Seeker

  Because this is Remembrance (Armistice) Day, I revisited this photo which I took in 2014, the year that saw the 100th anniversary of the start of WW1. It was in the grounds of the  Hooge Crater Museum  in Flanders, Belgium. Ironmongery from WW1 left in the area of Hooge Crater near Ypres in Flanders is a poignant reminder of the waste of that war that was supposed to end all wars, but didn't. Waste of so many young men and boys, waste of horses, waste of material resources, waste of energy, destruction of farmland and woods. And what was that all for? What did WW1 achieve? And what did the Armistice and the Peace Treaty that followed achieve? The seeds of WW2 among other things. Maybe like me you struggle in the silence to make sense of it all and to crave and pray for true peace to prevail. It's always hard when it seems there are always new wars, bloodshed and violence somewhere in the world today.  I think that's way this poem speaks to me so powerfully today as...

Between parades We're good at planning! Give us a task force and a project and we're off and running! No trouble at all! Going to the village and finding the colt, even negotiating with the owners is right down our alley. And how we love a parade! In a frenzy of celebration we gladly focus on Jesus and generously throw our coats and palms in his path. And we can shout praise loudly enough to make the Pharisees complain. It's all so good! It's in between parades that we don't do so well. From Sunday to Sunday we forget our Hosannas. Between parades the stones will have to shout because we don't. Ann Weems, Kneeling in Jerusalem (Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, 1994) p. 69 Image Credit: Palm Sunday, a painting by African artist Evans Yegon

I am not a cat lover, partly because of a slight allergy to them, especially the long-haired variety. That doesn't stop me admiring their beauty or their easy ability to completely relax. Many years ago, I heard a Christian speaker refer to a 'pussy cat experience' as a way to describe relaxing into the sabbath rest of God. Jesus said, "Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest." (Matthew 11: 28) The cat in the photo at the head of this post, seems truly at rest. I love D.H. Lawrence's poem called 'Pax' which uses the analogy of a sleeping cat in relation to the experience of being at home with 'the living God'. PAX All that matters is to be at one with the living God to be a creature in the house of the God of Life. Like a cat asleep on a chair at peace, in peace and at one with the master of the house, with the mistress, at home, at home in the house of the living, sleeping on the hearth, and ...

  I wonder how you feel at the start of the UK's 3rd Lockdown in an effort to stop the spread of Covid? Thinking about what to write, conscious of people who are tired, anxious, ill or grieving, the word that came to mind was ‘perseverance’. I write this on a gloomy Wednesday. It is 6th January and so the Feast of the Epiphany, a day to remember the 'wise men' from the east. You can read about them in Matthew 2: 1 - 12 . They followed a star, expecting to find a special king. To make that journey they must have needed much perseverance. Was it fuelled by hope? At the end of their journey, they found a young child with his parents, in an ordinary house in Bethlehem, on what was presumably for Mary, Joseph and their son Jesus, an ordinary day. Were the wise men disappointed? No, they were overwhelmed with joy. It was as if God opened a window in heaven to enable them to see what others could not. It was an ‘Epiphany’ moment. Did the memory of that revelation encourage them on...

“First Coming” He did not wait till the world was ready, till men and nations were at peace. He came when the Heavens were unsteady, and prisoners cried out for release. He did not wait for the perfect time. He came when the need was deep and great. He dined with sinners in all their grime, turned water into wine. He did not wait till hearts were pure. In joy he came to a tarnished world of sin and doubt, to a world like ours, of anguished shame he came, and his Light would not go out. He came to a world which did not mesh, to heal its tangles, shield its scorn. In the mystery of the Word made Flesh the Maker of the stars was born. We cannot wait till the world is sane to raise our songs with joyful voice, for to share our grief, to touch our pain, He came with Love: Rejoice! Rejoice! Madeleine L’Engle. From A Cry Like a Bell, 1987 Image Credit: Pixabay

Today is Ascension Day, a Christian celebration of Christ's ascension into heaven. Ascension is a mystery. In one sense Christ leaves this world. He is also given to us. Not confined to 1 place, Christ is in heaven at the heart of all things, accessible to all who seek him. Christ took our humanity into heaven. In the Ascension, Christ’s glory is both revealed and concealed.  In a world where weapons, wealth, winning elections or controlling the media means power, it’s not surprising many see as ridiculous the Christian claim that Jesus is King of kings and Lord of lords. We Christians claim that the most powerful are as nothing compared to the cosmic King Jesus. To celebrate Jesus’ Ascension is a daring act of faith. It’s audacious to claim that the son of a young Jewish girl, born more than 2,000 years ago and executed on a cross, is alive and now reigns over all. We’re not simply saying Jesus’ teaching influences us. We’re saying Jesus is both human and divine, seated...

On the 24th day of Advent and Christmas Eve the Advent Word is 'beloved'. The word 'beloved' reminds me of this verse from Chrisina Rosetti's poem, 'In the bleak mid-winter'. "Angels and archangels may have gathered there,   Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;   But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,   Worshipped the beloved with a kiss." Image Credit: Flickr, CC License

Advent begins today. It's a season of waiting, of expectancy, of hope. That raise the question what do you expect as you wait in hope? One thing I expect is to follow the themes of #AdventWord through Advent which this year is only 24 days. Advent always has 4 Sundays before Christmas. It always starts on a Sunday. That is why in the church the 1st day of Advent varies between the end of November and beginning of December. For the last 2 years I have tried to post something each day that connects with the word of the day suggested by #AdventWord. I expect to manage that again this year, but life is full of unexpected events and my plan may have to be abandoned. Today's Advent word in the global Advent calendar I'm following is 'unexpected'. When I saw that word I immediately thought of Mary's unexpected pregnancy announced to her by an unexpected angel. Or the unexpected pregnancy of her post-menopausal cousin Elizabeth. Were they ready for t...

Today 22 July is the feast day of St Mary Magdalene. I love this image of a detail of a mosaic in the Resurrection Chapel in Washington National Cathedral, D.C in the USA. It shows Mary Magdalene meeting the risen Jesus Christ. Mary Magdalene has been the subject of so much speculation, denigration, imagination and admiration over the last 2000 years, it's hard to sort truth from legend and fiction. I prefer to stick to what the 4 Gospels in the New Testament tell us about her and also notice what they do not tell us. Here is who Mary Magdalene was not: Mary Magdale was not one of the other Marys in the New Testament e.g. Mary mother of Jesus or Mary sister of Martha and Lazarus of Bethany. Mary Magdalene was not a prostitute, although she has been portrayed as such. Mary Magdalene was almost certainly not the anonymous sinful woman who annointed Jesus' feet in the house of Simon the Pharisee. Mary Magdalene was not Jesus' wife or mother of his child. ...

When you think about God breaking into human life, what do you expect? Earthquakes? Wind? Fire? Storm? Upheaval? When you think about one sent from God, who comes to save, what do you expect? A strong superman? A warrior at the head of a conquering army? What do you expect? Advent is about preparation for God coming to our world in Jesus Christ. Today's #Advent Word on this 21st day of Advent is #expect. When you think of Christ's coming, what do you expect? I love Rowan William's poem on this theme, which I quote in full below: Advent Calendar He will come like last leaf's fall. One night when the November wind has flayed the trees to the bone, and earth wakes choking on the mould, the soft shroud's folding. He will come like frost. One morning when the shrinking earth opens on mist, to find itself arrested in the net of alien, sword-set beauty. He will come like dark. One evening when the bursting red December sun draws up the sheet and penny-masks i...

One Advent theme is finding light in darkness, hope in despair. Today's word for reflection on this 4th day of Advent in the #AdventWord2018 online calendar is #night. In the Northern hemisphere, the Advent season falls at a dark time of year, with short days and long nights.  The long #night of winter d arkness affects us physiologically and emotionally. Darkness can also be a metaphor for hopelessness, for oppression, for feeling lost and seeing no way out whatever pit we find ourselves in. Light is essential for human life. No wonder we like to light candles in the darkness. No wonder we want to light up the #night. One reason to observe Advent, rather than rushing too quickly to decorate our homes and public spaces with Christmas lights, is that where there is darkness, we need to name it. We need to get real about whatever darkness we face within and around us. We need to acknowledge the mess we are in. We can best welcome light when through the #night we have been long...

For Christians today is the beginning of Holy Week. It begins with a man riding a young donkey towards the walled city of Jerusalem, a city crowded in anticipation of the Jewish Passover feast, a celebration of freedom from slavery.  If you could look down on Jerusalem that day you would see the huge golden domed temple and crowded narrow streets. You would see two processions entering the city from different directions. On the main road coming from his winter quarters on the Mediterranean you see the Governor Pontius Pilate on a fine stallion. The Roman occupying power needed extra security to prevent terrorist threats at the festival. Alongside Pilate, riding and marching into the city are a lot of highly-trained, well-armed Roman soldiers. People line the streets cheering them - probably paid to cheer or threatened with violence if they didn’t. Here are the conquerors who have brought peace – of a sort. Everyone watching this procession has to cheer or risk viol...

We know what Mary was doing on the night Jesus was born, but what was Joseph doing? No, I think it most unlikely he would have been helping Mary to give birth. That was a female duty and it is inconceivable that local women would not have rallied round to assist a young woman in labour with her first child, whatever the circumstances. While the midwives or Joseph's female relatives of Bethlehem supported Mary through labour and the birth of her firstborn son, what did Joseph do? Stay nearby to protect her? Most probably, but it would have been hard to do nothing through the long hours of waiting and wanting do help but feeling helpless. So, there's plenty of room to imagine what Joseph might have done during the hours of Mary's labour.  Thanks to Byrony Taylor's post I came across an animated poem by Nick Morgan about how Joseph might have kept busy. It is imaginative, simple and profound. I am grateful to Nick Morgan for giving it a Creative Commons licence ...

The Advent Word for today is 'Dazzle'. What could be more dazzling than the sun? A part of the sun is shown in this image of a filament eruption accompanied by solar flares. A sight to dazzle anyone attempting to look at it directly. It is no surprise that sun worship features in many ancient religions, or that times, seasons and calendars are constructed in relation to the sun's position in the sky. Without the light of the sun there would be no life on earth, or at least not as we know it now. In the vision of the new heaven and the new earth in Revelation 21 are these words about the 'city of God': "And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it." Revelation 21: 23 The glory of God is pictured as a light, glorious enough to give light for all nations. Will that light dazzle ...

Today Christians remember and celebrate how Jesus' promise to his disciples was fulfilled, that they would receive power to be his witnesses when the Holy Spirit came upon them. And they did. And they were blown out of their privacy onto the streets to take the message of Jesus to festival goers in Jerusalem and eventually, through them, to all the world. Here is the start of the Day of Pentecost story from Acts 2, the momentous occasion that gave birth to the Christian church in Jerusalem 2000 years ago. "When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability."   (Acts 2: 1 - 4 NRSV) The problem for Christi...

For reflection on Good Friday here is a poem by the Scottish poet  Edwin Muir (1887 - 1959) THE KILLING That was the day they killed the Son of God on a squat hill-top by Jerusalem. Zion was bare, her children from their maze sucked by demon curiosity clean through the gates. The very halt and blind had somehow got themselves up to the hill. After the ceremonial preparation, the scourging, nailing, nailing against the wood, erection of the main-trees with their burden, while from the hill rose an orchestral wailing, they were there at last, high up in the soft spring day. We watched the writhings, head the moanings, saw the three heads turning on their separate axles like broken wheels left spinning. Round his head was loosely bound a crown of plaitied thorn that hurt at random, stinging temple and brow as the pain swung into its envious circle. In front the wreath was gathered in a knot that as he gazed looked like the last stump left of a death-woun...

Outside St Paul's Cathedral, London, is a memorial bust of John Donne sculpted by Nigel Boonham and unveiled in 2012. John Donne (1572 - 1631) was a Dean of St Paul's. He died on 31 March 1631 which is why the Church of England commemorates him today. John Donne is remembered as priest and poet. Inside St Paul's is a 17th century memorial statue of Donne , one of the few to survive the 1666 great fire of London.  Many years ago as an adolescent studying the English metaphysical poets I fell in love with Donne's poetry - his erotic love poetry and his religious poetry. Later I discovered other works by him including sermons and philosophical writings. Probably the best known of John Donne's words was not written as poetry but as part of a prose devotional meditation, although often quoted as poetry. I have been thinking of the quote below especially this week while feeling particularly sad following 29 March 2017 when Article 50 was triggered to sta...