The power of Story

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The Oscars.  “The movies have always been there for us. They’re the place to go to laugh, to cry, to question, to text. So tonight, enjoy yourselves because nothing can take the sting of the world’s economic problems like watching millionaires present each other with golden statues.” Billy Crystal. Since the advent of the cinema, celluloid has been an escape, a storybook come to life. However, stories can hold our dreams, our griefs, and our questions, like no other medium of communication. Skilled writers, photographers and actors can slip past our defences and reshape the way we think and feel, through the power of story. Nick Baines has also recently reflected on story.  Jesus may not have had cinema, but he spoke in stories. No wonder they said of him, “No one speaks like this man”.  The more I study them, I am sure that the parables we have, are merely the bones of the stories he told. Like the best of storytellers he would have fleshed them out with passion and imaginative details, with colour and tone and dramatic pause. He was the master of surprise, speaking of familiar things, readily accessible and adding a very different twist.

I love films that move me and make me think. ( I also love films that you bury your brain under the seat and enjoy fun and laughter)  I have seen a few recently, that made a deep impression on me. No surprise to anyone, of the first of these was  ‘The Artist’ , which in my view, deserves all the accolades it gets. A beautifully crafted film, creating so many layers of meaning and depth. I went, expecting it to be a light hearted ‘fluffy’ film about the 20’s and 30’s, the time of the transition from Silent Movies to The Talkies. What I got was a touching film where communication was by expression and micro-gesture. The absence of words left a lot of room for thought and interpretation.  It spoke alot to me about priesthood. Being a public person,  and handling both sides of  ‘fame’. How you view yourself, and how others see you, good and bad. Being a ‘rising star’ a newcomer, or a ‘has been’ where all you trained for is suddenly disappearing beneath your feet. Adapt or you are last weeks news. The touches of humour sprinkled through it heightened the pathos. You can take it at any level you like, and I defy anyone not to enjoy it. Definitely a ‘must see’.

The next film was Shame.  A sensitively produced picture of  the very real and complex problem of sex addiction. A review said, “Shame is captivating and intensely intimate. McQueen has followed up Hunger with an unflinching and compelling film that explores the depths of addiction and the consequential destruction and demise of the mind and although it is sometimes difficult to watch, you won’t be able to keep your eyes off it.”  I couldn’t agree more. Not an easy film, not an easy subject, but that was the point. Like his film Hunger, the co-writer and director Steve Mcqueen intended to bring out into the light a hidden and painful issue.  Michael Fassbender, McQueen’s acclaimed lead actor in Hunger, was apparently, the first and only choice to play the lead role in Shame. He played it exceptionally well, with great depth and insight. Anyone who came expecting cheap titillation would have left disappointed, from this intensely moving film. I applaud McQueen’s compassionate motivation in writing and directing this story and for crafting it with such sensitivity and skill.

‘Prayers for Bobby’  is another difficult film to watch.  The synopsis on the website for the film probably says it all.

“Prayers for Bobby is the amazing true story of a mother torn between her loyalties, challenged by her faith, and moved by a tragedy that would change her life, and the lives of others, forever.

Bobby Griffith (Ryan Kelly, Smallville) was his mother’s favorite son, the perfect all-American boy growing up under deeply religious influences in Walnut Creek, California. Bobby was also gay. Struggling with a conflict no one knew of much less understood Bobby finally came out to his family. Despite the tentative support of his father, two sisters, and older brother, Bobby’s mother, Mary (three time Academy Award nominee and Golden Globe winner Sigourney Weaver, Avatar, Working Girl), turned to the fundamentalist teachings of her church to rescue her son from what she felt was an irredeemable sin. As Mary came closer to the realization that Bobby could not be “healed,” she rejected him, denying him a mother’s unconditional love, and driving her favorite son to suicide.

Anguished over Bobby’s death, Mary finds little solace in her son’s poignant diaries, revelations of a troubled boy fighting for the love of his mother and God. Finding it difficult to reconcile her feelings of guilt, her conflicted emotions over religious teachings, and her struggles with understanding her son’s orientation, Mary finally, and unexpectedly, reaches out to the gay community as a source of inspiration and consolation. For Mary Griffith, it’s the beginning of a long and emotional journey that extended beyond acceptance to her viable role a vocal advocate for gay and lesbian youth. In 1996, twelve years after Bobby’s death, she was invited to address the Congress of the United States, establishing her as a major force in the fight for human rights.”

Prayers for Bobby

Image via Wikipedia

In a church where this subject is such a divisive issue,  I tread softly on what is very tender ground. I have seen the emotions on both sides of the debate, and this searingly honest  film shows a range of them.  Any hope of reconciliation of polemically held views, requires understanding of the other person’s perspective. To ‘walk a mile in their shoes’ and to feel the loads they carry. I feel this film goes some way to helping this to happen. The debate is not a safely packaged theoretical argument – it is played out very painfully within the realities and struggles of a real family who have to live with the consequences. I firmly commend it to anyone to see, and particularly to anyone in ministry or church leadership.   You can make your own mind up about how it leaves you, of course, but for me, looking away wasn’t an option.

Ten Ideas for Lent

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Ten Ideas for Lent. ( from Stephen Cherry’s Blog)

FEBRUARY 20, 2012

Ten Ideas for Lent

These ideas all all based on my book Barefoot Disciple: Walking the Way of Passionate Humility The Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lent Book 2011

The original plan was to include these ideas in the book but in the end we decided not to. Just as well, probably. Now you can get them without troubling to read it.

Have a great Lent! And if you do nothing else, try number 6.

1. Take Off Your Shoes

We have all walked barefoot and felt the earth beneath our feet. And we all played barefoot when we were children. But have you everprayed barefoot? Do it once and you won’t forget it. It will touch your imagination. Try it out of doors. As you feel the world through the soles of your feet, you will begin to realise the spiritual relevance of the material world. As a barefoot disciple living in a northern country you will, most of the time, be well shod. But if spiritually your feet are bare, you will tread carefully and walk differently. You and your prayer will be earthed, real, humble.

2. Admit a Recent Mistake

Just one will do. Notice when you have made a mistake and own up to it quickly, simply and honestly. And then let it go. Do not seek forgiveness unless the mistake has really hurt someone. If you say ‘sorry’ as a habit, stop it now. You are devaluing the currency. The idea is to acknowledge that you are a mistake-maker for much of the time. This is an exercise in realism and true modesty. Once you have mastered it, you will no longer try to cover up the mistakes you make in daily living. Rather you will find them to be opportunities to learn humility. After a while you might even develop the confidence to begin to address the mistakes for which you really do need to ask forgiveness.

3. Pocket an Insult

The phrase is Ghandi’s. He is a barefoot walker who can speak to us from another faith. It means: ‘do not take an insult personally’, ‘do not take it to heart’, ‘do not react’. But, equally, it does not mean ‘ignore it and it will go away’. Rather, if you are on the receiving end of an insult, it is rarely going to be helpful to react. Instead, pop it into your pocket and, after a while, take it out to see whether it is worth responding to carefully and humbly. Such humility can be determined and powerful, but it is never hot-headed or full of smouldering resentment.

4. Behave as a Child

Jesus says that children are at home in the kingdom of God. And so he wants adults to be childlike. What could be more fun than that! This is your the invitation to let the child within out to play. The child in you is naïve, impulsive, direct, simple, trusting, vulnerable, unsophisticated and unpretentious. Jesus tells us that this is a really most important part of who we are. If the inner child does not thrive then nor do we. Let your inner child out to play. It knows how to live.

5. Step across a Boundary

Visit somewhere that feels a bit scary, uncomfortable or even provocative to you. For many Christian people, a visit to the place of worship of people of another faith is uncomfortable and disorienting enough to wake them up to the fascination, depth and quality of their own faith. So visit a Mosque, Synagogue, Hindu Temple or Sikh Gurdwara. Risk putting yourself in a situation where you know that you will not fully understand what is going on and feel like an outsider. Pay attention to your feelings and let your bewilderment and confusion enhance your learning, your wonder and your enjoyment of the experience. Afterwards try to describe your experiences in a notebook or perhaps to a friend who agrees to step out of his or her comfort zone too.

6. Give up Grumbling

Do you remember Terry Waite’s vow when taken into captivity: ‘no self-pity’? It is a good one but it is far more difficult than we realise. So take the trouble to tune in to the grumbling that you hear around you (and which sometimes comes from your own mouth). It will be difficult to give up grumbling for good, so start by giving it up for Lent. After you have done without it you will wonder why you ever bothered with it. And if you can’t give it up, try to transform it into protest, penitence or petition. You will soon find you have a new passion for both justice and prayer.

7. Practise Hospitality

Take the trouble to notice the people you don’t usually notice. Offer a greeting when others are locked in silence. Learn how to wave in an affirming, positive way. Learn how to smile across a room or make eye-contact across a meeting to support someone who is struggling. You can’t be friends with everyone, but by being friendly you can touch, and perhaps change, many people’s lives and even have an impact on the whole social environment of a neighbourhood. Don’t think that you need to turn your home into a refuge for ex-prisoners in order to exercise true hospitality. Simply take one small but deliberate step in the direction of being more hospitable.

8. Do Something for Someone Else

Do something simple, modest but practical for someone else. It might involve giving someone an unexpected gift or offering to help lift something. Such gratuitous and caring action can touch the heart and imagination and have untold positive repercussions. But don’t be excessive. Don’t take over. Don’t create dependency. Lend a hand but try not to ‘make a suggestion’. It is modest, humble, practical generosity that is called for. Not grand projects or patronising performances.

9. Be Proud of Yourself

Surprised by this suggestion? While bad pride is to be avoided there is such an experience as good pride. It is a very down to earth feeling and we have it when we allow ourselves to look at work well done with kind and straightforward eyes. It is childlike to have good pride, because there is nothing arrogant or conceited in it. Good pride accepts praise gratefully but humbly and allows you to recognise that your efforts are worthwhile and achievements valid. Good pride is not pushy and might be expressed modestly: ‘hmmm, not bad’. It is a good feeling and not only consistent with healthy humility – but a sign of it. Meanwhile try to shake off all forms of bad pride: arrogance, conceitedness and chauvinism. But also try to do away with false modesty. No more ‘little me’, thank you.

10. Encourage Others

Encouraging others is the opposite of criticising them. Whereas criticism comes from meanness of spirit encouragement comes from generosity of spirit. As such it reflects something of God’s love. Also, whereas criticism often comes from envy, encouragement comes from a desire to see others thrive and flourish. Criticism can come from a spirit of competition or fear, whereas to encourage people involves noticing what they are contributing. Tell people you havenoticed the difference that their effort has made or let them see that you acknowledge their difficulty or suffering. We are often a bit stingy with our encouragement, for fear of causing others to swell in pride. The truth is that when encouragement is sincere and appropriately expressed, it nurtures genuine humility. Allow people the joy of feeling truly humbled and really encouraged by what you say.

( Editor’s note – I can thoroughly recommend both this blog and the book Barefoot Disciple The Way of Passionate Humility. Links to both in blue above) 

Light in the cracks

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“There is a crack in everything, that is how the light gets in” A famous line from Leonard Cohen’s song Anthem. I came across the song for the first time at an alternative Eucharist I attended recently, based on Cohen’s intense, insightful songs.  Robust, creative liturgy provided the framework in which the songs were used, each powerfully complimenting and enriching the other.  An ancient, candlelit church provided the backdrop for this powerful encounter with God in the broken bread and poured out wine.  Many songs were used, ‘Hallelujah’,’ Suzanne’ and others, and each is worthy of its own reflection, but I have picked out this one particularly, as  it touched a nerve in allot of us who were there.

 
 
“Anthem”
The birds they sang
at the break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don’t dwell on what
has passed away
or what is yet to be.
Ah the wars they will
be fought again
The holy dove
She will be caught again
bought and sold
and bought again
the dove is never free.
 
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
We asked for signs
the signs were sent:
the birth betrayed
the marriage spent
Yeah the widowhood
of every government —
signs for all to see.
 
I can’t run no more
with that lawless crowd
while the killers in high places
say their prayers out loud.
But they’ve summoned, they’ve summoned up
a thundercloud
and they’re going to hear from me.
 
Ring the bells that still can ring …
 
You can add up the parts
but you won’t have the sum
You can strike up the march,
on your little broken drum
Every heart, every heart
to love will come
but like a refugee.
 
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
 
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
That’s how the light gets in.
That’s how the light gets in.

Leonard Cohen

This song has hovered in the background of the last few weeks which haven’t been the easiest start to a Lent term. Demands and stretching circumstances on a whole manner of fronts, have made juggling home and study, family and academic pressures, interesting to say the least!  Such is life, and that is how it goes sometimes. It has been my experience over my life time that if I let Him, God can use the hard times to be rich ground for growth or ‘formation’ as it is known at theological college.  The centre of Cambridge is being dug up ( again) at present. It doesn’t have a sign that says ” Men at Work” but it could. It is awkward, messy and  disruptive. Sometimes it feels like that in the spiritual/emotional realm. We need a big sign saying “God at work”.

Yesterday  I was leading our tutor group prayers/meditation. I used Cohen’s words paired with another powerful poem which goes further in developing the theme of growth and the cracks it causes. I didn’t know at the time, but it was written by a priest, Dave Bookless, when he was himself at theological college, some years ago. He used it for his own tutor group worship.

Cracks

There are cracks in my world
I noticed them one day and now they are everywhere:
Sinister hairline cracks that start and finish out of sight
cracks that grow and gape and laugh at my certainties
My world has been declared unsafe
 
I have tried to paper them over,
paint them out,
move the furniture to hide them,
but they always return, 
cracks that hang like  question marks in my mind.
And now I begin to think:
why do the cracks appear?
from where do they come? 
They have made my room unsafe
BUT
 
They have thrown it open to new horizons
drawn back the curtains
raised long closed shutters.
One day I looked and crack had become a window.
Step through it said, what have you to fear?
Do you wish to stay in your crumbling room?
 
And then I remembered a childhood dream.
Watching the egg of some exotic bird
oval and perfect, spotted blue and cream
I wished to hold that egg and keep it on a shelf
BUT
 
As I watched it, cracks appeared.
Tiny fissures spread like zigzag ripples.
It broke in two and life struggled to its feet,
Wet and weak and blinking at the world.
 
Without those cracks that egg could hold
no more than rotting stagnant death
 
without its cracks my world would be
a room without a view
Cracks maybe uncomfortable, disturbing gaps
BUT
 
Could it be that I need them?
Do you believe in cracks?
Because I keep searching for God in the room
and find he is hiding in the cracks.
 
Dave Bookless    
 
This poem can be found in Dave’s book God Doesn’t Do  Waste IVP 2010 , and you can find out more about him and his work with A Rocha  here: www.blog.arocha.org  
 

Later that morning, one of my group shared with me yet another poem on this theme. The writer Imtiaz Dharker was inspired to write about her experience of the ceiling of her house falling in, leading to a cathartic giving away of her possessions, moving into a new freedom. She puts  this so much better in her own words on the website, Sheer Poetry:
http://www.sheerpoetry.co.uk/gcse/imtiaz-dharker/this-room

“In the poem ‘This room’ I wanted to suggest first of all that some kind of constriction is suddenly falling away. The walls of the room could mean different things to different people, and I hope when you read the poem you will find something in it that you can relate to your own life. Very often people try to trap us inside the box of a word, a label, a definition or an expectation. The box could even be self-imposed, our own limited idea of ourselves, the structures we build up around ourselves to keep ourselves ‘safe’ – nationality, religion, social barriers that keep others out.

The poem is about a moment when the structure falls away. The room is personified. It breaks out of itself, out of something suffocating. The image of ‘cracking through its own walls’ could suggest an egg and something about to be born into the light. The lines are short and broken, the sounds sharp.

Instead of falling, the everyday objects in the room take flight to unknown possibilities. ‘No-one is looking for the door’ because doors have become irrelevant. There is no need for one conventional exit when so many openings have appeared.

Perhaps I was working towards the idea that a person or a whole culture actually becomes stronger by opening up to the outside instead of closing inward.

The poem ends with a feeling of amused dislocation and a final moment of celebration in the last lines

‘In all this excitement, I’m wondering where
I’ve left my feet, and why
my hands are outside, clapping.’

(Just an extra note: I started writing this poem when a ceiling in my house in Bombay actually fell down. I should have felt terrible about it but I didn’t. Afterwards I gave away all the things I owned in the room and that gave me a great feeling of freedom).

You could also see this as a poem about writing a poem, when the writer steps away from an experience and looks at it from the outside, from an odd angle. This is the moment of celebration.

As often happens at one of the Poetry Live! days, a student added something else to the poem. She said the words ‘this room’ could apply to the room of the title and also to the ‘room’, the space, at the end of the poem.

That’s an example of how important you are as the reader and how a poem can grow in your reading of it.”

 
 
This Room by Imtiaz Dharker

This room is breaking out
of itself, cracking through
its own walls
in search of space, light,
 empty air.The bed is lifting out of
its nightmares.
From dark corners, chairs
are rising up to crash through clouds.
 This is the time and place
to be alive:
when the daily furniture of our lives
stirs, when the improbable arrives.
Pots and pans bang together   
in celebration, clang
past the crowd of garlic, onions, spices,
fly by the ceiling fan.
No one is looking for the door.
In all this excitement I’m wondering where
I’ve left my feet, and why
my hands are outside, clapping.
 
 
 

Beannacht ( blessing or benediction)

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A blessing for a Sunday night, or a Monday morning, whatever faces you this week or has been in the week just closed. A blessing for those I know and love, and those who may  have stumbled upon this looking for something else.  Shortly before his sudden unexpected  death in 2008 aged 52, John O Donohue recited his poem Beannacht, during an interview.  I had the privilege of meeting him at Greenbelt Festival in the year or two before this, having long been captured by his writings.  In his family’s own words:

“John had an amazing intellect which could never allow itself to become a prisoner of its own `ivory tower`. He had a beautiful, wild soul that he showered with love and attention. All of this, together with his great respect for language as expression and his sensitive eye led him on the journey towards poetry as being his best-loved medium of expression and conversation. I think that ‘poetry’ must have been very frustrated at all the time he spent under the spell of Theology and Philosophy!! Poetry was an impatiently awaiting vehicle eager to transport his fluency out to starved ears.“

He served as a catholic priest for most of his adult life At the end of 2000, John retired from public priestly ministry and devoted himself full-time to his writing and to a more public life of integrity in action – speaking, advocating against social injustice, and inspiring the wealthy and powerful in society to engage their own integrity in service of meaningful, positive change. He is certainly someone I can say ( and many others will agree) whose ‘life was an inspiration, and whose memory a benediction’.

Beannacht 

for Josie, my mother
 
 
On the day when
the weight deadens
on your shoulders
and you stumble,
may the clay dance
to balance you.
 
And when your eyes
freeze behind
the grey window
and the ghost of loss
gets into you,
may a flock of colours,
indigo, red, green
and azure blue
come to awaken in you
a meadow of delight.
 
When the canvas frays 
in the currach of thought
and a stain of ocean
blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters
a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home. 
 
May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of the light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours.
 
And so may a slow 
wind work these words
of love around you,
an invisible cloak
to mind your life. 
 
This poem can be found under the title Blessing for the New Year, in his book, Bless the space Between U s available in the USA, or in the book  Echoes of Memory available in Europe/UK. 

© Estate of John O’Donohue. All rights reserved.


 

You can find out more about John and his work at :  http://www.johnodonohue.com/

Moving on

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Transitions. Saying good bye to whole community of people you have loved and learned with, is hard. I have done that several times in the last four years, and it doesn’t get any easier. Two weeks ago I left the attachment parish I have been working with/in during all of my ordination training so far. Next week I start over in a new parish. Down the line, not so very long away, I will be having to say a whole load more good byes as I leave the college where I have been training, and take up my curacy. But that is getting ahead of myself.

Yesterday, the incumbent of the parish I have just left, also moved on. He has been called to higher things. I went back back for his final service and the meal following. It was a heart-tugging day, full of mixed emotions, as these occasions always are. The hymns that he had chosen,  spoke eloquently to a community in a time of transition.

We opened with a hymn whose words were written in the 7th century, but are no less true today:  That God, who had held this church through many centuries, would continue to be the unshakeable foundation on whom it can continue to build His Kingdom.

	Christ is made the sure foundation,
	Christ the head and cornerstone;
	chosen of the Lord and precious,
	binding all the church in one;
	holy Zion's help forever,
	and her confidence alone. 

	To this temple, where we call thee,
	come, O Lord of Hosts, today!
	With thy faithful loving-kindness
	hear thy people as they pray,
	and thy fullest benediction
	shed within its walls alway.

I have been singing hymns for as long as I have been able to talk.                                               The next one,  Guide me O thou great Redeemer , is a wonderful Welsh hymn.  Every time I sing it, I can hear my father’s deep bass voice resonating it’s comforting words.

Guide me, O thou great redeemer,
Pilgrim through this barren land;
I am weak, but thou art mighty,
Hold me with thy powerful hand;
Bread of heaven, bread of heaven
Feed me till I want no more;
Feed me till I want no more.

Open now the crystal fountain
Whence the healing stream doth flow;
Let the fire and cloudy pillar
Lead me all my journey through:
Strong deliverer, strong deliverer;
Be thou still my strength and shield;
Be thou still my strength and shield.

“I am weak, but thou are mighty, hold me in thy powerful hand… let the fire and cloudy pillar lead me all my journey through. Be thou still my strength and shield. “  A prayer for the those on the road, and those left behind.

During the Eucharist the choir sang Rutter’s The Lord Bless you and Keep you. I can’t add anything to this beautiful ancient blessing:

Finally we closed with a modern hymn,  I the Lord of sea and sky  which opens like this:
I, the Lord of sea and sky,
I have heard my people cry.
All who dwell in dark and sin,
My hand will save.

Chorus
Here am I, Lord. Is it I, Lord?
I have heard you calling in the night.
I will go, Lord, if you lead me.
I will hold your people in my heart.

I, who made the stars of night,
I will make their darkness bright.
Who will bear my light to them?
Whom shall I send?

‘ I will go, Lord, if you lead me. I will hold your people in my heart.’   Moving on.

Treading into the unknown

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I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year
‘Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.’

And he replied,
‘Go into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.”

These opening lines of a poem by Minnie Louise Haskings, were used in King George VI’s Christmas Radio broadcast at the start of World War II, in 1939 . He used them to speak to a nation and Commonwealth that was facing very uncertain times, in the upheaval of war. His life has been immortalised this year in the very moving film  ‘The King’s Speech’, showing how he faced down his own inner demons and difficulties.

We are again in uncertain times, but the message of this poem seems relevant to me for any year. None of us know what it may contain, nationally, internationally or personally.    I am looking ahead into a year of big changes. A house move, ordination and a new job to adjust to. Somewhere before all that lot, there is a degree to finish.  Fortunately I am one of those oddities who enjoys change and challenge, and am looking forwards to these new directions, but even so, the scale and pace of all this change feels quite daunting at times. What has been on the horizon for a long time, is almost here.

I know that I am not up to what God is asking of me, and never have been, but fortunately He knows that too. I am in good company. Almost everyone God asked to do something for Him in the Bible felt the same way. Moses certainly did.  On one occasion he said to God,  ” You have been telling me  “Lead these people” but you have not let me know whom you will send with me”  and God replies:

“My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest”   Exodus 33:14 

That is all I ask, and all I need as I set out on this newest adventure with God. I don’t know what else the year may contain, or what may be demanded of me, but I do know that He has promised to be with me every step of it. My prayer like Moses, is for a continual awareness of His Presence, and to be able to rest in His enabling.                       My prayer for me, and my prayer for you.

Give this to Jesus for me ( From Sheila Bridge’s blog)

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Give this to Jesus for me

For the second year in a row I have been given something by a small child and asked if I could ‘give it to Jesus’! Last year a little boy at the crib service was left holding one of the gifts from the King and was most concerned what to do about it (we took it to the crib and put it beside the manger).

This year 6 year old Jake breezed into Kid’s Club and handed me a card. At first I assumed it was for me and was about to say thank you but a raised eyebrow from Jake’s mum standing behind him warned me to take a second look. ‘To Jeasus’ it said in wobbly writing.

Well, what would you have done?

I’m deeply honoured by the association but it still felt kind of rude to open someone else’s post so I stammered a bit and eventually said ‘Thank you Jake, that’s really kind, I’ll make sure he gets it’.

Two things  touched me about this exchange. The first was that Jake was the only person I knew who’d actually sent a card to the one person whose birthday we are celebrating.

Secondly I have a lot to learn from such  total and utterly simple confidence. He had no doubt what so ever that I would be able to pass on his card.

As adults, how hesitant are we?

How cynical have we become?

How complicated do we make things?

How unsure am I when I come to God that he will even hear me, let alone respond. Yet this is the God who says ‘Ask, Seek, Knock’,  all of which are instructions simple enough for a six year old.

Later I did, in fact, open Jake’s card. It said ‘Dear Jeasus’ Merry Christmas and Happy New Year ‘love from Jake’.

Brilliant! The child is a genius. We can learn a lot from children, no wonder Jesus said ‘Unless you become like a child, you cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven’.

‘Thank you Jake’ – and that comes from Me and Jesus!

Holy Gifts

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Holy Gifts
 
 
Taken
Chosen
A life lifted from obscurity
Held in hands that hefted galaxies
Hallowed  by an ask
To sustain
The Word
 
 
Blessed
Given grace
To bear the weight of favour
Daughter of Eve,
Giving God a thankful heart
By holding His, within
Her own
 
 
Broken
Lanced by sword
That pierced Father, Spirit, Son.
Blood of her blood
Poured out for those
That clamoured for
His death.
 
Given
Her whole life
Offered on the altar
Of surrender
A readiness  to be God’s Yes
Shared out to hungry hands
To feed  a world
With grace
 
It has been my habit for the last 12 years or so, to write a poem at Christmas to include as a tiny  gift with the cards I send. Most often they come out of my own journey, and its juxtaposition with the wonder of the Christmas Story. It helps me keep it fresh. I never want to lose that awe. On a much smaller scale, when I was a midwife, I was privileged to bring large numbers of babies into the world, and it always was just that. A privilege and a wonder. No two births are alike, and each one is a miracle. 
 
I have been living with these four words for most of this year, in a variety of ways. Taken, blessed, broken, given. 
They are known as the shape of the Eucharist, based on Jesus’ actions as he shared bread with his disciples or the the huge crowds by the Gallilean shore, taking a tiny, seemingly insignificant gift, ( five loaves and two fishes)  blessing it, breaking it and sharing it out to all. Making the miniscule feed the many. 
 
They have come up, time and again, most recently within Henri Nouwen’s book,                  Life of the Beloved, where he brackets them under the larger heading : Becoming the Beloved.  He says “ Becoming the Beloved means letting the truth of our Belovedness become enfleshed in everything we think, say or do.”                                                     A beautifully succinct way of expressing the two great Commandments, and the description of a life’s journey into Love. 
 
I sit several times a day in chapel, facing an icon that depicts Christ looking steadily forwards and holding the words.
“You did not choose me, I chose you.”
It echoes with my own journey on this path to ordination, that began with a gargantuan struggle with the call God was placing on my life, and reminds me daily that this is all about Him, and I am simply an offered loaf in His hands. 
 
Mary’s life  continues to inspire and challenge me. I wrote about her in Bringing Love where Love is absent, earlier in the year, and when thinking about this year’s poem, I looked in a variety of other directions/angles but came back to her, as a whole lot of thoughts over the year seemed to come together and distil. 
 
 
 
 

Beatbox Nativity

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This was such a good, literal and seasonal example of my last post Singing the Next Verse      I just had to add it here.

Reverend Gavin Tyte, a  vicar from Uplyme in Devon who puts a  creative take on a very familiar story.  It has been entered for a competition and  you can vote for it on the following site and see many other examples ( in a wide variety of styles) of the Nativity Story told in 3 minutes or less.

http://bit.ly/vQJQCR!

 

Singing the next verse

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“it makes me realise what an amazing privilege we have, and yet what a huge responsibility, singing the next verse of the Great Story and Song to those who have not  yet heard the tune, with a certain freedom to improvise, but in such a way that the Word is still heard. ”   Sue Wallace speaking about Cathedrals, and Transcendence at York Minister, in particular. 

Singing the next verse..  joining in with the song. Finding your voice and  daring to sing, even when the tune is unfamiliar.  Discovering God as composer and conductor.  I have been sitting with this quote for some weeks now, partly because it is a key quote in an essay I have been writing on Cathedrals and the Mission Imperative, and partly because the image sparked something in me.

Perhaps it is because I love re-inventing..  ‘How can I do this differently? ‘ is my default approach. I have come in recent years to appreciate the rich inheritance of tradition in Church liturgy, and all the depth and nuance it gifts us with. I have no desire to sweep it away, but I do want to add to it. Contribute my own voice/verse. In an age where culture and language change at a breathtaking pace, I want to be at the crest of that wave, as it were. The Good News is as relevant now as it has ever been, but less and less people have heard the song. There is both a need and a place for finding ways to make the song one that connects. The possibilities are endless and the question is only,

“How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?’  Psalm 137:4