Ann and I had a pleasant walk yesterday which took in a short section of the Offa's Dyke Path along the banks of the Severn. It was a beautiful afternoon, and there was plenty to see - and to hear. We were able to draw quite close to an oystercatcher, prospecting for worms and other invertebrates at the top of the bank. It eventually did fly, calling shrilly as it did so. We followed along the path, and - having paused to search for a drake goosander we'd noticed flying in - were startled by a sudden burst of what one can only describe as oystercatcher swear-words! All was explained as we saw three oystercatchers fly up from a point some distance away on the opposite bank. The one we'd flushed earlier had clearly met up with a pair, and the conversation between them was a fierce one. The three birds flew high over the trees being very noisy, and then, after some aerial jostling, the pair flew together back to "their" place on the bank, while the solo bird disappeared upriver.
Observing probably the same three birds a week or two back, at Llyn Coed y Dinas, I was struck by the behaviour of the pair when the solo bird arrived to join them on an island. They were, again, quite noisy, and moved side by side and in step around the island with heads down so that their long bills were pointing straight downwards. This presumably demonstrated their commitment to each other; certainly, it was an aggressive enough response to unsettle the third bird, which seemed to flinch away from this activity before flying off.
Saturday, 31 March 2012
Friday, 30 March 2012
Judas
A poem which may connect into some of my reflections on faith and religion, and which I gladly offer for all to read as Holy Week approaches:
If you ask the folk who knew me
just what kind of man I was,
I wonder now what answers you might get?
I signed up in all good faith, and I hung on his every word,
for he told us things nobody could forget.
I joined a march to freedom, I was ready for the fight,
and I’m sure the others saw it that way too,
but when we reached the holy city,
something happened, I don’t know, and yet
it seemed somehow he wasn’t coming through.
All our people cried ‘Hosanna!’
and they hailed him as their king -
well, they’d seen down by the lake what he could do;
but the people of the city, they looked down on us in scorn -
“A messiah from the north? That can’t be true!”
When he went into the temple,
turned their tables, broke their stalls, I thought
“Well, now we’ll see this city set alight!”
But then he seemed to pause, as though he wasn’t really sure,
as if he didn’t have the stomach for the fight.
I did not sign up for failing, Judas here goes all the way,
I stayed with him, he would not be left alone.
We had come to make him king,
and he could trust me, through and through,
for I’d not rest till he was seated on that throne.
So it was me, I set it up,
I brought the high priests and the guard,
and he knew what I was doing all along;
this is where the fight begins, I thought,
it’s revolution time - so tell,
how could a man like me have got it wrong?
For he talked about the kingdom, told us tales
to make it clear,
and yet somehow I had never understood;
he stirred dreams in me of David,
of a palace and a crown,
but he made his only throne a cross of wood.
As from the shadows by the path
I watched them dragging him away;
there were shadows in my heart - by God above,
as I knot this cord for hanging,
tell me, any who can hear,
just how you’d have better served the King of love?
If you ask the folk who knew me
just what kind of man I was,
I wonder now what answers you might get?
I signed up in all good faith, and I hung on his every word,
for he told us things nobody could forget.
I joined a march to freedom, I was ready for the fight,
and I’m sure the others saw it that way too,
but when we reached the holy city,
something happened, I don’t know, and yet
it seemed somehow he wasn’t coming through.
All our people cried ‘Hosanna!’
and they hailed him as their king -
well, they’d seen down by the lake what he could do;
but the people of the city, they looked down on us in scorn -
“A messiah from the north? That can’t be true!”
When he went into the temple,
turned their tables, broke their stalls, I thought
“Well, now we’ll see this city set alight!”
But then he seemed to pause, as though he wasn’t really sure,
as if he didn’t have the stomach for the fight.
I did not sign up for failing, Judas here goes all the way,
I stayed with him, he would not be left alone.
We had come to make him king,
and he could trust me, through and through,
for I’d not rest till he was seated on that throne.
So it was me, I set it up,
I brought the high priests and the guard,
and he knew what I was doing all along;
this is where the fight begins, I thought,
it’s revolution time - so tell,
how could a man like me have got it wrong?
For he talked about the kingdom, told us tales
to make it clear,
and yet somehow I had never understood;
he stirred dreams in me of David,
of a palace and a crown,
but he made his only throne a cross of wood.
As from the shadows by the path
I watched them dragging him away;
there were shadows in my heart - by God above,
as I knot this cord for hanging,
tell me, any who can hear,
just how you’d have better served the King of love?
Faith and Religion (1)
As I begin to consider the relationship between faith and religion, one thing I'd want to say straight away is that it isn't a simple matter of "faith good, religion bad". It's easy - too easy - to make that a default position in these Postmodern times when everyone seems to have the freedom to choose and create their own truth. In fact, for me, there is a necessary relationship between faith and religion that needs to be considered carefully and nurtured well, in order to keep things balanced and focused.
Faith without religion lacks coherence, discipline and purpose; the structures of religion provide the context within which faith may be shared, questioned, debated, enriched, directed, challenged, and find a use and focus in worship, outreach and social action. But religion can very easily become something that is essentially faithless; faith needs the space to breathe, to invent, to experiment, to travel, and where religion requires a fixed and rigid form of faith, it will become what most fixed and rigid things are - dead. And religion then becomes something that is essentially self-serving, rather than God-seeking.
Like any human organisations, religions are able to acquire power, wealth, prestige and all the other trappings of worldly success and status. This is a sickness to which all religions are vulnerable, upon which which faith can act as a disturbing, disruptive but ultimately cleansing and healing agent. Worldly and self-seeking religion has historically decided where it has wanted to go, and then chosen a reading of its holy scriptures to justify this, allowing God to be the uncritical source of blessing for all that was being done in his name. The faith of mystics, reformers and social pioneers has, in ways sometimes gentle, sometimes traumatic, been the necessary antidote, through which a real awareness of God at liberty among us, and no longer safely tucked away in a reliquary or a dusty library, has been restored.
This, at any rate, seems to be a continuing theme throughout Christian history. At present, in the Western Church, we have a religion that remains quite powerful in worldly terms, but which has been steadily losing the influence it has been used to having, and not liking that very much. It has enjoyed the powerful role it has been able to hold as a more or less unquestioned right in what is still a nominally Christian society, and now finds its sense of its own identity challenged as that status and role in society is being bypassed and eroded. The Church has attempted to deal with this by finding new ways of being powerful and holding influence, new areas in which it can carve out a role - when perhaps what we need to be doing as Christ's people is to learn how to be weak, how to live without power, how not to have a place.
I feel sure that as part of this process we shall need to discover how to be Church in a different way, with less emphasis on structure, hierarchy and ceremonial, certainly less sense of our place within society, but more emphasis on what it may mean to be a pilgrim people, and on the nurturing and encouragement of perhaps quite disparate expressions of faith. To those to whom the existing structures are all-important, this may feel rather like ceasing to be Church at all - but what I see here is a necessary rebalancing of the relationship between religion and faith. Anyway, that's a thought to which I'll return in due course. These are very much reflections in real time!
Faith without religion lacks coherence, discipline and purpose; the structures of religion provide the context within which faith may be shared, questioned, debated, enriched, directed, challenged, and find a use and focus in worship, outreach and social action. But religion can very easily become something that is essentially faithless; faith needs the space to breathe, to invent, to experiment, to travel, and where religion requires a fixed and rigid form of faith, it will become what most fixed and rigid things are - dead. And religion then becomes something that is essentially self-serving, rather than God-seeking.
Like any human organisations, religions are able to acquire power, wealth, prestige and all the other trappings of worldly success and status. This is a sickness to which all religions are vulnerable, upon which which faith can act as a disturbing, disruptive but ultimately cleansing and healing agent. Worldly and self-seeking religion has historically decided where it has wanted to go, and then chosen a reading of its holy scriptures to justify this, allowing God to be the uncritical source of blessing for all that was being done in his name. The faith of mystics, reformers and social pioneers has, in ways sometimes gentle, sometimes traumatic, been the necessary antidote, through which a real awareness of God at liberty among us, and no longer safely tucked away in a reliquary or a dusty library, has been restored.
This, at any rate, seems to be a continuing theme throughout Christian history. At present, in the Western Church, we have a religion that remains quite powerful in worldly terms, but which has been steadily losing the influence it has been used to having, and not liking that very much. It has enjoyed the powerful role it has been able to hold as a more or less unquestioned right in what is still a nominally Christian society, and now finds its sense of its own identity challenged as that status and role in society is being bypassed and eroded. The Church has attempted to deal with this by finding new ways of being powerful and holding influence, new areas in which it can carve out a role - when perhaps what we need to be doing as Christ's people is to learn how to be weak, how to live without power, how not to have a place.
I feel sure that as part of this process we shall need to discover how to be Church in a different way, with less emphasis on structure, hierarchy and ceremonial, certainly less sense of our place within society, but more emphasis on what it may mean to be a pilgrim people, and on the nurturing and encouragement of perhaps quite disparate expressions of faith. To those to whom the existing structures are all-important, this may feel rather like ceasing to be Church at all - but what I see here is a necessary rebalancing of the relationship between religion and faith. Anyway, that's a thought to which I'll return in due course. These are very much reflections in real time!
Thursday, 29 March 2012
Panic
I've been over to Stafford today, to visit my mother, and I always fill up with diesel when I'm there, as it is anything up to 7p per litre cheaper than it is at home, a difference in price I find it hard to justify. So I refute any allegation that I was "panic-buying" in response to some ill-advised ministerial statements (or, maybe, a bit of political sh*t stirring by a government feeling under pressure from the bad press the budget "granny tax" and the latest "cash for favours" story have brought them); I'd have been there anyway, I insist! But of course all the people queuing up with me will have been panic buying!
How helpless we are without our machines and the fuel to run them! Modern society comes across as so in control, so self-assured, so sorted. We're well and happy, aren't we, and so secure? Or might it all be a house of cards? That urge to panic is never far below the surface. We keep telling ourselves how safe and secure we are, but that worm of disbelief is always gnawing away within us.
We find ourselves thinking, "Surely this is all too good to be true?" Well, I hope we do, at least sometimes, anyway, because it is. I'm told that we need three planet earths to sustain the standard of living expected in Western Europe, five planet earths to support the people of the USA in the style to which they've become accustomed. That's how unsafe we are; that's how unreal the world we're living in is. Well, we have committed ourselves to sorting out the country's finances, or so our politicians assure us. They have a plan, they say, and it's already working. And yet, the sad truth is that for the foreseeable future, however far ahead we look, we'll still be borrowing, just to keep afloat.
And - while we do our best to hold the panic and desperation at bay - where most of us are (me too, if I'm honest) is that we want to see it all sorted out, glad to see some tough decisions and hard line policies, supportive of cuts - just so long as it all happens somewhere else and to someone else and doesn't really hurt me. In other words, not in the real world; someone else can have that.
How helpless we are without our machines and the fuel to run them! Modern society comes across as so in control, so self-assured, so sorted. We're well and happy, aren't we, and so secure? Or might it all be a house of cards? That urge to panic is never far below the surface. We keep telling ourselves how safe and secure we are, but that worm of disbelief is always gnawing away within us.
We find ourselves thinking, "Surely this is all too good to be true?" Well, I hope we do, at least sometimes, anyway, because it is. I'm told that we need three planet earths to sustain the standard of living expected in Western Europe, five planet earths to support the people of the USA in the style to which they've become accustomed. That's how unsafe we are; that's how unreal the world we're living in is. Well, we have committed ourselves to sorting out the country's finances, or so our politicians assure us. They have a plan, they say, and it's already working. And yet, the sad truth is that for the foreseeable future, however far ahead we look, we'll still be borrowing, just to keep afloat.
And - while we do our best to hold the panic and desperation at bay - where most of us are (me too, if I'm honest) is that we want to see it all sorted out, glad to see some tough decisions and hard line policies, supportive of cuts - just so long as it all happens somewhere else and to someone else and doesn't really hurt me. In other words, not in the real world; someone else can have that.
Tuesday, 27 March 2012
Monty Don
Another thing Monty Don was quoted as saying (in my 'Times' last weekend) was that though he firmly believed in God, he was not a churchman as he did not feel the need to 'join a gang'. I am growing less and less church-minded, I find, mostly because the sheer weight of the organisation seems to me these days to be demanding so much of the members, using up so much of their energy. I have been reflecting, with the Psalms, as ever, before me, on the distinction between religion and faith. As something like a conclusion forms for me, I'll maybe return to this as a theme and share some of what I've found.
Feeding the Five Thousand
I was reading the story the other day, in the version given in chapter six of St Mark's Gospel, when it suddenly hit me. My apologies to those for whom this isn't a new idea, but it hadn't really broken through into my consciousness before - the direct connection there is between this story and our prayers.
I think that when we say prayers of intercession, whether in church on a Sunday or in our own private daily prayers, very often we're hoping for God to wave a magic wand and to make everything all right. And that's exactly what Jesus seems to be doing in this miraculous event. All these hungry people, out there in the remote place where Jesus had really gone in the hope of escaping from people - all of them were fed, and with food left over besides.
And yes, this is a story that speaks of the divine creative power that rests in Jesus and is at his disposal, and which is here seen expressed in a miracle of provision. But it isn't only that. Jesus doesn't magic the food out of nowhere. And here for me is an important little detail: what he says to his disciples, what he asks of them.
He does not say "What can you spare?" - he says "What have you got?" He does not ask from his disciples a charitable donation, he asks them to hand over all they've got. It isn't much, but that doesn't matter. It is all they've got, and when that is given, a miracle takes place.
If in our prayer we're secretly hoping that God might act so that we don't have to, our prayers will seem to be unanswered, I guess. If in our prayer we're offering a carefully measured and rationed out bit of ourselves to God, then - well, if we're offering something then I suppose something will be given in return, but it's hardly going to change the world, though it might just begin to be the start of changing us. But it's when we take the risk of offering everything that miracles happen. When our prayer for peace adds those wonderful words that we sing but don't always really mean, ". . . and let it begin with me."
Well, as I say, probably not a new thought, but it came fresh to me as I was reflecting on the story. It seems to make sense to my life and to my striving for faith; and perhaps it will add life and fire and a certain rash boldness to my praying. So I gladly share it with you.
I think that when we say prayers of intercession, whether in church on a Sunday or in our own private daily prayers, very often we're hoping for God to wave a magic wand and to make everything all right. And that's exactly what Jesus seems to be doing in this miraculous event. All these hungry people, out there in the remote place where Jesus had really gone in the hope of escaping from people - all of them were fed, and with food left over besides.
And yes, this is a story that speaks of the divine creative power that rests in Jesus and is at his disposal, and which is here seen expressed in a miracle of provision. But it isn't only that. Jesus doesn't magic the food out of nowhere. And here for me is an important little detail: what he says to his disciples, what he asks of them.
He does not say "What can you spare?" - he says "What have you got?" He does not ask from his disciples a charitable donation, he asks them to hand over all they've got. It isn't much, but that doesn't matter. It is all they've got, and when that is given, a miracle takes place.
If in our prayer we're secretly hoping that God might act so that we don't have to, our prayers will seem to be unanswered, I guess. If in our prayer we're offering a carefully measured and rationed out bit of ourselves to God, then - well, if we're offering something then I suppose something will be given in return, but it's hardly going to change the world, though it might just begin to be the start of changing us. But it's when we take the risk of offering everything that miracles happen. When our prayer for peace adds those wonderful words that we sing but don't always really mean, ". . . and let it begin with me."
Well, as I say, probably not a new thought, but it came fresh to me as I was reflecting on the story. It seems to make sense to my life and to my striving for faith; and perhaps it will add life and fire and a certain rash boldness to my praying. So I gladly share it with you.
Chiffchaffs
I've been waiting for a while to hear my first returning chiffchaff of the year, always a sound to gladden my heart. There've been reports of chiffchaffs heard around here for a week or more, but I'd not managed to hear one, until yesterday, that is. And all of a sudden they were everywhere! In fact, such is my contrary nature, it wasn't long before secretly I was begging them to belt up so I could listen to some of the other spring birds instead. But really, I'm glad they're around. Small birds, nondescript in appearance, really, but such a bright and lovely call.
Monday, 26 March 2012
Thought For The Week
"With the crumbling physical sense of getting older, I am very aware that I mustn't waste life."
Monty Don (who goes on to say, "Instead of making me want to trample the Earth, go to the Moon or jump off bridges on elastic bands, it makes me want to sit very still and pay attention.")
Monty Don (who goes on to say, "Instead of making me want to trample the Earth, go to the Moon or jump off bridges on elastic bands, it makes me want to sit very still and pay attention.")
Ouch!
It's been a few days since I last posted anything, and that's partly because it isn't easy to do that from a horizontal position. Last week I had a definite intimation of mortality when my back, very suddenly and quite decisively, "went"! One moment I was fine, and the next I couldn't move a step. I was in spasm, I guess, with pain building on pain. After a couple of days floating around on codeine I'm better than I was, thank you . . . still a twinge or two, mind. Nor did I miss a day's work, but I missed mostly everything else, including one significant family event. When you're used to being fit, it's pretty tough when you get to the stage of not being able to even walk across the room, let alone get into your car and drive.
Strangely, on Saturday I was fine . . . too fine, to be honest, I did all kinds of things I shouldn't, totally over-estimated my powers of recovery, and put things out again. But it did mean I was able to get to the Minsterley Eisteddfod, compete in a number of classes, and come away with two firsts and three seconds. That was, I think, my most successful day at the Eisteddfod, though others did even better. A lot of eisteddfodau and local music festivals have bitten the dust over the years; I'm glad to see Minsterley continue, and, indeed, make it to fifty years old this year. I'm glad not only because it gives oldsters like me a chance to shine, before our spines completely crumble and we're stuck in bathchairs, but because it gives young people a chance to perform, to learn, to achieve, to make something of their talents. And they were certainly there at Minsterley. I missed most of the day session, when children and young people compete, as I was busy at home doing all the things that did my back in again - mostly trying to re-start a recalcitrant lawn-mower - but it was well-attended and there was some real young talent on display, so I'm told. The younger element was very present, and, I have to admit, far more talented and successful than me, in the adult evening classes too, and everyone received encouragement and useful advice from the excellent adjudicators. Long may it continue!
Ann and I went back to Minsterley last night (in my case, well fuelled with pain-killers) for the celebration concert, which featured the very entertaining Wessex Male Voice Choir. The place was packed, I'm pleased to note, and everyone went home happy (including the choir, who probably got home to Wiltshire somewhere around dawn this morning, I should think). Thank God for the gift of music - and for those who work so hard to encourage it!
And - though I am up and about this morning - ouch (still)! My b----y back!
Strangely, on Saturday I was fine . . . too fine, to be honest, I did all kinds of things I shouldn't, totally over-estimated my powers of recovery, and put things out again. But it did mean I was able to get to the Minsterley Eisteddfod, compete in a number of classes, and come away with two firsts and three seconds. That was, I think, my most successful day at the Eisteddfod, though others did even better. A lot of eisteddfodau and local music festivals have bitten the dust over the years; I'm glad to see Minsterley continue, and, indeed, make it to fifty years old this year. I'm glad not only because it gives oldsters like me a chance to shine, before our spines completely crumble and we're stuck in bathchairs, but because it gives young people a chance to perform, to learn, to achieve, to make something of their talents. And they were certainly there at Minsterley. I missed most of the day session, when children and young people compete, as I was busy at home doing all the things that did my back in again - mostly trying to re-start a recalcitrant lawn-mower - but it was well-attended and there was some real young talent on display, so I'm told. The younger element was very present, and, I have to admit, far more talented and successful than me, in the adult evening classes too, and everyone received encouragement and useful advice from the excellent adjudicators. Long may it continue!
Ann and I went back to Minsterley last night (in my case, well fuelled with pain-killers) for the celebration concert, which featured the very entertaining Wessex Male Voice Choir. The place was packed, I'm pleased to note, and everyone went home happy (including the choir, who probably got home to Wiltshire somewhere around dawn this morning, I should think). Thank God for the gift of music - and for those who work so hard to encourage it!
And - though I am up and about this morning - ouch (still)! My b----y back!
Tuesday, 20 March 2012
Leaving (2)
Sometimes we may find ourselves thinking that a new awakening, to vocation, purpose, self-identity, in our lives is bound to require us to leave where we are. For some that may be true; not for all, though. Here is a story from Hindu tradition.
A young man had felt growing within him a sense of God's call. For months he wrestled with it, in the quiet moments in which he reflected and prayed. The call grew stronger, until in the end it could not be denied.
In the silent hours of darkness, as his wife and young children lay sleeping, he rose from his bed. Leaving behind all his possessions, he tiptoed from the house, and, long before dawn, he was away, out on the road, beginning his new life as a sadhu, as a wandering holy man.
Back in the young man's house, and as his family slept on, the God wept tears of compassion and bitter frustration. "Why is it," he asked, "that those who sense my call in their lives should feel the need to leave the place where I dwell in order to go out in the world to find me?"
A young man had felt growing within him a sense of God's call. For months he wrestled with it, in the quiet moments in which he reflected and prayed. The call grew stronger, until in the end it could not be denied.
In the silent hours of darkness, as his wife and young children lay sleeping, he rose from his bed. Leaving behind all his possessions, he tiptoed from the house, and, long before dawn, he was away, out on the road, beginning his new life as a sadhu, as a wandering holy man.
Back in the young man's house, and as his family slept on, the God wept tears of compassion and bitter frustration. "Why is it," he asked, "that those who sense my call in their lives should feel the need to leave the place where I dwell in order to go out in the world to find me?"
Leaving
Someone once said that our whole journey through life is really just the process of leaving. Obviously, this must have been a very wise person, since I'm left wondering exactly what his words really mean! For the believer, life, even as a vale of tears, can be seen as a preparation for the life beyond, for eternity; he or she will be aiming to live this life with the leaving of it very much in mind ("Live this day as if thy last" - as the morning hymn reminds us). For the unbeliever this life is all there is: after death, nothing; yet even so, the journey of life is again and again about leaving. We move from place to place, and from relationship to relationship (and even within a relationship, its essential nature will change over time). We leave behind the things of childhood, the excesses and passions or youth, and, eventually, the certainties, clear vision and strength of body that in our middle years we thought we'd keep for ever. There's much else we leave - that's in the nature of a journey.
The funeral I attended and assisted at today was a secular one, though much of what it contained suggested a hope if not a firm expectation of an existence beyond this one, and of being re-united with friends. It was well taken, and it was both a celebration of a life and of the person whose life it was, and a statement of the love and affection within which that person will live on, at least in memory. And of course, it was also a leave-taking; we leave people and places and circumstances - and they also leave us. And we need to mark that, to take time to consider, reflect, pray if that's what we do, in order to cope with the change.
We need ways, ceremonies, words, music that enable us to cope with leaving, and with being left. Religion can provide these, but sometimes, perhaps too often in the past, what it has provided has been impersonal at a time when the personal is most important, demanding at a time when people have least to give, dogmatic at a time when people are least sure about what they believe. Thankfully, most of the church funerals I have recently attended have been better at that - but, dare I say, they have been better at least in part because they have sat lightly both to the liturgical material and, more importantly, to some of the liturgical instructions. It is better for the Christian minister to give a sense of his or her own faith without requiring too much of others, than for a service to insist that all who attend pretend to a faith they may not share; and it is better for a family to feel received, supported, nourished, cuddled even, than to be sermonised at or to have imposed upon them a liturgical exactness sure to pass over most heads.
It's pleasing and reassuring to find there's been a fair amount of change for the better - certainly from the days long ago when as a green young curate I was advised not even to mention the name of the deceased in the service, and certainly never to use affectionate family or nick-names. In those days, it seemed (or was made to seem) to us more important to be doing the right thing liturgically - and therefore requiring people to conform to that - than to be creating sacred space in which family and friends can do the leave-taking they need to do, in a way that makes sense where they find themselves to be.
The funeral I attended and assisted at today was a secular one, though much of what it contained suggested a hope if not a firm expectation of an existence beyond this one, and of being re-united with friends. It was well taken, and it was both a celebration of a life and of the person whose life it was, and a statement of the love and affection within which that person will live on, at least in memory. And of course, it was also a leave-taking; we leave people and places and circumstances - and they also leave us. And we need to mark that, to take time to consider, reflect, pray if that's what we do, in order to cope with the change.
We need ways, ceremonies, words, music that enable us to cope with leaving, and with being left. Religion can provide these, but sometimes, perhaps too often in the past, what it has provided has been impersonal at a time when the personal is most important, demanding at a time when people have least to give, dogmatic at a time when people are least sure about what they believe. Thankfully, most of the church funerals I have recently attended have been better at that - but, dare I say, they have been better at least in part because they have sat lightly both to the liturgical material and, more importantly, to some of the liturgical instructions. It is better for the Christian minister to give a sense of his or her own faith without requiring too much of others, than for a service to insist that all who attend pretend to a faith they may not share; and it is better for a family to feel received, supported, nourished, cuddled even, than to be sermonised at or to have imposed upon them a liturgical exactness sure to pass over most heads.
It's pleasing and reassuring to find there's been a fair amount of change for the better - certainly from the days long ago when as a green young curate I was advised not even to mention the name of the deceased in the service, and certainly never to use affectionate family or nick-names. In those days, it seemed (or was made to seem) to us more important to be doing the right thing liturgically - and therefore requiring people to conform to that - than to be creating sacred space in which family and friends can do the leave-taking they need to do, in a way that makes sense where they find themselves to be.
Thought For The Week
"Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent."
Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo
Friday, 16 March 2012
Ash & Bone
I was persuaded a little while ago to start reading the crime novels of John Harvey; and, having a passing acquaintanceship with Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire (and jazz, and Poland, come to that), I very much enjoyed his tightly plotted stories featuring Charlie Resnick. He is an excellent and very convincing writer of the 'police procedural' type of crime novel. "Ash & Bone", which I've just finished reading, is the first of his Frank Elder novels I've read (though in fact the second in the series, which might have slightly spoiled the first for me, when I get to it!), and I've been quite blown away by it. Here and there I'm reminded of John le Carre, and, throughout, I've been impressed by the convincing interplay between the three more or less separate crime cases under investigation. It all feels very real.
When this novel was first issued in 2005, one report read that it was "one of the best crime books you're likely to read this year." My verdict? Well, this kind of novel is one of my favourite choices of reading, and yes, it really is that good.
When this novel was first issued in 2005, one report read that it was "one of the best crime books you're likely to read this year." My verdict? Well, this kind of novel is one of my favourite choices of reading, and yes, it really is that good.
Thursday, 15 March 2012
Allegri . . . and brambles
Ann and I have just got home from choir practice. We shall be singing the Allegri 'Miserere' on 31st March at St Mary's, Welshpool (also the Faure 'Requiem' and 'Cantique de Jean Racine'). The Miserere is not a particularly complex piece of choral music, compared to some, but it is both stunningly beautiful and extraordinarily difficult to sing well. It is one of those pieces that it is a privilege to sing; and we find ourselves really working hard to live up to that sense of privilege, and to the sublime quality of the composition, in the way we deliver it. Not long to go - and I'm still pondering over how we'll cope with the very different acoustics of St Mary's, as compared to the hall in which we practise.
I've also spent a happy couple of hours today rooting out weeds from a very overrun border, for a lady the back garden of whose flat backs onto farm land around Powis Castle. So all sorts of things have invaded her garden, including some quite voracious nettles and brambles. I think I shall have some aching bones tomorrow. Anyway, two very different activities, but a real sense of achievement, conquest even, each time: hearing our voices blend in this holy music, and looking at the well worked soil and spring bulbs after my hard work removing brambles!
I've also spent a happy couple of hours today rooting out weeds from a very overrun border, for a lady the back garden of whose flat backs onto farm land around Powis Castle. So all sorts of things have invaded her garden, including some quite voracious nettles and brambles. I think I shall have some aching bones tomorrow. Anyway, two very different activities, but a real sense of achievement, conquest even, each time: hearing our voices blend in this holy music, and looking at the well worked soil and spring bulbs after my hard work removing brambles!
Tuesday, 13 March 2012
The Call
When Christ Jesus says “Come,” keep these thoughts close at heart,
for our journey in him must have faith as its start:
the first thing to know is the price we must pay;
when we give of ourselves, he’ll support us each day.
There’s a path to be taken, Christ walked it before,
when he called Simon Peter, along the sea shore,
saying, “Come, follow me, do the things that I do.”
And when we walk this path with a faith that is true,
when we keep to his will, when we rise to the test,
he is goodness and mercy, in him we’ll be blessed.
“Do not be discouraged,” this promise we know -
the Lord will be with us wherever we go.
for our journey in him must have faith as its start:
the first thing to know is the price we must pay;
when we give of ourselves, he’ll support us each day.
There’s a path to be taken, Christ walked it before,
when he called Simon Peter, along the sea shore,
saying, “Come, follow me, do the things that I do.”
And when we walk this path with a faith that is true,
when we keep to his will, when we rise to the test,
he is goodness and mercy, in him we’ll be blessed.
“Do not be discouraged,” this promise we know -
the Lord will be with us wherever we go.
Hospital
A journey to the hospital last night, to see the specialist regarding a possible colon problem. As it was an evening appointment, the hospital outpatients' department was fairly quiet, though there were a fair number of takers for this clinic. The atmosphere in the waiting area was fairly tense - long periods of silence alternating with short bursts of rather forced jollity. Not many of us were on their own, like me, but families sat quietly or conversed in virtual whispers.
The consultant himself was pleasant, positive and brisk. My symptoms need not mean anything serious. They are quite mild, and may in part be caused by certain medication I'm taking; however, I have a low iron count, which is a slight cause for concern when taken along with the rest. I may have a bit of a wait before I'm called in for tests, but they will be thoroughgoing (cameras inserted from both top and bottom ends, if you take my meaning). "Think of it as an MOT," as the doctor put it.
My concern isn't completely removed, of course, but my mind was somewhat eased as I made my way home. But for some of those in the waiting area with me, the news received or awaited has, or will have, changed their lives for ever. I'm glad of the practical and positive approach taken by staff, and presented in the ambience of the place. I expect to be back for a rather more tense encounter with medical science in maybe six to eight weeks.
The consultant himself was pleasant, positive and brisk. My symptoms need not mean anything serious. They are quite mild, and may in part be caused by certain medication I'm taking; however, I have a low iron count, which is a slight cause for concern when taken along with the rest. I may have a bit of a wait before I'm called in for tests, but they will be thoroughgoing (cameras inserted from both top and bottom ends, if you take my meaning). "Think of it as an MOT," as the doctor put it.
My concern isn't completely removed, of course, but my mind was somewhat eased as I made my way home. But for some of those in the waiting area with me, the news received or awaited has, or will have, changed their lives for ever. I'm glad of the practical and positive approach taken by staff, and presented in the ambience of the place. I expect to be back for a rather more tense encounter with medical science in maybe six to eight weeks.
Goldfinch
We still have siskins in our garden, but the most exotic resident through the summer will be our goldfinches, which are really lovely birds. There were two pairs in the area last summer; the most I've seen feeding with the siskins over the past couple of weeks has been three. This spell of bright and sunny spring weather is bringing on our daffodils - only a couple out as yet, but everywhere else the buds are on the verge of opening. We have kerria just about to open, and wood spurge well out, and the yellow archangel that spreads so readily across the shaded areas is full of new bright green leaf. The crocuses are all but finished, but we still have a brick red snapdragon in flower, which, along with our Mexican daisies, shows just how mild this winter has been!
Meanwhile, the goldfinches do really add to the brightness of the scene. I'm watching a couple now, perched on our feeders, with the sun glinting on them in a very attractive way. The red of the face is in fact more a stand-out feature than the gold from which they are named - until, that is, they take flight, when the gold and black of the spread wings is very distinctive. Now the two I was watching have moved on, but not far away, since I can still hear their twittering song.
Monday, 12 March 2012
Thought For The Week
"God is not disillusioned with us. He never had any illusions to begin with."
Luis Palau
Luis Palau
Gardens
Ann and I love gardens, and visit as many as we can during the season each year. Of course, it helps to have two splendid gardens at Powis Castle and Glansevern on our doorstep. Here, our own gardens are small but with plenty of possibility: the back garden is a pleasant enclosed space, and gets a lot of sun - well planted when we moved here, but we've added a couple of borders. The front was little more than a patch of grass with a few shrubs, so this year's project is to gradually dig out stock a few beds and borders. An attractive front garden is not only our own space, but also in a way a gift to the community.
So yesterday we made a start on things in the spring sunshine. I put some spring bulbs in - scilla and bell hyacinth - that I'd picked up quite cheaply at our local garden centre as it's getting to the end of the season. There's plenty of flowering still to come on them, and they'll bed in, of course. Alongside them we planted a good batch of traditional and wild flowers - geum, primrose, cowslip, scabious, lily of the valley among them - all of which should settle well in that ground, to give a good show every year. They are all species that do well in part shade, which is what they'll get, as the sun doesn't reach the front garden until the afternoon.
We mowed both lawns, too - in fact I'd mowed the back one the first time in mid February, and I'm not sure when I last was out that early with the mower - not the past two years anyway, that's for sure. All the time we were working, we had the sound of siskins as a background chant: they're still here, with a few goldfinches mixed in. I imagine the goldfinches will be staying on, but the siskins will be away from here before long, and we'll miss them!
It occurs to me that some garden designs seem almost hostile to nature - more architecture than garden, turning that space into an extension of the house. They'll suit some folk, that sort of garden, but as they won't suit siskins and goldfinches and the like, for me they're not real gardens. The gardens Ann and I most love to visit and spend time in, are the product of close co-operation between the gardener and Mother Nature, to produce something that is sympathetic to and enhances the natural lie of the land. Careful management and sensitive planting can give something that is special and delightful, but feels as though this is how it was always supposed to be.
Friday, 9 March 2012
Snipe
At our local nature reserve yesterday I spent some time watching snipe - a pair - prospecting along one of the banks of the pool there. I've been watching them for days, in fact, whenever I've been up there. They are devilishly hard to spot, but lovely birds, their cryptic plumage of streaked browns and buffs exactly blending in with the cut dead reeds and waterside foliage within which they lurk.
Both the colours and the markings blend so perfectly with the background that snipe can be all but invisible unless some movement gives them away. Their long beaks allow them to probe deeply into leaf litter, mud and soft ground, as they search for food. The thing that impacted on me was not just how hard it was to see them, how well camouflaged they were, but that the strip along the shore within which they were lurking was in fact very narrow and quite discrete. If one of the birds had been just a foot or two away from where I saw them, it would have shown up quite clearly against short green grass or lighter coloured stubble.
So it isn't just that they have a plumage that allows them to hide, they also have the ability, it would seem, to select and keep to the sort of background against which that plumage works. This leads me to speculate as to how self-aware birds actually are. How clear an image does a bird have of itself, of what it looks like, and therefore of what surroundings to seek so as to (if it's a snipe) "disappear"? Is it purely instinctive, or does it require an element of conscious planning? Do birds help each other to know whether or not they are blending in as they should? There's so much we can't know!
Small Things
After reflecting on my interview with my bishop the other day, it seemed right to write to him yesterday; and it seems right now to report that the reply I received was gracious, kind, honest and very positively framed. For all the discouragement I'm bound to feel, I find my respect for this man growing. Just thought I'd say that.
The siskins that had so delighted me over recent days seemed this week to have disappeared from my garden - but this morning there have been a few again, and I've been able once more to watch their acrobatic prowess at our feeding station. I don't imagine we'll have them here much longer, as the days lengthen and the weather improves.
I woke this morning with the message in my head, "Do small things". I can only interpret this as being an answer to my prayer of last night, where I was struggling to think what the purpose and direction of my life should be. "Do small things." Even those whose lives revolve around big things, those whose decisions as statesmen, captains of industry, opinion formers, affect the lives of millions, need to to take care to do the small things - to make the most of the opportunities that arise each day to say the right word, to touch a shoulder in encouragement, to pause and delight in a view, to listen to a song, to stroke the cat. This is where real life is centred, and the big things are not possible unless the small things are right.
St David famously urged his people, in his last sermon to them, to "do the small things you have seen me do and have heard about" (I think that's right, from memory). Mother Theresa wrote of the need to "do small things with great love." Small things are important, both for our own health and in the service we offer to others. My bishop's prompt and kind response to my message was a small thing, but very important to me; my siskins (if I may be so proprietorial) are small things too - but the important small thing for me this morning has been to take a few moments just to stop what I'm doing and to delight in their antics.
But the thrust of the message, I suppose, is simply this: that the big issues that tend to crowd and scare me as I look to my future are not what is really important. What is important is that I take the time to be aware of possibilities, make the most of opportunities, be of service and use and good cheer to others, in the small ways and the informal occasions for mercy and love, that each day is bound to bring. What I am, and what I am allowed to be, status and role and recognition, is less important - much less - than what I can do, what I can share, and what I can receive in small ways just as a child of God and within my bit of his world.
The siskins that had so delighted me over recent days seemed this week to have disappeared from my garden - but this morning there have been a few again, and I've been able once more to watch their acrobatic prowess at our feeding station. I don't imagine we'll have them here much longer, as the days lengthen and the weather improves.
I woke this morning with the message in my head, "Do small things". I can only interpret this as being an answer to my prayer of last night, where I was struggling to think what the purpose and direction of my life should be. "Do small things." Even those whose lives revolve around big things, those whose decisions as statesmen, captains of industry, opinion formers, affect the lives of millions, need to to take care to do the small things - to make the most of the opportunities that arise each day to say the right word, to touch a shoulder in encouragement, to pause and delight in a view, to listen to a song, to stroke the cat. This is where real life is centred, and the big things are not possible unless the small things are right.
St David famously urged his people, in his last sermon to them, to "do the small things you have seen me do and have heard about" (I think that's right, from memory). Mother Theresa wrote of the need to "do small things with great love." Small things are important, both for our own health and in the service we offer to others. My bishop's prompt and kind response to my message was a small thing, but very important to me; my siskins (if I may be so proprietorial) are small things too - but the important small thing for me this morning has been to take a few moments just to stop what I'm doing and to delight in their antics.
But the thrust of the message, I suppose, is simply this: that the big issues that tend to crowd and scare me as I look to my future are not what is really important. What is important is that I take the time to be aware of possibilities, make the most of opportunities, be of service and use and good cheer to others, in the small ways and the informal occasions for mercy and love, that each day is bound to bring. What I am, and what I am allowed to be, status and role and recognition, is less important - much less - than what I can do, what I can share, and what I can receive in small ways just as a child of God and within my bit of his world.
Thursday, 8 March 2012
Coping
For any readers who are taking an interest in these things, I have to say that yesterday's interview with my diocesan bishop did not contain much to encourage me. The invitation to meet him had seemed a positive thing, and I had expected something concrete might be on offer. In fact, nothing at all was, and, having driven a distance on a rough and wet morning to be there, I had the distinct and definite feeling of having been strung along.
Of course, he has to be seen, not least by his peers, to be doing the right thing. And he does have a very good point, in saying that while I am living where I am it would be difficult if not impossible to place me back into any kind of active ministry. I have to think myself into his shoes, and ask what would be the wise and prudent decision to make, bearing in mind where the buck stops. However, I do hope that sooner or later he or someone else is prepared to take the risk with me that will need to be taken, not least because I am confident that, with the help of God, I can deliver on that trust.
There was a time, however, during the course of our meeting, where I had the distinct impression of being conformed into a distorted image of myself. It felt like being in the hall of mirrors at a fun-fair: you know it is you in the glass, but it isn't the you that you normally see and recognise. Nonetheless, it may be true, or at least contain some elements of me I've not properly seen or understood before. But I have, I believe, acted with integrity, faith and solemn purpose, to the best of my ability, since this period of my life began; and, however shaken or disheartened I may feel today, I can only continue to do the same. Anything else would do damage to people I care about, while being ultimately unproductive. After all, in the last instance, as I've said before - it isn't (just) about me.
Of course, he has to be seen, not least by his peers, to be doing the right thing. And he does have a very good point, in saying that while I am living where I am it would be difficult if not impossible to place me back into any kind of active ministry. I have to think myself into his shoes, and ask what would be the wise and prudent decision to make, bearing in mind where the buck stops. However, I do hope that sooner or later he or someone else is prepared to take the risk with me that will need to be taken, not least because I am confident that, with the help of God, I can deliver on that trust.
There was a time, however, during the course of our meeting, where I had the distinct impression of being conformed into a distorted image of myself. It felt like being in the hall of mirrors at a fun-fair: you know it is you in the glass, but it isn't the you that you normally see and recognise. Nonetheless, it may be true, or at least contain some elements of me I've not properly seen or understood before. But I have, I believe, acted with integrity, faith and solemn purpose, to the best of my ability, since this period of my life began; and, however shaken or disheartened I may feel today, I can only continue to do the same. Anything else would do damage to people I care about, while being ultimately unproductive. After all, in the last instance, as I've said before - it isn't (just) about me.
Tuesday, 6 March 2012
What Am I?
A colleague was telling me yesterday just how annoyed he was at being described as "an epileptic". He does suffer from epilepsy, but he was extremely cross at that one feature of who he is being used in effect to define or pigeonhole him. It's easy to stereotype, to stick labels onto people based on one or two things we know about them, and then to use those labels as though they were all that needed to be said. We write people in or out as acceptable or not to us, based on such things as what clothes they wear, what accent they speak in, the way they vote, or the size of their waistband.
In reality we're all much more complex than that, but we will only find this out when we really listen to the other person, when we devote time to them, when we are prepared to take interest. People who come into contact with one part of my life are likely to see me very differently from those who only ever meet me or work with me somewhere else. I was talking music for an hour or more the other day with someone, a very competent pianist, who I know plays golf regularly with a guy I sing with; at the next choir practice I mentioned this to my singing colleague, who was surprised to discover that his golfing friend had an interest in music - it wasn't something that had had intruded on their days out on the golf course.
What am I? My last few months of enforced semi-idleness have, I suppose, required me to reflect on that basic question as a matter of some urgency. As the incumbent of a group of busy parishes I had an identity and status that now belongs to someone else. What did losing that leave me with? For it's true that, to a degree, we adapt and model ourselves to fit in with what other people see in us and expect of us; we conform to their stereotypes. Maybe that's part of what so annoyed my colleague yesterday: there's a sense in which, as people label us they also expect us to conform with that label, to fit in with the image they've required of us. Those who don't do that get labelled in another way - as 'difficult', as non-conformists, non-joiners, people who rock the boat. Since most of us actually do want to please others and be approved of, there is a real pressure to do the right thing and to fit in.
Well, I don't know where I fit in just now . . . and I'm not at all sorry to be in this place. For some people, retirement, whether planned or enforced, is a scary thing because so much of the self that has been built up and modelled and formed through the working years has now been lost, and the question "Who am I now?" is hard to deal with. For others, though, it's liberation; I can be who I want to be, and who those closest and dearest to me want and need me to be. And in this week of decisions, that's actually very good ground on which to be standing!
In reality we're all much more complex than that, but we will only find this out when we really listen to the other person, when we devote time to them, when we are prepared to take interest. People who come into contact with one part of my life are likely to see me very differently from those who only ever meet me or work with me somewhere else. I was talking music for an hour or more the other day with someone, a very competent pianist, who I know plays golf regularly with a guy I sing with; at the next choir practice I mentioned this to my singing colleague, who was surprised to discover that his golfing friend had an interest in music - it wasn't something that had had intruded on their days out on the golf course.
What am I? My last few months of enforced semi-idleness have, I suppose, required me to reflect on that basic question as a matter of some urgency. As the incumbent of a group of busy parishes I had an identity and status that now belongs to someone else. What did losing that leave me with? For it's true that, to a degree, we adapt and model ourselves to fit in with what other people see in us and expect of us; we conform to their stereotypes. Maybe that's part of what so annoyed my colleague yesterday: there's a sense in which, as people label us they also expect us to conform with that label, to fit in with the image they've required of us. Those who don't do that get labelled in another way - as 'difficult', as non-conformists, non-joiners, people who rock the boat. Since most of us actually do want to please others and be approved of, there is a real pressure to do the right thing and to fit in.
Well, I don't know where I fit in just now . . . and I'm not at all sorry to be in this place. For some people, retirement, whether planned or enforced, is a scary thing because so much of the self that has been built up and modelled and formed through the working years has now been lost, and the question "Who am I now?" is hard to deal with. For others, though, it's liberation; I can be who I want to be, and who those closest and dearest to me want and need me to be. And in this week of decisions, that's actually very good ground on which to be standing!
Monday, 5 March 2012
Thought For The Week
"Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else."
Judy Garland
Judy Garland
Big Week
I'm writing this on a very pleasantly sunny afternoon in Brookfield, with siskins still congregating in our garden to dine at our bird-feeders. They are very noisy birds, and there must have been some thirty or so in a nearby tree this morning, twittering away at each other. They are a delight to watch.
But I shan't have much time to do that this week, as it's looking to be quite a busy one. Quite a big one too, I'd say. Whatever happens, things will look very different at the end of this week from how they are now. Wednesday is the significant day; an interview which will be over and done with in 45 minutes, but which is of - I expect - crucial importance.
So how do I prepare for it? In one sense, that has been the task of the past twelve months, working on the reasons why I am retired, invalided out of a priestly ministry which I always hoped and assumed (even) would be mine for life. After a lot of effort, and the patient help of some very good people, I am ready to dip my toe back into the water - or perhaps I should better say, my sense of being called to the ministry of priest has been restored.
For there is no going back - is there ever in life? Whatever ministry I may take on will be something new. I am not the same person as I was twelve months ago. The events and circumstances that triggered my resignation, and the events and circumstances of the twelve months since - all of that together has to be part of what I now am, and what I now am able to offer. What will that mean? I don't know. It's not impossible that nothing will be offered or made available that fits with who I now am, in which case there will be no new start, just, perhaps, a more permanent form of resignation.
I'm open to all possibilities, and I shall not be taking any agenda or road map into the decisive meetings I shall have this week. To be honest, important though the meetings may be, I can't help but feel I'd be happier and better not attending! But anyway, if God has things for me to do, he will enable me to do those things, I guess. This isn't quite a "whatever" moment - I do care more than that about what happens next - but I am prepared to go with the flow.
I can't see them just now, but the siskins are still happily twittering away somewhere. Perhaps I can manage to keep the same sunny disposition through this week? I hope so!
But I shan't have much time to do that this week, as it's looking to be quite a busy one. Quite a big one too, I'd say. Whatever happens, things will look very different at the end of this week from how they are now. Wednesday is the significant day; an interview which will be over and done with in 45 minutes, but which is of - I expect - crucial importance.
So how do I prepare for it? In one sense, that has been the task of the past twelve months, working on the reasons why I am retired, invalided out of a priestly ministry which I always hoped and assumed (even) would be mine for life. After a lot of effort, and the patient help of some very good people, I am ready to dip my toe back into the water - or perhaps I should better say, my sense of being called to the ministry of priest has been restored.
For there is no going back - is there ever in life? Whatever ministry I may take on will be something new. I am not the same person as I was twelve months ago. The events and circumstances that triggered my resignation, and the events and circumstances of the twelve months since - all of that together has to be part of what I now am, and what I now am able to offer. What will that mean? I don't know. It's not impossible that nothing will be offered or made available that fits with who I now am, in which case there will be no new start, just, perhaps, a more permanent form of resignation.
I'm open to all possibilities, and I shall not be taking any agenda or road map into the decisive meetings I shall have this week. To be honest, important though the meetings may be, I can't help but feel I'd be happier and better not attending! But anyway, if God has things for me to do, he will enable me to do those things, I guess. This isn't quite a "whatever" moment - I do care more than that about what happens next - but I am prepared to go with the flow.
I can't see them just now, but the siskins are still happily twittering away somewhere. Perhaps I can manage to keep the same sunny disposition through this week? I hope so!
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