Cathedral.聽 Christus vincit, Christus regnat, Christus imperat:聽 Christ conquers, Christ reigns, Christ rules.

CHRISTUS VINCIT (SUNG)

PRAYER
Gathered as justice-seeking disciples
we now acclaim Blessed Oscar Romero
as guide and inspiration for us all.
Seeking courage to follow his example in service to the marginalized.
Speaking out for those who have no voice.
Exposing the abuse of power over those who are powerless.
Creating community with all who feel isolated.
Naming the signs of God鈥檚 reign in a world which would remain silent.
Witnessing to the joys and hopes, the griefs and anxieties of the people of our time.
Being at one with the Church of God throughout the earth in proclaiming Good News
to the poor, freedom to those who are in chains,
vision for those who cannot see, dignity for all the oppressed. Amen.

BLESSING AND DISMISSAL 鈥� sung by the Choir
The Lord be with you.
And with your spirit.
May almighty God bless you,
the Father, and the Son,
and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

Go in the peace of Christ.
Thanks be to God.

HYMN: Hail, Redeemer, King divine!

ORGAN VOLUNTARY Paean - Kenneth Leighton (1929-1988)