The bells rang out from St Mark’s at the weekend to celebrate the church’s l50 years at its Darling Point home - but if the current shortage of bell ringers carries on, there are doubts that future anniversaries will be marked in the same way.

On any given Sunday members of this arcane fraternity wander from church to church- Catholic or Anglican, it doesn’t really matter - to ring the bells.

Basil Potts, tower captain at St Mark’s, fills the same role at Christ Church St Laurence on George Street.

Helen Whitsed, who is a student of Mr Potts and took up bell ringing a year ago at the age of 54 rings at three towers: St Mary’s Cathedral, Christ Church St Laurence and St Benedict’s Catholic church on Broadway. “I know of a group whose home tower is St Jude’s (Catholic Church) at Randwick, who go to St Benedict’s and then to St Andrew’s Anglican Cathedral,” she says. Some ringers are not religious. Others are, but - like Mr Potts -may be members of one congregation and attend another church as bell ringers.

It is, in every sense of the word, an ecumenical occupation.

Where the bells toll:
· St Benedict’s, Broadway
· St Paul’s, Burwood
· Wesleyan Chapel, Castlereagh

· St Mark’s, Darling Point
· All Saints, Parramatta
· St Jude’s, Randwick
· Christ Church St Laurence, George Street
· St Andrew’s Cathedral
· St Mary’s Cathedral
· St Philip’s, Church Hill
· St James, Turramurra

“There was a chap at St Mary’s who died in the bell tower not so long ago,” Mr Potts recalls.

“He was a Quaker. The ringers were very touched by his death and had a memorial service for him up in the tower which was conducted by the Dean of St Mary’.

“Then there’s a chap I taught from Malaysia who was quite hostile to any form of religion at all, but he just loved bell ringing. It’s an amazing little activity that people can take part in even if they’re not comfortable with church, or religion, itself.”

Ringing a bell “full-circle” means using a rope and wheel to turn the bell through 360 degrees - a skill ringers say does not require great physical strength. Mr Potts says all you need is to be “healthy enough to get up the stairs -

that takes more effort than to ring the bells”.

It often attracts “people with computer skills, the sort of people who are attracted to the mathematics of it”.

The Australian and New Zealand Association of Bell ringers says the simplest method is called Plain Hunt, when each pair of bells changes places, with the ringers having to memorise successive positions of their own bells.

It’s not surprising then that Mr Potts says “it does help if you can count backwards and hold two or three sets of figures in your mind at once.”

He estimates there are probably a couple of hundred bell ringers in Sydney, many of whom learn young, drop out during the busy years of marriage and children, then come back to it later in life.

Apart from ringing for services, the commitment also extends to weddings and other special events, as well as regular practice sessions.

But for Ms Whitsed, bell-ringing is just “huge fun”.

“There’s nothing but the personal satisfaction and pleasure of doing it well and being associated with people who share your enthusiasm.”

Geraldine O’Brien
Heritage Writer