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Parish Magazine Archive
Each month the Priest-in-charge writes a letter for the parish magazines. They are reproduced below.
Saturday June 1st 2019
New Year Resolutions
According to a YouGov poll, the most popular
New Years resolutions for 2018 were: To eat healthier; to get more exercise;
to save more money. What resolutions, if any, have you made for 2019, I wonder?
I suspect that the ones Ive just mentioned will be familiar to many of us.
Depending on wh More...
Saturday June 1st 2019
New Year Resolutions
According to a YouGov poll, the most popular
New Years resolutions for 2018 were: To eat healthier; to get more exercise;
to save more money. What resolutions, if any, have you made for 2019, I wonder?
I suspect that the ones Ive just mentioned will be familiar to many of us.
Depending on when you read this, you may be in the process of making your New
Years resolutions. Or, you might be marking with satisfaction that, a few days
into 2019, youve so far been successful in doing, or not doing, what you
resolved to. Or, of course, you might be lamenting that resolutions made with
such sincere intent have already gone by the wayside. If thats you, be kind to
yourself!
At the time of writing this, weve gone through
a turbulent week in British politics a reminder that, as we stand at the
threshold of 2019, many of us will have very little, if any, idea of whats in
store for us in the year to come. Perhaps the only thing that we can be certain
of is uncertainty and living in a world of uncertainty can, to say the least,
be difficult. It often makes us feel lonely and afraid. Our unrealistic
expectation is that politicians will somehow make it all better. That wont do,
though, because it absolves us of the responsibility that we all have to make the world a better
place. Whilst theres nothing wrong at all with the resolutions that Ive cited
from last years YouGov poll, they are all about us and Id like to suggest a
different and, dare I say, a better, kind of New Years resolution, one in
which we, together, resolve to make better
the places where we live, work, learn and play.
My inspiration for this comes from the children
at Honeybourne Primary Academy. At an assembly that I was privileged to lead a
few weeks ago, they sang a Michael Jackson song called Man in the Mirror. The
song talks of making changes for good in our lives, of making a difference, of
not ignoring those who have no money, no food, no place to go or no place to
belong. The chorus, which stays with me, largely because the children sang the
words with such gusto and understanding, says:
Im starting with the man in the mirror,
Im asking him to change his ways,
And no message could have been any clearer:
If you want to make the world a better place,
Take
a look at yourself, and then make a change.
Each
one of us really canmake a difference. Im pledging to do that, in whatever ways I can, in 2019.
Please join me. And remember, that no matter what happens in 2019, the good
news of Christmas is that God is with us in Jesus Christ and has promised,
Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you. (Hebrews, chapter 5, verse
5, NIV)
Happy New Year.

Monday February 12th 2018
Communication
I
realise that this is going to make me sound old (!) but it struck me recently
that, as a child, our means of communication were, in essence, limited to the
telephone, letters/cards/postcards and, of course, face-to-face visits and
meetings. Now, in addition to the methods above (all of which w More...
Monday February 12th 2018
Communication
I
realise that this is going to make me sound old (!) but it struck me recently
that, as a child, our means of communication were, in essence, limited to the
telephone, letters/cards/postcards and, of course, face-to-face visits and
meetings. Now, in addition to the methods above (all of which work perfectly
well, by the way!) we have email, texts, Skype, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat,
WhatsApp, Tumblr, Instagram, Viber, Pinterest, etc. The list goes on. And on. And
on. Yet, despite the many ways of being able to communicate with one another,
there is a huge amount of research to suggest that many in our society feel
increasingly lonely. A survey by the Mental Health Foundation in 2015 revealed
that one in ten people in Britain "feels lonely often" and that "48% of people
think we're getting lonelier in general". We are reminded time and again of the
need for meaningful communication.
Perhaps
you've never thought about it like this before, but Christmas is really about God's
desire to communicate meaningfully with us.
This desire to communicate has always been central to the nature and character
of God. God has spoken, and still speaks, in many ways, such as through the
Bible, through family and friends, through the beauty and wonder of his
creation, through the situations and circumstances that we find ourselves in,
to name but a few. What is it, then, that God wants to communicate? What is the true message of Christmas? It is
this: God longs for each one of us to
know - without any doubt - his deep, unchanging and unfailing love for us - for you and for me. At Christmas, we are reminded that God's desire to communicate
how much each one of us means to him is so great that he sent his Son, Jesus
Christ, into the world to live among us, to show, in action, the height, depth,
length and breadth of his love for us, and to save us from our sins.
Whether
Christmas is something that you look forward to all year, or something that you
dread because it is a painful or lonely time, I pray that you will hear God speaking
to you afresh this year about how loved you
are. If you're in any doubt about that, why not come along to a Christmas
service? Then, in spirit, you can follow the example of the wise men, who gazed
in wonder at God with us,
"When
the wise men saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. On
entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt
down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him
gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh." (NRSV)
With love for a
blessed and peaceful Christmas and New Year.
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Sunday November 11th 2018
We will remember them
This
year, at 11 oclock on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, it will be
100-years since the beginning of what one author has described as the greatest
silence in modern history. That silence, which marked the end of the First
World War, had, and continues to have, a sacrednessabout it. More...
Sunday November 11th 2018
We will remember them
This
year, at 11 oclock on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, it will be
100-years since the beginning of what one author has described as the greatest
silence in modern history. That silence, which marked the end of the First
World War, had, and continues to have, a sacrednessabout it. It came after what HG Wells referred to as the "War to end all wars.
Wells, and idealists like him, believed that the sheer scale, horror and
bloodiness of the First World War would somehow show humankind once and for all
that war was then, and is now, an utterly ineffectual means of solving
political disputes. How much we have still to learn.
In
the First World War, and in subsequent wars, men and women made what we often
refer to, quite rightly, as the Supreme
Sacrifice. They laid down their lives so that the powers of immense
darkness and evil could be vanquished and the rest of us live in liberty and
peace. As a child, attending Remembrance services each year with my parents, I
remember singing the hymn, O Valiant Hearts. The fourth verse says,
Long years ago, as earth lay dark and
still,
rose a loud cry upon a lonely hill,
while in the frailty of our human clay,
Christ, our Redeemer, passed the
self-same way.
The
words reminded us, as we gathered to honour the fallen, that those who made the
Supreme Sacrifice were following the example of Jesus Christ. Like them, Gods
Son gave his life so that evil and sin ourevil and sin might be overcome and peace, liberty and a right relationship
with God restored.
Youll
find details elsewhere within these pages of a Remembrance service taking place
near you. I hope that you will join us as we remember, with a thankfulness that
is beyond words, those who died as a result of war those known to us and
those known to God alone and as we rededicate ourselves to hallowing their
memory by pursuing all that makes for peace and builds up our common life.
They deserve nothing less. We owe them everything. We will remember them.
With
love,
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Sunday October 28th 2018
God alone is all-sufficient
Let
nothing disturb you,
Nothing
frighten you.
All
things are passing,
God
never changes!
Patient
endurance means that all things are possible.
Those
who belong to God want for nothing.
God
alone is all-sufficient.
A
version of the words above, in much more traditional lan More...
Sunday October 28th 2018
God alone is all-sufficient
Let
nothing disturb you,
Nothing
frighten you.
All
things are passing,
God
never changes!
Patient
endurance means that all things are possible.
Those
who belong to God want for nothing.
God
alone is all-sufficient.
A
version of the words above, in much more traditional language, used to hang
above my desk at the hospital where I was chaplain. I looked at them, and
prayed them, every day, often before going into some difficult and deeply
challenging situations. Its said that the words were found in the Bible used
by St Teresa of Avila, a nun in the 16th Century, after she died.
Theyre
wonderful words that mean a great deal to me, that continue to inspire me and that
I wanted to share with you. Their message is clear: No matter what we walk
through in life, we need not be disturbed or afraid. Everything is passing,
however awful it may be, and, through it all, God is our rock and anchor. They
are a reminder that with patience and endurance (what a former vicar of mine
used to call stickability!) there is nothing, with God at our side, that we
cannot cope with and I see that so often in the lives of those of you I am
privileged to walk with through challenging circumstances. St Teresas words
culminate with hope and absolute certainty: That if we have welcomed God into
our lives, God will be our all-in-all in this life and in eternity.
Well,
thats easy to read and even easy to say, but its not always so easy to put
into practice. How can we be surethat God will never leave or forsake us, especially during trying and testing
times? The best evidence that I can offer you is the fact that God cast in his lot with us when He became one of us in
and through His Son, Jesus Christ. Becoming one of us gives God a unique
insight and understanding of the trials and challenges of the human condition.
More than that, God becoming one of us is our cast iron guarantee that we need not be disturbed or afraid, even
during the bleakest times. In the words of Psalm 46, We stand fearless at the
cliff-edge of doom, courageous in sea-storm and earthquake, before the rush and
roar of oceans, the tremors that shift mountains (The
Message) and we do so
because God really is unchanging, all-sufficient and always with us.
With
love,
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Sunday September 30th 2018
God, grant me serenity
And so, having written last month about the importance of taking time
out, the holiday season is now over! For students, their teachers, support
staff and others involved in the world of education, its back to school/college/university.
Life returns once again to a more familiar pattern.
&n More...
Sunday September 30th 2018
God, grant me serenity
And so, having written last month about the importance of taking time
out, the holiday season is now over! For students, their teachers, support
staff and others involved in the world of education, its back to school/college/university.
Life returns once again to a more familiar pattern.
Hopefully, regardless of whether or not you have to plan your life
around school terms, you will have had some time out and perhaps, during that
time, you have been able to gain a clearer perspective on the priorities for
your life. Its often only when we are away from the day-to-day that we can
gain insights into how we should best spend our time. Being able to determine
the best use of the time available to us requires wisdom wisdom to be able to
differentiate between the important, the urgent, the urgently important and the
things that really dont matter much at all.
Wisdom is a combination of experience, knowledge and good judgement, more
often than not recognised in hindsight. In Ancient Greek mythology, Athena was the
goddess of wisdom and of military victory. She is often depicted with a helmet,
spear and shield. This imagery was adopted for Britannia, as seen on some of our
coins, most notably the 50 pence piece. Britannia first appeared on coinage on
these shores under the rule of the Roman Emperor, Hadrian.
In the Bible, we read that getting to know, and then honouring, God, is
the beginning of wisdom. There is a need for all of us, from time to time, to
go back to school to realise that wisdom begins when we acknowledge that we
dont know it all and that we may have to juggle conflicting pressures and come
up with the best or least-worst solution. Talking to God can help. If you dont
think you know how to pray, you might like to start with the beautiful and
still much-used Prayer for Serenity:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.
God give you serenity, courage and wisdom.
With love,
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Sunday August 26th 2018
Time Out!
"Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying
heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from
me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." (St Matthew's Gospel, chapter 11,
v More...
Sunday August 26th 2018
Time Out!
"Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying
heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from
me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light." (St Matthew's Gospel, chapter 11,
verses 28-30, NRSV)
As I write, we are just a few days away from the end
of the school term and the 2017/18 academic year (hear the collective
expressions of exhaustion from many teachers and school staff!) Traditionally,
this is the time of year when some people make time to 'get away from it all',
either by going on holiday of by having the increasingly popular staycation, or
holiday at home.
If you are about to head off for your holidays, I hope
that you have a wonderful, safe and enjoyable time. But, even if you're not, may
I encourage you to make space in your life for some 'time out'? As human beings
we are, well, exactly that - human, not super-human! We need time and space to
lay down everyday burdens and pressures and to recharge our batteries. Jesus
modelled this in the gospels. His ministry (that is, his service of others and
his work for God) was busy and, of course, important. Important as it was,
though, he made time and space for himself, often, in his case, to pray and
spend time in his Father's presence. As well as being fully God, Jesus was also
fully human and knew what it was to be tired and burdened.
In the quote from St Matthew's Gospel at the beginning
of my letter, Jesus issues a personal
invitation to all who are 'weary and burdened' to come to him for rest,
recuperation and refreshment. He invites us to 'learn from him' and that means
that, as well as working hard, we need to find time to rest.
Whatever you're going to be doing over the summer, and
regardless of whether or not you're going away, I pray that you will make some
time and space for yourself - because you're worth it!
With love,
Scott

Friday May 18th 2018
Having celebrated the joy of Easter, the Church looks forward
Having
celebrated the joy of Easter, the Church, whilst continuing to rejoice in the
physical, spiritual and emotional resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead
giving to the whole of creation hope,
in this world and the next now looks forward to two further significant
events.
First,
More...
Friday May 18th 2018
Having celebrated the joy of Easter, the Church looks forward
Having
celebrated the joy of Easter, the Church, whilst continuing to rejoice in the
physical, spiritual and emotional resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead
giving to the whole of creation hope,
in this world and the next now looks forward to two further significant
events.
First,
we remember Christs ascension into heaven. After all that he went through for
each one of us on Good Friday, Christ ascended into heaven to be reunited with
his Father and to sit at Gods right hand the place of privilege and honour,
as befits the one who is King of kings and Lord of lords. Immediately before
his ascension, Christ said to his disciples,
"Go therefore and make disciples of
all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you Matthew 28: 19-20
(NRSV).
These
words are often referred to as the Great Commission. They apply to every
Christian and, lets be honest, can make us feel afraid, even inadequate.
Thats
where the other significant event that I mentioned comes to the fore. The other
great occasion that we look forward to after Easter is Pentecost, or Whitsun.
On this day, we remember the outpouring of Gods Holy Spirit, promised by
Jesus, on all believers. It is the
Holy Spirit who empowers and enables Christians to share the Good News of Jesus
Christ and I dont know about you, but, just as Im ready for some sunshine,
so I could do with some Good News!
When
we feel fearful to share the hope and fullness of life promised by Jesus, I
encourage you to remember that, in St Pauls words, God did not give us a
spirit of fear, but of power and of love 2 Timothy 1: 7 (NKJV). Heres a
wonderful thought the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead dwells
within every Christian and makes us
able, despite our own fear and trembling, to share with others the
life-changing, world-changing Good News of Jesus Christ.
Hope,
indeed, for what can seem, on occasions, a world with very little hope.

Monday July 2nd 2018
Count your blessings!
Im very privileged in my
role to be invited into our wonderful schools at Honeybourne, Pebworth and
Willersey. In each school I have been accepted as part of the family, which is
a great joy to me. Having been a healthcare chaplain for many years, being
involved in schools is a relatively n More...
Monday July 2nd 2018
Count your blessings!
Im very privileged in my
role to be invited into our wonderful schools at Honeybourne, Pebworth and
Willersey. In each school I have been accepted as part of the family, which is
a great joy to me. Having been a healthcare chaplain for many years, being
involved in schools is a relatively new aspect of ministry but one that I
absolutely love. Im grateful to the staff and students for the warmth and
generosity of their welcome.
Recently, in assemblies and
collective worship, Ive encouraged those present to think about things for
which they are grateful. At one of the schools I took in a large jar we
called it our Thank you Jar and everyone was invited to write one thing that
they wanted to say thank you for. I then left the jar in school until my next
visit. By the time I went back, it was crammed full of slips of paper. Children
were grateful for mums, dads, grandparents, brothers and sisters, extended
family, carers, the school, their teachers, pets and so much more besides. It
was humbling and encouraging to be presented with a visible reminder of the
many blessings that we receive on a daily basis and which, so often, we all
take for granted.
I have been so inspired by
the childrens example that Im going to do something similar myself and want
to encourage you to do the same. You may or may not want to use a Thank you
Jar (Im going to!) but, even if you dont, why not, at the end of every day,
before you go to sleep, recall one good thing that has happened to you, or that
was said to you, or an act of kindness shown towards you, or the beauty of the
area where we live, or whatever it might be, and say thank you? Life isnt
always a bed of roses but even in the sadness, pain, chaos or brokenness, there
is often something for which to be thankful.
As a child, I used to sing a
song at the church I attended. It was called Count your blessings and the
chorus goes like this,
Count your blessings, name
them one by one;
Count your blessings, see
what God has done;
Count your blessings, name
them one by one,
and it will surprise you
what the Lord has done.
May we may you be constantly surprised at Gods
goodness and faithfulness and thankful for all that He has done.

Friday June 15th 2018
Were all in it together.
The
phrase, were all in it together, is a hackneyed one, misused by politicians
and the social elite to suggest that when times of austerity and hardship are
upon us, we all walk through such times together. That should, of course, be
exactly what happens but often the reality is something qu More...
Friday June 15th 2018
Were all in it together.
The
phrase, were all in it together, is a hackneyed one, misused by politicians
and the social elite to suggest that when times of austerity and hardship are
upon us, we all walk through such times together. That should, of course, be
exactly what happens but often the reality is something quite different.
In
the Church, though, it really is true that were all in it together. Every
Christian has a unique, special and invaluable role to play in the life of the
Church. In May, I attended a special service called an Episcopal Visitation. At
the service, the Bishop of Gloucester, Bishop Rachel, admitted those elected to
serve as churchwardens to their office. I felt incredibly proud as I witnessed
Brian, Mary, Sylvia, Michael, Elizabeth, Peter and Robert take up their
appointments for the year ahead. Each one of them had heard Gods call and
responded with generous and open hearts and Im so thankful to each one of them
for all that they do to support our parishes, the mission and ministry of Gods
Church, and me.
It
seems hard to believe that on 28th June, it will be one year since I
was licensed by Bishop Rachel to serve as Team Vicar in the Vale and Cotswold
Edge Team, with responsibility for the parishes of Aston-sub-Edge, Dorsington,
Honeybourne, Pebworth, Weston-sub-Edge and Willersey with Saintbury. I give
thanks to God for every day of the past year, for the love, support and warm
welcome what you have shown to Ros and to me, and, above all else, for the
profound sense that God has amazing plans for our parishes and communities. Your
kindness and encouragement have been overwhelming and we love being here with
you.
Just
like those who will serve as churchwardens in the year ahead heard and
responded to Gods call, we also came here in response to Gods call. So, what
is God calling you to do? Each one of you has something unique and invaluable
to offer in the service of Jesus Christ. It might be spiritual or practical.
Only you know what it is. One things certain without you playing your
special part and taking your special place, the Church, Christs body on earth,
will always be incomplete. St Paul, writing to the early Christian community in
Corinth, puts it like this,
There is one body, but it has many
parts. But all its many parts make up one body. You are the body of Christ. Each one of you is a part of it.1 Corinthians 12: 12
& 27 (ESV)
We
would love to come and take your place and play your part. God has called you. How will you respond?

Sunday April 29th 2018
NEW LIFE, NEW HOPE
It all seemed so hopeless
on Good Friday. The Saviour promised by God had been crucified and was dead. So
many hopes and dreams were shattered and lay in ruins. The disciples were
bewildered and confused by what had happened. How could this possibly be part
of Gods plan to reconcile the whole More...
Sunday April 29th 2018
NEW LIFE, NEW HOPE
It all seemed so hopeless
on Good Friday. The Saviour promised by God had been crucified and was dead. So
many hopes and dreams were shattered and lay in ruins. The disciples were
bewildered and confused by what had happened. How could this possibly be part
of Gods plan to reconcile the whole of creation to Himself?
Christs death, which is as
significant and effective today as it was 2,000 years ago, and which will still
be just as significant and effective in 2,000 years time, was necessary because
sin had driven a wedge between our relationship with the God who created us in
His image and who longs to be in a relationship with each one of us. On the
cross, all our sin past, present and future was put to death with Jesus and we have been forgiven.
And then this happened.
Mary Magdalene arrived at the tomb where Christs body had been buried, only to
find it empty. St John writes,
Mary Magdalene stood crying outside the
tomb. She was still weeping, when she stooped down and saw two angels inside. The angels
asked Mary, "Why are you crying? She answered, "They have taken away my Lords
body! I dont know where they have put him. As soon as Mary said this, she turned
around and saw Jesus standing there. But she did not know who he was. Jesus asked her, "Why
are you crying? Who are you looking for? She thought he was the gardener and
said, "Sir, if you have taken his body away, please tell me, so I can go and
get him. Then Jesus said to her, "Mary! She turned
and said to him, "Rabboni. The Aramaic word "Rabboni means "Teacher. (CEV)
The story of our salvation
doesnt end with death. On what we now celebrate as Easter Day, Christians
believe that Jesus Christ rose from the dead. In doing so, he destroyed eternal
death and gave the whole of Gods creation the opportunity to revel instead in eternal life. Those who believe, no
matter how falteringly, have hope hope for the here and now, and hope for
eternity. This doesnt mean that we wont go through difficult times. It doesnt
mean that wont know pain and suffering. It doesnt even mean that well escape
physical death. What it does mean is that death, when it comes, is not the end
of our journey, but, rather, the beginning of a new one in Gods presence forever.
I pray that this Easter,
amongst family gatherings and enjoying lots of Easter eggs, you will find time
to draw real hope from the Easter
story. Across the six parishes that I am privileged to care for, you will find
services in our churches to help you do just that. Wed love you to join us,
but, even if you dont want to, or arent able to, may you know and experience
the hope that Jesus Christ offers.
Theres nothing like it, and nothing so certain, this side of heaven.
A very happy Easter to you
all.

Thursday March 1st 2018
Everything I do, I do it for you.
In 1991, just
before I was married, the film, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was released. I
went to see it in Cambridge with my Best Man. Whilst the film wasnt especially
memorable, the theme music, composed and sung by Bryan Adams, was Everything
I do, I do it for you.
Were now More...
Thursday March 1st 2018
Everything I do, I do it for you.
In 1991, just
before I was married, the film, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was released. I
went to see it in Cambridge with my Best Man. Whilst the film wasnt especially
memorable, the theme music, composed and sung by Bryan Adams, was Everything
I do, I do it for you.
Were now in the
Season of Lent. This is a time when Christians prepare themselves, by prayer
and fasting, for the great celebration of Easter and of Christs victory over
sin and death. More than that, it is a time to look honestly and openly at our
lives, finding those places where we have shut out God and inviting Him in, to
transform those dark places (which we all have) with his marvelous and glorious
light. Some people choose to give something up for the 40-days of Lent but,
more and more, through initiatives such as 40 Acts (www.40acts.org.uk), were
being encouraged to do an act of kindness or generosity on each day during
Lent. I think this is a great idea. What we do doesnt have to be complicated.
It could be as simple as saying "thank you to someone who helps us, visiting a
housebound neighbour or, as I said recently in an assembly at Honeybourne
School, talking to the person on their own in the playground. Age is no barrier
to acts of kindness!
For many, Lent
generates, consciously or subconsciously, a lot of questions, the most
significant one being, "Why did Jesus have to die? The answer to that question
is, on the one hand, profound and, on the other, straightforward: Jesus Christ
went to the cross for you, for me and for the whole of Gods creation, to
restore our relationship with God, which had broken down because of sin. On the
cross, all our sins past, present and future were dealt with once and for
all. The words of Bryan Adams song, might have been spoken by Christ himself:
"Everything I do, I do it
for you.
Christs death is
a wonderful, life-changing, world-changing moment in history like no other. And
yet still questions remain about God, about life and its meaning and about
Jesus Christ and his relevance in 2018.
We want to give
you a space to explore some of those questions and so, on 9 April, were going to start something called The Y Course
(www.ycourse.com). This eight-week course is aimed at those with questions. You
need no knowledge of the Bible, Christianity or the Church and there are no
prayers and no hymn singing! In its own words, the Y Course is, "Cringe free.
Totally relevant. Cynic friendly. Ken Spensley, who attends St Peters Church
in Willersey, and I, will be leading the course. Well meet at 7pm in The Thatched Tavern in Honeybourne. Wed
love you to join us. No need to let us know if youre coming just turn up.
Over a pint, and in a relaxed atmosphere, we can look together at those Big
Questions that youve always had but never been able to ask.
In the meantime,
I hope that, during this Season of Lent, you will know for the first time, or
know again, how loved you are by Gods Son, Jesus Christ. On the cross,
everything he did, he did for you.
With love,
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Wednesday December 20th 2017
The most wonderful time of the year?
"Ha!, I hear some of you cry. "It was all
very well for Andy Williams to sing about Christmas being the most wonderful
time of year. He didnt have to do all the things that Ive got to do between
now and 25th December!
For many, Christmas is stressful. Diaries
are groaning under the More...
Wednesday December 20th 2017
The most wonderful time of the year?
"Ha!, I hear some of you cry. "It was all
very well for Andy Williams to sing about Christmas being the most wonderful
time of year. He didnt have to do all the things that Ive got to do between
now and 25th December!
For many, Christmas is stressful. Diaries
are groaning under the strain of concerts, school plays, church services,
office parties, family and friends arriving and departing, shopping, meal
preparation and so much more besides. For others, Christmas can be a
particularly difficult time. Some will spend it alone. For some, it will be the
first Christmas without a loved one, or after a sad or painful life event.
In spite of these very real situations, I
still believe that Christmas really is the most wonderful time of the year
not because, in the words of Andy Williamss song, of "jingle belling, parties
for hosting, marshmallows for toasting, or much mistletoeing, fun though all
of those things may be. No, I believe that this really is the most wonderful
time of the year because of this message, spoken by an angel to some shepherds
who were keeping watch over their flocks,
"Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great
joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city
of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you:
you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger. And
suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God
and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with
whom he is pleased. Luke 2: 10-14 (ESV)
God, in Jesus Christ, becomes one of us. He
feels pain and sadness. He walks with us in and through our brokenness. There
is no fake news here, only Good News especially for those who find
Christmas and the New Year difficult. Emmanuel God with us.
There are numerous services taking place
before and during Christmas, to which youare warmly invited. However you come happy or sad you are welcome. On
behalf of everyone at your parish church, I wish you and yours a peaceful and
blessed Christmas and New Year.
With love,
Scott

Monday January 1st 2018
New Year, new beginnings
I
approach the New Year with a mixture of excitement, anticipation and with a bit
of nervousness! I look forward it. I love looking at my new diary, not yet full
with commitments, and wondering what events will fill its pages. Some will be
happy, things to really look forward to, and some, o More...
Monday January 1st 2018
New Year, new beginnings
I
approach the New Year with a mixture of excitement, anticipation and with a bit
of nervousness! I look forward it. I love looking at my new diary, not yet full
with commitments, and wondering what events will fill its pages. Some will be
happy, things to really look forward to, and some, of course, will be sad.
When I
feel that twinge of nervousness, which many of you may relate to, I turn to
these words, written many thousands of years ago by the Old Testament Prophet
Jeremiah,
"For
surely I know the plans I have for you, says theLord, plans for your
welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. Then when you call
upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you
will find me; if you seek me with all your heart Jeremiah 29: 11-13 (NRSV)
and those words
fill me with hope.
God is Sovereign
and whatever the year ahead has in store for us, we can be absolutely confident
that God will be with us. This is good news for us as individuals and for our
villages and communities. Over the last six months that Ive been with you as
your Vicar, I have a growing sense that God has good and positive plans for our
churches and communities. There is something for us to do, though, and Jeremiah
sets it out clearly. We are to be a people who pray and who seek God and His
will. And what happens when we do those things? In Jeremiahs words, God will
hear us and we will find Him if we seek Him with all our hearts.
In his Christmas
Broadcast to the Empire in 1939, a year overshadowed with troubles of the worst
kind, King George VIth quoted these words from a poem by Minnie Louise Haskins,
And 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 out 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.
So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God,
trod gladly into the night.
What wonderful
words. Even when we walk into the darkness of uncertainty, we do not walk
alone. God is with us that Good News is at the heart of the message of
Christmas, the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ, so recently celebrated and
so fresh in our minds.
So, I encourage
you in the year the lies ahead to put your hand in the Hand of God and, if I can
help and support you in anyway, regardless of whether or not you come to
church, please let me know.
I wish you a
very Happy New Year.
With love,
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Wednesday November 15th 2017
Prayer and Fellowship Meeting
Prayer the beginning and the end
Jesus
said, Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be
like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came,
and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had
been founded More...
Wednesday November 15th 2017
Prayer and Fellowship Meeting
Prayer the beginning and the end
Jesus
said, Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be
like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came,
and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had
been founded on rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not
act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain
fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and
it felland great was its fall! Matthew 7: 24-27 (NRSV)
In a world of
shifting sands, what solid foundation, what rock, can we with absolute
certainty build our lives on? Money, property, stocks and shares and
commodities all fluctuate in value. The Lottery really? I suppose thats fine
if you fancy odds of 1 in 13,983,816!
Meanwhile, the writer of Psalm 18 describes God as,
My
rock, my fortress, and my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge, my
shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
That sounds more
like it. I said recently, in a talk that I gave in Church on a Sunday morning,
that,
"Prayer is, or rather, must be, the one thing that
undergirds everything else that we do.
I honestly
believe that. Prayer is what makes the difference to us personally, to our
churches, to our communities and to Gods world. Prayer to God, in and through
Jesus Christ, puts us into direct contact with the living God. We speak to God
and, wonder of wonders, God speaks to us. Through prayer, we enter into a
relationship with God and that relationship is sure and certain and never fails
its the one thing in this world that we can rely on, a truly solid
foundation for life.
Because prayer
is so important, Im starting a monthly Prayer
and Fellowship Meeting. The meeting is open to all Christians, regardless of where you usually worship and this is
my personal invitation to you! The format will be simple: well start with tea and coffee, read
some verses of the Bible and talk about them and then lead into a time of
prayer, where we can pray together, primarily
for our churches and communities.
The first
meeting will take place at 7.30pm onThursday, 16 November, in the Vicarage
in Honeybourne. I really hope that youll be able to join me.
With love in Christ,
Scott
Revd Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Thursday October 26th 2017
Autumn is a glorious season
"As long as the earth
endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night,
shall not cease."
These words, spoken by God and recorded for us in the book of
Genesis, the first book of the Bible, remind us that all of creation, which
very much includes you and me, i More...
Thursday October 26th 2017
Autumn is a glorious season
"As long as the earth
endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night,
shall not cease."
These words, spoken by God and recorded for us in the book of
Genesis, the first book of the Bible, remind us that all of creation, which
very much includes you and me, is part of a cycle of life that includes sowing
and planting and then harvesting and reaping what was sown.
Autumn is a glorious season in so many ways. John Keats captures the
spirit of this time of year beautifully, describing it as the "Season of mists
and mellow fruitfulness." Traditionally, it is one of the times during the year
when we thank God for his goodness and faithfulness, rejoicing with thankful
hearts that another harvest is being safely gathered. We are mindful of, and
give thanks for, the work of farmers, farmworkers and all those who provide for
our daily needs.
Harvest is a particular reminder of the need never to take for
granted what we have, whether that be family, friends, health, food to eat, a
place to sleep, possessions, wealth or whatever it might be. In many ways, compared
with so many others around the world and in our own land, we have an abundance
of things to be thankful for and the Bible teaches us that all we have is from
God. This is why, at Harvest time in particular, we offer some of what we have
been given back to God, in token of our gratitude for his unending
faithfulness.
But, Harvest causes me to pause and reflect on my own life, too, and
I'd like to encourage you, in the busyness of your life, to also take time to
take stock. What 'seeds' am I sowing - seeds of love, kindness and unity, or
something else? What will be the 'harvest' of my life? Will what I have sown
bear much 'fruit'? Will I be fulfilled as I look back in years to come? The
answers to those questions will depend on the choices that we've made - the 'seeds' that we've sown, if you like.
Sow well. Sow wisely and, if you are able to, make time this Harvest
to thank God for the blessings that he has given to you.

Friday August 25th 2017
Be encouraged!
Be encouraged!
In his first letter to the Christian Church in Thessalonica, St Paul
wrote,
"Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed
you are doing.
Ive been reminded of those words as Ive reflected on my first few
weeks as your vicar. We live in a world whe More...
Friday August 25th 2017
Be encouraged!
Be encouraged!
In his first letter to the Christian Church in Thessalonica, St Paul
wrote,
"Therefore encourage one another and build up each other, as indeed
you are doing.
Ive been reminded of those words as Ive reflected on my first few
weeks as your vicar. We live in a world where the focus is always on what were not doing! Its not wrong to be
challenged, of course, and its always fatal to rest on our laurels. But
equally, its not wrong to celebrate what we have achieved and are achieving.
I am delighted and greatly encouraged to see so much life in our
villages and in our churches. There is so much going on around us from successful
and flourishing schools; to thriving businesses; to village fetes; to a Party
in the Park; to Honeyangels, our parents/grandparents and toddlers group; to
committed and faithful Christians, as well as people of other faiths, living
and actively engaged in the life of our churches and communities. It is through
our engagement with one another and the wider community that we fulfil St
Pauls call to build each other up.
You have been, and you are, a great encouragement to me and my hope
and prayer is that I will be able to be the same to you in the years ahead. Ive
said it before and Ill keep on saying it: The Church is here for you, whatever
you believe, struggle to believe or dont believe. So, be encouraged and go on
encouraging others, building up one another and our communities and thank you
for all that you do to make a
difference for good in our villages. I feel privileged and proud to be a part
of them.
With love in Christ,

Friday September 15th 2017
Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid.
"Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid.
The world, beautiful
though it is, especially the area where we live, can sometimes seem a
bewildering, even frightening, place. As I write, the situation on the Korean
Peninsular is a particular concern. An already tense situation, that has been
wor More...
Friday September 15th 2017
Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid.
"Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid.
The world, beautiful
though it is, especially the area where we live, can sometimes seem a
bewildering, even frightening, place. As I write, the situation on the Korean
Peninsular is a particular concern. An already tense situation, that has been
worsening for some months, is now being exacerbated by unhelpful rhetoric and
sabre-rattling on both sides.
So, what are we
to make of this and other similar situations? As Lance Corporal Jones in Dads Army would undoubtedly say, "Dont
panic, Captain Mainwaring! The Bible tells us that, in the present age,
frightening things will sometimes go on around us in the world and in our own
lives. The writer of Psalm 46 said, "God is our refuge and strength, a very
present help in trouble; therefore we will not fear, though the earth be moved
and though the mountains tremble in the heart of the sea. With God, no
situation is ever hopeless. And so, however falteringly, we trust God, who is
our refuge and strength in and through the storms of life.
The words that I
began my article with were spoken by Jesus to his disciples when they were "terrified
by a storm going on around them when they were in a boat. They are as true
today as they were then and speak through the ages. When we are terrified,
either by the world around us or by things happening in our own lives, Jesus promises
to walk through it with us and speaks to us the same words of reassurance:
"Take heart, it is I. Do not be afraid.
With love in Christ,
Scott
Rev Scott Watts
Team Vicar

Tuesday August 1st 2017
New journeys begin
New journeys begin:
I've just spent 3 days in Chartres, in north-central France. The town is famous for its cathedral, which dominates the skyline for miles around. But there are plenty of nice cathedrals in the UK, so why head for Chartres?
Located in the Cathedral is a 12th century circula More...
Tuesday August 1st 2017
New journeys begin
New journeys begin:
I've just spent 3 days in Chartres, in north-central France. The town is famous for its cathedral, which dominates the skyline for miles around. But there are plenty of nice cathedrals in the UK, so why head for Chartres?
Located in the Cathedral is a 12th century circular labyrinth. The labyrinth is huge, measuring 42 feet in diameter, and the winding path contained within it is over 850 feet long! For around 900 years, pilgrims like me have walked the labyrinth, following the twisting and turning way, which, if followed correctly, leads to the centre. To some, the path symbolises life's journey, while our arrival in the centre represents what should be the ultimate goal of every human being - to be in the very presence of the God of love and to know and share in the fullness of life that Christ promises to all who believe in him. Above all, the labyrinth is a reminder that life is for each one of us a journey.
By the time you read this, I'll be back from Chartres and Ros and I will have made another significant journey - from Cambridgeshire to the Vale and Cotswold Edge. My appointment as your Vicar marks the beginning of the next phase of the journey that God has planned for our churches and their role in our communities. As we embark on this new venture together, we can know with all certainty that God journeys with us.
Ros and I are looking forward to being part of your journey and to you being part of ours. We're so looking forward to meeting you all! Whatever life throws at you, regardless of whether or not you currently come to church, we are here - with you and for you.
With love in Christ,
Scott
Reverend Scott Watts, The Vicarage, Honeybourne

Friday June 16th 2017
I will take with me many memories ...
It is 3 years
since I arrived as a not so young and inexperienced, newly ordained curate in
these parishes. In the initial months of my curacy when I attended training courses,
together with other curate colleagues, we were expected to be able to recite
the names of our parishes a task whi More...
Friday June 16th 2017
I will take with me many memories ...
It is 3 years
since I arrived as a not so young and inexperienced, newly ordained curate in
these parishes. In the initial months of my curacy when I attended training courses,
together with other curate colleagues, we were expected to be able to recite
the names of our parishes a task which took more than a few moments for me do
then, but can now trot off with great
ease! And that is because I have become not only
familiar with the names but also of the people and places in which our 7
churches sit. I have been very blessed to get to know this beautiful part of
England, but more importantly I have been very blessed to be able to minister
to you and get to know you well.
After three
years curates move on to take on the 'cure of souls' in a new parish. It seems
hard to believe that my three years is now done and it is time for me to move
on. I will be moving to the Diocese of Chichester to become priest-in-charge of
the parishes of St Mary the Virgin, Burpham and St Nicholas, Poling, two small
rural parishes nestling in the South Downs and close to the south coast near
Arundel.
I will take
with me many memories and you will always have a special place in my prayers.
There have been moments of great joy and moments of great sadness. There have
been moments of discord and moments of beauty and moments when your expressions of love and fellowship have
touched both Ronald and me. All these moments are part of a rich tapestry of experiences,
not just for us but I hope for you too.They are experiences which help to form and build relationships across
our parishes and communities. They are living, breathing glimpses of what our
diocesan vision hopes for - that we come to know life and life in all its
abundance through a relationship with God and in the name of Jesus. My prayer for
these parishes is that you will continue to grow and develop relationships
which reflect Gods love in the way I have felt your love and affection for me.
My final
service in the Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry will be at 10am at St
Ecgwins Church, Honeybourne on Sunday 18th June followed by celebration drinks
and canapés in church. I would be thrilled if you can be there, but if
that is not possible, I would like to say thank you to you all. You have taught
me a great deal, you have given me a great deal and I will remember you with
love and affection as I move on. Ronald
and I will take many happy memories of the fellowship we have enjoyed in
these parishes as we move to pastures
new.
With love andblessings,
Celia.
Assistant
Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Tuesday May 16th 2017
Hello message from Scott and Ros
Hello!
I'm grateful to have the opportunity to introduce myself,
although I want to do that properly when Ros and I, along with our Basset
Hound, Marigold, move into Honeybourne Vicarage and I become your Vicar and
part of the Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry. I'm excited and humbled to
hav More...
Tuesday May 16th 2017
Hello message from Scott and Ros
Hello!
I'm grateful to have the opportunity to introduce myself,
although I want to do that properly when Ros and I, along with our Basset
Hound, Marigold, move into Honeybourne Vicarage and I become your Vicar and
part of the Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry. I'm excited and humbled to
have been appointed and really look forward to being part of the community and
of your lives. One of my passions as a priest is to do my utmost to be there
for everyone, regardless of your age,
gender or anything else - even regardless of whether or not you come to Church,
although I hope you will!
I was born and grew up in Suffolk. After Ros and I married in
1991 we lived in Cambridge and then, in 1996, moved to Brampton in Cambridgeshire
where we have lived ever since. While the move to the parishes is a big one for
us, and we will leave behind much that is familiar and many friends, we're
looking forward to making new friends and to living in a part of the country
that we know and love. Apart from working for Lloyds Bank for five years,
during which time I met Ros, most of my pre-ordination working life was as a
civil servant in the Ministry of Defence, where I worked alongside the Royal
Air Force and US Air Force in human resources and in a parliamentary and
ministerial business secretariat. Apart from two years in Lloyds Bank, Ros's
career was in secondary education. She taught history and ended her career as
an assistant head teacher and director of sixth form. These days, as well as
working as a part-time receptionist at a local veterinary hospital, she
designs, makes and sells jewellery and has recently qualified as a milliner,
having trained in Chipping Campden with Louise Pocock.
I was ordained in Ely Cathedral in 2003 and served as curate
in Brampton. In 2007, I became chaplain of Sue Ryder St John's Hospice and in
2009, I was appointed as Lead Chaplain of Hinchingbrooke Hospital in Huntingdon.
I've played a full part in the life of the hospital, supporting patients,
relatives, visitors, volunteers and 1,650 amazing staff, through some of the
hardest things that life can ever throw at us. That's all been a privilege
beyond words and now the sense of privilege continues as we follow God's call
to come to you.
Ros and I are looking forward to meeting you all and a great
opportunity for us to do that is on 28 June at 7pm in St Peter's Church,
Willersey, when Bishop Rachel, the Bishop of Gloucester, will License me as
your new Vicar. Please come along and share in this very special and joyous occasion,
when, together, we begin the next phase of our journey with the God who loves
each one of us more than we can even begin to imagine.
With our love, Scott & Ros (and Marigold!)

Tuesday May 16th 2017
Celia's news
Dear Friends
With the early spring sunshine
we have enjoyed in April and everything bursting into bloom, we are looking forwards to a new era in our six
parishes. Our new team vicar, Scott Watts will be installed at St Peter's,
Willersey on 28th June while I will be leaving the parishes on 18 More...
Tuesday May 16th 2017
Celia's news
Dear Friends
With the early spring sunshine
we have enjoyed in April and everything bursting into bloom, we are looking forwards to a new era in our six
parishes. Our new team vicar, Scott Watts will be installed at St Peter's,
Willersey on 28th June while I will be leaving the parishes on 18th June. These two dates are close together through
the purely happy coincidence that Scott's appointment coincided with the end of
my term as a curate. That means that there will be no 'gap' between my
departure and Scott's arrival.
I will be taking up a new post
in July, and will be able to tell you more in my final pastoral letter next
month. Scott has written an introductory article for you all this month. He and
his wife Ros, together with Marigold the basset hound will be moving into the
Vicarage in Honeybourne in June. I am
sure you will give them a warm welcome as you did me when I came to the VACE
team ministry nearly three years ago now. How time flies!
With love and blessings, Celia.
Monday April 10th 2017
We are delighted to announce the new encumbrant.
We
are delighted to announce Revd Scott Watts will be the next Team Vicar serving the
parishes of Aston-sub-Edge, Dorsington, Honeybourne, Pebworth, Weston-sub-Edge
and Willersey.
Scott writes,
Dear
friends,
Ros
and I are looking forward to getting to know all of you in the Chu More...
Monday April 10th 2017
We are delighted to announce the new encumbrant.
We
are delighted to announce Revd Scott Watts will be the next Team Vicar serving the
parishes of Aston-sub-Edge, Dorsington, Honeybourne, Pebworth, Weston-sub-Edge
and Willersey.
Scott writes,
Dear
friends,
Ros
and I are looking forward to getting to know all of you in the Church family
and beyond and to working with you to share God's love and life in our
communities.
I
feel thankful and privileged to have been offered the post of Team Vicar and to
have the opportunity to work alongside Craig and Dana as part of the Vale and
Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.
Please
pray for us during this time of transition and know that we are already praying
for you. See you in June!
With
love in Christ, Scott and Ros
Scott's
licensing by Bishop Rachel and the new Archdeacon of Cheltenham, Phil Andrew
will be held on Wednesday, 28th June at 7pm in St Peter's Church, Willersey.
Friday March 31st 2017
As we move towards our great celebration of Easter
As
we move from Lent towards our great celebration of Easter, we will re-live the
drama of Jesus' last earthly journey which took him to the cross. For some that
was a symbol of defeat. Those in power
at the time thought that executing Jesus would put an end to his ministry - At
that point it More...
Friday March 31st 2017
As we move towards our great celebration of Easter
As
we move from Lent towards our great celebration of Easter, we will re-live the
drama of Jesus' last earthly journey which took him to the cross. For some that
was a symbol of defeat. Those in power
at the time thought that executing Jesus would put an end to his ministry - At
that point it seemed like the end for his followers too - but it didnt end
there. 3 days later Jesus was among his followers again - no longer in the tomb
- an event which remains both mysterious and real to this very day. Christians
refer to this very special week before Easter Sunday as Holy Week which of course
ends with Jesus' death on a cross.
Three
days later we celebrate Easter Sunday
with all sorts of symbols of new life and new birth - eggs, baby chicks, lambs,
flowers and lighted candles because that is what we believe happened on that
first Easter Day over 2000 years ago. Jesus' overcame the power of death and
lived again amongst his people. When
Jesus friends went to the tomb at the end of the Sabbath day they were
expecting to find a dead body - but they found an empty tomb. Many efforts have
been made since then to explain and dismiss the witness and experience of
Jesus' disciples and close friends - men and women - but despite the most
rigorous examination of the facts over the centuries no one has been able to
offer a convincing set of arguments to dismiss their claims.
They
were inspired by what they experienced - first of all great fear and then great
joy because they were certain that Jesus was no longer dead. We cannot explain
that in terms which completely make sense to our 21st century minds which
demand a rational answer to all questions and all events. Indeed, those first
century Christians couldn't describe their experience fully either. But we
cannot dismiss the witness and experience and convictions of the men and women
who were Jesus' disciples and close friends. It is their testimony which led to
the founding of the Christian Church - still the largest single faith group in
the world today.
Christian
lives are grounded in the hope that Jesus gave us. That love will always be more
powerful than evil. And so I invite you to come and see or learn for yourselves
what it is we believe as we re-live the events of Holy Week and celebrate the
greatest of our Christian festivals Easter Day. There are many opportunities
throughout Holy Week to join us and an Easter Sunday service in all 6 of our
churches. You will be most welcome wherever you choose to be. As we celebrate
together, I pray that you too will experience something of the wonder and
mystery of Easter as those first disciples and friends of Jesus did - all those
centuries ago.
I
join with all my clergy colleagues in the Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry
and with Dr Israel Selvanayagan from our Methodist Church in Willersey to wish
you all a very happy and joy filled Easter.
Celia.
Assistant
Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Friday March 10th 2017
We can look forward to March winds, April showers and misty May mornings!
With
winter now behind us this year, we can look forward to March winds, April
showers and misty May mornings! The fresh green shoots of growth, which have
been dormant during the winter months, will soon appear. March is a transition month in terms of the
weather. But it is also a transition More...
Friday March 10th 2017
We can look forward to March winds, April showers and misty May mornings!
With
winter now behind us this year, we can look forward to March winds, April
showers and misty May mornings! The fresh green shoots of growth, which have
been dormant during the winter months, will soon appear. March is a transition month in terms of the
weather. But it is also a transition month for Christians. We turn away from
thoughts of Jesus as that tiny baby in a manger at Christmas and turn towards thoughts
of Jesus the man and his life-changing actions on that first Easter Day.
Christians
devote time to prepare and reflect on the great events of that first Easter Day
through a time of preparation known as Lent. Lent can be looked at as a kind of
spring cleaning of our souls and our spiritual lives. We believe that it is in
spending time in reflection and a more disciplined life of prayer and practical
action that we can become people who reflect the glorious colour and light
which we see in the person of Jesus Christ.
In
the same way that spring cleaning our houses does away with accumulated dirt,
dust and unwanted rubbish to make our homes warm and welcoming for our families
and friends, so too does the clearing out of the accumulated dirt and rubbish
in our minds help us to make space for God in our lives. So-called Lenten
disciplines are varied. Giving things up - perhaps the chocolate or the glass
of wine or the little luxuries we enjoy - or taking things up - perhaps making
that regular phone call to a lonely relative or popping in to see a neighbour
who is bereaved or housebound - these are things which prompt us to think more
carefully about what life means and how we can become the loving, compassionate
human beings which God intended us to be. And we make an extra effort to study
a part of the Bible too. If you are
curious about what the scriptures hold, you are welcome to come along to a
weekly gathering at Weston bowling club on any Wednesday evening in March from
7.30 to 9pm. We will read and discuss a book called the The Joy of the Gospel by Paula Gooder. Look it up on the internet
to find out more about it or give me a ring if you are interested in joining
us.
Through
our reflections in Lent, we will be better prepared to celebrate the greatest
Christian festival of all - Easter Sunday. Do come and explore what it is about
Jesus that has inspired so many people over the centuries and perhaps find out
for yourselves why Christianity is still a huge force for good in the world. And if that doesn't appeal, you only have to
stop and look around you in the next few
weeks and watch and enjoy the wonders of creation as we see new life blossom
around us in our gardens, fields and hedgerows. Happy watching!
With love and
blessings.
Celia.
Assistant
Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Monday January 23rd 2017
Have you made any New Year resolutions yet?
Have
you made any New Year resolutions yet? Its a much talked about but, in my
experience, often failed enterprise in our household! Ideas which seem inspired
on New Years Eve and for the first few weeks of January soon seem to be
replaced by other better ideas and so it goes on until the More...
Monday January 23rd 2017
Have you made any New Year resolutions yet?
Have
you made any New Year resolutions yet? Its a much talked about but, in my
experience, often failed enterprise in our household! Ideas which seem inspired
on New Years Eve and for the first few weeks of January soon seem to be
replaced by other better ideas and so it goes on until the original idea has
not only ceased to be carried out or aimed for , but has been completely
forgotten!
A
recent lecture given by an eminent, emeritus professor of economics at the
London School of Economics, Professor Lord Richard Layard, tackled the
importance of wellbeing and its relationship to the national economic state of
affairs in the UK. More, he suggested, should be done to improve the national
state of wellbeing of all our citizens. From that set of actions, better
economic forecasts could be expected and a healthier nation would ensue. The
professor is co-leader of an organisation called Action for Happiness. What an attractive idea to begin the New Year
with!
The
principles of the Action for Happiness organisation could so easily be aligned
with the core teachings of our Christian faith. Our founder, Jesus Christs
instruction to his followers was "Love one another as I have loved you
So,
this New Year, perhaps we could all give it a go? Look at the action points
from the Action for Happiness website and pick one or two of their ideas as
New Years resolutions. Perhaps, if we all try harder, our efforts will
generate a greater sense of wellbeing in our communities. And that would be a
great achievement for 2017!
A
Happy New Year from The Vale and Cotswold Edge team ministry!
With love and blessings.
Celia.
Assistant
Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Monday February 13th 2017
As winter turns to spring
February
to me is the time when we can begin to put winter behind us and look forward to
spring, and new life in the shape of our gardens and fields being filled with
new growth and baby animals of all sorts appearing in the countryside. Life
means all sorts of things to different people. What More...
Monday February 13th 2017
As winter turns to spring
February
to me is the time when we can begin to put winter behind us and look forward to
spring, and new life in the shape of our gardens and fields being filled with
new growth and baby animals of all sorts appearing in the countryside. Life
means all sorts of things to different people. What floats your boat, gets
you going energises you are some of the expressions we use to describe the
things which really interest and animate us.
The
Diocese of Gloucester launched its new vision at the beginning of Advent, and
it too is called LIFE. LIFE stands for Leadership,Imagination, Faith and Engagement. In
the next five years your church communities are being challenged to find new
ways of engaging with everyone in the communities in which we live and work and
socialise. Do look out for events and activities which will be happening in
your local parish church. And you are always welcome to join us at a service or
just for a chat.
The
inspiration for the name of the vision document comes from a saying of Jesus: "I have come that they may have life, and
have it to the full. (John 10:10). More details of our plans can be found
on the diocesan website, if you wish to take a look!
Gloucester.anglican.org>about>vision.
As
Winter turns to Spring, may your life be energised through new growth, so that
your hopes and dreams will be fulfilled.
With love and blessings.
Celia.
Assistant Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Saturday December 17th 2016
Love, peace and joy!
Love, peace and joy! The Christmas
message. As we approach the celebrations of Christmas Day we have a habit of
moving into a frenzy of activity and activities. Love there certainly must be,
the love of our families and our friends, because the frenzied activity is all
about getting ready to c More...
Saturday December 17th 2016
Love, peace and joy!
Love, peace and joy! The Christmas
message. As we approach the celebrations of Christmas Day we have a habit of
moving into a frenzy of activity and activities. Love there certainly must be,
the love of our families and our friends, because the frenzied activity is all
about getting ready to celebrate together. The presents and the food and the
decorating of our homes are all gestures of love. And that is just what it
should be! But among all this busyness there is sometimes a lack of peace and
quite a lot of anxiety before the great day arrives! So it might help if we
pause a little and reflect on what and why we are doing these things right now.
We do, after all, love our families and friends all the year round, not just at
Christmas. So why now, why at Christmas? Many of you will know why, some may be
a little puzzled by all this activity in the depths of winter.
If you are familiar with the Christmas
story, then pause and reflect on the Christmas gift we were given over two thousand
years ago. The gift was a promise that human kind would overcome evil through
the life and death of a very special baby Jesus the Christ Child, born in a
lowly manger.
If you are a little uncertain as to
why Christians celebrate the birth of this very special baby, dont be afraid
to ask!
The birth of this very special baby changed
the world. His life and death gives us hope for the future. In Johns gospel we
are told that through Gods grace and love we all have the opportunity to live
life in all its abundance. Our part in this is to live as Jesus taught us: to love one another as he loves us. So as well as thinking of just ourselves
this Christmas, thinking about what we can do for others is what we must do. Putting
the thinking into action, no matter how small the action might be, will change
the world. Living such a life will give us all love, peace and joy, the message
we hear at Christmas time.
This Christmastide come and celebrate Gods
wonderful gift to us at one of our many special services. Look out for the
benefice Christmas card, delivered to every household. It has details of all our
carol services and our Christmas Eve and Christmas day services too. Bring the
children to a crib or Christingle service or,if you are night owls or need to get the Christmas turkey in the oven
early on Christmas morning, come and
join us at St. Ecgwins, Honeybourne formidnight mass. Whatever you
prefer, the churchwardens and I shall look forward to welcoming you to one or
more of our services over the next few weeks. We wish you all a blessed and
peaceful Christmas and a joyful and prosperous new year.
With love and blessings.
Celia
Assistant Curate. Vale and Cotswold
Edge Team Ministry.

Saturday November 26th 2016
Heads Together
As
the summer wanes and the beauty of the autumn colours turns to red and gold and
then disappear to leave the bare tress and darker days I am reminded of those
times in our lives when darkness can overwhelm us. It is at such times that we
need to be able to turn to others for comfort, reassur More...
Saturday November 26th 2016
Heads Together
As
the summer wanes and the beauty of the autumn colours turns to red and gold and
then disappear to leave the bare tress and darker days I am reminded of those
times in our lives when darkness can overwhelm us. It is at such times that we
need to be able to turn to others for comfort, reassurance and help. But in the
busy world we live in that does not always seem possible. Perhaps it is because
of our apparently diminishing ability to live in community that mental health
issues have become so much more a part of our consciousness. Depression and
other mental illness used to be something to be brushed under the carpet or
kept secret, thus making the situation even harder and darker for the sufferer.
So it has been good to see the efforts of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and
Prince Harry in beginning a new campaign called Heads Together. It aims to
change the national conversation on mental wellbeing and remove the stigma
which has so often prevented sufferers from finding help.
Alongside
this move to help those who suffer from the blackness and bleakness of
depression and other mental health issues is the school of thought which
recognises that a persons own sense of wellbeing also promotes a positive state
of health. Research shows that wellbeing is achieved through a sense of
belonging, purpose, meaning and hope. These four senses are reflected in the
teachings of Christianity and have recently led some of our best thinkers, not
all Christians, to suggest that belonging to a Christian community of faith might
well help people to live with a greater sense of wellbeing. And when this happens, those who are
suffering can be better embraced by the community in which they live, to be
loved and cared for and enabled to return to good health.
I
have just returned from a visit to see our family on the other side of the
world. What is so powerfully illustrated when we are away is that wherever we
are, there is a Christian community where we are welcomed and made to feel as
family. Living in community gives us all the opportunity to care for one
another. I pray that day to day in these villages that you are made to feel
welcome in one of our Christian communities of faith. Loving our neighbours as
ourselves is the commandment which Jesus gave us. The Heads Together campaign
highlights just how important that commandment is. Lets pray that it will
become a force for good and a source of energy to change the national
conversation about mental wellbeing in the years to come.
With love and blessings.
Celia
Assistant
Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Monday October 3rd 2016
Who am I not?
At a recent study day, spent with my
curate colleagues in training from across the diocese, we were asked a simple
question: Who am I not? An odd thing to ask perhaps
but on reflection a profound one and a liberating one if you choose to think
about it in greater depth.
Frequently our iden More...
Monday October 3rd 2016
Who am I not?
At a recent study day, spent with my
curate colleagues in training from across the diocese, we were asked a simple
question: Who am I not? An odd thing to ask perhaps
but on reflection a profound one and a liberating one if you choose to think
about it in greater depth.
Frequently our identities
are defined by what we do for a living, where we live, who we socialise or
relax with or what sort of entertainment we choose for ourselves. But that also
leads us and others to develop expectations which place unwelcome pressures on
us and can cause a great deal of stress. So we were prompted to imagine writing
a job profile or CV which began with the words I am not
In
the Gospel of John, the religious leaders wanted clarification about the
identity of St John the Baptist. They
wanted to know in whose authority John was preaching and teaching. But John
resolutely responded to all their questions by saying I am not.the Messiah, Elijah, the prophet. John knew that his role was to
point people towards Jesus, and not to claim supremacy for himself with grand
explanations or false claims of power and authority. That is our role as Christians today too.
So in this in-between time of the year, when summer has
gone and winter is not quite upon us, why not stop and reflect on who you are not? As a group
of curates we came up with some surprising responses. Perhaps you might too!
Dont forget our upcoming
baptism and confirmation service at St James, Chipping Campden at which Bishop
Rachel will preside. It is at 6.30pm on Sunday 30th October. Its not too late to sign up
and join the sessions to learn about both before you make the commitment. They
are being held on a Sunday afternoon for young people at 4pm or Sunday evening
at 8pm for those who are slightly (or a lot) more mature! Both sessions are in
Chipping Campden.
If the study sessions dont fit in with your family or
work schedules, and you think you would like to explore what baptism or
confirmation might mean for you, do contact one of the clergy team - Rev. Craig
Bishop, Rev. Dana Delap or me. Come and have a chat to find out what its all
about. The Christian family, like any other, grows and develops when we live
and work together in community. You can be a part of that growing community too
and you will be welcomed by those of us who witness to our faith in these
villages. And reflecting on who we are
and who we are not might be the catalyst for you to come and explore the
Christian faith in greater depth.
With love and blessings.
Celia Assistant Curate

Monday September 5th 2016
September is a month of beginnings and endings.
September is a month of
beginnings and endings. In the Northern hemisphere we are moving towards autumn,
the crops are being gathered in and we can celebrate harvest. In the Southern
hemisphere, the seasonal cycle is, of course, the other way round. For many of
our young people the seasonal cy More...
Monday September 5th 2016
September is a month of beginnings and endings.
September is a month of
beginnings and endings. In the Northern hemisphere we are moving towards autumn,
the crops are being gathered in and we can celebrate harvest. In the Southern
hemisphere, the seasonal cycle is, of course, the other way round. For many of
our young people the seasonal cycle may also be a beginning or an end. For the
very littlest ones, pre-school is replaced by big school and for those in the
middle it will be a change from being the oldest children to the youngest
again. Leaving home for college or university, or setting out for a new job as
a recent school leaver means both beginnings and endings too.
How we approach these changes and
make the most of them will depend on our circumstances and our outlook on life.
Students in further education and young adults setting out in the world of work
are beginning a life of exploration of their own. Decisions and personal
behaviour which might previously have been directed by parents and teachers
become the responsibility of the individual adult. Hopefully, as adults, they
and we continue to be supported by family and friends and have the wisdom to
listen and take notice of the advice of others who are part of our lives. That
is how healthy communities grow and develop.
In October, Bishop Rachel will be
coming to our team ministry to preside at a confirmation service at St James,
Chipping Campden. Confirmation is also a beginning, the start of the next part
of a Christians life journey. In infant baptism, we become children of God, and
parents and godparents make promises on behalf of children who are brought to
baptism. At confirmation, those who have been baptised have reached a point in
their lives when they have decided to take on the responsibility for their own
Christian living for themselves. This doesnt mean they are on their own
simply that they have been able to acknowledge that they are ready to embark on
the next part of their lives as Christians.
If you think you would like to
explore what confirmation might mean for you, do contact one of the clergy team
- Rev. Craig Bishop, Rev. Dana Delap or me. Details of baptism and confirmation
classes are also in the magazine. Get in touch and have a chat to find out what
its all about. The Christian family, like any other, grows and develops when
we live and work together in community. You can be a part of that growing
community too and you will be welcomed by those of us who witness to our
faith in these villages. My prayer for
all those beginnings and endings in September is that we might all make the
most of those God-given opportunities, and create joyous and harmonious
communities as a result.
With love and blessings. Celia

Monday June 6th 2016
Baptism is the primary layer of identity for every Christian.
Dear
Friends
As we move closer
to the day of the EU referendum, I have been prompted to reflect on the
vehemence of the two arguments leave or remain - and what that tells me about how we value
our identity. Identity is a greatly
cherished part of every human being to belong mean More...
Monday June 6th 2016
Baptism is the primary layer of identity for every Christian.
Dear
Friends
As we move closer
to the day of the EU referendum, I have been prompted to reflect on the
vehemence of the two arguments leave or remain - and what that tells me about how we value
our identity. Identity is a greatly
cherished part of every human being to belong means to be loved in some way
or other. Whether we are considering our membership or otherwise of the
European Union, our own ethnic or national identity or our place in a family, social group or
workplace, the absence of such an identity can be deeply disturbing and
unsettling. So to be comfortable with who we are plays a vital part in our own
peace of mind and personal contentment.
Over the next few
months there are a number of baptisms in our churches. Baptism is the primary
layer of identity for every Christian.Baptism also confers on the recipient a Christian name. It is our name
which becomes our own personal identity for the rest of our lives. There is a
beautiful line in scripture (Isaiah Ch. 43: v.1) which tells us that God has
called each one of us by name and loves each one of us. Baptism is also when we become a member of the worldwide family of
Christians, committed to leading a life which is modelled on the life of Jesus.
In infant baptism, this commitment is taken on by parents and godparents who
promise to guide the child in Christian living until the time they can take
responsibility themselves. Peace and contentment are the hope of
every Christian, offered as it is by God to every human being if we choose to
accept his love.
Of course, when there is
a birth, there has to be a birthday too! The birthday of the Church is
celebrated on the Feast of Pentecost. It was the a moment whenthose who had known Jesus personally or had heard about him through
friends or acquaintances felt inspired to go out and tell the world about their
great discovery that Jesus was and is alive amongst us. Since those early days, Christianity has
spread across the world and represents approximately 31.5% of the worlds
population, the largest single faith group in the world. Not surprisingly, such a huge family can
boast a variety of identities, but always in the knowledge that we belong to
one big family. Our European neighbours are also part of one bigger family, but
each with their own identity, just like the UK. Perhaps, in your choice of vote
you will be expressing something about your personal identity, be it from a
social, political or economic perspective within the context of the bigger
family of nations. Identifying with
other nations holds a greater prospect for peace and security, and whether we
are in or out of the EU, our hope must be that we can live together in peace
with our neighbours. Identity is part of our make-up and crucial to how we see
ourselves in relationship to others. Perhaps, as you consider how to cast your
vote, you might like to give some thought to what identity means to you!
And if you wish to explore identity as
a member of the Christian family do contact one of the clergy team to have a
chat. In the autumn we are running a 4 week course for those who are interested
in being baptised or confirmed. Look out
for dates posted on our church notice boards and in the magazine. Or get in touch with one of us. Our contact
numbers are printed on the next page.
With love and
blessings.
Celia
Assistant
Curate. Vale and Cotswold Edge Team Ministry.

Monday July 4th 2016
Christian festivals to celebrate the gifts of creation have become a traditional part of the churchs year.
Our summer weather brings out the best
of the English countryside! The combination of rain and sunshine creates a
patchwork quilt of ripening crops across this beautiful part of the world. For some
July and August bring the summer holidays and a break from the usual routines
of work and study. More...
Monday July 4th 2016
Christian festivals to celebrate the gifts of creation have become a traditional part of the churchs year.
Our summer weather brings out the best
of the English countryside! The combination of rain and sunshine creates a
patchwork quilt of ripening crops across this beautiful part of the world. For some
July and August bring the summer holidays and a break from the usual routines
of work and study. For our farmers in these communities and across the nation,
this is the time of energy and huge effort to bring in the harvests and rear
this years arrival of lambs and other new additions to the livestock on the
farms.
Christian festivals to celebrate the
gifts of creation have become a traditional part of the churchs year. They are
there to remind us that a bountiful harvest is a gift of God. All are blessings
come from our loving and generous God. This year local communities across the nation
have also been celebrating the unique milestone which Her Majesty the Queen has
reached. At the grand age of 90 she appears to be indomitable! Whether you are
a monarchist or republican or neither I think it far to suggest that Queen
Elizabeth has given us all a remarkable example of how to make the most of the
blessings she has received. The
blessings of privilege perhaps, but also an unrelenting role of duty and
service in the public eye. She has
deservedly reaped a bountiful harvest of admiration from a grateful nation.
As we enjoy the blessings of summer
sun and summer rain, a country at peace and a democracy which strives to be
fair and just to its people, we could do well to pause and reflect on how we
can appreciate our own blessings and make the most of them too. Its what Jesus did in his busy public
ministry. He sloped off to the hills to rest and refresh himself, sometimes
with his friends and sometimes alone. He ate and drank with others enjoying
companionship with friends and family. Its an example we can emulate if we
seek to make the most of our own blessings. Take the opportunity over the
summer to enjoy your surroundings, making the most of rest and relaxation or
times spent with friends and family. Rested
and refreshed, we are always better equipped to tackle the challenges which
come our way.

Friday April 22nd 2016
Thank you from Debbie and Edward
Dear Friends
We are now safely installed in the vicarage in Addington and
have just reached the point of deciding where to put pictures on the walls, so
before any more time elapses I wanted to write to say thank you. Firstly thank
you to the many of you who came to my last service in Honeybou More...
Friday April 22nd 2016
Thank you from Debbie and Edward
Dear Friends
We are now safely installed in the vicarage in Addington and
have just reached the point of deciding where to put pictures on the walls, so
before any more time elapses I wanted to write to say thank you. Firstly thank
you to the many of you who came to my last service in Honeybourne. It was a
wonderful experience to see the church so full of friends, there firstly to
worship God and secondly to wish us God speed. Thank you too to the many who could
not be there but who sent cards to wish us well. It was good to be able to
spend time eating together after the service in Weston sub Edge so thank you to
those who made that possible I know that these things dont happen on their
own! Worshipping together and eating together, what better way could there be to
celebrate our common life in Christ and the journey we have made together?
Which brings me to our beautiful gifts: I grew up in
Gloucestershire so its countryside is special to me and holds many precious
memories of childhood, of parents, of people who have been saints along my
journey so it is wonderful to have a book which captures so delightfully the
essence of its landscape and life and combined with poetry, another of my
loves, could not have been more aptly chosen. One of the things that we have
enjoyed learning while being in Honeybourne, has been gardening. We are still
amateurs, but have come to appreciate time spent wondering at the beauty of
plants, at their determination to flourish and time spent with the soil as a
way of getting life in perspective. Here in Addington we have a big garden. It
is a good time of year to move because we shall discover over the next few
months what is in the garden. Edwards book on Making a Garden will be an
invaluable resource as we move through the seasons and as he discovers the joys
of retirement. I said at the beginning of this letter that we are in the
process of deciding where pictures are to go. We are very much looking forward
to deciding on a place for the two wonderful paintings of Gloucester Cathedral,
the Cathedral that has played such an important part in our lives. For me that
goes back a long way to picnics as a child with my Nan and Mum in the Cathedral
precincts, to playing in the Youth Orchestra there and finally, after a gap of
many years, being ordained there in 2008 when it became a part of Edwards life
too. I love the Cathedral at night which speaks of the unfailing caring
presence of mother church and Edwards, The organ plays says all that can be
said about the way in which music transcends bricks and mortar and any possible
boundary we might attempt to put in place. The picture of the churches in the
group will likewise find a special place and be a reminder of the gift that
being among you was. Thank you too for the very generous cheque which
accompanied these lovely gifts. We shall spend it wisely.
So now, another chapter in our walk with God is beginning
for both you and for us. I keep you daily in my prayers as you enter a period
of discernment. For us we are in that strange place of belonging but not
belonging before my Institution on the 28th April. Last Sunday we
worshipped at Southwark Cathedral and we have yet to decide where we shall
worship tomorrow. Although it feels rootless it is good to have time to reflect
and to pray and I am grateful for these in between days.
May God bless you as you journey together.
With our love and prayers
Debbie and Edward

Friday May 6th 2016
We too will journey on ...
Dear Friends
On 3rd April we
said farewell to Debbie and Edward as they spent their last Sunday with us
before leaving for pastures new. We shared
a mixture of emotions with them. Joybecause we were blessed with a beautiful spring day and they are looking
forward to new and exciting experienc More...
Friday May 6th 2016
We too will journey on ...
Dear Friends
On 3rd April we
said farewell to Debbie and Edward as they spent their last Sunday with us
before leaving for pastures new. We shared
a mixture of emotions with them. Joybecause we were blessed with a beautiful spring day and they are looking
forward to new and exciting experiences,
and sadness because parting is always tinged with sorrow. Honeybourne church was full to the brim with
parishioners from around our 6 churches as Debbie presided at her last
Eucharist in the benefice. Afterwards we gathered for lunch at Weston village
hall where a delicious spread had been prepared by parishioners from all the parishes. Suitable gifts to remind her of her time with
us were presented to Debbie and Edward. They will be in our thoughts and
prayers as they journey on.
We too will journey on,
building on the legacy of ministry which Debbie has left us and looking forward
to a new era and a new incumbent in due course. Your PCCs are currently engaged
in an exercise to create a job spec ( officially referred to as the benefice
profile) to advertise for a new incumbent, a process which will take some time
complete. It is important that the profile reflects not only those who are
directly involved in church life, but also all of you who live in these
parishes. You might like to ask yourself some questions. For instance:
What sort of parish priest
would we like? What do we want of and
from the church in these parishes?
How can we be involved in the
work of our local church, even if we are not churchgoers?
How can the church work in
these villages for the good of all, in and beyond the local area?
Any comments and ideas you have will be included in the
deliberations of the various PCCs. Their target date to produce a benefice profile is July so do
get in touch with us if you would like to know more or wish to contribute in
some way. Their task is to identify both the shared and the unique elements of
each parish and set out a vision for the
future of the church in these villages. May I encourage you all to
pray for the parishes at this time, for those tasked with finding the new
priest and for the person who will be appointed.
I will continue to work as
your curate in these villages for the foreseeable future, supported by our team
rector, Craig Bishop who is based in Chipping Campden. Our details are printed
below and can also be found on our weekly newsheets which are available in all
of our six churches week by week. We
would be delighted to hear from you if you have any questions or contributions
to make about the selection of the new incumbent or any pastoral or parish
matters you wish to share with us.
With love and blessings.
Celia. Assistant Curate. Vale and Cotswold
Edge Team Ministry.

Wednesday March 16th 2016
Moving on...
Dear Friends
By the time you read
this you will know, or at least many of you will know, that I am moving on from
these parishes after Easter and that my last service here will be Sunday 3rdApril. It has been a great privilege to be your parish priest for four and a
half years and a year and a More...
Wednesday March 16th 2016
Moving on...
Dear Friends
By the time you read
this you will know, or at least many of you will know, that I am moving on from
these parishes after Easter and that my last service here will be Sunday 3rdApril. It has been a great privilege to be your parish priest for four and a
half years and a year and a quarter respectively. It has been wonderful to get
to know you, to worship with you and to share in your joys and sorrows over
that time. Moving on is always difficult because you come to love people in a
very special way. I am going to the parish of Addington, St Mary the blessed
Virgin in the diocese of Southwark. My decision to apply for another post was
two-fold: having seen these parishes through pastoral reorganization, so that
from my original four I lost Long Marston and gained Willersey, Weston and
Aston and having been through the first year of this new dispensation, it is
clear that these parishes need someone new who will take them through the next
phase of their life together and secondly I wanted to do another incumbency
before I have to hang up my cassock!
However, I have not gone
yet and I am certainly not planning to wind down. We are approaching the season
of Lent which is always a good time to do a reassessment of our lives. Of
course there are the traditional Lenten disciplines and the question "what are
you giving up for Lent?" and I suspect that if we're honest, it's quite simply
a good excuse to reinstate that diet that didn't quite happen after Christmas!
But why might we give something up? How will that help us? For Christians to
take away from our lives for a short while something that we enjoy fills us
with increased thankfulness to God for all the wonderful things we have in this
life. Secondly it reminds us of Jesus who fasted in the wilderness for forty
days before he embarked on his active ministry. It was a time of reflection in
which, through the temptations to be a quick fix miracle worker, to be a
superman style messiah and to exert power, he came to discern the character of
the ministry he was to exercise, a ministry that was humble and healing. So to
abstain from something during Lent gives us the opportunity to reflect on our
priorities and the way in which we live out our Christian Faith. This Lent we
are going to be meeting in groups to look at some of the psalms, wonderful
writings from the Hebrew Scriptures that cover the gamut of human emotions. So
if you might be interested keep your eyes peeled for details of these groups.
Finally a word about
Messy Church which is happening on Saturday 19th March at Weston-sub-Edge Village Hall and is a wonderful opportunity to spend a fun morning doing craft
activities including baking. It is the day before Palm Sunday so we shall be
looking at the Easter Story and centring our activities around that ... and really
importantly we shall end, as usual, with lunch together. There are many stories
of Jesus that involve his presence at meals. Whenever we eat together we are
reminded that Jesus invites us to sit and eat with him and be his friends.
So in these last months
may we journey together joyfully and thoughtfully.
With my love and
blessings
Debbie

Sunday January 10th 2016
The New Year has arrived
The
New Year has arrived, our New Years resolutions are still fresh in our minds
or perhaps we havent quite formulated them yet and yes, the evenings are
beginning to draw out. These are early signs of new life and hope for the
future in the dark days of winter when we anticipate and wait fo More...
Sunday January 10th 2016
The New Year has arrived
The
New Year has arrived, our New Years resolutions are still fresh in our minds
or perhaps we havent quite formulated them yet and yes, the evenings are
beginning to draw out. These are early signs of new life and hope for the
future in the dark days of winter when we anticipate and wait for what is to
come in 2016.
One
of the signs I look for is the sight of the first clump of snowdrops to appear
above the ground. These delicate, fragile looking flowers seem to defy the very
essence of winter darkness. They symbolize hope, rebirth and optimism. They are
also known as Candlemas Bells. Candlemas is the church festival which falls
on February 2nd. It marks the time when the child Jesus was
presented in the temple by his parents, Mary and Joseph. Often we refer to
Jesus as the light of the world. Candles provide us with a symbol of our
belief that Jesus will light up the dark corners of our lives and give us true
peace. In the past, when candles were the only source of light, candles which
would be used throughout the coming year in church were blessed on the feast of
Candlemas. In our 21st century world, when we have so many different
means of producing light, candles still provide us with a light which is warm
and soft and welcoming. When light is perhaps taken for granted, we should not
forget just how important this celebration of candlelight would have been in
earlier centuries. For Christians, the significance of that light is its
symbolism that Jesus is the light of the world.
By
the 2nd February, just as candles brighten up a winter night,
snowdrops or Candlemas Bells are usually emerging in abundance to brighten up
the dullness of a winter day. They never cease to make me stop and wonder at
the marvels of creation. How do these
tiny, delicate blooms push their way up through the hard ground, and withstand
the fiercest of winter cold and wet? I find them a great inspiration at a time
when most things lie dormant and hidden. But there is wonder too in the
dormancy of winter when miraculous growth is stirring without us ever seeing
what is happening beneath the soil. We can be like that too. We can be totally
unaware of the miracles which are taking place within our hearts and which can
burst into new experiences and new beginnings even if, at the moment, it seems
that there is nothing happening. God can
and does work in our hearts without us even being aware that things are
changing. And when something does happen, we marvel and we wonder how we have
missed the signs of such changes.
In
the depths of Winter when we are perhaps feeling a little low and in need of
something to revive us, I hope that the beauty of these early signs of growth
and new life, and the experience of light will serve to inspire you as they do
me. Whether it is because of the slowly lengthening days, the warmth of a
flickering candle or your faith in God I pray that this January there are things
in your lives which perhaps lie dormant at
the moment but will, in due course, emerge to give you hope and life and joy in
the coming months. Debbie and I wish you every blessing for the New Year and
pray that your lives will be filled with the peace and love of God.
With
love.
Celia.
Team
Curate

Sunday December 6th 2015
Evil is not a word I use lightly ...
Dear Friends
I write this
the weekend the western world is reeling following the attacks in Paris. These
attacks were carried out on ordinary people doing ordinary things: eating
together, watching football, at a concert. They get at the very heart of life
which is not played out on the big s More...
Sunday December 6th 2015
Evil is not a word I use lightly ...
Dear Friends
I write this
the weekend the western world is reeling following the attacks in Paris. These
attacks were carried out on ordinary people doing ordinary things: eating
together, watching football, at a concert. They get at the very heart of life
which is not played out on the big stages, but in the ordinary. Evil is not a
word I use lightly, but these attacks were, I believe, evil. Nor do they
represent the will of the peaceful majority of Muslims who seek to live out
their faith. So how are we to respond? Firstly, for those of us who profess a
faith, we must pray for the people of Paris and of France, pray for the victims
and for their families and for those who have been wounded. We are to stand
with them in compassion, feeling pain because they are in pain.
And all this
as we stand on the cusp of Advent, when we prepare our hearts and our homes to
celebrate the birth of the Christ child. Curiously, although the glitz and the
excess sits uncomfortably with such a picture of devastation and sorrow, it is
precisely in that infant, God become human, that we might find comfort and
hope. God did not stay outside the mess that is our world, but came to be part
of it. The pain of the French people will not escape the heart of God. It is
perhaps doubly important then that we pay attention to our gift giving. The
gift of Jesus to this world of pain and strife is to be celebrated and our
gifts to each other express something of the wonder of that most precious gift
of all.
Christmas and
New Year is also a time of hospitality, a time when we throw the doors of our
houses open so that we can celebrate together. This is one of the many aspects
of the season that I love because for me it mirrors the hospitality and
generosity of God. Part of our preparations for Christmas must be that opening
of our hearts to others and the desire to give of ourselves. As we choose
gifts, so we think carefully about the person for whom we are buying. It is not
simply a money transaction but rather an expression of love and self-giving.
I am looking
forward to Advent and Christmas. I hope that many of you will join Celia and me
at the carol services and Christingle services in our villages. We come to
celebrate in joyful carols and to rejoice in the gift of God in Jesus. We come
to celebrate the child who was heralded as Prince of Peace and we come to pray
earnestly for that peace in our world. May 2016 bring that peace.
I wish you
all a joyful Christmas and a peaceful New Year.
With my love
and blessings
Debbie

Sunday November 8th 2015
November is the month of Remembrance.
November
is the month of Remembrance. For the church, the 1st November is All
Saints Day, when we remember and celebrate all those Christians who have lived
and died and left a legacy of a true example of Christian living for us to
emulate. On 2nd November, All
Souls Day, we commemorate those More...
Sunday November 8th 2015
November is the month of Remembrance.
November
is the month of Remembrance. For the church, the 1st November is All
Saints Day, when we remember and celebrate all those Christians who have lived
and died and left a legacy of a true example of Christian living for us to
emulate. On 2nd November, All
Souls Day, we commemorate those we have loved and who are no longer with us.
And of course, as a nation, Remembrance Sunday calls to mind the two world wars
and many bitter conflicts since which have been etched in our hearts as times
of extreme valour and huge sacrifice. In
July, I had the privilege of serving with a small team of clergy colleagues as
chaplains at the Royal International Air Show at Fairford. Our purpose there
was to support the 3000 strong volunteer force should there have been a major
incident. This years show saw spectacular aerobatic displays given by the most
modern of military hardware, but the highlight for the crowds and for the teams
of aircrew was the memorial flypast of a large group of WWII Spitfires,
Hurricanes and Lancasters. The 50,000 strong crowd fell silent as these flying
displays caught their imaginations. But what was it they imagined?
As
I reflected on this, it is impossible to erase the fact that these machines are,
of course, designed to kill and to maim. Their purpose, if used with integrity,
is to fight for the cause of justice and peace. Even then, the concept of just
war, a theory expounded by St Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century,
is a difficult one to rationalise when so many innocents are caught up in the
violence of war. Sadly, military might
is not always used to fight for such high ideals. In the aftermath of the 2ndworld war, huge swathes of displaced and terrified people moved across Europe
in search of safety and a better life for themselves and their children. The
1951 UN Convention for Refugees was created to provide a fair set of rules to
ensure that such homeless people could settle in a place of safety and be
provided with international protection if appropriate. According to the Convention, a refugee is someone
who is unable or unwilling to return to their country of origin owing to a
well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion,
nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion. Sadly, 70 years later we are experiencing
similar sights of mass migration caused by despotic and power crazy regimes.
All
our parishes will be holding Remembrance Day services which will honour those
from our own communities who have fought for freedom. The national Act of Remembrance
at the cenotaph in London and the two minute silence at the 11thhour of the 11th day of the 11th month are also intended
to ensure we do not forget those who fought so valiantly and sacrificed so much.
Their legacy is our privilege to live in a democracy with the freedom to
express ourselves in peace whatever our opinions and views are. I hope that
this years services will serve to offer you an opportunity to reflect on the great gift of
freedom we have in this country and, for Christians everywhere, an opportunity
to remind ourselves of our calling to Christs service to love our neighbours
as ourselves.
With
love and blessings. Celia. Team Curate

Friday October 23rd 2015
+ Rachel Treweek, the 41st Bishop of Gloucester and the first diocesan woman Bishop
The waiting is over and on Saturday we all became part of
history as + Rachel Treweek, the 41st Bishop of Gloucester and the
first diocesan woman Bishop, was welcomed to the diocese and cathedral and
placed in the Bishops chair cathedra. She entered the cathedral vested in a
simple surplus More...
Friday October 23rd 2015
+ Rachel Treweek, the 41st Bishop of Gloucester and the first diocesan woman Bishop
The waiting is over and on Saturday we all became part of
history as + Rachel Treweek, the 41st Bishop of Gloucester and the
first diocesan woman Bishop, was welcomed to the diocese and cathedral and
placed in the Bishops chair cathedra. She entered the cathedral vested in a
simple surplus and as she came further into the cathedral she was asked at
various points why she was there. For me the most poignant was the first
question who are you and why have you come? To which the response was "I am
Rachel, a pilgrim and servant of Jesus. reminding us that we are all pilgrims
on a journey. During the service + Rachel was given symbols of the ministry of
deacon, priest and Bishop. Finally Vested in cope and mitre and carrying the
diocesan crozier she was presented to the congregation, and preached for the
first time before calling us to remember our Baptism in Christ and our
commitment to mission. As the service drew to a close we all poured out of the
cathedral gathering on lower college green and Bishop Rachel, standing on the
steps at the great west doors blessed the city of Gloucester and the towns and
villages of the diocese. It was a wonderful occasion, a heady mixture of
solemnity, humility, ceremonial and joy. There was a delightful light touch
afterwards as a live band played on College Green and we all ate "Just Rachel
ice cream!
So now the Autumn is really here, Keatss season of mists
and mellow fruitfulness. Late September and October bring Harvest Festivals in
all our villages and remind us of the faithfulness of God as we once again
gather in the fruits of the harvest of field and orchard and garden and bring
them to church in thanksgiving. It is a lovely time of year because although we
are approaching winter, when all seems lifeless, the autumn with its emphasis
on thanksgiving is a time rich in hope. Having spent a lot of my life in academic
circles I always think of the excitement of a new term, that fresh start and
all the possibilities of the coming year. So as I bless the offerings that will
be brought to church there will be both thanksgiving for all that has been and
also hope, trust, faith and confidence in all that shall be as we journey
together on our pilgrimage.
As part of that pilgrimage, keep your eyes open for all that
we are planning over the next few months: Messy Church in both Pebworth and
Willersey, the Pilgrim Course and much more besides. I look forward to seeing
very many of you, whether in church or just as you and I go about our daily
business. May we be people who live out
that message of hope. You are all always
in my prayers. With my love and

Saturday September 26th 2015
God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good
As we embark on a new school year,
finish the harvest, start putting gardens to bed and experience the inevitable commercial
emphasis towards Halloween and then Christmas, I have been reflecting on just
how much we are bombarded by words. Words come at us through the TV, radio,
internet, books More...
Saturday September 26th 2015
God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good
As we embark on a new school year,
finish the harvest, start putting gardens to bed and experience the inevitable commercial
emphasis towards Halloween and then Christmas, I have been reflecting on just
how much we are bombarded by words. Words come at us through the TV, radio,
internet, books, newspapers, advertising billboards and even from your vicar
and curate! Sometimes we can be
overwhelmed with and by words some beautiful, some helpful, some worthless
and some downright dreadful. Is it
possible to digest them all? I personally know that I dont and perhaps that is
a good thing. In trying to absorb so many words, I wonder just how blind we can
become to the world around us. Do our minds ever switch to the observe and
listen button so we look around and appreciate all the wonders of Gods
creation?
At the beginning of August our six churches rang
with the sounds of children and their parents and carers getting stuck into
indoor and outdoor activities along the theme of All Gods World. From Monday
to Saturday, using the Messy Church model, children spent time inside and
outside each one of our six churches looking carefully at the amazing world in
which we live and enjoying the fun and the wonder of each place. We searched for sheep, looked for plants and flowers,
listened to the sounds in our churchyard,orienteered, examined mini beasts under a microscope and identified
birds and butterflies, played giant Jenga and snakes and ladders and walked
around one of our villages to spot cluesabout the history of its community. We were creative too, producing
sheep puppets, flower pots, spiders webs, ladybugs and daddy long legs and our
star make, an altar frontal which was used at the benefice service in August
in Pebworth. At the end of each morning session, we enjoyed refreshments, a
bible story, prayer and song together. The theme, All Gods World prompted us
all to look more carefully at Gods creation. All our activities helped us to
be more aware of the wonders of creation and the God-given gifts we have
received.
And so, returning to my reflecting about the volume of
words which come at us, and the busyness which will happen as children return
to school and summer holidays become a memory recorded in photo and video
images, I encourage you all to find time in your busy lives to stop and wonder
at creation, and recall the words in Genesis which the children learnt at the
end of our week of activities:
"God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good
Genesis 1. v31.
And look out for the next Messy Church event when we will
explore another theme using bible stories and fellowship in the shape of food,
prayer and song together!
With love and
blessings.
Celia.
Curate.

Friday September 11th 2015
Rachel Treweek consecrated Bishop of Gloucester
The recent photographs from the New Horizons Space Probe
have been amazing, but what I find even more amazing is the ingenuity of those
who conceived the project in the first place. Indeed it has been a delight
listening to some of the scientists involved, hearing their excitement and
almost a More...
Friday September 11th 2015
Rachel Treweek consecrated Bishop of Gloucester
The recent photographs from the New Horizons Space Probe
have been amazing, but what I find even more amazing is the ingenuity of those
who conceived the project in the first place. Indeed it has been a delight
listening to some of the scientists involved, hearing their excitement and
almost awe realising that their project has come to fruition. I always find it
difficult to understand the supposed split between faith and religion.
Scientists seem to me to be engaged in the business of finding out about how
our world and our universe work. Such curiosity and such skill speak to me of
God given intellect. And as for the universe, looking up into the night sky or
seeing the photographs from Pluto or looking into the centre of a wayside
flower or dandling a new born baby fill me with a profound sense of being a
tiny part of something vast and yet something in which there is such detail and
such beauty that it can only speak of God. Science seeks to explore these
mysteries and these wonders. When new things are discovered, when chemical
formulae are found that teach us more about the world or about the functioning
of organisms, when new ways of exploring the universe are invented, then I am
excited and can only think of these things in terms of understanding more of
this extraordinary universe created by God.
So much for my musings about science and religion! By the
time you read this letter, history will have been made and Rachel Treweek will
have been ordained and consecrated Bishop of Gloucester in Canterbury
Cathedral. She is not the first woman Bishop in England, but she is the first
woman to be made a diocesan Bishop. The others thus far have been suffragans,
that is assistant Bishops. We shall have the opportunity to welcome her to
Gloucester at her inauguration service on 19th September in
Gloucester Cathedral. All of which reminds me how some of the language and
titles we use are confusing so perhaps I should explain at least how things
work in these six parishes. Currently I am Team Vicar and have responsibility
for the parishes €" in other words the buck stops here! Celia is the Assistant
Curate which means that she is still in training. She completed a course of
theological training and was ordained deacon last year, 2014 and came here to
continue her training on the job. She was ordained priest this year, which
means that she can now preside at the Eucharist, the Holy Communion, she can
also bless and pronounce forgiveness in the name of God, baptise new believers
and conduct marriages. Celia will be with us for another two to three years
completing her training. All this is of course rather technical and what you
will see on the ground is both of us really enjoying working together as
colleagues!
During this time of holidays, I do hope that you will all
manage to find some rest and relaxation. The Christian concept of Sabbath is a
good one.
With my love and blessings
Debbie

Sunday August 2nd 2015
Almost a year ago life changed dramatically for me
Almost
a year ago life changed dramatically for me. As a newly ordained deacon, I
joined this group of parishes as a complete stranger. I have been greatly blessed by your welcome
and encouragement. Once again this year I can expect life to change having just
been ordained priest. This doesnt More...
Sunday August 2nd 2015
Almost a year ago life changed dramatically for me
Almost
a year ago life changed dramatically for me. As a newly ordained deacon, I
joined this group of parishes as a complete stranger. I have been greatly blessed by your welcome
and encouragement. Once again this year I can expect life to change having just
been ordained priest. This doesnt mean
a move - a priests training spans five or six years before being considered
safe to be let loose alone among you! But whether curate or vicar, we have to
accept change with good grace if we are to do our job well. One source of
energy and refreshment to which all clergy are committed is time spent in daily
prayer and worship. Just as we need to spend time with friends and family to
get to know them better, prayer and worship are the way we get to know and
develop a closer relationship with God. And strong, healthy relationships are a
source of energy and security, through good times and bad, through periods of change
and during times of stability. The changes I have experienced have been truly
energising, not least because I know that family, friends and colleagues have
been praying for me.
All
of us experience change in some shape or form many times throughout our
lives. Whether it is of the hatched,
matched and despatched variety, a change of job, a house move or some other
event, we cannot avoid change at some point in our lives. The changes for our
six parishes have been both challenging and encouraging. We have morphed from four parishes to six. We
now belong to a larger team ministry as well. We have had to say farewell to
the familiar and begin to understand different ways of doing things and
different people doing them. As we work together to become a united group of
parishes we will inevitably experience further change. Change can create
uncertainty, fear and a loss of confidence. New housing developments, property used
only at weekends or as holiday lets and isolation for those who
become housebound is changing the shape of our communities. While some of these changes seem difficult and
our instinct is to preserve the familiar, change doesnt need to be daunting or fearful if we keep an open mind
and adopt a positive attitude.
Hospitality
and thought for others are key elements of Christian living. Such an approach
leads to growth while looking inwards generally runs the risk of imploding on
ourselves. Christians underpin these principles of hospitality and welcome in a
life of prayer and worship. Growing a relationship with God helps us to grow
relationships with others. Looking
outward, being positive and seeking to learn
how we might grow good relationships in
our communities will mean that change
will no longer feel unwelcome. Prayer helps us in this enterprise. Our diocese
has published a little booklet called Try Praying. The booklets are available in our parish
churches. And in each of our churches
you are invited to leave any prayer requests you might have. That prayer request
will be said on your behalf by a member of the clergy team during the week. As we
learn to adjust to continuing change in our village society and churches, I
encourage you to give it a shot try praying occasionally you might be
surprised by the outcome!
With
love and blessings. Celia

Tuesday July 7th 2015
how can a good God allow such devastation to happen?
As I write this I cant help but reflect on the terrible
scenes of suffering in Nepal that we have seen on our television screens in the
last month and it is quite difficult to come to terms with the sheer scale of
such a disaster. I can hear you saying to me, "how can a good God allow such
de More...
Tuesday July 7th 2015
how can a good God allow such devastation to happen?
As I write this I cant help but reflect on the terrible
scenes of suffering in Nepal that we have seen on our television screens in the
last month and it is quite difficult to come to terms with the sheer scale of
such a disaster. I can hear you saying to me, "how can a good God allow such
devastation to happen? This is perhaps the question that has been most asked
down the ages. I do not have a neat and tidy answer but I will share a few
thoughts. The world is filled with beauty. It is an incredibly complex and
finely balanced planet and for it to support the evolution of life there has to
be movement and change and vulnerability. A world where everything was fixed
and immovable could not support organisms that change and develop and grow. Nor
would such a world allow for human freedom and responsibility. God is no puppet
master. But of course such philosophical arguments do not help the suffering
people of Nepal. What I do believe is that God is not indifferent to suffering
but rather in the midst of it. I am always heartened too by the response of the
public to such disasters and feel comforted that compassion fatigue has not
taken hold of human hearts.
Christian Aid week has further focused our thoughts on the
world beyond our shores. This year we were reminded of the women of Ethiopia
unable to grow crops to feed their livestock and their families because of the
effects of climate change. Working alongside these women Christian Aid has
enabled microfinance to draw them out of poverty to a place of hope and
dignity. Thank you to the very many people in these communities who responded
with generosity to this call to care for some of the poorest people in the
world.
With June we shall soon be moving into the season of
barbecues I am optimistic despite the temperature as I write! And with
barbecues our thoughts are of the friends with whom we can share them.
Hospitality is a great gift through which we can show the value we place on
others. I am conscious that in some of our communities there are new people and
this gives us the opportunity to open our houses and our hearts to them in
welcome. Indeed, I hope and pray that as communities we can always be alert to
the stranger in our midst and through our hospitality make them companions and
friends.
June also brings with it a very joyful occasion in the life
of the church. Celia, our Curate will be ordained priest in Gloucester
Cathedral at 3pm on Saturday 20th and will then preside at the
Eucharist for the first time in Willersey at 11am on Sunday 21st after which there will be a celebratory lunch
in the village hall. Celia has brought many gifts to the life of the churches
in these villages and we look forward to her priestly ministry among us.
With love and blessings
Debbie

Friday May 22nd 2015
Religion and politics do not mix?
Easter has come and
gone, lambs are frolicking in the fields and before we know it, high summer will
be upon us! This year brings the General Election to add to the excitement, and 'election fever' seems to have hit our television screens, newspapers and
advertising hoardings all over the place More...
Friday May 22nd 2015
Religion and politics do not mix?
Easter has come and
gone, lambs are frolicking in the fields and before we know it, high summer will
be upon us! This year brings the General Election to add to the excitement, and 'election fever' seems to have hit our television screens, newspapers and
advertising hoardings all over the place. We are fortunate to live in a country
where our democratic right to vote is so established that it is taken for granted,
but sadly it is not always taken seriously. The day after our elections, 8thMay, is the 70th anniversary
of VE day and also the anniversary of the liberation of Theresienstadt concentration camp, the
last of eight such camps discovered by
allied forces between July 1944 and May 1945. It is perhaps a fitting time to
reflect on the importance of exercising our right to vote in a thoughtful and
responsible way.
Some may argue that
religion and politics do not mix. That seems to me to be flying in the face of
logic. Responsible citizens living in a peaceful and generally prosperous land
have a duty to participate in the way our country is governed. And most people
seek to live in a society which exercises fairness and justice for all.
Politics is all about how we are governed, how our lives will be ordered and
who we choose to lead us as a nation. Religion is a means by which we live out
our own personal lives, how we behave towards others and what we choose to
worship. Mixing the personal with the public seems to be an obvious course of
action. People of faith seek to live in a way which honours humanity and the
environment and seeks to reach out to help those who are in difficulty through
sickness, poverty or other human tragedy caused by war or natural disaster. The
life and teachings of Jesus Christ embodied a mission to challenge those who
were power crazed, selfish and bigoted and to encourage people to live out in
action, word and deed a way of life which provided protection for the weak and
the poor and the disadvantaged. Whatever our views about politics or religion, our
challenge is to think carefully about the published party manifestos and
exercise our democratic right to vote on 7th May so that we may
continue to live in a peaceful society
which strives to do its best for each and every one of its citizens.
Whatever our
political opinion or party leanings, we should make every effort to step out to
the polling stations or cast our votes
by post before the polls close on Thursday 7th May. The right to
vote is not to be thrown away as something we do if the mood takes us on
polling day.
With love and
blessings.
Celia

Tuesday April 21st 2015
April is the month of Annual Meetings
By the time
you read this we shall definitely be on the way to balmier weather, trees in
their fresh and vibrant clothes and the more confident flowers of early summer.
In the church, after the great festival of Easter, April is the month of Annual
Meetings. I know those words are not likely t More...
Tuesday April 21st 2015
April is the month of Annual Meetings
By the time
you read this we shall definitely be on the way to balmier weather, trees in
their fresh and vibrant clothes and the more confident flowers of early summer.
In the church, after the great festival of Easter, April is the month of Annual
Meetings. I know those words are not likely to make your hearts leap for joy,
but they are important occasions and not only do the statutory business:
election of churchwardens byparishioners, election of the Parochial Church Council by members of the
electoral roll and the adoption of the accounts for the previous year, but they
also provide the opportunity to reflect on the year that is past and look
forward to what lies ahead and think about the strategic direction of the
church in these communities. I am acutely aware of the affection in which the
parish churches are held and I delight in that, so I would really like to
encourage you to come along to our Annual Meetings to hear what we are up to,
to find out where we struggle and where things are going well. You will be
assured of a warm welcome and some excellent refreshments! Please dont forget
that the church is for the whole community, it is your church and not just for
those who come along on a Sunday. Ill put the dates at the bottom of this
letter and look forward to seeing you.
April is also
the month of showers, the month when we make certain an umbrella or waterproof
is part of our general paraphernalia. Such sweet showers, as Chaucer called
them, are in marked contrast to the violence we have witnessed in cyclone Pam
devastating the archipelago or Vanuatu. It has left in its wake a scene of
destruction: buildings have been torn apart, wells have been destroyed, there
is no shelter, no clean water, no food. And yet, and yet I am constantly
filled with awe at the capacity for rebuilding that is displayed by the human
spirit. I hope and pray that we shall all respond to their plight not least by
holding all those affected in prayer.
Of course the other thing that April brings this year is
the General Election Campaign. A few weeks ago the media responded in a variety
of ways to the letter from the House of Bishops, some saying that the church
should have nothing to do with politics. This is a stance with which I disagree
profoundly. Jesus of Nazareth spent his earthly ministry healing and teaching
in a way that challenged hypocrisy and injustice. Politics is about the way in
which we live our lives, about our values and the way in which society is
ordered. It does not take me to point out the overlap! One of the statements
from that letter says "as bishops we support policies which respect the natural
environment, enhance human dignity, and honour the image of God in our
neighbour. This seems to me a pretty good yardstick against which to measure
the proposed policies of the parties.
With love and blessings Debbie

Tuesday March 31st 2015
Its a time of new beginnings
Dear Friends
With
snowdrops, crocus and daffodils flowering as I write, it feels that the dark
winter days are behind us. Its a time of new beginnings and an expectation
that fresh colour and bright light will bring forth growth and warmth to our
lives. At this time of the year, Christians l More...
Tuesday March 31st 2015
Its a time of new beginnings
Dear Friends
With
snowdrops, crocus and daffodils flowering as I write, it feels that the dark
winter days are behind us. Its a time of new beginnings and an expectation
that fresh colour and bright light will bring forth growth and warmth to our
lives. At this time of the year, Christians look towards Easter, when we
celebrate the resurrection of the founder of Christianity, Jesus Christ. Jesus
was put to death by the Roman authorities because He challenged both the
secular and religious authorities of the day. Jesus challenge to them was to
turn away from corruption, cruelty, hatred and selfishness. He taught that
human beings should love one another and seek peace to live together in harmony,
taking care of the weakest and most vulnerable in society. Not, one would think, a particularly
challenging concept for the rulers of the mighty Roman Empire and the religious
elite of the day. But they saw His challenge as a threat to the absolute
control of their mighty empire and to the local power bases of the religious
authorities in Jerusalem. The Roman authorities thought that by crucifying Him
they would put an end to that threat. They failed because, despite all the
publicity and hype about falling congregations and a loss of faith, Christianity
is still the largest single religion. 31.5% of the worlds population today are
followers of Jesus Christ. Thats an awful lot of people who have become
Christians since just 12 disciples were drawn to follow Jesus over 2000 years
ago. It is quite amazing that a humble Jewish carpenter from a backwater of the
Roman Empire, whose non-violent message was peace and love led to His death,
should have so many followers to this day.
Why
should this be? Christians believe that in Christs teaching there lies hope of
a better way to live. As we journey towards that great festival of Easter, Christians
devote time to prepare and reflect on the great events of the first Easter Day.
This time of preparation is known as Lent. Lent can be looked at as a kind of
spring cleaning of our souls and our spiritual lives. We believe that it is in
spending time in this way that we can become people who reflect the glorious
colour and light which we see in the person of Jesus Christ.
In
the same way that spring cleaning our houses does away with accumulated dirt,
dust and unwanted rubbish to make our homes warm and welcoming for our families
and friends, so too does the clearing out of the accumulated dirt and rubbish
in our minds help us to be able and ready to welcome God into our lives through
learning about Jesus life and teaching and what it means to each one of us. Making
space for God in our lives gives us the chance to become more Christ like, because
in making space in our hearts and minds to take in Jesus teaching, we create
more space to become the loving, compassionate human beings which God intended
us to be. It is for this reason that preparation and reflection is so important.
Spending time in prayer and contemplation about how we can live in peace and harmony
helps us to achieve this spiritual spring-cleaning.
Our
local church communities will be doing some spiritual spring cleaning when we
gather during Lent on a weekly basis to ponder some of the really big questions
in life and how they relate to our Christian faith. Do come along and join us
at Weston-sub-Edge Village Hall between 7.30pm and 9pm on four evenings in
March. They are Wednesday 4th March, Monday 9th March,
Friday 20th March and Monday 23rd March. Puzzling
Questions such as How can I be happy? and Why is there suffering in the
world? will be presented in DVD format and then debated in a relaxed and
friendly atmosphere. Each will give us
an opportunity to reflect on Gods creation and how we might fit into it. Each
one is a separate session. Perhaps too you will join us on Palm Sunday, 31stMarch at 10am near the Seagrave Arms in Weston-sub-Edge when our worship will start
with a procession and perhaps even a donkey! Palm Sunday recalls the day when
Jesus made his way into Jerusalem to the life changing events which followed. Through
our reflections in Lent, we will be better prepared to celebrate the greatest
Christian feast of all - Easter Sunday. Do come and try some of these things
out for yourselves and find out why Christianity is still a huge force for good
in the world.
With love and blessings.
Celia

Tuesday February 17th 2015
God whose nature is forgiveness
Dear Friends
Christmas now seems long in
the past and sadly we cannot really claim that 2015 has got off to a very good
start if we look around the world. The shooting in Paris has cut to the core of
our western belief in the importance of freedom of speech and of religion.
Nothing can ever j More...
Tuesday February 17th 2015
God whose nature is forgiveness
Dear Friends
Christmas now seems long in
the past and sadly we cannot really claim that 2015 has got off to a very good
start if we look around the world. The shooting in Paris has cut to the core of
our western belief in the importance of freedom of speech and of religion.
Nothing can ever justify such a barbarous act and I do not want to live in a
world where there is no opportunity for shining a critical light onto
religions, indeed if we are to be true to our faith then that seems to me
essential, but I question a practice that is so knowingly offensive. The post
massacre edition of Charlie Hebdo shows a picture of the prophet shedding a
tear. It is intended to be conciliatory and strikes a chord with Christians.
Such a picture reminds us of Jesus weeping over Jerusalem or suffering in the
Garden of Gethsemane, the God whose strength is made perfect in weakness, the
God whose nature is forgiveness. For peace loving Muslims, however, with the
prohibition of any visual representations of the Prophet or of Allah, this can
only be a source of pain.
Even more shocking has been
the use of a child as a human bomb, not a suicide bomber because the child had
no part in the decision. To me this speaks of evil not a word I use often
and a deep sickness, an absence of humanity and morality that makes me weep.
So how can we go forward
into the year without being cast down? I am constantly heartened by the small
acts of kindness that go on without really being noticed, I am heartened by the
care that people show one for another, I am heartened by couples who come to
see me about getting married, so clearly committed to each other and so clearly
in love, I am heartened by the elderly who display the wisdom of years, I am
heartened by the faces of children and I am heartened by the renewal of the
land, the snowdrops that tell us that spring and summer really will come again.
God is faithful in the darkness and in the hope.
February brings with it the
season of Lent. Time for chocolate deprivation or whatever else we think might
fit the bill! More importantly though, it is a time when we commit to spending
time together once a week to reflect on elements of our faith and its
relationship to the world. Last year we looked at Les Misérables and this year there will be meetings at Weston sub
Edge Village Hall to look at "Puzzling Questions, for example, why is there
suffering in the world? These are the sorts of questions that I often hear
posed as I go around the parishes so I hope that many of you will take the opportunity
to come along.
Do not lose heart. Look
around you and day by day be thankful.
With love and blessings
Debbie

Monday December 22nd 2014
The time of mince pies and parties
Dear Friends
The time of mince pies and parties is fast approaching and
as usual I find myself caught between wanting people to enjoy celebration and
wanting to remind them that the pre-Christmas time is a time of preparation and
that the celebration doesnt actually start until Christmas day More...
Monday December 22nd 2014
The time of mince pies and parties
Dear Friends
The time of mince pies and parties is fast approaching and
as usual I find myself caught between wanting people to enjoy celebration and
wanting to remind them that the pre-Christmas time is a time of preparation and
that the celebration doesnt actually start until Christmas day and continues
even beyond the 12 days of Christmas until 2nd February, Candlemas.
Somehow we have lost this and by Boxing Day most signs of Christmas have been
stripped from the shops and replaced by the sales. But I am not steadfastly
going to refuse to have anything Christmassy in my house. Of course there will be a Christmas Tree and
of course I shall go to parties and lead carol services and Christingle
services and I shall do these things with joy. But that does leave the question
as to how we can at the same time honour this season of preparation and
waiting. Traditionally preaching has been about the four last things: death,
hell, heaven and judgement but I cant see myself filling the churches with
that diet, however interesting they are! What is essential about them though is
that they are looking beyond our immediate present to the end of time. As we
prepare to focus on the child in the manger, the image of human vulnerability,
God made flesh, becoming one of us, a very homely human scene we need to keep
that future horizon in mind.
So how then should we prepare for Christmas, other than by
buying lots of carefully chosen presents and sending cards to keep our
relationships alive with friends who are distant and stocking the larder?
Perhaps it is quite simply about being mindful when we do these things.
Choosing presents that are just right gives us the opportunity to really focus
upon a person, to value and cherish who they are. Sending cards reminds us of
the importance of relationships and of remembering. Stocking the larder is a
way of ensuring that hospitality is a feature of the season. What better way to
honour the child in the manger, the perfect gift, the expression of Gods
desire for relationship with us, the child whose first home was an outhouse? Certainly
I am looking forward to doing my Christmas shopping and writing our Christmas
cards. Of course being mindful cant stop there as we would be wrong not to be
mindful of places in the world where Christmas will not mean presents and cards
and hospitality. Our Christmas celebrations would be empty if our prayers
failed to remember a hurting world. So as you get ready for Christmas I hope it
will be time of great joy. Enjoy the parties (I shall), enjoy the Christmas
carols and the carol services but remember too the refugees, the homeless, the
lonely and above all, remember the babe in the manger.
I look forward to seeing many of you over the Advent and
Christmas season.
With my love and blessings
Your very joyful Vicar
Debbie

Friday January 9th 2015
New Year Greetings
Dear Friends
At the start of the New Year,
many would say that Christmas is done for another year. I often wonder what the
expression means. Is it that we are done with the shopping sprees or the
Christmas parties or the Christmas eating extravaganza? Or is it because the endless advertisi More...
Friday January 9th 2015
New Year Greetings
Dear Friends
At the start of the New Year,
many would say that Christmas is done for another year. I often wonder what the
expression means. Is it that we are done with the shopping sprees or the
Christmas parties or the Christmas eating extravaganza? Or is it because the endless advertising of food, toys and
other luxury goodies from TV channels,
newspapers or the bargain offers from
the shops and the internet have come to
an end? In the weeks before Christmas my
two small grandsons became transfixed by the ever present adverts on their
carefully monitored doses of childrens TV programmes. They were seduced by
the apparent brilliance of what was on offer and were convinced that what
they really needed was some amazing gadget which would transform their games
and their playtime. But the fact is that what they and we all treasured most
when the Christmas holidays came along was not their new toys fun though they
were but the time we spent all together as family.
Whatever your feelings or outlook,
perhaps the antidote to all of this excess is to look back to the real reason
for the feasting and the celebrations the birth of a very special baby over
2000 years ago a baby who was born to make a difference to the way we think
and act in our relationships with each and every person we meet, day by day, week by week, year
by year. So as we begin a New Year, with
or without a New Years resolution, its a good time to reflect on how we deal
with our relationships and the way we approach each other. What Christmas
really gave us all those years ago was a blueprint for building relationships
which go on to create peace and harmony. A blueprint which, if used properly,
will enable us all to make a difference because we will be committed to
building good relationships. Relationships which exclude hostility, discrimination, selfishness and
many other human actions which lead to disunity. If you have a sense that
Christmas has been done for another year, think again and remember the gifts
you have given and received, the hospitality and celebrations you have enjoyed
and the wonder and excitement on the faces of the children in your communities.
These are expressions of love for one another. And these expressions of love andmemories can be the springboard which will make a difference this
year in the relationships you will share at home, in your workplaces and in
your local communities. It might only be a friendly word or a helping hand but
you can be sure that it is those small gifts of love which will sow the seeds
of peaceful communities and a unified world.
I wish you a peaceful New
Year and pray that the gift of the Christ child in the manger will become a
beacon of light which will lead to greater harmony in all the relationships we
experience this year.
With love and blessings.
Revd. Celia

Saturday November 1st 2014
Introduction DF
Dear Friends
As your new
parish priest I felt it would be good to introduce myself separately from the
letter I have written for this month. Before 6th October I was
priest in charge of Honeybourne, Pebworth, Dorsington and Marston Sicca. I have
now relinquished Marston Sicca , and have joyfu More...
Saturday November 1st 2014
Introduction DF
Dear Friends
As your new
parish priest I felt it would be good to introduce myself separately from the
letter I have written for this month. Before 6th October I was
priest in charge of Honeybourne, Pebworth, Dorsington and Marston Sicca. I have
now relinquished Marston Sicca , and have joyfully added Willersey with
Saintbury and Weston sub Edge with Aston sub Edge, three more churches and more
importantly three more communities to get to know and love. I hope you will be
patient with me as I gradually learn names and please dont be offended if I
ask you your name more than once!
So what would
you most like to know about your new parish priest? I am married to Edward who
lectures in French at Bristol University and we have four grown-up children:
Elizabeth, a GP in Edinburgh, Bruce now a househusband, married to Katie and
dad to Abigail (2) and Samantha (6weeks), Ruth, a secondary school teacher soon
to be married to John and mum to Ethan (7 months) and Catherine, who works for
a charity called Impact and who is to marry Phil next September. It is
wonderfully busy and interesting when they all come home, but that doesnt
happen all that often as they are somewhat spread around the country. We are
very blessed, however, that they all enjoy each others company and remain in
touch. I enjoy reading, music, theatre, walking and giving hospitality. I have
been ordained just over six years and started out as a pioneer curate in
Innsworth just outside Gloucester. Before ordination I worked for seven years
for an organisation that trained Christian Youth Workers, overseeing their
degree programme and before that I was a teacher of French and German. I am
unbelievably happy being a priest and count it an extraordinary privilege.
Thank you for letting me minister among you.
With love and
blessings Debbie

Friday August 1st 2014
All we like ...
Over the Cotswold Edge, the bees are humming,
Dawn-chorus birds send and receive their tweets;
From honey-limestone folds, the sheep are coming
Into St Peters stalls to take their seats.
I leave my soon-to-be-vacated bothy,
Meet an escapee on Friday Street;
Id never catch this poor More...
Friday August 1st 2014
All we like ...
Over the Cotswold Edge, the bees are humming,
Dawn-chorus birds send and receive their tweets;
From honey-limestone folds, the sheep are coming
Into St Peters stalls to take their seats.
I leave my soon-to-be-vacated bothy,
Meet an escapee on Friday Street;
Id never catch this poor lost lamb for toffee
I pause less with a whimper, more a bleat.
I look away. Id much prefer to leave, right?
More than enough to do this Sabbath day,
Like any self-respecting priest or Levite....
Back-track to Manor Farm, report the stray.
Around Court Close, the woolly ones are shedding
Great-coated homespun, at the shepherds shears;
Relieved of all that Witney-worsted bedding
They skip for joy across this Vale of Tears.
Within the walls, two-legged lambs are praying
That they might slough the burden of their guilt,
Try to ignore the gilded serpent, saying:
No use in crying, once the milk is spilt!
Its true: their
singing does not hold a candle,
These Cotswold hillside sheep who safely graze,
To oratoria by Bach or Handel;
Yet, gone astray, still fill the heavens with praise.
During my time, Ive been both lion and leopard,
Sometimes Ive worried flocks within the fold;
But now at length I come to the Good Shepherd:
A chastened Derby ram, seven decades old.
Fred

Saturday August 2nd 2014
Part(y)ing is such sweet sorrow
As the big
day approached, time hurtled towards us. No way did we feel ready for it, let
alone to move house! But time and tide ... And so July 20th arrived,
with no apology for its unerring punctuality. It was time to stop. And to go.
The farewell
service was such a powerful experience for t More...
Saturday August 2nd 2014
Part(y)ing is such sweet sorrow
As the big
day approached, time hurtled towards us. No way did we feel ready for it, let
alone to move house! But time and tide ... And so July 20th arrived,
with no apology for its unerring punctuality. It was time to stop. And to go.
The farewell
service was such a powerful experience for the celebrant that there were
moments when he wondered whether he would get through, or end up in bits on the
church floor. All the more so in the presence of Billie, sons Jonathan and Jeremy,
along with Jonathans wife Helen and two of the grandchildren, Madeleine and
Frances. But it was the mega-presence of the vast congregation which was so
overwhelming. Rob Wilson counted 169 adults and ten children. Rarely if ever
had Fred seen St Peters so full. To all who came: thank you so much for your
support! It was a joy to have Canon Anthony at the organ sadly for us, David
Griffiths, so much valued over the years, was away on important family business.
Also in church were Canon Peter Burch, the Revd Raymond Avent, and the Revd Ros
Murphy with her Superintendent colleague. Add into the mix both sets of
Methodist church members, who had closed their own church doors for the
morning, and you get the feel. There were of course strong showing from all
four churches in the benefice Willersey, Weston, Aston and Mickleton, as well
as many friends from the wider communities.
Then there
was the party afterwards, in the Village Hall. Around 80 folk (legal limit,
fire regulations) foregathered enjoying a splendid array of sandwiches and
canapés, suitably washed down with a glass or several of wine or fruit juice.
Delicious! We want to thank all who helped to make the party possible, caterers
or facilitators and to make it such a pleasant occasion for us.
But there was
more! Speeches and presentations followed. Fred was almost blown away for the
second time by the very generous words of Rob McNeill-Wilson on behalf of the
whole benefice. And so began the presents. There was a hugely generous cheque
from you all we could hardly believe what we saw. An attractive pot plant (an
Acer palmatum) was presented to Billie. Mickleton church had put together a
deeply moving collection of individual contributions and comments from people
who had received Freds ministry. Earlier in the week, the Mickleton ringers
had invited us to listen to a Quarter Peal rung especially in our honour: 1260
Grandsire Triples rung by eight ringers, seven of whom were pretty local and
the eighth no less a person than the chair of the European federation of
change-ringers (sorry, John and Chris if the terminology there isnt quite
right!). Now John Kinchin stepped up to present us with a framed certificate
recording the Quarter in our honour! Both schools had marked Freds retirement
in their own ways, including a really nice cheque from Willersey with which a
suitable present will be bought! Last but not least, Fred was presented with a
framed photograph of your outgoing priest with the FAST women of Willersey (not
what you think ...FAmily Service Team get it?) who with
Fred have prepared the monthly services over the past five years or so.
You might
say, a party wouldnt be a party without cake.
Before we left, we were presented with a magnificent collection of cup cakes,
about 17 of them in all each bearing a letter of the legend FRED AND BILLIE
plus four with gardening or musical motifs. As we write, we are still enjoying
them (shall be for some days to come!). They were made by Marguerite Bell and
Karen Smith, Mickletons own caterers..
The previous
Sunday evening, on the occasions of Freds final visit to St Andrews,
Aston-sub-Edge, he was presented with an original water-colour painting of the
church, in the presence of a large gathering. And there have been other
individual and private kindnesses. Thank you all so much.
With love and
unspeakable gratitude from Billie and Fred

Sunday July 27th 2014
Ite missa est
Cheeky, I suppose: starting
this article for the magazine with three Latin words. But anyone with an RC
background and enough miles on the clock will probably remember them: the final
words from the Latin Roman Catholic Mass. The deacon sends the people away with
this parting shot. Go! You ar More...
Sunday July 27th 2014
Ite missa est
Cheeky, I suppose: starting
this article for the magazine with three Latin words. But anyone with an RC
background and enough miles on the clock will probably remember them: the final
words from the Latin Roman Catholic Mass. The deacon sends the people away with
this parting shot. Go! You are dismissed! Thats it, folks. Hit the road. On
your bikes.
Something of the same sort
comes at the end of our own service: Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.
The missa bit of it comes
from the Latin word for to send, mittere. Its English form has passed into
our language as the Catholic name for Holy Communion: mass. And so we see that
there is something at the heart of our worship about mission (another variant
of the word), sending out.
Now is my moment to say to
those I have been ministering to and who have ministered to me these seven
years: Ite missa est! True, it is I (we) who
are going, not you. But this dismissal is just as real; its a parting, a
separation, a committing of each other to God. If you want to get a good
picture of the dynamics of this leave-taking, think of what happens at the end
of a persons schooldays. In my time, an assembly on the last day of term, a
rendering of Lord, dismiss us with thy
blessing. Not a dry eye in the house. I recall grander ceremonies when
three of our children left their school in Sussex: an emotional experience like
no other as the Tudor-uniformed school band beat the Retreat, finally marching
off to the strains of Sussex by the Sea with
the organ music of The day thou gavestwafting across the Quad from chapel. Retiring VIth formers valedicted each
other with Have-a-good-rest-of-your-lives!
Schools have no monopoly in
such matters. The same happens in churches and has done from early days. I love
the story of the final departure of St Paul from Ephesus, where he had made
many friends. A chunky leaving-sermon is recorded in Acts 20, bidding adieu to the church there. But though
Pauls address was about much more than the extreme improbability of his
return, that was what his hearers
remembered, what cut them to the quick. "When he had finished speaking, he
knelt down with them all and prayed. There was much weeping among them all.
They embraced Paul and kissed him, grieving especially because of what he had
said, that they would not see him again. Then they brought him to the ship.
St Paul knew a thing or two
about poignancy. He knew that Christian work and experience are expendable,
consumable. He knew that ministers might look back and wonder what tangible had been achieved. But he knew
too that his work was an investment in people. He once pictured a church hed
been working with (Corinth) as a letter of testimonial, the only real evidence
of his work. Id love to be able to see these parishes in a similar way. "You
yourselves are our letter, written in our hearts, to be known and read by all;
and you show that you are a letter of Christ, prepared by us, written not with
ink, with the spirit of the living God; not on tablets of stone but on tablets
of human hearts. I could certainly never claim such credit from my work but
I subscribe exactly to Pauls sentiments. (2 Corinthians 3, 1-3)
Parting is such sweet
sorrow, reckoned Shakespeare. And so it is. The encounters and shared
experiences Ive found in ministry here over these years have been second to
none across my four-and-a-half decades as a clergyman. Some of the
extraordinary people whose funeral services I have conducted to say nothing
of all who are still alive and kicking will stay with me for the rest of my
days. But, affecting as all this is (and
it is!), we must still remember the gist of the Ite missa est message. We come together for a time. Seven years of
ministry here for me, but just the same applies to assembling for an hour on
Sunday mornings. We come together to be sent out, sent away, at the end. Not
into the void, the outer darkness: but into the mission-field. Notice that same word-stem again! Long ago, a joker
put it like this. "The Christian church is like the riot police it assembles
to disperse.
We are not here for our own
sakes, your priest-in-charge, your local church congregation. Our role is to
lose ourselves in the worship of God and then to lose ourselves among His
people in their need. What? Losers? Us?Remember that puzzling word of Jesus those who would save their lives will
lose them, and vice-versa? It is not a back-handed strategy for making sure we
are on the winning side, just a statement of how it works.
Thank you for your warm
welcome of Billie and me. Part of the North Cotswolds will stay with us always.
But it is time to hit the road. Ite missa
est.
Fred

Monday June 9th 2014
Exits and Entrances
Its a brave television series that ends (I mean really ends) with a question-mark hanging
in the air, characters and viewers alike left in suspense. But followers of BBC
1s Silk (Maxine Peake, feisty
barrister) know what its like to be left dangling. Martha, Peakes character,
had failed in More...
Monday June 9th 2014
Exits and Entrances
Its a brave television series that ends (I mean really ends) with a question-mark hanging
in the air, characters and viewers alike left in suspense. But followers of BBC
1s Silk (Maxine Peake, feisty
barrister) know what its like to be left dangling. Martha, Peakes character,
had failed in her bid to become head of chambers. Shed been advised by a
sadder-but-wiser crooked lawyer to walk away from the job. In the very last
shot, just as her devoted supporter Billy was going into anaphylactic shock
across the road, she disappeared from view. To help her friend? Off to a new
life? We shall never know.
How very different from the conclusion of many an
old-fashioned novel where loose ends are tied up and (in the case of Jane
Austen at least) theres the half-decent chance of a double wedding. We like
our story-lines sorted. We make no objection to a bit of speculation about the
future in such books, just as long as we know what the main protagonists are
likely to be up to. Away from literature, in real life, tidiness is also imposed where possible. We like our
History in periods Plantagenet,
Tudor, Stuart etc, forgetting that actually life is all of a piece, a
seamless garment with very little changing from one moment to the next, but
perhaps everything in flux over the course of a life-time.
Go into our churches and youll see time marked out like
that: divided into periods a priest has spent in a parish. This can vary
enormously. Canon George Drinkwater Bourne was Rector of Weston-sub-Edge from
1846-1901. By contrast, the first ten names in the Willersey list of incumbents
all came and went within a twenty-year span at the end of the 13thcentury. (What was going on there, I
often wonder perhaps monks from Evesham Abbey on successive tours of duty?)
My sevenish years are about up a convenient round
number, the period that Jacob thoughthe was serving to qualify for marrying Rachel, though it turned out he had to
spend another seven years in Labans service to get the right sister (see
Genesis!) But its an artificial division. These parishes were much the same
before we arrived and their stories will go on unfolding after our departure,
the interim a minor blip in the scheme of things.
Or perhaps not quite. For these few years, we have
together actually tried to make something work, which had been there on paper
before (not working well) and which will cease to be from this summer: the
Cotswold Edge (North) Benefice. Not only that but a whole crowd of people have
become part of our world, as we have of theirs. And that is not going to go
away when we do.
I have been blessed by the people of this benefice, as
they you have allowed me to become part of their stories. The plot is
open-ended. None of us knows what will happen after the credits roll of the
last episode. But we know that the journey will continue, the pilgrimage will
go on.
Fred

Tuesday May 27th 2014
Egypt v. Land of Promise
What is your favourite
novel? No let me ask the question a bit more pretentiously: which for you is
the finest novel in the English language?
I was writing recently about
detective fiction. Chief Inspector Morse seems to have settled the question of
Englands Best in his own mind. Much as h More...
Tuesday May 27th 2014
Egypt v. Land of Promise
What is your favourite
novel? No let me ask the question a bit more pretentiously: which for you is
the finest novel in the English language?
I was writing recently about
detective fiction. Chief Inspector Morse seems to have settled the question of
Englands Best in his own mind. Much as he loves Thomas Hardy, its really no
contest. For him, Bleak House (Dickens) wins hands down. I love that Colin
Dexter Morses creator has him lingering over the final chapters, just to
prolong the experience. I love Bleak
House, too. I can see why the splendid Inspector Bucket, who cracks the Dickens
mystery, would appeal to Morse. But in the end, I disagree with him; presumably
therefore also with Dexter; and go for Hardy as supplier of the greatest
English novel.
For me it has to be Tess of the dUrbervilles, recently
re-read. Apart from the drama and pathos of the plot and the wonderful
atmospheric descriptions of Wessex, its the insightful observations along
the way which help to make this such a great read. When, towards the end of the
book, Tesss mother and siblings lose their home, the novelist pauses to
reflect on a changing social pattern in the latter part of the 19thcentury. Previously, families had been content to stay on one farm for the
whole of their working lives. Not any more. "Latterly, the desire for a yearly
removal had risen to a high pitch. With the younger families, it was a pleasant
excitement which might possibly be an advantage. The Egypt of one family was
the Land of Promise to the family who saw it from a distance, till by residence
there it became their Egypt also; and so they changed and changed. Using
Egypt as a symbol of economic slavery would have come naturally to anyone
familiar with the Old Testament.
There is an illusion to
which most of us have clung at one time or another in our lives: that change
means a new start which in its turn will facilitate a sloughing-off of the
problems and faults which have dogged our lives in the old place. I well
remember moving parishes at a time when one of my sons had found life in the
local primary school pretty tough, the unwelcome attention which had come from
being a clergy-child. As we moved, the look in his eye seemed to express the
hope and expectation that all thatwas now behind him. He found, of course, as do we all that personal baggage
goes with us when we move. We cant leave our issues behind. They follow us.
A rather depressing statistic used to be bandied about that a greater
percentage of second marriages fail than first. I dont know if thats true.
Im certainly aware of many blissfully happy second marriages. But the numbers
do make the point. Our personal stuff comes with us. The buttons we allow
people to press in one location will have just the same effect in another, or
may be with another partner, unless we have taken steps to address the
underlying challenges. If we just move on, then behave in similar ways all
over again, we shall be like Hardys workforce, leaving behind one land of slavery only to find that the
garden of Eden we thought we were entering is actually as much of a prison as
the last place.
35 years ago, I took part in
a course run by a Christian social worker, all about personal relationships
with special reference to marriage. "There are no such things as new starts,
he told us. I hope he was over-stating his case. But he did have a point.
At a less personal, more
social, level the same process can be seen in the political life of our
country, perhaps of any democracy. The Egypt of one tired administration is
rejected by voters in a general election, in the hopes that the Land of Promise
will be reached by the next. Perhaps the Tony Blair period was a game-changer
in this respect. "Things can only get better, we were told. For several years,
many of us believed it. But by the time Iraq was invaded in 2003, the Promised
Land was beginning to look distinctly like Egypt once again. Creeping
disenchantment with Westminster and party politics followed. In the past when
oldies have become cynical, a younger generation of political enthusiasts have
followed through, bringing new energy into the system. Please God, that may
still be so: but there are too many who want to echo Russell Brand and say to
politicians "A plague on all your houses!. VeryEgyptian!
And yes! it can be the
same in parishes moving from one incumbency to the next. "Next time, well get
it right! I like the story of the long-serving churchwarden in conversation
with the new vicar. Youve been here a long time, George? Yes, vicar. Ive
seen seven vicars come and go. As many as that? Yes, vicar. And every one
of them worse than the previous one ...
New relationships can and do
work. It is possible to move from
Egypt towards a Promised Land. But it is not achieved by just being new and
different; but by dealing with the problems which prevented things working
properly in the previous place or relationship.
Or so I think.
Fred

Monday April 7th 2014
Knowing the place for the first time
Getting ready to come
here seven years ago, my imagination was stirred when I spotted a familiar
place-name on the map, actually within my new patch: Burnt Norton.Surely, there couldnt be twoplaces called that? It had (didnt it?)
to be the location used by the poet T.S.Eliot as the title for More...
Monday April 7th 2014
Knowing the place for the first time
Getting ready to come
here seven years ago, my imagination was stirred when I spotted a familiar
place-name on the map, actually within my new patch: Burnt Norton.Surely, there couldnt be twoplaces called that? It had (didnt it?)
to be the location used by the poet T.S.Eliot as the title for one of his "Four
Quartets. Well, I wasnt wrong. Home of the Earl and Countess (who has lately
published an historical novel, inspired by the story of the house) of Harrowby,
Burnt Norton was visited by Eliot in the late 1920s. His memories of the rose garden fed into a
whole series of recollections which inspired one of the great poems in English
of the 20th century. Much of
this work is about time and memory, so its not surprising that I find myself
returning to it at this juncture of my life.
Eliot, an Anglo-American
who spent his working life first in banking and then as Literary Editor of the
publishing house Faber and Faber, seems to have held that the journey of life
is circular, that we end up where we began but with new insights about the
place, which were unavailable to us first time round. These words (from the final Quartet, "Little
Gidding) sum it up:
"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time
I have had two striking
experiences in reading over recent months, which I should like to share with
you. Both are books which I have known,
indeed possessed, for many
years. The first was bought (though a
different, now lost, copy) in my mid-teens and dipped into over the
decades. The sword of Damacles hung over
it whilst I was considering which books to discard. But instead I read it from cover to cover. It is Dietrich Bonhoeffers Letters and
Papers from prison. Bonhoeffer, a
Lutheran pastor and teacher in Germany in the 1930s and 40s was implicated in
conspiracy against Hitler: though he had
already been behind bars for a year when the assassination attempt of July 1944
took place. He wrote and received an
extraordinary series of letters, as well as other papers and poems between 1943
and 5, when he was hanged by the Nazis, just a few weeks before VE Day. At a personal level, they are deeply affecting
to read. The ideas he put forwards about
what the Church might look like after the war, and how Christianity might
become separated from religion were deeply formative for my generation of
students.
This correspondence
also gives a vivid picture of what it was like for ordinary Germans when the
Allied bombing raids were taking place and of the disruption caused by
war. From the English point-of-view,
its easy to have a one-sided impression.Its been my privilege during my time here to conduct funeral services
for WW2 fighter and bomber pilots. How
we respect that generation! But reading Bonhoeffer himself totally
opposed to Nazism reminds me anew that there were ordinary, brave and good
people on both sides of that conflict:as indeed is likely to be the case in so many of our human
disputes. And coming back to
Bonhoeffer after 50 years and more is like returning to my starting-point and
knowing the place, properly, for the first time.
I suppose Letter and
Papers always stood a good chance of survival on my shelves. By contrast, my other choice for this month
came within a whisker of being slung, unread.But, as I write, Im getting deep into its pages. It is Journey of a Soul, the collected
spiritual diaries of Pope John XXIII.Previous forays had left me with a sense of too much, too repetitive
religious language with which I was uncomfortable. Not really sure why I started again but I
have to say, How wrong was I!
Its probable you have
to be at least my kind of age to have lively recollections of Pope John: larger than life, breath of fresh air after
Pius XII, inspiration behind the second Vatican Council, already very aged when
appointed, deeply humble and self-effacing.Angelo Roncalli was born into an Italian peasant family in 1881, a
bishop at 44, later Cardinal Patriarch of Venice, and elected Pope at the age
of 72. After this renewed encounter with
his writings, I found myself deeply touched by his thoughts about ordained
life, being called back to my own spiritual beginnings: back where I started and knowing the place
for the first time. I might have picked
any number of extracts to give the flavour of his work but here are just two.
1952 Retreat at Montmartre "Oh, this never doing or saying to others
what we would not wish to have done or said to us! We are all rather remiss about this ... In
every case, a caress is always better than a scratch. (A palpable hit, Your Holiness!)
During August 1961, he
was thinking about the (conflicting?) need to be both simple and prudent. He concludes as follows:
"Simplicity means
nothing contrary to prudence and the converse is also true. Simplicity is love: prudence is thought. Love prays:the intelligence keeps watch.Watch and pray: a perfect
harmony. Love is like the cooing
dove: the active intelligence is like
the snake that never falls to the ground or bruises itself because, before it
glides along, it first probes with its head, to test the unevenness of the
ground.
John XXIIIs simplicity
and prudence recall me to my ordination vows:back where I started, knowing better this time around Im not sure that
his words, or T.S. Eliots, have meanings so very different from Jesus when he
advised his followers to be wily as serpents and innocent as doves or, when
he described the scribe instructed in the Kingdom of heaven as a householder
bringing out of his treasure things new and old.
A heavier and longer
piece this month! So, as John Ebdon used
to say on the old Home Service: "If you
have been thank you for listening!
Happy Easter!

Friday March 7th 2014
How many detectives do you need to ....?
I
stumbled into detective fiction about 20 years ago. A friend Id served with as a curate pressed
into my hand a P.D. James novel, "An
unsuitable job for a woman, which I eventually read. This led me into the Adam Dalgleish
mysteries, all of which I devoured. Then I started on Ian Rankins More...
Friday March 7th 2014
How many detectives do you need to ....?
I
stumbled into detective fiction about 20 years ago. A friend Id served with as a curate pressed
into my hand a P.D. James novel, "An
unsuitable job for a woman, which I eventually read. This led me into the Adam Dalgleish
mysteries, all of which I devoured. Then I started on Ian Rankins Rebus, of
which, again, I have consumed all but the most recent. Where next?
C.J.
Sansoms excellent Tudor-based stories about the barrister, Matthew
Shardlake. And finally to Morse. Im not sure whether I have exhausted my
appetite for the genre but what I have already read has given me much food for
thought. None of the four heroes is
exactly a rounded, normal human being.They have all got faults, idiosyncrasies. None of them is married, at least during the real
time of the stories. John Rebus has
been in the past but like so many marriages
of those driven by their work, it has fallen apart by the time we first meet
him. He does have a daughter, Sammy, who
plays an important part in some of the novels.Adam Dalgleish is single, but accelerating towards marriage with Emma, a
Cambridge academic, by the end of the final book. Morse has never been married. But to say, "he isnt the marrying kind would give quite the wrong impression today
though it is true in one way: he is too selfish to make (let alone survive
in) such a relationship He has too glad
an eye for any woman who is "attractive.The author, Colin Dexter, uses that description a lot, in a way which
now seems
(a)
dated and (b) politically incorrect. In
any case, Morse is too bound up with booze and fags. Matthew Shardlake, the 16thcentury lawyer, is clearly not immune to the promptings of the heart, but again
he is too driven to allow such personal agenda room to prosper.
Theres
a sense in which none of these characters is a very nice person. You cant quite resist the conclusion that
Dalgleish and Shardlake are a bit too good to be true. With Alan Dalgleish, theres a steely
remoteness, and emotional buttoned-upness which tends to keep his personal
baggage out of the story-lines: though this is tempered by his poetry (he writes) and by his eventual falling for
Emma.
The
other two, Morse and Rebus (names suggesting codes and puzzles, NB) tend to be
scamps on a good day and potential scoundrels on many another. Either will take liberties with the law in
pursuit of "justice as they see it. Both
have good brains, and the capacity to crack seemingly un-solvable cases
though usually (of course) after first chasing up several blind alleys. Morse has an endearing but uncompleted
university background. Study of the
Classics was all going so well at St Johns College, until he went off the
rails with a girl student called Wendy. (Perhaps Dexter sees Morse as a perennial
Peter Pan?) The Times crossword and
Wagners music are what remains of his cultural background. And by the way he drives a Lancia in most of
the novels the Jag doesnt appear till the ninth of thirteen. The only one of the four who is really into
religion is Adam Dalgleish: but even
then (as far as we can see) not a regular church attender. P. D. James does know her Church of England she is a member of the Prayer
Book Society. All her references to
ecclesiastical matters are pleasing and accurate. It is less so with Dexters Morse! He has a priest coming away from Confession with
a green stole over his arm (for shame!)
and the same High Church vicar, after the Eucharist, carrying a surplice. In reality, he wouldnt have been wearing a Choir garment
and if he had, it would have been a cotta (now I am splitting hairs!). On the
other hand, Morse is pleasingly described as "a low-church atheist. Rebus has a love-hate relationship with the
kirk and, in the earlier novels, occasionally goes to talk to an RC priest in
the confessional. With Matthew
Shardlake, you cant help feeling that in many ways he is the "New Man of the
Renaissance period an early post-Christian, not really motivated by religious
belief but still taking it seriously as part of the cultural scene.
All
of these fictitious characters are real in one important way. They are depicted as three-dimensional human
being with foibles and short-comings.If, weighed in the balance, you have to wonder which way the scales
would tilt certainly in the case of Morse (who dies alone and lonely) and
Rebus.
But
with such real-life people, the Lord our God deals. For such people, such as us, our Lord Jesus Christ
died. Dylan Thomas has the Revd. Eli
Jenkins singing, in his Sunset Poem: "We
are not wholly bad or good, Who live our lives under Milkwood; And Thou, I know, wilt be the first To see our best side, not our worst! Amen, Lord! May it be so!

Friday February 7th 2014
Advertisers Announcements
Every
job Ive had in ministry (except for my first) has come via advertisements in
the Church Times. For more than 40
years, I have looked on, as the styles and techniques used by parishes to
promote interest in themselves have changed.It used to be simple: name of
parish, type of post (vica More...
Friday February 7th 2014
Advertisers Announcements
Every
job Ive had in ministry (except for my first) has come via advertisements in
the Church Times. For more than 40
years, I have looked on, as the styles and techniques used by parishes to
promote interest in themselves have changed.It used to be simple: name of
parish, type of post (vicar, curate), brief description (possibly) and contact
details. Now, advertisers go to great lengths to describe the particular
version of the Archangel Gabriel they are looking for and the concomitant skill-sets
that applicants, imagining they have a ghost of a chance, will be expected to
bring. Weirdly, the more they seek to be
individual, the more they look drearily similar. Dont even think about it unless youre a good
preacher, good with children, good with the elderly, a great administrator, a
good team-player (And passionate about evangelism). And oh yes, of course g.s.o.h.
All
this has a curious effect on clergy reading the ads. Partly, of course, it makes us feel inadequate. Who embodies all these qualities? Partly it makes us cynical. Some good column-inches have been written in
the Church press, sending up the mind-set which expresses such requirements
(but it makes no difference, the ads keep appearing) Partly, too, it reminds us that there can be
a tyrannical side to peoples expectations of what clergy are there to do. When we judge ourselves by such criteria
and we nearly all fall into this trap
on occasions we put ourselves and our families under stress and probably end
up failing to do anything properly. Home or away.
Such
strong expectations are raised, on bothsides, during the appointments process.The parish is looking for the perfect vicar, who in turn is looking for
the idyllic community with perfect parishioners. When the dust settles, both sides must come
to terms with reality. One of the
previous rectors in my last parish
once said (three years into his time there):"the first year, I could do no wrong.The second year I could do no right.This year, we have all started to be more
realistic
None
of us clergy is Gabriel. Angelic for the
most part, we aint. Even on a very good
day, it would at best be a case of "angels with dirty faces, sometimes with
fallen haloes. I am sorry for my
short-comings, some of which are obvious, others less so. But it is not all bad news. Within the Christian family, we embrace each
other, warts and all. We know we have
all fallen short of the mark and this gives us the liberty, and the responsibility, to accept one another
for what we are, made in the image of God, children of the same heavenly
Father, however much we have failed to deliver on the potential He has invested
in us.
Whateverelse the clergy are, and do, that
much we have in common. When the changes
come about later this year, try to be very kind to one another : patient, hopeful and accepting.
Fred

Monday January 13th 2014
Archery - The Final Shot
Followers of The Archers and of this column will know
that I occasionally use story-lines and characters from the Radio 4 Soap as a
peg on which to hang some thoughts.
This final shot in my series is the one fired by the hapless
Ed Grundy, worried for weeks that his milking herd is bei More...
Monday January 13th 2014
Archery - The Final Shot
Followers of The Archers and of this column will know
that I occasionally use story-lines and characters from the Radio 4 Soap as a
peg on which to hang some thoughts.
This final shot in my series is the one fired by the hapless
Ed Grundy, worried for weeks that his milking herd is being infected by stray
dogs, spreading disease. For weeks, it
has seemed somethings got to give. Out
rabbiting with his dad, Eddie, Ed suddenly becomes aware of barking and rapid
movement. His hackles rise. Almost before he knows it, his gun is at his
shoulder and the shot is fired. Moments
later, we learn that the offending (now dead) animal is Baz his estranged
game-keeper brothers pride and joy.Will, the Keeper, is close behind. The catastrophe can only be imagined there
is something operatic about it. To
compound the felony, Baz was beloved of George Eds step-son but Williams
actual son (Keep up, there!).
Some situations seem incapable of resolution, with
tragedy or accident-waiting-to-happen written all over them. The brothers used to get along quite well,
until Wills young wife, Emma, began an adulterous relationship with
brother-in-law, Ed. There was a big
wrangle as to who was the daddy of the baby George, eventually determined in
Wills favour by DNA. This affair was
never going to turn out well. Eds shot
in the dark may have put back the cause of family peace by years, if it is
attainable at all. Meanwhile, the hearts
of parents Clarrie and Eddie, and granddad Joe, are heavy, if not actually
broken.
As I hear the story unfold, my mind turns to a branch of
modern psychology called "Transactional analysis. Without getting technical, "TA (as its
called) sees human dealings on a spectrum with emotional intimacy at one end
and serious destructive game-playing at the other. In between can be all sorts of minor
exchanges between people, strokes where we show one another some attention,
talk trivially about the weather, pass the time of day,. etc. But in significant relationships, these
lesser encounters pale into insignificance beside the good and bad ends of the
scale.
In TA theory a game is a process entered, often out of
conscious awareness, in which both players find their own doubts and insecurities
about themselves and others reinforced.Game-playing always involves
abandoning any attempt at emotional honesty and intimacy. And it alwaysends badly. There are degrees of
games. A third-degree game is the most
serious. TA theory reckons that third-degree
games end up with someones getting physically hurt, or dying, or in court. Will and Ed Grundy are in the midst of just
such a third-degree game. The shooting
of Baz clinched that.
Unscrambling such games can be very hard work. Sometimes more than two people are
involved. William was an innocent party
but Emma presents herself to Ed as the victim of an unhappy relationship. Ed gets drawn in as rescuer, his brother
seen as persecutor. In these TA games,
people find themselves changing from one role to another. Now Ed is the persecutor, Will the victim,
his dog shot, leaving Emma as piggy-in-the-middle.
Such are human tragedies.They generally begin with sin, selfishness or stupidity. The messes Ive been in, for sure, have begun
with mine. They are compounded by an
inability or unwillingness to face up to the wrong which has been done, to
take on board the hurt of the genuine victims or wrong-doing. As long as we are defending our position,
untenable as it very likely is, the capacity for game-playing will
continue. Everybody will go on
hurting. Nothing will get resolved.
At this point, as ever was, I turn to St Paul in Romans 7
"Miserable creature that I am, who is there to save me from this body doomed to
death? God alone, through Jesus Christ our
Lord. There are no easy answers. Many
readers will be involved in their own (hopefully a little less dramatic)
versions of such games. When I am in the
thick of it, almost drowning in my
capacity for getting it wrong, I hanker after the intimacy which is the very
opposite of game-playing. I think of the
times in the Gospels when Jesus headed off such behaviour: from the Pharisees, from the likes of
Zacchaeus, even from the disciples as late on as Maundy Thursday.
And, painful as it all is, I thank the BBC for such a
clear and searing portrayal of how things can go so badly wrong and,
therefore, of how important it is to sort them out "while ye have time
Fred

Tuesday December 31st 2013
Doing Christmas
All through
my years of ministry and for very much longer the Church has tried to swim
against the tide in the keeping of Christmas. The Rector who trained me took a
dim view of people who only turned up for services on Christmas Day. Coming
with a skin-full of ale at Midnight would have g More...
Tuesday December 31st 2013
Doing Christmas
All through
my years of ministry and for very much longer the Church has tried to swim
against the tide in the keeping of Christmas. The Rector who trained me took a
dim view of people who only turned up for services on Christmas Day. Coming
with a skin-full of ale at Midnight would have gained few Brownie-points with
him. One year, he tried an admission-by-ticket-only policy. Of course it didnt
work and was dropped twelve months on. But even without such extreme measures,
church people have frequently felt divided between the warm welcome which
should always be extended to visitors and droppers-in and disappointment in
an interest which may not extend much
beyond cribs and carols.
Such strains
and stresses are not new. During the Oliver Cromwell period in the 1650s, there
was famously an attempt to ban Christmas as a feast-day. The Puritans thought
it should be kept as a fast, a time for calling to mind our sins. Soldiers were
dispatched by parliament to check out kitchens for signs of illicit
feast-making. But of course (rightly!) the English people would have none of it
not for long any way and such acts merely served to hasten the national
mood of impatience with Puritanism.
Nowadays,
Church wisdom says, Go with the flow!At least people still want to keep Christmas and thats got to be worth
something, hasnt it? So, forget all that inconvenient old stuff about observing
Advent right up till Christmas Eve and give people what they want, when they
want it! Whats the point of being out-of-step with Society at large? No! We
should make it work for us (we tell ourselves).
And so we
should and do. But there are difficulties,
challenges. And a thoughtful keeping of Christmas will not succeed in
altogether avoiding them. The trouble with Christmas is that the story
invites us to look at our lives in a new light. That can be inconvenient,
painful even. Whats it like to be an outsider? Mary and Joseph knew. Whats it
like to be hunted down by partisans (even when government troops)? They knew
that, just as millions do today in war-zones. Whats it like to be born in
unhygienic conditions, without the benefit of modern medicine and hospital
equipment? Just about everyone knewthat, then. Countless young
families know it today, too: not much in this country, but in many other parts
of the world.
We look at
the players in the Nativity story and seem to see them staring back at us, and
asking us: Are you for real? Are youtruly bothered about us, what we said and did, what our lives stood for? Our
hearts protest Of course we are
interested. They return our gaze, unblinking. Then why do you live lives so comfortable and protected, so little
concerned for the likes of us around you now? And we are the first to break
eye contact, because we know they speak the truth. And we are unsure how to
answer.
Christmas
rightly remains a joyous time for families and churches across this land and
beyond. Its no part of my intention to be judgmental about the way others do
Christmas. But neither shall I be able wholly to silence those disquieting
voices and glances from the Nativity characters, challenging too comfortable a
keeping of this great Feast.
Enjoy
Christmas when it comes! But listen and look carefully. And perhaps use the
prayer of St Augustine when you sense those heart-tugs:
You made us
for Yourself and our hearts find no peace until they rest in You.

Tuesday November 5th 2013
Tonic chord, second inversion
(Lets start at the
very beginning...)
This is a
piece I originally wrote last Spring, and then decided was a bit too eccentric
(even for me). However, fired up by the Last Night of the Proms recently, Ive
returned to it with fresh eyes (and ears): and with the hope that it might
just More...
Tuesday November 5th 2013
Tonic chord, second inversion
(Lets start at the
very beginning...)
This is a
piece I originally wrote last Spring, and then decided was a bit too eccentric
(even for me). However, fired up by the Last Night of the Proms recently, Ive
returned to it with fresh eyes (and ears): and with the hope that it might
just possibly mean something to someone.
Doing O
Level Music bequeathed me with a few good gifts for the enjoyment of life, none
of them I think greater than this little number. For the space of three or four
sentences, Im going to be slightly technical (bear with me, please), and then
talk plain English again. Imagine a three-note chord based on Do. (Do mi
sol ... "sew in Sound of Music speak ... you can add in a top do too, if you
wish). The "second inversion of this chord is when the notes are the same, but
the chord does a hand-stand, with sol at the bottom, do, mi and a top sol up
above. (If you want to be reallytechnical, forget Julie Andrews and say its the tonic, the mediant and the
dominant, inverted to have the dominant at the base. But hey on second
thoughts, lets keep it simple.) So when the chord usually based on do does
its handstand so that its now based on sol then you have it: tonic chord,
second inversion.
Why does
this excite me so much? Because, if you go to a concert with a concerto in the
programme, youre likely to become aware, suddenly, that the orchestra are
playing just such a chord: tonic, second inversion. Often towards the end of
the first movement (but sometimes in more than one movement), this little gem
is a sure indication of what is about to follow, the orchestras signal for the
soloist to take over and have her or his own way for the next unspecified
period. S/he takes the instrument through its paces, shows off shamelessly,
modulates through many different keys and back again, abandons the requirement
to play in strict time and takes us through a whole range of emotions. Its the
section of the work known as the cadenza an Italian term just meaning
cadence or step a movement towards the completion of the piece, finally,
by the orchestra coming back in, tutti,
(i.e. the whole lot of em).
So, why all
this, now? Because I think Ive reached my TCSI moment. For me, the concerto of
stipendiary ministry is drawing towards its end or at least the finish of
this particular movement. The rules say we must finish by the time were 70;
for me, next year. Fair enough, clergy are not meant to be solo performers,
moody prima donnas, let alone one-man bands. Were part of a team and the
work wont work unless all play their parts properly. Nevertheless, there is something in the analogy. For much of
the time, our role is rather more that of the conductor: enabling each section
and player to find their voices and contribute in their own ways to the
ultimate performance. Conductors undoubtedly give their own stamp to
performances and interpretations. At the hands of a master, you know from the
first chord that youre in for a great performance. But equally theres a
learning curve they have to negotiate about their own transitoriness. Theres a
story (probably exaggerated) about Sir Thomas Beecham. Supposedly, he was once
conducting at a concert when there was a power failure: the lights went out.
With enormous presence of mind, the orchestra kept playing, in total darkness.
When the power came back, Sir Thomas was seen to be in tears having had a
pointed reminder that he was not, after all indispensable. So too with clergy.
(But then, you knew that already.)
But, risky
as it might be, I want to persevere with this image of the soloist and the
cadenza. Im going to give myself permission over the next few months to have
my individual say in this parish magazine, without fear or favour. Im
putting myself on notice that it must be a performance of total honesty. There
will be up-beat and down-beat, changes of tempo and of mood. I shall not tell
half-truths (or worse). I shall make no claims that I do not feel in my gut to
be true. I shall endeavour to let it be a warts and all account of who I am
and what I believe. You may not agree with all of it (perhaps not with any of it!) You may sometimes think I
should not be writing such things in a parish magazine.
Take
courage! Cadenzas come to an end, as do periods of ministry. Others will follow
on, less wacky, more reliable. And Im hoping that when my individual
contribution eventually comes to the chord which brings the whole orchestra
back in, therell be a sense of culmination and harmony all round.
Fred

Thursday October 10th 2013
Hold that thought!
Over the years, I have never thought that prayer was my forté. To some people, it
comes naturally. They listen to Jesus words, Ask and you shall receive etc, they get it and they just go for it.
Not for them philosophical puzzles: how can bad things happen if God is
all-good and all-pow More...
Thursday October 10th 2013
Hold that thought!
Over the years, I have never thought that prayer was my forté. To some people, it
comes naturally. They listen to Jesus words, Ask and you shall receive etc, they get it and they just go for it.
Not for them philosophical puzzles: how can bad things happen if God is
all-good and all-powerful? Why and how would He interfere in a world created
with its own laws of nature? Whats the point of telling Him things which must
already be in the divine mind? Troubled with these, and other, problems since
my student days, intercessory prayer has never been an easy option for me.
Until recently. Because, yes, over the last few years I
have found that I have wanted to pray in this way far more than perhaps ever
before. When we say to someone we care for, I shall think of you, what we are really saying (I reckon) is, I shall pray for you. We are avoiding
the danger of being sanctimonious but the reality is just the same. We are
holding that thought of the person/issue/cause before God. We are not necessarily
bringing an agenda of what we want to
happen or desirable outcomes. We
are bearing in mind St Pauls words about giving thanks to God whatever
happens. We are simply holding that thought, as we see it, in the presence of
God. When I engage in this emotional, mental and spiritual activity, I feel
more alive and connected than I do at a good many other moments.
This should not be too surprising. The idea of having a
picture-image in our prayers is hardly new. I still have, somewhere, the little
handbook I was given at the time of my confirmation in the 1950s. The writer (a
former vicar of the church where we were married) made a suggestion about the
way communicants might use the Prayer for the Church Militant here in earth
(the long intercession prayer in the BCP Communion service). Imagine you are
in the street while a procession comes past, he wrote. You can see them all
the Queen, the church leaders, government, the poor, the sick, the needy, loved
ones who are no longer with us filing
past. As you watch, hold them before God in prayer. OK this is a bowdlerised
version remembered across five decades and more, but it was the gist! That mental image is not a bad way of thinking about
intercessions.
Some years after my confirmation, a different picture
came to mind. One summer evening in 1963, I was sitting alone on a hillside in
Dovedale, supposedly revising for my A-Levels but actually watching a shepherd
at work across the valley on the opposite hill. A sheep dog was doing his stuff.
Every time the sheep had been more-or-less rounded up, one or two of them would
break away and the dog would zoom into action again, ranging around until all
were safely gathered into the fold. Fifty years on, I can still see it
perfectly: and see it as a metaphor
for prayer. Jesus spoke of being the Good Shepherd, even of being the door of
the sheepfold. Perhaps it would be a justifiable extension of his metaphor to
say this: when we are holding people in our prayers, we are behaving like that
sheep dog, going from one beast to another in our minds to make sure that they
are not left out, that they do not escape our attentions.
My intercessory prayer is not quite as patchy as it used
to be thank you, Lord, for that! But whenever in the past I returned to it,
sometimes after long absences, I would find one person after another hailing me
in my prayers, and saying as it were Dont
forget me! I need to be included too! Then I was the sheep dog, on a
constant perimeter of prayer, encircling those who needed to be cared for and
bringing them into the fold of the Lords presence.
None of this, of course, answers any of the sceptical
conundrums I have always had in mind as to what on earth is going on when we
pray. But I think this thought is worth holding any way. I am still moved by
Tennyson: More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of. We are
not, after all strangers to the business of saying one thing and meaning
another. Louis Armstrong reflected on the fact that when we say to friends and
neighbours How dyou do?, what were really wanting to say is, I love you.
Similarly, in our own individual ways, Ill think of you = Ill pray for
you. A prayer by any other name would be as meet.

Saturday September 7th 2013
Wrong end of a telescope ....?
Looking back at ourselves as we were decades ago is
a weird business.
This August, I find myself looking back for two
reasons. One is, its 55 years this summer since that experience I had in
Lichfield Cathedral which eventually brought me into the ordained ministry.
Alone, locked by acci More...
Saturday September 7th 2013
Wrong end of a telescope ....?
Looking back at ourselves as we were decades ago is
a weird business.
This August, I find myself looking back for two
reasons. One is, its 55 years this summer since that experience I had in
Lichfield Cathedral which eventually brought me into the ordained ministry.
Alone, locked by accident in St Chads chapel high in the cathedral walls,
intended just for private prayer where the Blessed Sacrament was reserved, I
sensed/thought/suspected/came to believe/knew that God was speaking to me and
that, whatever it was He was saying, it was going to mean a big change in my
young life. Within three days, I had come to believe that this was a vocation
to ordination, I had told my local vicar and my parents about it.
Looking down the telescope through the wrong end,
across the decades, Ive often wondered what was going on. Had the seed been
implanted by others? Quite possibly. A year or two earlier, I had played the
main role in a drama about a child who felt called to ordination. Had I stepped
into the role Id been playing so recently? Was it something I fancied
doing/being? If so, I felt an unlikely candidate. Just three years earlier, Id
failed my 11+. By 1958, Id transferred to the local grammar school but knew I
had much ground still to make up. Then again, was this new turn of events somehow
related to issues about puberty, adolescence, feelings of inadequacy, aspirations,
guilt? Almost certainly. Yet, Ive never finally convinced myself that this
sense of vocation was merely the
product of all or some of these other explanations. Yes, even down the wrong
end of the telescope so remote, so distant God was in there somewhere.
Well, I really do hope so: or else what have I been spending my life doing?
Five years on from all that (so, fifty back from
now), I was doing A-levels, leaving school, going off to St Chads College in
Durham. (Bit of a recurring theme, Chad.) Looking down the telescope at that
young person feels odd. Was it really me/I? It seems another life. And yet
there are consistencies. My stream of consciousness is the same, sweeping me
along from one experience to another, whether I like it/am ready for it or not.
And Im truly blessed in having the same partner now as then. In 1963, we
werent yet formally engaged but we both knew where we were hoping to get.
Strange to think that three of our children have spent time in Durham since
then and even their student days now
long in the past. I recently read a Times supplement about Durham an
advertising inset. So much has changed but so much is still the same .The
little Department of History where I studied had about a dozen (maximum)
lecturers in my day. Now there are three times as many, and more. Werent we
all civilised and respectful, back then? Didnt the sun always shine? The past
is indeed another country. They do things differently there.
So reality check. Back to the future. Looking down
the wrong end of the telescope can be seriously damage your mental health. Out
come the rose-tinted specs. And we tend to see patterns there which may not
have really existed: not so much looking down a telescope as into a kaleidoscope.
Many readers will doubtless remember those intriguing toys from the 1950s and
before. A collection of coloured sparkly shapes, an arrangement of mirrors at
the end of the scope: when you looked into it, you saw wonderful symmetrical patterns,
a sort of Busby Berkeley arrangement of magnificence, without the arms and legs.
And isnt it the truth that when we peer into the remote past, we are inclined
to impose form and order on what we see there? Its infinitely easier to organise
the past than the present, to knock it into shape.
Typically, therefore, people feel that the past is
more secure than the present. Which of course it is: its fixed, you cant
change it. But in truth it was no safer thenthan now is, now. The only safe
thing about it is that, somehow, we got through it. Patterns more often than
not are a trick of the memory, a kind of security created by people who write
books and tell stories. Living in the now has always been a bit scary. It is
presently; and it was then, too.
For Christians, that is mitigated to a degree by the
sense of Gods active presence in our lives. For us, He is yesterday, today and
tomorrow; the Alpha and the Omega; He from whom we cannot be separated. For
most of our days, this doesnt actually make living less tricky and more
certain. But in the experience of millions of Christians and others, it really does
help. It is a presence that we can cultivate through prayer, worship and in
gracious personal relationships. When we think deeply about the past, the
present and the future, we realise that what unifies them or, rather, - who unifies them and makes sense of them for us is
none other than our Lord God.
Fred

Wednesday August 14th 2013
The Wisdom of Bilbo Baggins
Bilbo, aka the Hobbit, makes several appearance in
Tolkiens trilogy, Lord of the Rings.
We meet him at the outset, contemplating his Eleventy-first birthday. Bilbo has
had enough. In a wonderful simile, he describes himself as like butter which
has been spread over too much bread. In the co More...
Wednesday August 14th 2013
The Wisdom of Bilbo Baggins
Bilbo, aka the Hobbit, makes several appearance in
Tolkiens trilogy, Lord of the Rings.
We meet him at the outset, contemplating his Eleventy-first birthday. Bilbo has
had enough. In a wonderful simile, he describes himself as like butter which
has been spread over too much bread. In the course of a long period of
ordained ministry, there have certainly been moments when I could identify with
that. But Bilbos analogy just at the moment resonates for different reasons.
Pastoral units are growing in size. I currently have
four churches, five villages to look after. It was not ever thus. Go back far
enough and youll find Saintbury with its own rector. But many changes happened
during the 20th century. In the early 1930s, the parishes of
Weston-sub-Edge and Aston-sub-Edge were amalgamated into one by Orders in
Council, with Weston as the parish church. Legally, that remains the situation
although by 1950, the bishop had given permission for Aston to start behaving
in certain respects as though it were a separate parish. In 1977, the Sub-Edges
were added to Willersey/Saintbury. That foursome continued until around ten
years ago. Then Mickleton came into the reckoning, the incumbent of Willersey
etc taking it under his wings. This more than doubled the population of the
benefice.
In the period till 2007, the new arrangement had not
seemed like a proper marriage. Mickleton, it seems, felt as though they had
been tacked on to an up-and-running group (they had!) without the centre of gravitys changing properly. However,
that changed with the present appointment. When I applied for the job, I took
and have continued to take huge satisfaction in having that parish with its
fine church and interesting community as a major part of my brief. So, the
group now works. When we first arrived, I thought of these parishes (rather
fancifully) as a string of gems on a necklace, five beautiful villages
threading along the one main road, the B4632. My experience here has not
changed that view.
So in law there are presently three parishes
(Willersey with Saintbury, the Sub-Edges and Mickleton) but with five villages
and four open churches. The ancient philosopher Heraclitus famously wrote
Everything is in a state of flux. Thousands of years on, his words remain
true. Stand by for further changes! With two local clergy retirements already
in the bag and others pending, the Diocese and Deanery have decided on a cut in
clergy staffing levels.
In the old Campden Deanery there were five
benefices: ours; Campden etc; Welford on Avon etc; Honeybourne etc; and Blockley etc. All but
the last were full-time parochial ministries. Blockley had a two-thirds
appointment, the remaining third of the Incumbents time being spent and paid
for in Church House, Gloucester. The decision is that the 2/3rds appointment
must go and that all the parishes of the old Deanery must be reconfigured into
new groups covered by four parish priests.
This looks like the moment when push comes to shove.
On the surface, all the courtesies are being observed, a process of
consultation is under way (though rather jerky) and many options are said still
to be open. However, it seems to be on the cards that this Cotswold Edge
(North) benefice of ours will be dismantled, its parishes going in various
directions. To the historian in me, it feels a bit like Austria, Prussia and
Russia partitioning Poland (on three separate occasions) in the 18thcentury!
The timing of the recommendations was such that it
proved impossible to have discussions in most of the PCCs before responses were
due. With a Benefice Council coming up very shortly, and other PCC meetings, I
am sure that church members in this neck of the woods will have their voices
heard before close of play.
We cant avoid the harsh realities of staffing
numbers and the closely-related matter of funding. But all concerned would do
well to bear in mind Bilbo Baggins warning about butter and bread.
Fred

Wednesday July 3rd 2013
Good on you, Diarmuid!
It was a
something-and-nothing, almost a throw-away remark. But you could feel the shock
waves. BBC TV was holding its annual gardenfest (come to think of it, one of
many ...) in Chelsea Week. Nightly broadcasts: summaries, anticipations, finest
moments, out-takes. Gardening gurus Alan Titchma More...
Wednesday July 3rd 2013
Good on you, Diarmuid!
It was a
something-and-nothing, almost a throw-away remark. But you could feel the shock
waves. BBC TV was holding its annual gardenfest (come to think of it, one of
many ...) in Chelsea Week. Nightly broadcasts: summaries, anticipations, finest
moments, out-takes. Gardening gurus Alan Titchmarsh and Joe Swift had enthused
and fawned over show gardens, large and small. The nation had been swept away by the ...well
... floriferousness of it all. I was
as keen as most, catching several of the broadcasts during the week.
And then, along comes
Diarmuid Gavin, garden designer extraordinaire, to spoil the party. "What do
you think of this year's Show?" asks Titchmarsh. The reply?" Nothing special!"
Wait a minute! Did that really happen? Were my ears deceiving me? Did a Chelsea
Gold veteran just say that this year's Chelsea was nothing special? Wow! What a breath of fresh air in the midst of
the statutory adulation!
The point is not whether this year's Chelsea Flower
Show was, or was not, anything special.
I'd find it hard to judge, never having been to the Show. Hampton Court, yes;
Malvern, yes; but not Chelsea. This year's paying visitors will have made up
their own minds. Now, I normally I like both Titchmarsh and Swift as
presenters. I'm not wanting to knock them as such. But something seems to
overtake them when they enter the grounds of the Royal Hospital, rather like
Harry Enfield's Kevin who loses the
power of rational thought at the moment of becoming a teenager. Based on the assessment of this Dynamic Duo, viewers
could be forgiven for concluding that, year on year, it just gets better and
better.
And then along comes
Diarmuid Gavin. Like the little boy in the Hans Christian Anderson story who
hadn't heard about the emperor's new clothes, he speaks as he finds. And his
remark is a game-changer. Suddenly, one is liberated to have one's own
reactions, excused from being swept along by the presenters' relentless positivity.
Don't get me wrong, Being positive
in life is good - but not if the cost is ignoring reality. The parent who only
ever praises a child, not tempering encouragement with constructive criticism,
does the offspring few favours. Nor is it so very different for adults. It's
great to be told "that was a wonderful sermon, Rector!" But the currency might
hold its value better if the parson sometimes heard: "I haven't the foggiest
idea what you were on about this morning, Vicar!"Â There is a New Testament
sound-bite for this: "speaking the truth in love" - St Paul's expression.
Telling the truth in that way is one of the toughest challenges we face in our
day-to-day living. It's so easy to err in one direction or the other. Either:
out of love and respect we hold our tongue and don't speak at all for fear of
upsetting the other; or, we give ourselves free rein to say whatever we think -
often venting spleen rather than sensitively speaking the truth in love.
Getting this right is, at the very least, a life-time's work.
And here's the rub, Alan,
Joe and Diarmuid. Christians are aware
that not everything in the garden is beautiful. It might be so in the mind and
heart of God. May be that was indeed the way it was intended. But, enter the
human garden designer. And, of course, Adam the gardener.
Fred

Monday June 3rd 2013
When words won't do
Each
time I try to tell you, the words just turn out wrong
So
I have to say 'I love you' in a song
Some of you will remember that song. Human beings often can't find
the words to express what they are feeling: at least, not words in ordinary
prose. So we have to fall back on so More...
Monday June 3rd 2013
When words won't do
Each
time I try to tell you, the words just turn out wrong
So
I have to say 'I love you' in a song
Some of you will remember that song. Human beings often can't find
the words to express what they are feeling: at least, not words in ordinary
prose. So we have to fall back on something else. Silence? 'Whereof we cannot
speak, thereof we must be silent', said Wittgenstein, famously. (Pretty obvious
when you think about it but still, somehow, profound.) In a song? Jim Croce
thought so, in the 1970s (as above). In a poem? Yes, that can do it too.
Poetry, when not simply self-indulgent, can express things that are not readily
otherwise expressible. I've just finished reading an excellent book about the
poetry of the Welsh Anglican priest, R.S. Thomas (Leaving the Reason Torn by Alison Goodlad, published by Shoving
Leopard). Thomas trod a fine line between expressing the intensity of personal
faith, with all its problems, and communicating this to his readers in an
intelligible way. His verse isn't easy, but it's absolutely worth persevering
with.
We know nature can do it for us:
hills, the night sky, the sea. Words aren't necessary in their presence. So too
can buildings, some buildings any way. Being still and alone in a mediaeval
church or cathedral can speak volumes (no words required).
Or just listening to great words
set to great music by great musicians: that can certainly do it. When I hear
Handel's Messiah or one of Bach's Passions or Fauré's Requiem (to name but a few), then I'm off.
But it works with bad stuff too.
When something is troubling me deeply - may be something I'm doing wrong, or am
colluding with - I feel an unspoken burden which is likely to get heavier until
that moment comes when I remember what I have to do next. Like as not, I'll end
up on my knees, very possibly in tears, when I finally lay it down. No words,
usually, just an unspeakable (though not unbearable) lightness of being.
There are perhaps light-years of
distance and time between us and the Psalmist of the Old Testament. But this
much has stayed the same (even though we wouldn't subscribe to the verses which
continue in Psalm 73). 'Then thought I to understand this: but it was too hard
for me, until I went into the sanctuary of God ...'
We want to re-learn how to pray.
Christians need to experience the lessons of silence, in the midst of an
ever-more frenetic world. Without a still centre in our lives, we are unlikely
to find space for God; to have much to share with others who are looking and
listening for Him. Paul Simon's famous words were not so far from the Christian
experience:
Hello darkness, my
old friend,
I've come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping,
Left its seeds while I was sleeping,
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence.
Fred

Friday May 10th 2013
Getting it
One of the most over-used lines in
cinema, it seems, is: 'You just don't get it, do you?' Jeff Smith,
a film enthusiast in want of a life, has watched an untold number of
movies in order to come up with an amazing statistic: that it figures in
102 feature films, a surprisingly large number o More...
Friday May 10th 2013
Getting it
One of the most over-used lines in
cinema, it seems, is: 'You just don't get it, do you?' Jeff Smith,
a film enthusiast in want of a life, has watched an untold number of
movies in order to come up with an amazing statistic: that it figures in
102 feature films, a surprisingly large number of them within the last
decade. So, I've been thinking about 'getting it', wondering what I
do, and don't, get.
But first I must own up to curling the lip when I hear politicians
speaking of 'getting it' in this sense. Without being too
party-political, I have to suppress a sneer when I hear the Prime
Minister declaring: I do get it! (For instance, to do with the
problems poorer families are facing as the economy shrinks.) My problem
doesn't so much concern whether or not the PM understands the issues - though the likes of Nadine Dorries would have a view about that.
It's more to do with the choice of language. When David Cameron or Ed
Miliband declare 'I get it!', they are endeavouring to give
themselves street credibility by using what they take to be the language
of ordinary people, the 'demotic' as it's sometimes known. It's
as if they thought, "Saying I understand just won't impress any one. I
must find a way of expressing it which will register with the
public.€ What happens, though, is something they were neither
expecting nor wanting. We are the ones who actually get it. We get where
they are coming from; what they are trying to do is to cosy up,
insinuating themselves under our skin, talking our language. Are we
impressed? There's an unintended consequence, too. The language itself
becomes devalued, empty - and that's if there were much in it in
the first place. Ah, Americanisms!
But there are other times when talk of 'getting it' or 'not
getting it' can be useful. Do I really get it about being a Christian?
There comes a stage in our progress when it's as though the Lord
whispered to us, You just don't get it, do you? Then we have to stop
in our tracks and do a radical re-think. I don't know of a better
illustration of this than this story of St Thomas Aquinas. On the feast
of St. Nicholas in 1273, Aquinas was celebrating Mass when he had some
kind of deep mystical experience that affected him so much, he was
unable to continue his writing and teaching career. His greatest
theological work remained unfinished. To Brother Reginald's (his
secretary and friend) objections he replied, "The end of my labours has
come. All that I have written appears to be as so much straw after the
things that have been revealed to me." When later asked by Reginald to
return to his writing, Aquinas said, "I can write no more. I have seen
things that make my writings like straw." This most towering intellect
of the Middle Ages, university teacher, layer-down of Catholic doctrine
for the next eight centuries, suddenly realised that he just didn't
get it.
None of us is so old or so clever as not to need this reminder from
time to time. When it comes, it can be devastating; can seem to
invalidate all that has gone before. I may be on the cusp of a 'not
getting it' reminder. From university onwards (if not sooner), the
whole of my life has been built on an attempt to be reasonable and
reasoning in matters or faith. This has often made prayer more difficult
than it might otherwise have been. Now, late in the day, I'm
beginning to hear the whispers. "Simply enjoy My presence. Just come to
Me as a loving child. (And, by the way, you've just not been getting
it, have you?)"
Leopards, of course, don't change their spots. I shall always be a
questioning, skeptical person by nature. I shall still be quixotic and
mercurial (the kind way of putting it) or lazy and undisciplined (nearer
the truth) in my spiritual life; for at least a good part of the time.
But I shall also be a person with a 'burden', a task to carry, and
to carry out. This is the task of sharing with others what I take to be
great truths: that when we know ourselves most keenly to be alive, we
are with God (and vice versa); that when we are most aware of ourselves
and our consciousness, we are closest to God (and vice versa); that when
I am least inclined to justify myself and my actions at all costs, I am
best placed to encounter God (and vice versa).
For me, facing all this is the beginning of getting it. (Or, to put it in a more Biblical way, the beginning of wisdom.)
Fred

Sunday April 21st 2013
May 5th - A day with the Bishop
Once every couple of years, the Bishop or one of his immediate
colleagues spends a whole day in each benefice. At the end of 2010, Archdeacon
Robert Springett shared All Saints Day with us, culminating in a great
Eucharist at Mickleton attended by people from all of our parishes. This ti More...
Sunday April 21st 2013
May 5th - A day with the Bishop
Once every couple of years, the Bishop or one of his immediate
colleagues spends a whole day in each benefice. At the end of 2010, Archdeacon
Robert Springett shared All Saints Day with us, culminating in a great
Eucharist at Mickleton attended by people from all of our parishes. This time
its the turn of Bishop Michael. He will spend the 6th Sunday of Easter with us
- the one we used to know as Rogation Sunday (and still do, in the country!).
When he visited us last year for the re-dedication of Weston parish church, it
was simply for a one-off service. The other churches in the benefice gave up
their own separate worship so that we could all come together at Weston. This
time, by contrast, it will be business as usual in each parish church on the morning
and the evening of May 5th. With a following wind from Gloucester, Bishop
Michael will reach Mickleton in time for the 8 am service. He and I will go on
from there to Willersey for 9.30 am and thence to Weston for 11am. By the end
of the morning, he will certainly have got the flavour of what Sunday mornings
are like for your parish priest. No-one is looking to pack the pews just
because the Bishop is coming: but if going to church regularly is part of what
you do, then it would be a good day to try to be present.
Morning worship, though, isnt even the half of it. There
will be a lunch event at King Georges Hall, Mickleton - and you are invited!
The PCC of Mickleton warmly invite all PCC and other church members from across
the benefice to share in a proper knife-and-fork meal with two courses. We will
gather at 12.30 pm. Spouses of course are invited as well, not just those who
happen to go to church. After lunch with Bishop Michael, there will be at least
three further features to share: presentations in connection with our family
services, our approach to marriage preparation and a discussion about the
future shape on ministry in these parts. Please do come if you can. There will
be lists at the back of each church for you to sign, so we have a good idea
about numbers.
Later in the afternoon, the Bishop may take the opportunity
to call on one or two people who cant get out. He will also need a bit of down-time!
But, in the evening, its back to business with the Rogation Service at
Aston-sub-Edge (6.30 pm). The Aston Agricultural services deserve a higher
profile than they sometimes receive. This annual sequence - Plough Sunday,
Rogation, Lammas, Harvest - marks out the rural year, in a church situated in
one of the most beautiful spots in the north Cotswolds. Its traditionally
attended by members of the local farming community as well as regulars. It
will be good to share this occasion with the Bishop and with anyone else from
the benefice who would like to come.
For Bishop Michael, of course, another days work. He must
see similar occasions many times over. But he will also be sharing our life -
and we shall be sharing in his ministry, as indeed we do every Sunday, every
day. And - perhaps every bit as important - we shall be sharing life and
experience with each other. It will be a chance for us to come away heartened
and encouraged.
Lets make the most of it!
Fred

Monday March 11th 2013
Do what you do do well
Lent, Holy Week and Easter are not everyone's cup of tea. Seasons
come, seasons go. Some of us rarely bat an eyelid. Time was, people used
to turn out for special week-day festivals or solemn occasions. Now,
they are mostly observed on the nearest Sunday - though there are some
you can't r More...
Monday March 11th 2013
Do what you do do well
Lent, Holy Week and Easter are not everyone's cup of tea. Seasons
come, seasons go. Some of us rarely bat an eyelid. Time was, people used
to turn out for special week-day festivals or solemn occasions. Now,
they are mostly observed on the nearest Sunday - though there are some
you can't really move and people will still come along to them. Ash
Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday. Not perhaps in such great
numbers as once: but for many, they still register as important times we
wish to mark and honour.
Along with this, the whole pattern of churchgoing has changed more
widely. Some still see weekly participation as really important. For
others, it€s less frequent. All sorts of pressures have led to the
change: more leisure time to go away, scattered families, the growth of
alternative attractions, secularisation ...
Everyone's pattern is different. As we approach Holy Week (Palm
Sunday 24th March - Easter Day 31st), my plea/suggestion would be
decide what you're going to do and then put your whole self into it
while it's going on.
Do what you do do well!
Happy Holy Week and Easter!

Wednesday February 6th 2013
Making much of miracles .....
Years ago, I used to be a huge fan of the musicals of Rogers and Hammerstein One of their lesser-known songs from a relatively-forgotten show was A Hundred Million Miracles, from The Flower Drum Song. When youre in love, its true: a hundred million miracles are happening every day!
Id like to More...
Wednesday February 6th 2013
Making much of miracles .....
Years ago, I used to be a huge fan of the musicals of Rogers and Hammerstein One of their lesser-known songs from a relatively-forgotten show was A Hundred Million Miracles, from The Flower Drum Song. When youre in love, its true: a hundred million miracles are happening every day!
Id like to report on just four such, one for each of my four churches and their villages.
Let me tell you about Holy Communion at the Four Seasons Residential Home in Mickleton. I inherited a monthly visit there. In the early days, it was all rather chaotic. Staff didnt always seem to know I was coming. A number of very elderly folk (whose space I was, after all invading) sat around in the main sitting room apparently taking little or no notice. One or two might have joined in with the Lords Prayer, or woken up sufficiently to manage communion. Then a dear lady in her 90s (who left us two years ago) took the situation in hand. She Mary arranged for the monthly service to take place in a separate conservatory, where four, five or six who really wanted to attend the service would be taken. Members of staff helped to start turning things around. The mood had changed completely. Another year on, and two new messengers had arrived. (Id like to say, angels: but that might be rather fanciful and/or embarrass them. Yet I dont doubt that they were meant and sent.) Judith, whose mother is a resident; and Felicity who is a member of staff. They moved us back into the main lounge and actively encouraged people to attend the service. Now there were a dozen or fourteen people present, nearly all alert, interested, keen to join in. Each month, Judith prints special sheets with the lessons and prayers for the week, so that the residents can follow. Felicitys commitment from the staff side, too, makes an invaluable contribution.
I think that being open to the enthusiastic involvement of new people is often key to recognising miracles when they happen. My second illustration shows this in miniature. Our small congregation at Weston-sub-Edge has laboured on faithfully across many decades, very occasionally being joined by someone new. One of those joinings happened a few years ago, when David Herbert started to attend and then, in due time, joined Barrie Knight as a second churchwarden. On Davids watch, a number of fabric issues were pushed forward but may be his main legacy to us is having facilitated the installation of a sound and loop system. This was meant as Step One towards producing downloaded musical accompaniments to our hymn-singing. David and his wife Kris left Weston in September and perhaps we all quietly wondered whether we would get as far as Step Two of the project.
Enter, stage right, another relatively new member (Ros) who volunteered to access the hymn downloads and supervise the technology at services. All things work together for those who love God, said St Paul. This certainly seems evidenced by what happened at Weston church in December. Within two weeks, Maries son had offered advice about suitable websites for the music and Ros had identified and downloaded it. Wow!
Within two weeks... gives me the link for my next miracle stop: Aston-sub-Edge. On Sundays 9th and 16th December, St Andrews was packed. Thats not unusual for the carol service (16th) but the previous week saw the first-ever (as far as we know) Christingle Service there. Here, for me, the miracle was about the age-profile. In that small village, there were lots of children. They read beautifully at the lessons and carols. Theres a feeling of real encouragement when there are so many young at church services, even just once in a while.
All of which leads to my Willersey miracle. St Peters is the church in this benefice where family services have really taken off. We started them there in September 2007. For the first couple of years, there was a hesitant response: some regulars chose not to attend, yet there was no noticeable influx of new people. The real break-through came when a team of church members started to meet each month to brain-storm ideas and plan the services. They have put a tremendous amount of effort and energy into this Rachael doing much of the visual aids preparation. Over the past twelve months, this has really borne fruit. We have done a series of presentations about the Dioceses across the world linked with Gloucester in India, Africa, Sweden, the USA. Jenny shared her vision for a village celebration service and that came to pass in November. On half a dozen or more occasions this year, there have been between 40 and 60 people in church at 11 am on the 3rd Sunday in the month.
This has been a very personal selection of miracles. Your list may well have been different. But Id like to end by remembering words of the 19th century American poet, Walt Whitman:
Why! Who makes much of a miracle?
As to me, I know of nothing else but miracles,
Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan,
Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky,
Or wade with naked feet along the beach, just in the edge of the water,
Or stand under trees in the woods,
Or talk by day with anyone I love ....
Our capacity for recognising miracles for seeing life as miraculous may be the difference between really living and merely existing.
Fred

Monday January 14th 2013
Ouch!
November 20th was not a good day for the Church of England. After a
preparation build-up period of several years, General Synod rejected the
change of church law which would have made possible the ordination of
women as bishops. This, in spite of the fact that 42 out of 44 dioceses
had voted More...
Monday January 14th 2013
Ouch!
November 20th was not a good day for the Church of England. After a
preparation build-up period of several years, General Synod rejected the
change of church law which would have made possible the ordination of
women as bishops. This, in spite of the fact that 42 out of 44 dioceses
had voted in favour of the Measure (the C of E's equivalent of an Act
of Parliament). Of course, on the day itself a majority did actually
vote in favour of the change: but not a large enough majority. A vote of
2/3rds in favour is required by the General Synod for a change such as
this, and in each of the three 'Houses' - bishops, clergy and
laity. In the event, the bishops and clergy produced a
more-than-adequate third-thirds-plus vote. The motion was lost in the
House of Laity, which could only manage around 64% in favour, not the
required 66.666%.
We have reached a stage where the great majority of Synod members
(let alone church members more widely) accept that there will be women
bishops in due course. The scrapping which is still going on is all
about what kind of provision should be made for those who disagree. At
one side of the debate are those who still don't want women bishops.
They think that they should have legally-enshrined arrangements for
separate management by bishops of their own - not only male, but men of
their own persuasion. But many of those who favour the introduction of
women as bishops (which is the great majority) see such an arrangement
as somehow putting women bishops on an uneven footing with their male
colleagues-to-be. So they favour a simple, one-clause Measure to bring
in the change - leaving it to a Code of Practice (not yet written) to
make arrangements for those who disagree. Those who supported the
proposed changes as they stood voted in favour. Those who opposed them
included some who are actually in favour of the eventual change but felt
that more provision should have been made for the dissenters.
The outcome is a mess - with huge disappointment for the women who
have been waiting for this recognition - as well as many men who
support the change (including me). If you stayed up late that Thursday
night and watched Andrew Neill's Weekly Politics show, you would have
seen the columnist Anne Atkins arguing that this is nothing but a
temporary blip in the scheme of things; that it's much more important
to 'take everybody with us' in the decision, quite unnecessary to
see it as a public-relations disaster for the C of E (which many people
reckon it is). Methinks the lady did protest too much: Rowan Williams is
much nearer the mark than Atkins, seeing clearly just what negative
signals this result sends out to Society at large.
Just how long does the Church of England need? Synod decided in
about 1976 that there was no theological objection to ordaining women:
but it took another 16 years before the eventual decision was taken that
they could be ordained priests. From the moment that became a reality
(two years later, in 1994), it was inevitable that they would be
admitted to the order of bishop as well. You can't have a 'stained-glass ceiling'. It's not just a matter of following
fashions in Society, of conforming to equal-opportunities legislation
(though we certainly ought to be catching up with all that). More
importantly, it arises from proper theology. If we are 'made in the
image of God', then how can it be possible that half of us are somehow
more restricted than the other half? Something like 40% of parishes now
have women on their staffs. Thousands of parishioners have attested the
skills and gifts they have brought to the ordained ministry. Men and
women are different - yes - but why should those inevitable
biological differences extend into church governance and leadership?
Until about 27 years ago, I used to have some doubts about the change.
But now I look back to my mind-set as it was then, and see it as fired
by a mixture of fear and prejudice, a preference for remaining in my own
comfort-zone. Which parts of what the opponents are now saying, I ask
myself, are different from those doubts I had, back then? I wouldn't
want to see anyone needing to leave the church, whatever their beliefs:
but neither do I think it is right for a process of good and necessary
change to be capsized by a mixture of a reluctance to let go of the past
and a failure to discern the promptings of the Holy Spirit. (Though I
recognise that when people start claiming the Holy Spirit as a
subscriber to their point-of-view, it's time for a reality check.)
One of the things about being in ministry for a long period is that
you gain a different perspective. I'd been ordained for fewer than
three years when something rather similar happened: though the
subject-matter was different. In 1972, the Anglican-Methodist unity
scheme was voted on by Synod. There again, two Houses were in favour but
the two-thirds required majority was narrowly missed by the third. Back
then, the House of Laity was progressive: it wanted the change and
voted accordingly; as did the Bishops. But the vote was lost in the
House of Clergy where the two-thirds requirement just failed. To my
mind, it is interesting that the clergy are now the ones with courage
and imagination and that the failure was down to a rear-guard action by
members of the House of Laity. Apart from having to return in due time
to the issue itself (women as bishops), it seems to me that there are
two other issues which must be examined. First, why must we go on with
this 'two-thirds' requirement system for matters of change? 66.6 (%)
is, after all, the Number of the Beast! Do we want our future to be
determined by that? And secondly, is there a case for overhauling the
way elections to Synod work? Can it be right, in other words, that when
42 out of 44 dioceses support the change, those who are elected to
General Synod seem to be of such a very different complexion? General
Synod members are elected by those on Deanery Synods. They tend to be
recruited from an age-group which has time and money to support
attendance at residential sessions - and who are (small-c) conservative;
and/or from people who have bees in their bonnets about particular
issues. Is this right? Should it be changed?
Fred

Saturday December 15th 2012
When you come to church at Christmas ...
( ... and I warmly invite you to consider doing so) I suggest you
may think about bringing with you some or all of the following:
Someone who is happy. Christmas is a great time to be happy
(though it's the very time when happiness eludes many). And 'church' is a great place to bring our More...
Saturday December 15th 2012
When you come to church at Christmas ...
( ... and I warmly invite you to consider doing so) I suggest you
may think about bringing with you some or all of the following:
- Someone who is happy. Christmas is a great time to be happy
(though it's the very time when happiness eludes many). And 'church' is a great place to bring our happiness. The poet Philip
Larkin wrote a little poem called Days. One of its most telling lines:'they (days) are to be happy in'. If so of any day, how much more so
of Christmas Day.
- Someone who is sad. The person whose burden you are helping to
carry. The one who can only see the cinders, ashes, dust; who is failing
to catch sight of the crown held out to us. The one for whom life is
bleak - and whose own bleakness-of-heart (rather like Oscar Wilde's
selfish giant) turns the landscape into an ice-scape.
- Someone who is asking questions, who is curious, who is
(perhaps) sceptical. Church is not just a place for people claiming
certainty in heart and mind. It may not primarily be for them at all.
Some kinds of "total conviction" are more at home in an asylum than in
church. Having honest doubt, facing open questions openly: these
features are commonplace amongst church-going Christians - whatever
the likes of Professor Dawkins would have us think. The Church Fathers
who put together our creeds in the 4th Century spent many hours
formulating these statements of faith that we recite week in, week out.
My hunch is that they must sometimes have arrived at the final wording
swallowing hard and with their fingers crossed behind their backs. (And
if they didn't, they should have done!) No wonder we may feel the same
sometimes, when we recite the creeds.
- Someone who has screwed up. Actually, which of us hasn't? But
some people seem to suppose that their sin is so great that they are
beyond the pail. I have been there. I know the feeling. It's what
happens when we start to forget that the forgiveness of God is greater
than the weakness and wickedness of us. Bring that person. Help them to
rediscover they've got it wrong, they're not seeing the whole
picture of God's grace.
- Someone who feels truly thankful. For just about anything ....
Now I'm not living in cloud-cuckoo land. If everyone who was going
to come to church at Christmas actually brought with them five other
people, it would be a miracle and it might stretch our seating capacity.
(Dream on, Fred. Dream on.)
But there are two other ways in which you could rise to this
challenge. The first is, when you come, identify in your heart and in
prayer those amongst your circle of family, friends and acquaintances
for whom these particular caps might fit. That is what intercessory
prayer is all about. Bring them in your hearts and hold them before the
Lord in prayer. I remember reading, when I was young, Tennyson's Morte
d'Arthur. The lines that grabbed me most strongly, which I've held
on to through thick and thin, were these: More things are wrought by
prayer/ Than this world dreams of. Christians may not know how this
works. But we do believe that it does.
The last way in which you might rise to my Christmas challenge is by
holding up a mirror. You may not need to bring anyone other than
yourself to church, to have encompassed all of these people: the happy,
the sad, the questioning and perplexed, the messed-up, the thankful.
Doesn't this describe each of us, at different times? Church is the
best place I know for coming to face these truths about ourselves, for
bringing them into the presence of God. And for finding that somehow,
wonderfully, we are changed in the process.
Bringing these people - this person - this me - into the
presence of the Infant Christ and the worshipping circle surrounding Him
can seriously make a difference. "Yet, what I can, I give Him: give my
heart." This Christmas, are you ready to bring that gift?
Happy Christmas (whatever)!
Fred

Monday November 12th 2012
Rickety-tickety-tin
You'll either get that quotation, or you won't. No
half-way house. And if you do, the probability is that you were young,
and a bit of a rebel, in the 1950s and 60s.
It's the chorus from a grimly-funny song by an American Maths
teacher, Tom Lehrer. Lehrer was out there, in the late 50s, do More...
Monday November 12th 2012
Rickety-tickety-tin
You'll either get that quotation, or you won't. No
half-way house. And if you do, the probability is that you were young,
and a bit of a rebel, in the 1950s and 60s.
It's the chorus from a grimly-funny song by an American Maths
teacher, Tom Lehrer. Lehrer was out there, in the late 50s, doing satire
before Beyond the Fringe was heard of. Some of his songs achieved
almost cult status. Poisoning Pigeons in the Park (never one of my
personal favourites), The Elements Song: after rehearsing all the known
items on the periodic table, to the G & S Modern Major General tune,
Lehrer finished ...These are the only ones of which the news has come
to Harvard ... And there may be many others but they haven't been
discovered'. The Vatican Rag (Genuflect, genuflect, genuflect!) But
then, darker songs too, like "I hold your hand in mine, dear" and "The old dope peddler". Back then, it was edgy, dangerous stuff, may
be with the power to corrupt young minds.
So much so that it nearly got me into serious trouble. When, aged
15, I'd wanted a Lehrer LP as a Christmas present from my parents, my
dad (deeply distrustful of anything iconoclastic) said, "No, I'll give
you the money and you can buy it for yourself - if you must." Which
I did. The real trouble came when I lent it to one of the girl-boarders
at our school. During a routine house search, the record came to light- with my name on the sleeve. I was hauled in before the headmaster.
Pointing a yard-stick at me, he demanded: "What is Tom Lehrer?" For
shame, I did my best to argue that I was laughing at him, not with him.
(Lies, lies!) May be we had both consigned the memories of this painful
interview to oblivion by the time I became Head Boy three years later.
Except in my case, clearly not.
Fifty years and more on, I reflect on how my attitudes have changed.
My generation soaked up satire. We tuned into That Was The Week That
Was religiously. We belonged to the Monty Python era. Then, gradually,
as 20-something became 30-something and then more, attitudes changed. I
found myself adopting some of my father's caution about
destructiveness and disrespect. Now I just get irritated with the
banality of (for instance) some BBC late-night comedy - or even the
Radio 4 6.30 pm slot. O Mores, O Tempora! (Please - not Latin again!)
How are the mighty fallen!
I have, though, retained a capacity for looking at things
ironically, for bringing to situations a dark humour which sometimes may
border on the inappropriate. But I do it gladly, joyfully, knowing that
it is one of the tools available to me for getting through life
relatively unscathed. When laughter is suppressed (even disrespectful
laughter), then it is bad news for everyone. Umberto Eco's novel, The
Name of the Rose, tells of the tragic events in a Mediaeval French
monastery when one of the monks tries to suppress an Aristotle text
about humour - because he considered it destructive to the spiritual
life. Surely, the opposite is true. As long as we can laugh, there is
always the possibility of picking ourselves up, shaking ourselves down
and starting all over again. True, the boundaries have shifted for me
over the years. I may not laugh at everything I once found hilarious.
But I must remember - when I start to become old-fogeyish about what
amuses the young today - that my appetite for pricking pomposity fifty
years back doubtless distressed others besides my dad. And there are
still things which make me fall about. You just have to hope that a
generation which (sometimes) seems to hold nothing sacred will learn
some sense over its own ensuing decades. As did we.
Humour is about keeping a sense of proportion, resisting the urge to
take ourselves just that bit too seriously. It may seem
counter-intuitive to address such a topic on the month of Remembrance
Sunday, when our thoughts dwell on serious and weighty matters. Yet it
was often humour, albeit dark, which saw the war generations through,
which famously has left its ethnic stamp on those who recall the Death
camps.
Humour which is not cruel and destructive is at least a
second-cousin to joy: and for that reason it should be cherished by
people of faith, not seen as a work of the Enemy. GSOH is not only a
requirement on lonely hearts. (Though, come to think of it, which of us
would permanently exclude ourselves from that category?)
Fred

Tuesday October 2nd 2012
The Years Turn
Autumn is a poignant time. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Keats thought. A time for reflecting on the zigs and zags of a year hurtling on towards its conclusion. For gardeners, a time of busy-ness: harvesting, cleaning up, perhaps a window for reckoning with weeds which have dug themselves More...
Tuesday October 2nd 2012
The Years Turn
Autumn is a poignant time. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Keats thought. A time for reflecting on the zigs and zags of a year hurtling on towards its conclusion. For gardeners, a time of busy-ness: harvesting, cleaning up, perhaps a window for reckoning with weeds which have dug themselves in during a disappointing year. A season when cold, bright, sunny days fall on our hearts and minds unctuously, like a blessing, take us by surprise, gladden our hearts especially in a year when there have been relatively few hot bright sunny days. A time too of implicit sadness. As the year draws on towards its end, we are conscious, whether we like it or no, that our own lives are another twelve-month closer to their own full stop.
Our national calendar tells the story. Autumn puts us on notice when the throngs in the Royal Albert Hall sing Land of Hope and Glory. Next come a flurry of Harvest Festivals: so much the centre of village life for decades, centuries even, but sadly now more honoured in the breach than in the observance. Before we know where we are, Remembrance Sunday is upon us: full, grateful, sad hearts, quickened recollection, poppies, swirling mist, the Albert Hall again, the Cenotaph. Then though no-one much cares to admit it on the second Sunday in November Christmas itself is barely seven weeks away. Sic transit gloria mundi. (Ouch! Latin again.)
Im reminded (for no reason that seems remotely logical) of the Danny Kaye song from the Hans Christian Anderson film: "Inchworm, inchworm, measuring the marigolds, you and your arithmetic will probably go far... Time is a mystery. We inch our way through it, across it, making our tiny calculations which may not amount to much in the long run. On occasions, we feel as gloomy as Macbeth: Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow/ Creeps in this petty pace from day to day/ Till the last syllable of recorded time. But actually as Christians we think we know better or at least different.
Church members in the Middle Ages (and, by the way, that meant pretty much everybody) had got all this sussed. A succession of festivals and saints days, reverently and riotously observed, made sense of the annual calendar, drew the Faithful along a time-line which led inexorably in the direction of heaven. Herdsman, blacksmith and carpenter knew when the Mass was being celebrated, as the Sanctus bell rang out. Even the hours of the day were marked by the tolling of bells. When I was at college, a visiting BBC producer suggested to us that television scheduling had picked up where all that left off. Now, people mark the passage of time by the output of East Enders (which wasnt in my college days) or Coronation Street (which was).
The parish church in your village has a unique contribution to make. It represents stability, continuity and tradition at a time when each of those values can appear very thin on the ground. How many houses are there in your community which are not only ancient and beautiful but where you have the right to be (untrammelled by private ownership), where you are welcome, where the doors are open most hours of the day, where you can bring joys and sorrows and where if you wish you can meet and share with like-minded people? The buildings are handsome, lovely, full of interest in this benefice, they are all either Grade 1 or Grade 2* listed. In all of our parish churches bells call people to worship bells which have been rung for centuries.
The passage of time is as keenly felt now as ever perhaps more so, in an age which has largely jettisoned belief in heaven. Our parish churches offer a unique opportunity for us to mark, thoughtfully, the annual round. You dont have to be a paid-up, card-carrying member of the regular congregation to come along and mark times like Remembrance Sunday, Christmas, Mothering Sunday, Easter etc etc. Its your church, as much as anybodys.
Fred

Sunday September 9th 2012
A Broadway Lullaby
When
the good burghers of Broadway start losing their sleep, perhaps it is
time for us all to sit up and take note. At the end of July, our
neighbouring benefice was catapulted into national focus because of a
letter which had gone out to some parishioners, advising them that their
propert More...
Sunday September 9th 2012
A Broadway Lullaby
When
the good burghers of Broadway start losing their sleep, perhaps it is
time for us all to sit up and take note. At the end of July, our
neighbouring benefice was catapulted into national focus because of a
letter which had gone out to some parishioners, advising them that their
properties may carry with them the ancient responsibility of
contributing towards chancel maintenance. This early-bird warning
suggests a whole flurry of avian analogies: the cat was among the
pigeons, the dovecote was a-flutter, clerical vultures were about to
swoop. The lullaby of Broadway was no longer sufficient to rock
discomfited parishioners off at night: the dawn chorus is twittering
that the tithe-man€s on his way.
Easy to sit back and write about it, of course, when you€re not
affected. From across the Diocesan boundary, we wish our new colleague
Michelle all the very best for her ministry in the village. It must be a
horrible situation to have to deal with, in your first few months of
ministry in a new parish. But there is food for thought for us all in
this story. The church often gets a bad press. On the face of it, this
is one more occasion when we may be in for a good kicking. But before
anyone rushes to judgment, it€s worth stopping to reflect on the
background to all this. We should also grasp that there are inexpensive
solutions for home-owners which could bring peace of mind.
Not many miles away, the parish of Aston Cantelow in Warwickshire
recently brought this whole matter into national prominence, in a case
which started in 2003 and ran for six years. A family who had bought
property with chancel repair liability had known about the problem for
decades. The father of the 2003 owner, at the time of the original
purchase, had insured against liability. The succeeding generation,
though, thought better of it and decided not to renew the insurance. In
due time, a claim for chancel repair liability was lodged by the PCC,
which the owners resisted when they might have been able to meet it. The
case dragged on. They eventually had to sell the property in order to
settle a much larger claim. Procrastination in these matters does not
seem the best policy, especially in retrospect.
But what€s it all about, this ancient responsibility to help
maintain the parish church€s chancel? Long ago, land was given so that
the parish priest could have a living €" in other words, be maintained
in his office €" and so that he could fulfil his share of church
maintenance. The Rector (priest) had to maintain the east end, where the
choir and altar were. The laity were responsible for the nave. During
the course of the Middle Ages, many of these lands, with their rights
and responsibilities, ended up in the ownership of monasteries. When
Henry VIII suppressed the religious houses, they were sold off into lay
ownership: but this carried with it the responsibilities which now fell
on the new owners. The matter was further complicated at the time of the
enclosures of common land (late 17th-19th centuries, mostly). As these
lands have gradually been sold and re-sold, divided into much smaller
units and built upon, so too the ancient responsibility has been
inherited. I have greatly over-simplified the story, of course. If you
want to read a longer account, a good historical summary, then go to
www.peterboroughdiocesanregistry.co.uk/wellman.pdf
You may or may not think that such ancient duties should still be
observed and applied in our modern Society. You perhaps feel that it is
unbecoming in the Church to try to make them stick. For at least thirty
years now the Church has felt uneasy about the situation. Some think the
old requirements should be modified, even abolished. But for now, they
remain. PCCs have been advised that this ancient right, under trust,
should be seen as an asset. As such, if it is to be protected it needs
to be registered by October 2013: which is what has prompted the present
scare.
I have conducted a little internet research myself and discovered
that insurance can indeed be taken out by home-owners. One reputable
company offers cover against claims of up to £1million, for as little at
£15 p.a. premium. But there is a bit of a
damned-if-you-do-and-if-you-don€t aspect to this. You can only insure
€blind€, it seems. If you start to research whether your property is
liable or not, you probably become uninsurable.
Whatever the rights and wrongs of all this (and it is complicated),
there is a bottom-line which all parishioners need to take on board,
whether they are in affected properties or not. Churches do not pay for
themselves. It may be reasonable to expect most of the burden of paying
for the ministry of the church to fall on those who actually go to
services, more or less regularly. (Equally, it may not be reasonable €"
after all, everyone expects the ministry to be there in times of need
or crisis.) What is not realistic, though, is to count on that small
bunch of people to keep the church building wind and watertight. That is
what this ancient chancel-repairing responsibility is all about. If it
is not to fall on those who legally and traditionally should bear it,
then who is going to pick up the tab?
That€s the trouble with History, isn€t it? We all love it when
we€re walking round an ancient cathedral or castle, or when we€re
watching an Olympics Opening Ceremony or a Diamond Jubilee. We€re not
quite so sure when it hits us in the pocket.
Fred
€ History can cut both ways. In the parish of Mickleton, the
Richard Porter Trust (founded in 1513) dedicates a sizeable part of its
assets and income to helping to support the fabric of St Lawrence€s
church €" as well, of course, as fulfilling its educational trust. The
parish church is hugely appreciative of this support €" as indeed
should the whole parish be. Next year, we shall celebrate the 500th
anniversary of the Trust.

Wednesday August 8th 2012
A (mostly forgotten) poet
I dont do drugs. (The class A, B and C sort). Never have. Flirted with alcohol, yes. Not much, in the scheme of things. Ditto, ditto tobacco untouched now for forty years. No. If I want a mid-blowing high, I look elsewhere: into the realms of poetry. Over-exposure can seriously mess up the More...
Wednesday August 8th 2012
A (mostly forgotten) poet
I dont do drugs. (The class A, B and C sort). Never have. Flirted with alcohol, yes. Not much, in the scheme of things. Ditto, ditto tobacco untouched now for forty years. No. If I want a mid-blowing high, I look elsewhere: into the realms of poetry. Over-exposure can seriously mess up the mind, the consciousness. Im talking of course not about verse which merely rhymes and scans without saying anything profound, interesting or original. Poetry is allowed to rhyme and scan, for sure. Some of the finest poems do both, seemingly without effort, whilst at the same time carrying us to destinations we hadnt foreseen, of which we were completely unaware till the poet brought them to our notice. During one period of my life, I made a point of reading, daily, modern poems which were new to me, as part of my morning prayer. Eventually, I had to call myself off because the effect it was having put me in mind of how users described their reactions to LSD. (Poetic analogy, NB.) May be poetry books should carry a government health warning.
So much, then, for the Prologue. Poets come and poets go, some remembered, some not. I want to write this month about one for whom you will find an entry in Wikipedia, yes, but whose work has largely sunk into obscurity. Much of it was done in the 1930s and 40s. The cycle of verse Im familiar with was written during World War II. This poem-sequence is called 20th Century Psalter. Richard Church, the poet, allocated two poems for each day of the month, morning and evening, just as the Prayer Book appoints psalms to be used in like fashion. He does his best to make sense of the war-time carnage around him: constant bomb damage, privation, rations, loss of life, manic dictatorships abroad. He sees his own life and his struggle for faith against that background. It is a piece of its time, of course a moment when I was in gestation (why I feel so connected?). But it also raises questions about life and faith and doubt which are every bit as relevant today. If just one reader were to look Richard Church up, following this article, and to engage with what he says, then my living will not be in vain. But Ill try to give you the flavour of it any way.
The first three verses of the real Psalm 1 declare:
"Blessed is the man that hath not walked in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners: and hath not sat in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord: and in his law will he exercise himself day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the waterside: that will bring forth his fruit in due season. (Verses 1-3)
Richard Church takes up the idea of the tree-planting in his Day One poem, deciding to plant a quince and a willow beside a pond in his garden. These plantings will grow and persist, come what may. This idea is a background theme running through the cycle and he returns to it in the end, in the Evening poem for Day 30.
Here, at thirty days cost,
With the psalter of grief, I depart
Into the crowd, and am lost
Among those that are broken in heart,
The moving, war-stricken host,
Homeless, bereaved, but still
Led by a resolute will.
Not the will of kings but their own
Is bringing them forth to fulfil
The hope that they saw overthrown.
I am lost, but I stand undaunted
Looking out on the decades beyond
When the willow and quince that I planted
Shall overshadow the pond.
These are signs for any who wander
Beside my garden to ponder,
While they talk with a man whose toil
Made a miracle spring from the ground,
A song smelling sweet of the soil,
A faith out of faithlessness found.
Thank you, Richard Church. May you rest in peace.
Fred

Sunday July 1st 2012
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
It's not often ( ...ever? ...) I start my piece with a Latin
quotation. Gone out of fashion, 'dead language', as my grandson
tells me. And any way I'm a poor sort of classical scholar. But this
one does seem worth thinking about right now. "Who takes care of the
caretakers themselves?" "Wh More...
Sunday July 1st 2012
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
It's not often ( ...ever? ...) I start my piece with a Latin
quotation. Gone out of fashion, 'dead language', as my grandson
tells me. And any way I'm a poor sort of classical scholar. But this
one does seem worth thinking about right now. "Who takes care of the
caretakers themselves?" "Who guards the guardians?" Sometimes
wrongly attributed to Plato, it actually comes from the Latin poet
Juvenal. It asks a pertinent question which arises in our Society time
and again. Who is watching those who watch us? Any one who strikes a
strong moral posture, who lays down standards by which others may feel
judged, had better watch out. The slightest chink in their own ethical
probity will be seized on. They will be pursued and then savaged, like a
pack of hounds closing in on a fox.
This is what has happened to Rupert Murdoch's News Corp in the
course of the Leveson Inquiry. We have watched agog as one leading
figure after another has been dragged into the melee and ended looking
muddy and battered. Perhaps we don't feel unduly surprised when some
of our politicians turn out to have feet of clay. But there is something
particularly unedifying about the behaviour of phone-hacking
journalists and the subsequent cover-ups. So quick to point the finger
when others in public life turn out to be less than perfect, their own
standards have now come under telling scrutiny. So often self-appointed
moral guardians, they are now being 'taken care of' by Lord Justice
Leveson. This kind of in-depth no-nonsense investigation is surely a
mark of our free democratic society and we must surely be thankful for
the work which is going on through its sessions.
By the same token, clergy too (including this one) had better take
care. We're often seen as a 'preachy' lot: laying down God's law - Ten Commandments etc - in a prescriptive way which can leave
listeners feeling got at, as if we're speaking from a great height.
But we too are paid-up members of the human race with all its faults and
foibles. We shouldn't be too surprised if there is an outbreak of
schadenfreude when we slip on moral (or immoral) banana-skins. St Paul
himself seemed to recognise this in the New Testament when he wrote:
"But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after
preaching to others I myself should be disqualified. It is grimly
encouraging to realise that even Paul himself knew the pitfalls for
being a custodian.
Yet it can't all be bad news, can it? Surely, we ought to be
grateful that people are prepared to put themselves forward for public
service, in an age when it's all too easy to be self-contained and
introspective. It's good, for instance, that we have parish
councillors. They are difficult to recruit hereabouts - when did any
of our villages last have a 'voting election' for membership of its
council, with more candidates than places available? How easy is it for
those who have chaired a parish council to step down when there is no
orderly queue of potential successors? We get the public servants we
deserve. If local people are not forthcoming to take on these
responsibilities, there is little point in complaining about 'newcomers grinding their own axes'. I did a spell as a parish
councillor in Kibworth (of Michael Wood/TV history fame) back in the
1980s and 90s - so I know you get little thanks for attending to
gullies and over-hanging trees, or for scrutinising planning
applications. But, as parishioners, we all want our councillors to be
accountable - and that means taking part in the democratic process
ourselves.
I'd like to end on a really positive note. By all accounts, each
of our villages made a great fist of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations.
We were able to attend some of them, across the benefice, and it was
good to see the planning and attention to detail which had gone into
these events and the warmth and enthusiasm of those who took part. All
concerned should give themselves a big pat on the back, in my opinion.

Tuesday June 5th 2012
June - A Tale of Two Queens
I
was seven-and-a-half when King George VI died (I remember the day
vividly) and nearly nine when the Coronation happened. I watched it on
the telly with my grandmother, who would have been able to recall Queen
Victoria's funeral. History is elastic like that, a sort of relay-race. I
won More...
Tuesday June 5th 2012
June - A Tale of Two Queens
I
was seven-and-a-half when King George VI died (I remember the day
vividly) and nearly nine when the Coronation happened. I watched it on
the telly with my grandmother, who would have been able to recall Queen
Victoria's funeral. History is elastic like that, a sort of relay-race. I
wonder if our present Queen was thinking of Elizabeth I's Armada speech
at Tilbury, when she addressed the nation and Commonwealth at the end
of Coronation Day 1953? Here are the two queens' speeches - so judge for
yourselves!
So here is Elizabeth I putting heart into her armed forces before an invasion attempt:
My loving people
We have been
persuaded by some that are careful of our safety, to take heed how we
commit our selves to armed multitudes, for fear of treachery; but I
assure you I do not desire to live to distrust my faithful and loving
people. Let tyrants fear. I have always so behaved myself that, under
God, I have placed my chiefest strength and safeguard in the loyal
hearts and good-will of my subjects; and therefore I am come amongst
you, as you see, at this time, not for my recreation and disport, but
being resolved, in the midst and heat of the battle, to live and die
amongst you all; to lay down for my God, and for my kingdom, and my
people, my honour and my blood even, in the dust.
I know I
have the body but of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and
stomach of a king, and of a king of England too, and think foul scorn
that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the
borders of my realm; to which rather than any dishonour shall grow by
me, I myself will take up arms, I myself will be your general, judge,
and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field.
I know
already, for your forwardness you have deserved rewards and crowns; and
We do assure you in the word of a prince, they shall be duly paid you.
In the mean time, my lieutenant general shall be in my stead, than whom
never prince commanded a more noble or worthy subject; not doubting but
by your obedience to my general, by your concord in the camp, and your
valour in the field, we shall shortly have a famous victory over those
enemies of my God, of my kingdom, and of my people. (1588)
In a broadcast on her 21st birthday, Princess Elizabeth
pledged: "I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be
long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our
great imperial family to which we all belong." Then, at the end of a
long Coronation Day, she reflected:
When I spoke to
you last, at Christmas, I asked you all, whatever your religion, to pray
for me on the day of my Coronation â€â€ to pray that God would
give me wisdom and strength to carry out the promises that I should then
be making.
Throughout this
memorable day I have been uplifted and sustained by the knowledge that
your thoughts and prayers were with me. I have been aware all the time
that my peoples, spread far and wide throughout every continent and
ocean in the world, were united to support me in the task to which I
have now been dedicated with such solemnity.
Many thousands of
you came to London from all parts of the Commonwealth and Empire to join
in the ceremony, but I have been conscious too of the millions of
others who have shared in it by means of wireless or television in their
homes. All of you, near or far, have been united in one purpose. It is
hard for me to find words in which to tell you of the strength which
this knowledge has given me.
The ceremonies you
have seen today are ancient, and some of their origins are veiled in
the mists of the past. But their spirit and their meaning shine through
the ages never, perhaps, more brightly than now. I have in sincerity
pledged myself to your service, as so many of you are pledged to mine.
Throughout all my life and with all my heart I shall strive to be worthy
of your trust.
In this resolve I
have my husband to support me. He shares all my ideals and all my
affection for you. Then, although my experience is so short and my task
so new, I have in my parents and grandparents an example which I can
follow with certainty and with confidence.
There is also
this. I have behind me not only the splendid traditions and the annals
of more than a thousand years but the living strength and majesty of the
Commonwealth and Empire; of societies old and new; of lands and races
different in history and origins but all, by God's Will, united in
spirit and in aim.
Therefore I am
sure that this, my Coronation, is not the symbol of a power and a
splendour that are gone but a declaration of our hopes for the future,
and for the years I may, by God's Grace and Mercy, be given to reign and
serve you as your Queen.
I have been
speaking of the vast regions and varied peoples to whom I owe my duty
but there has also sprung from our island home a theme of social and
political thought which constitutes our message to the world and through
the changing generations has found acceptance both within and far
beyond my Realms.
Parliamentary
institutions, with their free speech and respect for the rights of
minorities, and the inspiration of a broad tolerance in thought and
expression - all this we conceive to be a precious part of our way of
life and outlook.
During recent
centuries, this message has been sustained and invigorated by the
immense contribution, in language, literature, and action, of the
nations of our Commonwealth overseas. It gives expression, as I pray it
always will, to living principles, as sacred to the Crown and Monarchy
as to its many Parliaments and Peoples. I ask you now to cherish them -
and practice them too; then we can go forward together in peace, seeking
justice and freedom for all men.
As this day draws
to its close, I know that my abiding memory of it will be, not only the
solemnity and beauty of the ceremony, but the inspiration of your
loyalty and affection.
I thank you all from a full heart.
God bless you all.
And a footnote from me. Anyone with access to the BBC iPlayer might
like to replay Professor David Cannadine's Point of View, broadcast on
Radio 4 on 13th April. Cannadine put the Jubilee into a wonderful
historical and global perspective.
Fred

Tuesday May 1st 2012
May -Sometimes a light surprises
It's
a bit like the human genome, a person's genetic fingerprint, is the
list of hymns that you know and love. Everybody's bag contains a
different selection from everyone else's. It's a collection that you
started to build up when you were at school, and/or Sunday school. For
some peopl More...
Tuesday May 1st 2012
May -Sometimes a light surprises
It's
a bit like the human genome, a person's genetic fingerprint, is the
list of hymns that you know and love. Everybody's bag contains a
different selection from everyone else's. It's a collection that you
started to build up when you were at school, and/or Sunday school. For
some people of my generation, therefore, it will include such lost items
as 'Daisies are our silver' and 'When a knight won his spurs'
(still sung in primary schools today). People thirty years younger would
number among their canon of hymns 'Autumn days when the grass is
jewelled ...So I mustn't forget'. One noticeable tendency over
recent decades has been for the hymn data-base acquired in schools to
shrink - hence the prevalence of hard-core items like 'All things
bright and beautiful' at weddings and funerals as the remembered
catalogue reduces in scope.
Fair play, you might expect someone who has spent a life-time
singing hymns to have acquired an extensive, even bizarre, repertoire.
Some of those in my own kaleidoscope would have to go down as fairly
obscure. Who remembers 'I lift my heart to Thee, Saviour divine?'
(Lovely tune, Ancient & Modern Standard, now wholly dropped out of
use). Or, dramatically, 'Who are these that shine from afar?'
(English Hymnal, Welsh tune, you know when you've sung it.) But you
don't have to be an ageing cleric to have a UHP (Unique Hymn Profile).
You'll have your own specially tailored UHP if you watch Songs of
Praise on the telly without ever darkening a church door. Back in the
1940s Canon Adam Fox wrote, in a book called Hymns that live, that hymn
singing is by way of being "a national institution" in Britain.
Seventy years on, far fewer folk go to church services but national
occasions and Sunday TV remind us that hymns still resonate for huge
numbers.
Our UHP can make us conservative (small 'c') and intolerant of
change. One curious outcome is that we simply can't understand why or
how other people aren't familiar with the hymns we cherish most.
("Surely, everyone knows that! - the implication being "Where on
earth have you been, that you don't know it?") But of course, to
make that mistake is to miss the point about UHPs. In my own case, I
admit to becoming too easily intolerant of hymns whose language has been
cleaned up to make them politically correct or gender-neutral. I'm
not entirely sure whether this is indicates that I may be an
unreconstructed male-chauvinist; or whether I simply don't like
violence being done to the poetry of the old hymns; or that I don't
think we should have to stage our language quite so much when we address
the Lord. Another quirky aspect of my own UHP is my impatience when
hymns are set in a lower key than that originally intended by their
composers. Many modern hymn books offer them in settings a whole tone
down. The thinking is presumably to make them more singable without
strain at the top end. But in the process, I find, the 'oomph'
usually goes out of them.
Hymnody is a great gift to the church, and to the world.
Hymn-singing releases in us that which cannot easily be said in prose,
in sentences, in conversation. 'Cause every time I tried to tell you,
the words just came out wrong, So I'll have to say I love you, in a
song - wrote American singer-songwriter Jim Croce over 40 years
ago: but the same applies to our hymn-singing. There are some great new
titles around. We should be willing (perhaps more willing) sometimes to
learn new ones, and so to add to our own UHPs. But, equally, we might do
well to hold fast to some of those traditional numbers which are in
danger of disappearing completely from sight and sound. I remember
an old couple, when I was a curate, who grieved because of the
disappearance from modern hymnals of On the Resurrection morning, which
they wanted for their funerals. (Anyone remember that?) May be we should
hold a local Songs of Praise service which is devoted entirely to 'saving orphaned hymns' - those which are on the endangered list.
Fred
PS There are some excellent ones for the pending festivals of
Pentecost and for Trinity Sunday. Why not see how many hymns you can
remember which have a verse dedicated to each 'person of the
Trinity'?

Tuesday April 3rd 2012
April -Singing and Detecting
A Who's Who, for making sense of what follows:
Dennis Potter, Playwright 1935-94; author of the television drama, The Singing Detective
Philip Marlow, central character in this TV drama, suffering from psoriatic arthritis; author of 'cheap' detective novels
Philip Marlow (confusingly), central ch More...
Tuesday April 3rd 2012
April -Singing and Detecting
A Who's Who, for making sense of what follows:
Dennis Potter, Playwright 1935-94; author of the television drama, The Singing Detective
Philip Marlow, central character in this TV drama, suffering from psoriatic arthritis; author of 'cheap' detective novels
Philip Marlow (confusingly), central character in one of Marlow's own novels, The Singing Detective
Michael Gambon, actor, who plays both Marlows: the one in the play and the one in the play-within-the-play
At the time of writing (mid February), I'm enjoying the re-run on
BBC4 of The Singing Detective. Actually, I'm not sure enjoying is the
right word. Watching Michael Gambon's unspeakably brilliant portrayal
of Philip Marlow is a searing experience. I ask myself, Did television
ever get any better than this? For copyright reasons, the dramatisation
has not been repeated for the best part of a decade, and only once
besides that since its first broadcast in 1986. So this screening is an
event.
I suppose I was always a sitting target for The Singing Detective,
just the kind of person whose 'issues' would resonate with those of
the central character. But Dennis Potter, the playwright, and I went
back a whole lot further than that. (Not that I ever met him, you
understand.) His play Son of Man - unsurprisingly about Jesus - was
televised in the very early days of my ministry. Colin Blakely's Jesus
was serious but enjoyed a good joke, he was confused about his own
role, he was compelling. In all of those ways, he was an icon for me as I
began my Rev years. There followed many television plays, each with its
own uncomfortable perceptive edge, often witty and wise. And dark. In
Where Adam Stood, Potter imagined a battle-of-wills between Philip Gosse
(the biologist who, on Evangelical grounds, fiercely opposed Charles
Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection - survival of the
fittest) and his young son Edmund. The boy had set his heart on owning a
sailing ship he had seen in a shop window. In spite of his father's
reluctance to buy it, Edmund eventually got his way by deciding to tell
Philip that he had prayed about it, and that - the Lord wanted him to
have the boat. Not only was Philip defeated game, set and match but
the boy's victory was delivered in the cruellest way - proving
Darwin's theory into the bargain. "Any creature, any life form that
can, by however small a degree, adapt to the harshness of its
environment is the one that is going to persist. Extinction awaits those
creatures which cannot rise to meet the challenges of their own
environment. The fit survive, the unfit perish." Thus, the closing
passage of the play.
Dennis Potter's work took off in a new direction with his 1978
Pennies from Heaven when his love for 1930s popular songs found its way
into his drama. But it was in The Singing Detective that this new
marriage of word and music were most interwoven. Although in the end it
was cancer that carried him off, Potter had been a long-term sufferer of
psoriasis as was Marlow, the play's central character. As Philip
Marlow works his way through the plot, mostly from his hospital bed,
painful memories and unresolved tensions come flooding back. By the end
of episode 1, we are in no doubt that the irritability of the novelist
and the phoney suaveness of the singing detective (the novel within the
play - hope you're keeping up, there!) are both directly related to
all the pools of unhappiness Marlow has brought forward with him from
his childhood.
One sequence in particular was for me almost unwatchable, it was so
painful - though neither could I take my eyes or attention away. He
was sitting in a corner in the miners' club in his Forest of Dean
home, watching his father sing and his mother play. But no longer was he
the ten year old boy of earlier shots; he sat fully grown, dressed in
his hospital pyjamas, his face covered with scabs. Suddenly the room is
empty, apart from one bullying club member whose role was to make it
very clear that those days and people have gone forever. Philip, alias
Dennis Potter, alias you or I, cannot understand or grasp this. "They
can't have gone. There are still things I need to say to them. There
are things that need to be put right." Michael Gambon's palate of
sensitive expression-changes in this section of the drama is
extraordinary, like a singer with a range of three octaves or more. And
anyone who knows about unfinished business with the dead could not fail
to find themselves moved. Carpe diem.
As I write, the serial is still running. Though I have seen it
several times, I shan't be able to avoid the emotional roller-coaster
which inevitably results from following the story through. 18 years on
since I last saw it, I can't remember exactly how it ends. But I do
recall that there was some kind of resolution, closure. And even the
hint of resurrection. Well, for me, any way.
This is the month when Christians celebrate the Resurrection of Our
Lord Jesus Christ. We need to keep singing in our hearts amid gloom and
discouragement. We need to be detectives, to catch glimpses of
Resurrection wherever they are to be found. Watching Dennis Potter's
drama, for me, points us in the right direction even at the most
unexpected moments.
And, as the Singing Detective might himself have put it: Who could ask for anything more?

Thursday March 8th 2012
March - Are you now, or have you ever been ... ?
Baptised. Christened. Or whatever you want to call it.
This year, Bishop Michael wants us all to ask these questions. He
hopes that we'll respond positively, in the present tense: I am
baptised! Our baptism may have taken place many decades ago. It may be
completely inaccessible to our cons More...
Thursday March 8th 2012
March - Are you now, or have you ever been ... ?
Baptised. Christened. Or whatever you want to call it.
This year, Bishop Michael wants us all to ask these questions. He
hopes that we'll respond positively, in the present tense: I am
baptised! Our baptism may have taken place many decades ago. It may be
completely inaccessible to our conscious memories. But if it happened,
it happened! We became members of the Church, life-long members. The old
Prayer Book catechism put it succinctly. In my baptism, I became "a
member of Christ, a child of God and an inheritor of the kingdom of
heaven. We may be sleeping members, or have turned consciously away.
But it's there, waiting to come back to life in us.
The problem is that far fewer are baptised now than used to be the
case. When I was a curate, 40 years back, someone wrote: €27 million
baptised, 9 million confirmed, 3 million Easter Communicants. What went
wrong?€ Now, four decades later, those numbers look like something
good beyond our wildest imaginings.
What can we do in this benefice about meeting the Bishop's
challenge? At a PCC meeting, the question was asked: "How about a
whole class baptism at school?" (No, not compulsory, of course not!
But, making it possible for a group of children, with the support and
approval of their parents, to think about 'belonging' and to receive
the sacrament if they weren't christened as babies. Interesting
thought.)
Baptism is the basis of Christian belonging. It's true that in the
Church of England, confirmation has normally been required before a
person can be admitted to Holy Communion. Yet even that is changing, as
more churches admit seven and eight year olds who attend church
regularly to communion - without waiting for Confirmation. Baptism
should be the door to full membership.
This year, the theme of baptism is going to be at the fore-front in
this Benefice for another reason completely. The parish church at
Weston-sub-Edge (at the geographical centre of the benefice) will be
re-branded on June 24th, St John the Baptist's Day. Dedicated for
eight centuries to the Baptist and only changed to St Lawrence 100 years
ago, John is celebrated in many of the church's windows. The Bishop
will preside and preach that day at a service for all our churches, at
11 am on that day. Afterwards, there will be lunch for all who can stay,
in Weston village hall.
When you next visit Weston-sub-Edge parish church, take a careful
look at those windows. In one of them, we see John baptising Jesus
Himself. The Spirit descends and the Lord indicates His approval: This
is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. At the end of his pastoral
letter, the bishop reminds us that we are all called to be the beloved
sons and daughters of God. In a unique way, our baptism tells that story
and confirms that truth.
Fred

Wednesday February 1st 2012
February - More Archery ......
It's
been a while since my first piece on The Archers, time enough for my
quiver to be brimming full with further reflections. The big issue for
me (and all other listeners) lately has been the capacity of the past
to turn up like an avenging Fury and to play havoc with personalities
a More...
Wednesday February 1st 2012
February - More Archery ......
It's
been a while since my first piece on The Archers, time enough for my
quiver to be brimming full with further reflections. The big issue for
me (and all other listeners) lately has been the capacity of the past
to turn up like an avenging Fury and to play havoc with personalities
and relationships in the present. That's the way it has been for Pat and
Tony Archer and their offspring for weeks now, as the spectre of dead
son John's one-time relationship with no-better-then-she-ought-to-be
Sharon has cast its shadow over the plot. Is Sharon's 13 year-old son,
Rich, John's offspring and therefore Pat and Tony's
grandson, a miraculous survival of their dearly-beloved John? And, if
so, might it be possible to re-establish links with alienated Sharon,
and so with this grand-progeny? What would the implications be for Helen
and Tom, siblings of the late John? All this has become a magnificent
obsession in Pat's mind, brilliantly written and acted in an utterly
searing way. The pain felt by both parties in the phone call between Pat
and Sharon in early December was palpable. It was almost unbearable,
even for a listener who knew full well that this was fiction, not
reality. Except, of course, that it is realty: in the sense that many of
us have such situations with which to deal and/or come to terms.
As an Archers buff, I remember basing a sermon on the death of young
John Archer 14 years ago. For people who take their soaps seriously, it
felt really grim - though, once again, the point actually was that it
resonated with so many experiences in real life. What I didn't know then
(and I'm guessing, neither did the script-writers, unless they were
playing a very long game) was that these events would return
nemesis-like half a generation on for a tragic-looking end game.
The Pat-and-Tony unit of the Archer clan has been skating on thin
ice for long enough. Pat, unsurprisingly, suffered serious depression
after her eldest child, John, had died. It took a great deal of getting
through, was only negotiated at all by the final realisation that Life
goes on, that her remaining family still needed her. Under her resolute
exterior, the hurts have remained. Then daughter Helen has had her own
huge set of issues: the brother she 'worshipped' dead, her long-term
relationship with game-keeper Matt also ending abruptly when he died.
("Every one I love is taken away from me ...") So she underwent her own
depression, accompanied by serious eating disorders. Recovery was slow
and painful - but, by degrees, achieved.
Tony, Pat & Co. can usually 'get through', providing they're not
constantly faced with mega-problems. But enter, stage left, a hapless
Clarie Grundy, accidentally bringing food poisoning into the family's
dairy unit and so closing down the precious Bridge Farm brand. As if
that were not bad enough, a village funeral is attended by Sharon's
daughter - so exposure to the long-vanished former girlfriend of John is
once again on the horizon. Inquisitive Pat picks up on a passing
reference to Sharon's brother, Rich, and begins a Facebook search. When
Helen and Tom discover what's in the wind, they go bananas (Helen
especially) at the thought of opening up all those old wounds, whether
or not 'Ë"Rich' turns out to be their nephew. Yet Pat can only see the
positives: the prospect of a 'new' grandson, a living link with John.
But she is on a descending spiral. The fateful phone-call call with
Sharon only makes matters worse .....
Anyone familiar with Transactional Analysis will recognise all this
as having the makings of a 'third degree game' - a series of
interactions between people, loaded with old hidden agendas and bereft
of detached grown-up thinking, in which the outcome is most likely to be
disastrous: the participants end up feeling even worse about themselves
and each other than they did at the outset. If it really is 'third
degree', then someone will end up in court, or physically hurt - or
perhaps even dead. So let's hope that it may not come to that. But we
should be aware that 'skating on thin ice' is not limited to radio or TV
soap shows, that many of us have areas on experience which remain
unresolved and unhealed - and that 'to go there' will always be a risky
business which ought to be considered very carefully before taking the
fateful step.
I think we sometimes set ourselves, and others, a standard of
perfection for personal relationships which is mostly impossible to
reach. When we know and accept that we are broken people, then we can
come to God and to each other for healing and encouragement. Sometimes,
this will mean living with the fruit of our past mistakes, accepting
that things can't always be mended: and declaring in time-honoured
tradition "Alleluia any way!" Yes, it is in the nature of human
behaviour and experience to hope and to yearn. Yearning in particular is
something we would do well to recover the capacity for, in modern life.
It's terrific when there's a break-through: a moment of grace we didn't
see coming, something we'd thought desirable but impossible - which has
happened contrary to all expectations.
So - what will the outcome be in this latest piece of 'Archery'?
Will Pat's hopes and dreams hit the mark? Or must she go on, like so
many, living with areas of life which are less than perfect?
Stay tuned!
Fred

Monday January 2nd 2012
And a Happy New Year!
I've never spent the festive season north of the border, but they
tell me that, in Scotland, Hogmanay is a bigger deal than Christmas Day.
It's not a competition - but I can kind of see why that might be. In
the depths of winter, when all seems dormant, dark and depressing, it's
important to More...
Monday January 2nd 2012
And a Happy New Year!
I've never spent the festive season north of the border, but they
tell me that, in Scotland, Hogmanay is a bigger deal than Christmas Day.
It's not a competition - but I can kind of see why that might be. In
the depths of winter, when all seems dormant, dark and depressing, it's
important to keep an eye open for the light that hath shined in the
darkness, and the darkness consumed it not.
A couple of dark months are behind us already. Poets in the past have
captured their essence. Many people learned Thomas Hood's November in
their school days:
No sun - no moon! No morn - no noon -
No dawn - no dusk - no proper time of day.
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,
No comfortable feel in any member -
No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees,
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds! -
November!
A bit tougher is John Donne's dismal reflection on December 13th - St
Lucy's Day - which he thought of as the year's shortest day:
'TIS the year's midnight, and it is the day's,
Lucy's, who scarce seven hours herself unmasks ;
The sun is spent, and now his flasks
Send forth light squibs, no constant rays ;
The world's whole sap is sunk ....
And now, the jollifications over, we face two or three months
gradually-remitting greyness. More than ever, it's important for us to
keep our eye on that 'Daystar' which arose at that first Christmas,
which we hope, pray, believe and trust will never set and which sheds
all the light we need in our small corners. But, yes, sometimes it's
hard to keep that vision clearly before us, especially in the depths of
winter.
Many people today are afflicted with seasonally affected disorder,
'SAD'. Hardly surprising that our bio-rhythms and moods vary with
ambient conditions, when you think about it. Yet the Christian
experience is that Jesus hangs in there with the Sad, that there is no
place we can take ourselves which will be out of the reach of His love.
When you feel afflicted by spiritual sadness, try reading Psalm 139.
No wonder the theme of light has been so strong in Christian hymnody
over the years! Lead, kindly Light amid th' encircling gloom ....
Sometimes a light surprises the Christian when he sings ... Hail,
gladdening light, of His pure glory poured ... Shine, Jesus, shine! And
the Lord whispers to each one of us, in our moments of all-pervading
gloom: "You'd better believe it, sunshine!
2012 promises to be a very upbeat year in some ways (sporting,
largely) and a remarkably difficult one in others (as the new economic
situation begins to bite). We need to stay grounded through all of this,
aware of the darkness all around us but more than ever convinced that
Jesus is the Light of the World.
Happy New Year!
Fred

Tuesday November 1st 2011
November -DIYDO
DIYDO, DIYDO!
Whats this? An onomatopoeic rendering of a police car or fire engine sound? Words from a backing group in a 1960s love song? None of the above. Its a mnemonic. Damned if you do, damned if you dont: a suitable strap-line, perhaps, for the month of Remembrance. November commemo More...
Tuesday November 1st 2011
November -DIYDO
DIYDO, DIYDO!
Whats this? An onomatopoeic rendering of a police car or fire engine sound? Words from a backing group in a 1960s love song? None of the above. Its a mnemonic. Damned if you do, damned if you dont: a suitable strap-line, perhaps, for the month of Remembrance. November commemorates the agony of warfare current and long ago. Hindsight for historians is a vice devoutly to be resisted. Sir John Frenchs British Expeditionary Force of 1914 marched forth believing that, with the lights going out all over Europe, there was little choice. By 1916, soldiers in the Somme trenches may have come to see things differently. Certainly some of the WW1 poets did. Wilfred Owen described as the old Lie the much-quoted sentiment: Dulce et Decorum est Pro patria mori How sweet and right to die for ones country! Its a tough call. The liberal democracies in 1914, in 1939, in 2003 (Iraq) and in 2011 (Libya) may well have reflected ruefully that they were damned if they did and damned if they didnt. With hindsight, their situations look very different from each other. WW2 must surely be seen as a just war. Yes, there were dissenting voices in 2003, plenty of them, to the invasion of Iraq but opposition to that conflict has hardened and distilled in the intervening years. Only a minority would still openly support Blair and Bush. 20-20 vision may now be available, years after the fact. At the time it wasnt. People have to take the best and most courageous decisions possible on the basis of the evidence available from their current standpoint. DIYDO, DIYDO!
When we are in the thick of it, seeing issues clearly and logically can be very hard. It doesnt always seem possible easily to distinguish right from wrong. Theres nothing new here. Its something religious people have understood and experienced from way back when. The Old Testament is full of characters facing moral dilemmas which seemed insoluble. Sometimes, they too must have felt they were damned if they did, damned if they didnt. After an initial rush of heavenly blessing, King Saul just didnt seem to be able to get it right, no matter what he did. Counting his men, conducting a census (to say nothing of consulting a medium while disguised) he just couldnt do right for doing wrong, as we say in the North. Most of these bad decisions were taken during some national emergency when fair play there was no clear way forward.
The first half of the Bible has other notably confused characters aplenty. The Israelites in the wilderness are thirsty. They complain to Moses, who takes their moans to the Lord. OK. Strike that rock with your staff and water will issue forth. Moses strikes the rock but perhaps too soon, or the wrong number of times? The water gushes forth, but Moses is in the Lords dog-house and pays by not being permitted to enter the Promised Land. Or what about that most confusing of stories, the tale of Balaam and Balak (and the donkey). See Numbers 20. The prophet Balaam is told by God (apparently) to answer a call to prophesy but is blocked by an angel of God from doing so. The story has a comic, even pantomimic, dimension. But at a deeper level it is troubling. What did God want the prophet to do? How was Balaam to know, in the teeth of contradictory evidence?
Religious people have rarely found following the Lords lead to be a comfortable journey. Consider Jeremiah. He pours out his heart in response to what he experiences as Gods ambivalence. O Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am in derision daily, every one mocketh me.
I dont suppose many of us would want to go quite that far in addressing God! But I think that every single one of us knows something of the quandary, the Divine dilemma: What does God want of me? What is the right thing to do in these circumstances? "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling may not mean quite the same to us as it did to Paul (Philippians 2.12). But it is nonetheless good advice. All we can do is to be open to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, always to test what we suppose them to be against our inheritance of received teaching and guidance, against the requirements, too, of common sense.
What does the Lord require? "He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?" (NKJV) So wrote the prophet Micah. Sounds simple enough. We just have to spend a lifetime learning how to put it into practice.
But the soldiers, sailors, airmen and women whom we commemorate this month did not have the luxury of philosophising and agonising. They just went.
Fred

Thursday December 1st 2011
December - Ass
Ass, You, Me ....... Get it?
I heard it from a verger in my last parish. Im guessing most readers will have come across it, from wherever. This is how it goes, this gem of wisdom: "The trouble with assuming is that it makes an ass of u and me. Right. Youd better believe it. But its possible More...
Thursday December 1st 2011
December - Ass
Ass, You, Me ....... Get it?
I heard it from a verger in my last parish. Im guessing most readers will have come across it, from wherever. This is how it goes, this gem of wisdom: "The trouble with assuming is that it makes an ass of u and me. Right. Youd better believe it. But its possible to assume in a good way, too and thats the subject I wish to address in the Christmas edition of this magazine.
It all goes back to a 4th Century bishop in (what is now) Turkey: Gregory of Nazianzus, one of the three so-called Cappadocian Fathers. Gregory hit on a very simple principle, proof positive for him, that Jesus really must have become fully human. "That which was not assumed is not healed, he wrote. In other words: if Jesus did not enter completely into the experience of being a man, if he did not assume the human condition, then everything is a sham. That was Gregorys line of thinking. St Paul, too, puts it neatly in his letter to the church at Philippi. Jesus did not regard equality with God "as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death even death on a cross.
So, the first challenge this December: dont assume you know what Christmas is all about if you havent got your head and your heart and your soul around this central feature of our faith that God in Jesus assumed our human nature, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.
But thats only the beginning. Even if you leave the heavy-duty theology out of it, there are still issues for us about assuming. Being human requires us to assume responsibility for what we do. This can be hard. We let ourselves off the hook. We cast around for excuses when we do bad things. We are eager to blame others. King David made a complete ass of himself and in the most despicable way when he sent Bathshebas husband Uriah off into battle to face certain death. He assumed all the powers of royalty and made them work for him, in order to cover his own back. It took a wise but tough talking-to by the prophet Nathan to wake the king up to what he had done. You are the man, declared Nathan after feeding back to David, in parable form, just how the king had behaved. It is in that moment of seeing, perhaps for the first time, that you are the man, or the woman, or the child who is responsible, that responsibility begins to be assumed and that changes can be made. As Ive had cause to reflect before today: theres only one thing worse than being found out. And thats not being found out. That way, we can go on avoiding responsibility all our lives.
May be, in spite of the vergers witty observation, we need to put the ass back into assume. (Lets not quibble about fine distinctions between asses, donkeys, colts and foals ...) Mary is traditionally depicted as journeying to Bethlehem on a donkey. Jesus makes that final, fateful entry into Jerusalem on some such similar beast. If you want to see a Little Donkey with super-human insight (and attitude), read the charming if incredible story of Balaams ass in Numbers 22. The clue is, theres something about this humble and silent beast of burden which comes very close to the heart of what God was doing in Jesus. If we assume the Christian life and faith, as Jesus assumed our condition; if we assume responsibility for ourselves, our behaviour, our environment; it may sometimes feel as though we are carrying the woes of the world on our shoulders but may be we shall be getting very close to the experience of God in Jesus. As always, Paul has a way of putting it (Colossians 1.24): I am now rejoicing in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am completing what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church.
We might simply say, Doing our bit.
Now, wheres that list of carols ..... ?
Happy Christmas!
Fred

Monday September 12th 2011
October - Ella
That Ella Fitzgerald moment
I was recently passing a household where two young people, a while back, had got themselves a reputation for being potential €trouble'. I'm not sure the notoriety was justified €" but that's another matter. What struck me this particular night was t More...
Monday September 12th 2011
October - Ella
That Ella Fitzgerald moment
I was recently passing a household where two young people, a while back, had got themselves a reputation for being potential €trouble'. I'm not sure the notoriety was justified €" but that's another matter. What struck me this particular night was that a party was under way. Loud, but not offensively so, music was being absorbed by the lazy summer evening in a far-from-disagreeable fashion. And what was issuing forth was not Heavy Metal or Rap, or any of those other categories about which I feel hazy. No, it was unmistakeably a love song. I don't know whom it was by but there was no disguising the heady cocktail of smooch and yearning, of hope and dreaming the impossible dream. In that moment, I knew it was going to be okay for the young people concerned. They'd rounded the corner from adolescence towards adulthood. They'd bought into Society and its aspirations. They were on their way!
Fanciful of me? Yes, of course. In reality, there was no guarantee that it would stick. Or even that they came close to seeing things in the same was as I. It might be objected that the kinds of values promoted by Hollywood and the recording studios are very far from real life, as indeed they are. We may also reflect on the fact that there is a huge gulf between enjoying music (of whatever sort) and living a good life. After all, Hitler was a concert-goer. Enough said. Yet, for all this, the moment when love speaks in our hearts persuasively for the first time represents one of our peaks, a transforming instant after which nothing will be quite the same again, beyond which anarchy and nihilism become impossibilities.
I'm calling this an Ella Fitzgerald moment because it's Ella, amongst many others, who did it and does it for me. Everytime we say goodbye, I die a little; Everytime we say goodbye, I wonder why a little; Why the Gods above me, who must be in the know Think so little of me, they allow you to go? Did anyone ever write a better love song than that? The moment we hear it, and affirm it in our hearts, we are part of a community which seeks to find our happiness and fulfilment in others, in their happiness and fulfilment. Everything is changed.
This is nothing new. Plato, in his Republic, recognised how important it is to inspire a rising generation with the best of what has gone before €" what he called €good myths'. Socrates, his great teacher, says "A young thing can't judge what is hidden sense and what is not; but what he takes into his opinions at that age has a tendency to become hard to eradicate and unchangeable". His view is that kids can't distinguish between good and bad. So they collect examples of how not to behave from bad tales. He claims that children will only use bad examples to justify their own bad behaviour. Through the telling of carefully crafted tales, he suggests, mothers and nurses will shape their children's souls. What on earth would he have said about the output of TV and DVDs, about the €myths' that young people in our Society constantly have set before them?
There has been much wringing of hands since the Tottenham riots, and the others which followed. How come we are suddenly surrounded by a rising generation who seem not to have bought into the values we remember from our younger days? (Actually, there's nothing sudden about it; the problem has been growing for years. The unacceptable behaviour of the rioters and looters could be said to be the flip side of our own pillaging of the earth's resources, of our own expecting to acquire whatever we have wanted on credit.) What we can say is that, somewhere along the line, the €myths' that we grew up with have flown out of the window. My generation, whether we liked it or not, grew up with Bible stories and teachings, imbued through religious assemblies and scripture lessons. We have two schools in this benefice €" the Church school in Willersey and the Community school in Mickleton. Both do their best with all this, making notable and praiseworthy efforts to give the children positive values, under-girded by the Christian faith. Christian involvement is actual and continuing, to be expected in the C of E ethos at Willersey but all the more impressive in the €open' context of a Community school at Mickleton. But the parameters everywhere have changed hugely since the 1960s. Perhaps we are all paying the price.
Meanwhile, it's reassuring to reflect that positive values are being passed on willy-nilly in a variety of informal, less conscious ways: not least, through that Ella Fitzgerald moment.

Saturday August 20th 2011
September - Someone to watch over me
First, an apology and a belated word of congratulation! 13months ago (August 2010), I published a little quiz in this magazine, What had all the saints I listed got in common with each other? Promises of glittering prizes for right answers, etc etc. Then I broke my ankle and spent the best More...
Saturday August 20th 2011
September - Someone to watch over me
First, an apology and a belated word of congratulation! 13months ago (August 2010), I published a little quiz in this magazine, What had all the saints I listed got in common with each other? Promises of glittering prizes for right answers, etc etc. Then I broke my ankle and spent the best part of three months out of circulation. The quiz got lost in the ensuing chaos, leaving those of you who bothered to take part feeling a tad frustrated.What these saints had in common was, their feast-days all fell within the month of August. Simples. Well done, all who took part memorably Mary Stephenson of Willersey and Emma Phillips of Mickleton/Willersey for your high degrees of accuracy. Sorry about the prizes, however.
One of the August saints' days is especially significant for me. Oswald was King of Northumbria (and for a while overlord' of all England)from 634 to 642, the year of his death. On 5th August in that year, he led his troops against the pagan King Penda of Mercia at Maserfield', usually taken to be our Oswestry, and perished in battle. The Venerable Bede, writing just under a hundred years later, records that even in death, Oswald watched over his men and prayed for them. In Christian art, Oswald is often depicted carrying a wooden cross, which denotes both his humility in spite of being a king, and his strong adherence to Jesus as his Lord.
I have good reason to dwell on the story of Oswald. I grew up as a member of St Oswald's church in Ashbourne, a parish which watched over my young progress from secondary-modern boy, late transfer to the GrammarSchool, altar server, ordinand, university student and finally ordination. When, ten years later, I was appointed to my first benefice, my Latinmaster-cum-Lay Reader and the Anglo-Catholic head server both took the trouble to come to my Induction. St Oswald's was actually a middle-of-the-road' parish with no particular devotion to the saints but I can't help wondering now whether Oswald wasn't keeping aweather-eye open for me even back then as I progressed from one improbable stage of my life to the next.
Then on St Oswald's day last year I went mountain-climbing with my son and grandson. Around 5.30 pm I slipped and heard a sickening crunch as my foot landed and twisted through around 90. I'm not going to recount thestory yet again but within an hour I was being winched into an RAF helicopter and on my way to Bangor hospital. Accidents always raise difficult questions for us. Why does bad stuff happen? Carelessness? Lack of paying proper attention? A poor decision? (Mine, that day, was to go on ahead of my companions). Or are there deeper, more significant, influences? In the Middle Ages, the faithful might have asked, Why was not my patron saint watching over me when that happened? But others may have preferred: Thank God he was watching, because what happened could have been so much worse than it actually was! Just a short distance from Tryfan where I slipped are the Idwal Slabs, yet more hazardous, at the bottom of which, I was later told, a Scout song used to relate how an accident victim was "scraped up like raspberry jam. St Oswald, thank you for saving me from the preserving pan!
All such thinking, of course, involves a decision about our world-view, our preferred way of seeing things. We might rightly observe that there is no one right way, or even wrong way, of interpreting what happens to us. Or that no such view can be proved (or disproved). But what many religious people and others are left with when the dust has settled is a sense that we really are being watched over, that the Lord will watch our going out and our coming in. It isn't a charm, or a mantra, or superstition. For many of us, it's an absolute conviction, the stuff of our faith. It doesn't provide us with a set of fool-proof answers to questions like Why do bad things happen to good people?But it does give us something to do with our experience, a lens through which to see it. We are being watched over: watched over by a loving heavenly Father who sees our foolishness, our fauxpas, and forgives us. We are being watched over by a Crucified Lord from the Cross, whose role is not to change what is coming our way but to help us take the strain whatever befalls. Paul put it a different way: All things work together for those who love God.
Almost exactly 1000 years after the death of St Oswald, another watcher' uttered a memorable prayer. Sir Jacob Astley was a commander in the King's army during the Civil War. Before the Battle of Edgehill in 1642, he offered these words: O Lord! thou knowest how busy I must be this day; if I forget thee, do not thou forget me March on, boys!' Astley had a lively faith in a God who watches over us. He himself lived to a ripe old age. And he was still watching over his family and their backs when he wrote to his daughter, about to send her ten year-old son away to school: Full littell thincke you how his bumbe will suffer, for they ar all churlish masters thear'.(This quotation is too charming to be apocryphal but I take it on trust from Wikipedia!)
Watching and caring can take many forms. Let us pray for each other and care for one another.
Fred

Saturday July 30th 2011
August - Archery
Many readers, doubtless, watch or listen to soaps'. In my time, so have I. I saw the first ever episode of Coronation Street. For a few months, late in 1978, we were aficionados of Emmerdale Farm (when it was Farm'). And yes- for a good long while I watched East Enders, admired its brillian More...
Saturday July 30th 2011
August - Archery
Many readers, doubtless, watch or listen to soaps'. In my time, so have I. I saw the first ever episode of Coronation Street. For a few months, late in 1978, we were aficionados of Emmerdale Farm (when it was Farm'). And yes- for a good long while I watched East Enders, admired its brilliant production, its characterisations, its wonderful comedic portrayals (Dot, Holly etc). But then cold turkey. Now I don't care two figs for it (mixing food metaphors) and rarely even dip in.
But The Archers is something different. Admittedly I only came to the programme after we were married (quite a time ago now). Since then, I've scarcely been out of touch with it. Grace's death in the stables fire came too early for me, but most of the other big crises I've followed. And what started (at least in part) as a government propaganda exercise with relatively safe and staid story-lines has gradually become for us a mirror held up, via which we can see our own experience reflected, played back to us: giving us every opportunity to think about the ways in which we behave, what makes us tick, how we handle our problems.
Somehow, this all became ever truer, more relevant, after our move to the Cotswolds four years back. Were we not now in the very midst of Archers country? Where is Borsetshire, anyway? Is it meant to approximate to one of these three counties, Warwickshire, Worcestershire, parts of Gloucestershire even? Probably not, rather a mixture of the three. But one of the great rural myths' in this part of the world goes something like this: "Ambridge is actually based on our village! The events in the story-line reflect what we've been doing! There must be a spy, locally, noting it all down! Sounds preposterous, self-aggrandising even, inverted paranoia. But hey how could they really know about those village pantomimes and scare-crow competitions, if they hadn't been watching us? Don't we come across Archers actors at local events? And haven't I run into Joe Grundy and Bert Fry on the local allotments? Not to mention well-known incontrovertible facts like the Bull is at Inkberrow, Hanbury Hall is Lower Loxley, etc
No, you don't get to live in this part of the world for four years without learning a thing or two about Archery.
It's that mirror held up' dimension to the programme that makes me want to write an occasional (not necessarily every month) Archery column. Because there is enough stuff going on in the show that chimes with real-life problems of real-life people to make a pause for thought worth-while.
The problem presently set to run and run is Elizabeth's grief and its consequences. Her husband Nigel died at the year's turn after falling tragically from the roof-top at Lower Loxley. Elizabeth's brother, David Archer, was with him at the time, and has been blaming himself for Nigel's death, because he persuaded Nigel that they should tackle the roof-top chore against the dictates of common sense. David just about hacked it, initially, by not fully explaining to Elizabeth his own role in what had happened, and by trying to appease his conscience by spending all hours helping his sister run her business. But eventually, he told her the truth and suddenly Nigel's death became (a) avoidable and (b) all her brother's fault. Now she says she won't see him ever again. Jill, their ageing mum, is devastated as are their other siblings and, in fact, the whole wider family. As I write, David and wife Ruth have been written out of Elizabeth's will, no longer to be guardians of her children. My mind turns to Tolstoy: Every happy family in the world resembles every other happy family; but every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
We don't know how it will all turn out. Being a soap', there's a reasonable chance that in the end, it will be sorted. It would take a very courageous script-writer and producer to resist an eventual resolution. But which of us does not know the pain of family dislocation, even if only slight and occasional? When it touches us, we hope and pray for reconciliation, bridging gaps, meeting people half-way, when there have been break-downs within the family circle. Sometimes they come, these mendings, sometimes they seem long-delayed. In our families, we have to learn to pray the prayer of the mid-20th century German-American theologian, Reinhold Neiburh: "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
Perhaps that is the prayer of Jill Archer, who told her other daughter recently how she takes her problems into church with her and speaks to God about them. A nice piece of positive publicity there for us, I thought. Jill knows a thing or two about de-fusing familial tensions. I've never heard her quote Proverbs 15.1 but she certainly puts it into practice: A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. She has been in the programme long enough, a sufficiently seasoned character, to know that miracles "can sometimes take a little longer
But they are never to be discounted.
Fred

Thursday June 16th 2011
July - Lazy, hazy, crazy
Summer doesn't get much of a look-in in the New Testament. Pop the word into a Concordance search-engine (or even try looking in a hard-back) and you'll find pretty much just one reference to the season anywhere in the twenty-seven books. (Well, actually three, but it comes down to the same word o More...
Thursday June 16th 2011
July - Lazy, hazy, crazy
Summer doesn't get much of a look-in in the New Testament. Pop the word into a Concordance search-engine (or even try looking in a hard-back) and you'll find pretty much just one reference to the season anywhere in the twenty-seven books. (Well, actually three, but it comes down to the same word of Jesus, recorded by the Synoptic gospel writers, Matthew, Mark and Luke.) Jesus said, When you see the buds sprouting, you know that summer is near'. Or words to that effect. And that's it: summer in the New Testament. Blink and you'd miss it. A bit like many of our summers in that respect. But there are Gospel moments when the lazy, hazy crazy days of summer are there, between the lines, even without explicit reference. In St Mark, Chapter 2, there's a tale which is clearly from high summer.
One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grain fields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees said to him, "Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?" He answered, "Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions." Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
It's good to see Jesus chilling out' with his friends (curiously inappropriate expression, may be, for what could easily have been a very hot day); taking time out. Imagine them enjoying a bright golden haze on the meadow. But, even as they may have tried to relax, there was a crazy dimension to it as well. The sharks were out. The critics were ever present. If you're Jesus and the disciples, you're never actually off duty. Those who want to follow Jesus can expect no different.
Come July and August, it's good to feel that the pressure is off a little, that we can enjoy the lazy and hazy summer. But you're never quite off duty as Christians, as church members. When our guard is off, our defences down, people are still alert to what we say, how we behave. They are still watchful of us, on the look-out for our peccadilloes or greater acts of hypocrisy. In any case the slightly crazy reality is that church life can get even more hectic than ever during these months, with the onset of fetes and festivals, gatherings and galas. Perhaps it's just those summers in the past, long ago, that were lazy and hazy: a crazy stunt pulled by our memories to wipe out the anxieties/boredoms/stressed preparations for family holidays, if we were privileged enough to get them, which were the reality. The past is another country. They really did do things differently there. (Didn't we?)
Sometimes, though, the past can produce wonderful and deeply moving links with the present. I recall a walk through a Leicestershire field of ripening wheat on a blazing-hot summer's day in the early 90s whilst on retreat at Launde Abbey; words from the Book of Ruth running through my head. The last verse of chapter 1 records that Naomi and Ruth "came to Bethlehem in the beginning of the barley harvest. That key Biblical moment of high summer points us forward towards another Bethlehemite, Ruth's great-grandson, King David. And beyond him, way beyond, to another Bethlehem descendant of Ruth whose birth is traditionally placed not in summer but winter. All in the end is harvest.
Whether it's summer or winter, springtime or harvest, we need to take time out, to see patterns, to discern links pointers, hints, clues. That is the challenge of being alive, sentient creatures. Our impressions and conclusions may still be hazy, our faith none too clear. But to decline this journey of human and spiritual exploration might be both lazy and crazy.
Fred
Wednesday June 1st 2011
June - Technology, eh?
When I belonged to a church youth group in the
1950s, we produced a duplicated magazine. To be more accurate, I
produced it. It involved using stencils (skins') and in my case a
primitive one-sheet-at-a-time duplicator, with a hand-roller that you
had to run over the stencil, to press More...
Wednesday June 1st 2011
June - Technology, eh?
When I belonged to a church youth group in the
1950s, we produced a duplicated magazine. To be more accurate, I
produced it. It involved using stencils (skins') and in my case a
primitive one-sheet-at-a-time duplicator, with a hand-roller that you
had to run over the stencil, to press the ink through on to the paper.
The technology was ancient even then but it was all that was available
to us. Later, as a curate, I was to graduate on to a hand-operated
cylindrical model, enabling multiple sheets to be run off rapidly. The
kind of corporate technology that slipped memorably out of Jane Fonda's
control in the Nine to Five print room was an impossible dream. Since
those days, we have come to take much hi-tech stuff for granted. The
parish office in my last job had a monster of a machine that would
produce finished, stapled magazines in a little tray with a satisfied
electronic grunt, leading the secretary to comment, It's laid another
egg.' And what is true of reprographic progress is equally so in many
other areas of technological advance.
This process has escalated over the past three or four decades. It
has left many of us struggling to catch up, not sure whether we actually
want to do so, sometimes making a virtue of being dinosaurs. In the
course of fifteen years, the mobile phone has progressed from being the
size of a brick, a status-symbol only used by rich or powerful business
folk, to a must-have matchbox-sized accessory owned by huge numbers of
children as well as many (even most?) adults. We have moved from a
mid-1980s government target that there should be two BBC computers
(remember them?) in each school, into an age of electronic whiteboards,
computer suites with enough terminals for a whole class to use at once.
To Google' is a verb that we all now know, even though twelve years
back no-one had heard of it (because it hadn't been invented). Just as
some of us are congratulating ourselves on our ability to handle
e-mails, we find that the technology has moved on, that you're no-one
now if you don't tweet'. (And I don't.) If you want to have a friend,
be a friend. On Facebook, of course. (And I'm not.) Oh dear.
But enough of all that timidity in the face of progress. The time has
come to take our courage in both hands. This benefice is about to Go
Digital. Our website is being launched as I speak. Whether you're a
technophile or a technophobe, I hope you'll want to visit it. Finishing
touches are being put, though it will take a while for all the desired
data to be uploaded. But soon, very soon it will be there, waiting to
welcome you. Just go to www.cotswoldedgenorthbenefice.org In an age when looking online' is the first thing many people do when
they want information, it is really good that details about who we are
and what we do can be accessed in this way. We shall be glad for
suggestions, comments, feedback and we hope that as the website in
develops it will reflect such viewpoints.
The website has actually been facilitated by resources which are far
more important (in the end) than technological assets, a kind of
chain-reaction. It ran something like this. I raised the matter of a
website at the Benefice Council. One of the wardens (Ray) suggested I
approach so-and-so, who might be prepared to do the work. I did. They
felt they hadn't the expertise but put their thinking-caps on and
pointed me in the direction of a pair of professionals Mark and Janice
Hall. I already knew them as they were married in St Peter's a couple
of years back. Mark and Janice responded positively in fact more than
that, they generously offered to do the work as their contribution' to
church and village life. Many thanks to you both! I then approached
Lavinia Stephenson (editor of The Messenger) about the possibility of
being webmaster effectively the hard-working, hands-on manager of the
site. Without hesitation she agreed. This was a chain of positive
energy, the age-old but timeless way in which (I believe) the Holy
Spirit works.
Saying Yes!' does not depend upon technology but, in an age of
unlimited possibilities, such positive responses can have far-reaching
and wide-ranging effects which we can barely begin to imagine.

See also....
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