anglican focus

The news site of the Anglican Church Southern Queensland: nourishing and connecting our faith community

Music teacher and Receptionist at St Martin’s House, Ann St

Frances Thompson

About Frances -

Frances Thompson is a music teacher and currently a Receptionist at St Martin’s House.  She sings Evensong at St John’s Cathedral, and also worships at many Southern Region churches, accompanying her husband, Bishop John Roundhill. She has a Bachelor of Arts from Lancaster University, UK,  with a special interest in orchestral strings, Kodaly singing and handbells.

Frances writes on -

Articles by Frances

Reflections Woman with cochlear implant playing violin Reflections

Hearing in stereo again

“Today my lithium ion rechargeable batteries are small and the CI connects to my phone via Bluetooth. I can choose to listen to podcasts with the audio sent directly to the implant, with no need for earbuds. There is a reason that the cochlear implant is also known as the ‘bionic ear’ — the technology is truly marvellous,” says Frances Thompson

Features Features

News from an Anglican missionary in Africa

“I am now pretty fit in myself and am spending a few days slacking, on Doctor’s orders, except for writing sermons for Holy Week and Easter and then translating them into Chinyanja. Learning the local language has been a trial for me, but I am aware of the immense privilege I have in ministering to the folk,” as described by The Rev’d Harold Aldwyn Machell Cox CBE, the great-granduncle of Frances Thompson, in a series of family letters called ‘The Budget’, which is held in the famous Bodleian Library

"Photo taken by The Rev’d Edmund Machell Cox of the bomb damage of St Bartholomew's Anglican Church, Hallam Fields in January 1916 and of two officials inspecting the damage, including a middle-class gent wearing a hat and a black mourning armband and a working-class gent wearing a flat cap"
Features

The night the Zeppelin bombs fell

“The Vicar’s wife and the Sunday School teachers should have been meeting in the Parish Room, but the meeting was serendipitously moved to the Parsonage, where they could have coffee afterwards. Plans altered, for no particular reason. While the Parish Room was destroyed in the bombing, tears of joy and relief came later,” says Frances Thompson in her retelling of her great-grandfather’s real-life account
Features

Advent serendipity

In this special Advent tale, Frances Thompson tells us about her serendipitous birth on the first day of Advent in 1970 and about a surprising find in Oxford’s famous Bodleian Library

Features

Three Anglican priests, 10 siblings, a dog named ‘Satan’ and hundreds of letters

“Picture, if you will, a large extended family on holiday in Porlock, Somerset, in the south west of England. The date is August 1906 and the family have taken rooms at Birchanger Farm for a month where they have been enjoying excursions, bicycling, walking and bathing,” writes Frances Thompson following her discovery that the famous Bodleian Library holds hundreds of her family’s letters, dating back to the early 1900s

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