A Sermon preached by the Reverend Robert Atwell at the Parish Church of St Mary the Virgin, Primrose Hill, on the occasion of the funeral of Tessa Addenbrooke, Wednesday 29 October 2006

‘Thou knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts; shut not thy merciful ears to our prayer; but spare us, Lord. Suffer us not, at our last hour, for any pain of death to fall from thee.’

Words from today's anthem which the Prayer Book decreed should be sung as a body is accompanied to the grave and which Henry Purcell set to music for the funeral of Queen Mary II. The choice of music is highly appropriate for the funeral of Tessa who loved all music but in particular that composed for the liturgy of the Church of England to which she was devoted, not least because her father was a priest and from her earliest days the music of the church filled her mind and memory.

All of us who knew Tessa would say that she was a very special person. Each of us is unique and each of us matters uniquely to God, but some stand out from the crowd by virtue of the quality of their life or because of the nature of their story. Tessa was special on both counts, though she would be the first to laugh at such a designation. She never understood how much she meant to so many people or why she was admired by them. Some people find it difficult to believe that they are loved or indeed lovable, and this was Tessa's lot, and it contributed to her vulnerability. She travelled through life like a snail without a shell, acutely sensitive and vulnerable to ‘the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune’.

Tessa was a child of the vicarage, the eldest of six children. Life for her parents on a small stipend was far from easy. Her family was of paramount importance to Tessa, as those of us who were privileged to have known her will gladly testify. It is wonderful to see you all here and to be able to put faces to the names Tessa has spoken of down the years, including a phalanx of nephews, nieces and godchildren. Even the NZ and Australian contingent has sent suitably sunny Antipodean flowers to honour Tessa's memory so they can be with us in spirit.

Tessa's earliest years, as we all know, were blighted by illness. TB of the hip was diagnosed when she was two, and in an age without antibiotics the only known cure was complete bed-rest and fresh air. At an incredibly tender age Tessa found herself inexplicably removed from her home and parents, and placed in an isolation hospital, miles from home. Seven years of her childhood and adolescence were spent in hospital receiving treatment of one sort or another.

Today hospitals invariably make provision for parents to stay with their children during painful and long treatments, but seventy years ago a different culture in hospitals prevailed. Parents were not welcome. Their presence was deemed by the nursing regime too upsetting for the children. In spite of this, and the fact that the journey was long and tedious, including a walk of a mile across open countryside, one of Tessa's parents nevertheless went to see her in hospital once a fortnight.

You do not need a degree in child psychology to know that such a traumatic experience leaves an indelible mark on a person. Thus it was that like Jacob, who wrestled so hard with God beside the ford of Jabbok that he dislocated his hip, Tessa too limped into life, handicapped not simply by a diseased hip but by a recurrent sense of abandonment. Periodically through her life this would well-up and overwhelm her in waves of desolation and depression. But like Jacob she kept on walking, both literally and metaphorically. She refused to abandon her faith in the goodness of God. And for that courage alone, as well as for so much else, we give thanks today.

There is a verse in the psalms which spoke deeply to Tessa. It is from Psalm 56. ‘Put my tears in your bottle, O God. Are not these things noted in your book?' Bizarrely, as it may now seem to us, the ancient Jews had mourning bottles, little glass phials in which they used to collect their tears in bereavement. The psalmist is saying here that none of the tears that we shed in this life goes unnoticed by God. Indeed, he says, God collects them and notes them in his personal register. None of the tears that Tessa shed - and she shed more than most - have gone unnoticed by God. We rejoice today, in words from the Book of Revelation, that in the life she now shares with God ‘the former things have passed away’, and that at last for Tessa there is ‘an end to tears and to crying and to pain’ For God has made all things new.

Many lesser people would have been defeated by such a terrible childhood illness and the certain prospect of permanent disability, but not Tessa. Indeed her sense of vocation was forged in the crucible of her own suffering. At the age of ten - her family tells me - Tessa decided to become a doctor. Against all the odds she got to Oxford, read medicine at St Anne's and studied at the Radcliffe Infirmary, and qualified as a doctor. Her medical career took her successively from general practice initially in Epping and then in Highgate, to being a company doctor for the John Lewis Partnership. She then became a doctor and medical adviser for the student medical service of Imperial College, London; and most recently before the deterioration of her health forced her to take early retirement, she was an advocate on disability commissions and tribunals.

In my experience some doctors are outstanding in their diagnostic abilities, but when it comes to bedside manner or dealing with individuals can be not so good. Tessa proved to be a wonderful doctor on both counts. She was intelligent, sympathetic, intuitive, incisive, and warm. Unlike many of her medical colleagues she knew what it was to be a patient in hospital and to be seriously ill, and it had carved out within her a deep reservoir of compassion which never deserted her. Tessa was a wounded healer.

With good reason Tessa struggled to make sense of life, the world and the universe. Her faith gave her the framework and resources not merely to survive but to flourish. Like St Paul, she learned ‘to find resources within herself whatever her circumstances’. And in the church and its fellowship she found consolation and friendship. Her friends here at St Mary's became a second family to her. And it was through the church that she made a deep friendship that would last her lifetime.

At the age of 16 she went on retreat. It was led by Christopher Evans, then Chaplain of Corpus Christi, Oxford, but later to become Professor of New Testament at Durham and later still King's College, London. Christopher, now 96 and living in retirement outside Oxford, proved to be an inspiration to Tessa. More than that, following her bone graft after her hip was fixed in her early 20s, she lived with him and his wife in Durham during her long convalescence. They became good friends. 

In recent years following the death of his wife - and before Tessa's increasing disability meant that it became impossible for her to drive long distances - she and Christopher would tour France together, indulging their favourite pastime: exploring Romanesque churches. They liked nothing better than to sit in a field with a bottle of red wine, some bread and cheese, and put the world to rights.

Tessa was a collage of contrasts and contradictions. She was resilient, but vulnerable; strong but fragile; independently minded, but in frequent need of reassurance. She could stand up for herself and for the rights of other disabled people, but the next moment crumple. She was dutiful, caring, generous and loyal - she was fun.

She was also determined. In late middle-age she realised her long-cherished ambition to play the cello. She had been told that, given the nature of her disability, this would be impossible. Impossible was not a word in Tessa's vocabulary. Against all the odds she learned how to play, and the cello's melancholic voice perfectly resonated with her own. It gave her permission to express the intensity of her own inner journey. It is fitting, therefore, that we should have some chamber music in which to reflect and to give thanks for her life in a few moments.

When Judith was going through Tessa's things she found a poem folded into her filofax that had been written about her cello playing. The poem is entitled ‘Rondo’. You need to know that Christopher's nickname for Tessa was ‘zig’. I'd like to read it to you because it stands as a fitting coda for this address.

Cello hands and trumpet toes,
Piano ears, recorder nose,
    All help the doctor diagnose. 

Viola eyes and oboe lips,
With fluted thighs, triangle hips,
    All fit to launch a thousand ships. 

A fiddle back and trombone arms,
Cor anglais breasts, piccolo palms,
    All exercise symphonic charms.

When she's in comfort, and her tail's
At ease, and zeal for knitting fails,
    Hear Mermaid Zig perform with scales.

This morning's gospel is that set for Easter morning. There is no more appropriate reading for one who believed that in the end all will be harvest. ‘This is the will of the One who sent me,’ says Jesus, ‘that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.’ Tessa lived her life in the conviction that in the economy of God nothing in our lives is wasted or discarded, but everything will be redeemed and raised up. So let that be our prayer with her and for her today.

We give thanks to God for Tessa's life, her gifts, her friendship; and we commend her to God's gracious care with love. May she rest in peace and rise in glory.