Parishioners’ gifts surprise Canon Lowe

Press, 29 December 1986, Page 8

Parishioners’ gifts surprise Canon Lowe

The generosity of his parishioners has left Canon Bob Lowe almost speechless.

A husband and wife have given the retiring cleric a world trip and spending money, while the rest of the parish has given him an antique dining suite. Canon Lowe has retired from church life after 21 years at St Barnabas’, Fendalton.

“I can’t really cope with this sort of love. After all the thousands of words I have spoken, the hardest two to say are thank-you,” he said yesterday. “I feel very guilty and completely unworthy of these gifts.” The couple who provided the trip and money wanted to remain anonymous, said Canon Lowe. The fare came at an opportune time, when he wgnted to travel to Crete buf "probably couldn’t

raise the fare to Lyttelton.” He said the seven-piece suite had already been used for his Christmas dinner. It would be the focal point of the “woodshed among the rich houses” he will move to in Westmorland. “It’s quite embarrassing really because we are in the early formica period here.” Both gifts were “wonderful symbols of love,” and it was appropriate to announce them at Christmas, he said. Canon Lowe had begun the “traumatic experience” of sorting through 20 years of accumulated rubbish and memories and would move to a small house in Westmorland on January 13. "It will look like an early episode from the ‘Beverly Hillbillies’,” the saiSg ’