Kevin Lambert, a member of the Newman Association for sixty years and former President, died on June 28th aged 86. A long-time member of the Coventry Circle, he made outstanding contributions to the Association including organising eleven Newman pilgrimages across the Middle East and Europe, editing the Council newsletter, and serving as Newman representative on Pax Romana.
Kevin Lambert, a member of the Newman Association for sixty years, and a huge contributor to the Association's activities during much of that time, died on June 28th aged 86. A long-time member of the Coventry Circle, he became a leading figure on the national Council, including a term as President between 1993 and 1995, and made several particularly important contributions.
For example, he was the Newman representative on Pax Romana for many years. This provided international connections which may have encouraged him to organise a series of Newman Pilgrimages. These took Newman members around large parts of the Middle East, including Israel, Turkey, Syria and Egypt, at a time when political conditions were more favourable than they have subsequently become. With the Middle East remaining in turmoil more recent pilgrimages have been confined to Italy and Cyprus.
After a Circle Officers' Conference had called for better communications between Council and the Circles, he took up the further challenge of editing an email newsletter sent out to Circle Secretaries to supplement the occasional journal The Newman. These were mainly linked to the regular meetings of Council.
A native of Lancashire, from Blackburn, Kevin studied physics at Leeds University and embarked on a career of teaching and lecturing. He was an active member of the Association for Sciences Education. He organised science field courses as part of his work for the National Association for Able Children in Education. After retirement he became Chair of Governors at Our Lady of the Assumption School in Coventry.
The Newman Pilgrimages
Meanwhile he was developing his Newman activities. The pilgrimages began with a visit to the Holy Land in April, 1997, and they continued every 12 or 18 months in the spring or autumn each year to Istanbul, Greece, Italy, Anatolia and Syria, with a visit to Santiago de Compostela in between in 2004. The most challenging pilgrimage was probably to Egypt in 2007, and Kevin contributed a personal report on that journey to the May 2021 issue of The Newman. It did not help that the pilgrimage clashed with the dates of that year's Ramadan so hotels were difficult, one being described by Kevin's wife Freda as "a run-down holiday camp". However, there was the highlight of a night-time ascent of Mount Sinai which ten brave pilgrims signed up for. He wrote that the path up the mountain was boulder-strewn but well-marked although "I soon learned, the hard way, that camels have right of way". Kevin's final pilgrimage, the eleventh, when he was already suffering from health problems, was to Rome and Assisi in 2012.
Eventually drastic brain surgery was required to save his life. As a consequence he suffered physical disabilities, including speech problems, but he lived on for a number of years and he refused to cease his activities with the Association. In particular he continued to produce the Newsletter and there were in all 99 of these published until he finally resigned in April this year, after an Easter Newsletter, only a few weeks before his death. He also continued his lifelong love of walking but instead of the long hikes across the Lake District, Yorkshire, Scotland and Wales which he once enjoyed he had to be content with local routes.
Besides his connection over a long period to Pax Romana Kevin also accepted the responsibility of representing the Newman on the National Council for Lay Associations, which reports to the Bishops' Conference. For Pax Romana he agreed to organise a gathering in the UK in 2009 which took place at the High Leigh conference centre in Hertfordshire. He gathered charitable funds to help finance this event.
Well into his 80s he continued to be active. When Fr Fabian Radcliffe retired as national Chaplain in 2018 the search was on for a successor. Kevin remembered that Mgr Patrick Kilgarriff had been the chaplain for the Newman's Seven Churches Pilgrimage to Asia Minor in 1999. A highlight had been the celebration of Mass using a gravestone as an altar at the Anzac cemetery at Gallipoli overlooking the Bosphorus. He contacted Fr Pat, who had subsequently been appointed Rector of the Venerable English College in Rome, but by 2018 was about to retire as a Parish Priest in Malvern, and he agreed to be the new National Chaplain.
Kevin Lambert is badly missed. He has been a great source of energy and initiative for the Newman Association. Requiescat in pace.
B.R.