Liverpool's rebirth predicted by Worlock

by Rita Wall
ARCHBISHOP Derek Worlock looked forward to the renewal of Liverpool in his sermon at the city's civic mass in the Metropolitan cathedral last week.
With the Merseyside city's council leaders in the congregation, Archbishop Worlock asked that they persevere with their plans to rejuvenate Liverpool, and praised Liverpudlians "who refused to be got down or to be put down, or to give up".
Archbishop Worlock emphasised in particular the renewal of Liverpool's port facilities as a result of the Mersey barrage, the development of its airport and the planned growth of railway infra-structure to link the northwest to the Channel Tunnel and therefore. European markets.
Public and private sector partnership was essential to the rejuvenation of Liverpool, the archbishop said, and he praised the 1991/2 Urban Programme Strategy Statement produced by the city council, which emphasised such co-operation.
"No-one who has tried to engage in the work of reconciliation will consider that an easy task", he went on. "It requires courage and perseverance and a willingness to sustain criticism as a result of misunderstanding or misrepresentation". In such a course the church was alongside the people of Liverpool, he added.