Following the Yellow Brick Road to Oblivion

Well it would appear that the Church thinks it has found the yellow brick road and they are determined to traverse it. The trouble with going to visit Oz is that you discover that rather than some magical change that a great being can bestow on you to change your future, you find you did indeed have all the skills and knowledge inside yourself all along you just had to learn how to use them. Equally you find the the great endgame your chasing is not what you thought it was. When will the hierachy learn the Church is not a great business and the mythical idea that you can create a marketing policy that will fill the pews. It is like looking for the Wizard of Oz, you will find it is not what you thought it was and what was needed was on the inside all along.

The situation we find ourselves in, encouraging less and less theological learning and training of leaders is a result of a hierachy who have largely been fast tracked from backgrounds that are not Church based with signifcant leanings towards a particular churchmanship. Meaning there are no checks and balances, no one to question the theology, no one to question the history and no one to actually look at why we need that corperate knowledge at the top to make sensible and wise decisions. Most crucially those at the top have very little understanding of what it means to be one of those "key limiting factors" in a parish like my husbands that is so poor that even our vicarage could not hold 20/30 people in one room. We struggle to have 15 in happy times when social events were a thing. A community that has struggled with technology over the pandemic becuase they either can't or wont engage with it. A community made up of some many different elements that meeting round a house would never bring people together like the neutral territory of the church and the church hall. A community much in need of the space to find peace everyday with an open door to a shrine and prayer, not the closed door of a house that is only there during the services. A place that can engage everyday with the need to see people, provide food, emotional support and the sacraments. For example someone who has no other vocation they need to attend to and they can then sit with someone while they wait for emergency services because they are suicidal or being threatened. Someone who can drop everything and be at the bedside of the dying. Being trained and set aside is not a bad thing, wearing clericals means that people can see you, approach you for help even if they don't regularly attend your church. It means that you are noticed as some one called by God to lead and help.

Having been seen, you are expected to be able to deal with people who are questioning, lost and in need of help and understanding. If we remove the deep theological training that college provides, we enter into superfcial answers that do not wash with people. One of the key issues with losing young people. Young people and indeed adults alike need boundaries, something to attempt to live within, even if they fail sometimes. This is why we have a catechism and why we have the sacrament of reconcilliation. We have something to have faith in and the eternal forgiveness when we fail. If we do not educate our leaders, how can they know what to teach and what to forgive. In short how can they live, the Bible as is, is not all the answers. There is much historic study in order, to gain understanding of what is written rather than just a superficial understanding, which would lead to both clergy and congregations understanding the value of the Sacraments as something vital.

We can not side line the Sacraments as something that can only happen when the rare trained Priest can turn up, is not a situation when can end up in. This is the salvation of people's souls we are talking about. In a community, that is fractured, tormeneted by gun crime, rivalry and poverty. The Church  building proivides a portal into something different a space to encounter the peace and the divine. It is a place where what is outside stays outside. When you come to a service you can encounter the kingdom of God here, on earth through the sacraments. For some this is a lifeline, in a turbulent and disturbed life, for others a time just to breathe and recieve the gift of God. But has the Church learnt nothing from the uproar surrounding thoe closing of Church buildings during the pandemic, from witholding the Sacraments from the people. In a time when people literally had nothing it was the need for that encounter with the divine that they were searching for. We recieved letters of complaints begging for the Church to be open and for the ability to recieve the Sacraments and indeed when other Churchs closed latterly we remained open giving people the space to recieve that divine gift in order to find the hope for another week. This can simply not be replaced with a buffet meal and a shallow chat about the Bible. Being a Chistian is hard, it is sacrficial and occassionally it can be boring, but I am fairly sure that dying and abandoned on the cross Jesus didn't suddenly say this is a bit hard and no one much is here anymore I need to rethink my stratergy. No, he continued to his death with instructions for our future. Instructions and teachings that have been carried through the Apostolic line of Succession to uphold the Church for thousands of years, soemtimes through booms sometimes through quiet times. But we must not give in or up because the times are hard, we most engage, learn from and embrace the past as well as the present. We must continue to train our leaders to understand that which they teach, the history and theology from whence they came. We must have enough of those paid to have the time to set aside for people to be there 24 hours a day to provide those Sacraments as required for each and every soul in their care. We must have buildings that are open, quiet, beautiful and transcendentant in order to allow all to encounter God wether they want to attend a service or not. The Church and Faith can not be managed like a business, because it is a different entity one that pervades all areas of our life, demands far more than 9-5 hours and door closed at the end of buisness. We must cease our search for The Wizard of OZ  here and learn to embrace and encounter the wonderful world of awesome gifts we have alredy had bestowed upon us by God. Or else we will find the emptiness of the false journey and we will lose the People, the Faith and The Church forever.

The value of life

Somewhere in the world there is a union of gametes, their cells dividing multiplying into a miraculous transformation. It is life from the start, living, growing, developing,a child.

Somewhere in the world a tiny seed unfurls its foliage for the first time, breaking through the hard deep soil. It shows a strength and tenacity to have got this far, it will grow steadily, it will become food, and inturn give life to another.

Somewhere in the world there is an insect breaking from its cocoon, it may only have hours or days to live but in its short lifetime it will provide a valuable service to our plant life that ensures our food supply endures.

The list goes on and on, from the tiniest cells to the largest of the plant and animal kingdoms we all depend on each other, we should all value each other. Each tiny cell is alive, be it one or multiple. Each life is a life be it emerging and developing or fully formed. Each one has a part to play, each of us a role in the world around us.

God said, 'Let us make man in our own image, in the likeness of ourselves, and let them be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven, the cattle, all the wild animals and all the creatures that creep along the ground.' God created man in the image of himself, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them. God blessed them, saying to them, 'Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven and all the living creatures that move on earth.' God also said, 'Look, to you I give all the seed-bearing plants everywhere on the surface of the earth, and all the trees with seed-bearing fruit; this will be your food. And to all the wild animals, all the birds of heaven and all the living creatures that creep along the ground, I give all the foliage of the plants as their food.' And so it was. God saw all he had made, and indeed it was very good. Evening came and morning came: the sixth day.

Genesis 1 26-31

However you believe God created Earth, it is beyond doubt that his divine hand created all that lives and breathes. It is unequivicol that we are made the custodians of the earth and all that lives and breathes that we may support, grow and give life to one another. It is our duty and I mean duty, to protect, enrich and support each living being. From the smallest seedling, to the unborn child, to the neglected child,to the dying person,  to the changing climate, to the trees being felled, to the vast forest fires, to the tiniest ant on earth.We are dependent on each life and each life is dependent on us.

It is election time and there is no more important time to make our voices heard and no greater opportunity to influence the way the future unfolds. We have a duty to consider the party policies and how they protect life, from the unborn life, to the neglected life, to the poverty stricken life, to the refugee life, to the dying life  and to the environment. No life should be un important. Party Policies can be made law, it is not worth taking the chance that this policy or that will not be put into action if we vote for them.

 "900 years of time and space and I've never met someone who wasn't important".  The 11th Doctor

I appreciate the above quote is from a fictional character but it is no less true, if we were to travel all of time and space, if we could hold creation in our hands as God, we would maybe see far better how valuable the entricate web of life is. How dependent we are on other lives and how dependent their lives are on us. With one swift move I could end your life, with another I could give it.

 I will leave you with one final quote from JRR Tolkein. It is easy to hand to power to those who seem to have to power to change it all. Yes, in voting we have one small act in it and they make the greater changes. But if we want the powers to be to see the value of life, community and even Christianity, we must live it, we must breathe it and we must be it to all we encounter. It is a collection of small everyday actions, each tiny gesture added together that can become a tidal wave that can eradicate evil from this world. Go today and make each action you have a life giving one, it is what we were created to do.

“Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love.”

Called to prayer

Sitting in the sunshine in the hammock the other day watching the many clouds float by, swinging gently back and forth. The background noise of city life hanging in the air but not imposing itself in my space. The sounds of bird song dominated and I just felt an enormous wave of gratitude and grace. It was just one of those moments when I was immensely thankful for the many blessings we have received in this life. It occurred to me, that I was most grateful for the relative silence and solitude.
  For me, as a clergy spouse, Church is very rarely a private encounter with God. It is hard to concentrate on building a relationship, when you have a thousand and one things on your mind, when people want to talk and when you are aware that everyone has a point of view on how you as a family chose to worship and sometimes even just how you live. The last few weeks have been very private encounters with Christ, both at Mass and as I have lived my life. There has been time, space, peace and quiet to allow my relationship build up again. I had not realised quite how distracted I had been by the mechanics of Parish life, how far my focus had drifted.
  But swinging in that hammock, seeing a glimmer of a rainbow forming on it's edge, I was reminded of God's promise and became aware with quite a jolt of how much closer I have got to God in this period of time. It feels very much like I have been called to prayer in the silence, the space, the gaps. It feels like a breath of fresh air in my lungs and I have been able to spend my time learning, re-reading and praying. The consequence being that I have developed and reaffirmed my faith, found the ability again to just place my life at his feet and to discern the direction I should be taking in my relationship with Christ. It really is in the silence and stillness that we hear the most.

Shocking News

The last few weeks, are weeks that I never thought I would ever have to live through. I never imagined that our little family would be the one to go through trauma. You always expect these events to happen to someone else, but it has nevertheless been traumatic. It didn't feel so at first, I was getting up, getting through the day, surviving. We all were. But it soon became apparent that auto pilot only got us so far. We were gradually slipping, falling into shock. We were tired, emotional and though we were still surviving it was all we were doing. We did not see it coming, we did not think it would be us.

The diagnosis of a spinal tumor in my husband was upsetting enough. The journey to surgery a fairly simple one, however to watch a seemingly healthy mobile person, reduced to being immobile not just once but twice is agonizing. However both times there were complications, distressing times and heartbreaking times. As a family our coping mechanisms began to fracture. We are a close family, we have no secrets from each other. We talk everyday, we share meals together and spend most of our time enjoying each others company, as well as inviting people in to share in our family life. Inspite of this, it all proved a little to much to do alone. 

When we all started to fall apart, due to exhaustion and shock, a cloud of prayer lifted us, friends old and new supported us in so many ways. I was actually genuinely amazed by how much love there was surrounding us. For four long weeks people visited and we sat as a family round my husbands bedside. Though there were many tears along the way, surrounding this little bed there was also laughter and love. We saw some stay longer than us and many come and go but no one had the level of family and friends around their side as we did. We were enormously humbled and grateful. You could genuinely feel the Holy Spirit at work. 

It is safe to say that though are kids are wonderfully stoic in many ways and their faith also carries them far. However, I was fraying around the edges, it is hardly surprising that they started to need extra help to. This is where the fantastic Place2Be team picked up the pieces. Place2Be have been a fantastic support not only to my children but also to me. I had massively underestimated the impact the illness would have on us all, the lack of sleep, the constant travelling, exams, emotional upheaval and family stresses. School made the recommended referral to help us cope with the shellshock of the events as they happened. If it had been hard enough to accept support of  friends when I needed it, this was a whole new hurdle. But the story of the man on the roof during a flood, asking God why he did not help came to mind. I felt very much overwhelmed at this point and it is only now with time and space that I appreciate how overwhelmed I felt. Pulled in so many directions, with so many people needing so much. Place2Be helped me carry the kids through, one of them in particular. If it had not been for the organisation being in school to give my child the time and space to voice their fears and anxieties at a time they did not want to burden me with more, I am not sure where we would be. The counsellor kept in close contact with me to and helped me talk through things too. Often helping me to realise that actually sometimes we all need help. It is very much true that  God knew just when to place help in our paths in so many ways and with so many people. 

I am so enormously grateful to everyone for pulling together and being there for us, from the tiniest prayers to weekends given up. I can not sing the praises of Place2Be enough, they do such fantastic work with children in our school system and I am thrilled to see child mental health being taken so much more seriously than when I was at school.

More than that I have definitely come away with a reaffirmed faith, there has been no doubt as to why I only had one set of footprints during those few weeks. I was not alone, I was very much carried by my faith and the Holy Spirit. It has taken me a while to process, a few days to realise the extent of the impact on our lives. It feels a bit like when I looked back at the first year of all my children's lives, going how did I get here. I am asking the same now, how did I get here? Bur get here we did, we survived. Undoubtedly it is because I had a great faith, fantastic children, help from unexpected places and amazing friends. But now the healing process must continue for us all, as we watch, help and guide my husband through his recovery.

I just want to say thank you to you all. Each and everyone of you. 

Thanks be to God for healing, friendship and faith.

From Moomin Valley to Lourdes

“But one needs a change sometimes. We take everything too much for granted, including each other.”

 – Moominmamma (Moominpappa At Sea)

A very dear friend sent me a pin of Moominmamma to wear over the last few weeks, a reminder of our friendship and that I was never alone. Moominmamma is the matriarch of the Moomin family and at the moment this little pin holds so much symbolism for me.

First of all there is the quote above. It has always been one of my favorites but given the recent course of events, I have realised just how much I had taken everything for granted including my family and friends. It has only been with the imminent challenges and struggles that I have become aware of just how precious they all are. It has been a revelation as to how valuable the life and memories that we have together are. Moominmamma, always values each and every part of her life. She pays attention to each and every detail making sure everyone has just what they need.  The necessity for this has been all to blatantly spelled out for me over the last few weeks,both in the way I have come to treat others but in the way they have been there for us.

So Moominmamma sits on my collar everyday. She watches over me like my friend has, reminding me of how I should be as a wife, a mother and a friend.But this gentle loving creature sitting there reminds me of something more.

When my friend gave me the pin she said she had had a reticence about not giving me something Christian to watch over me. The parallels are there though. This quiet Mother figure sitting there watching over me, is not that dissimilar to another Mother who also carries out this duty.  

Over the last few days I have sought the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary. I have prayed fervently to her and sprinkled Holy Water from her Shrine in Lourdes. Other visitors too, have sought her intercession and asked her to wrap her motherly cloak of love around us all.  Her presence surrounds us, her motherly love has held us close and her intercessions have held us strong. She is our heavenly mother, she knows our pain, worry and loss, as we watch those close to us suffer. She can hold those feelings and offer them up to her Son. Through many of my darkest and my happiest hours I have sought the intercession of Our Lady. Her Motherly love has calmed my storms, eased my fears, guided me towards her son when I thought I was lost. Much like Moominmamma watches over her family and guests. Moominmamma is my friendly earthly guardian and she sits there reminding me of the overwhelming love that my family and friends have given and continue to give. But each time I glance at my pin I am also reminded of that great Motherly love of Our Lady and then on past that to the Divine love of her Son. We may feel alone, lost at sea when we are faced with our world turning upside down. We may feel that life may never be the same again, and maybe it won't, but at least we will have learned to value those around us a little more. Also, we 

will have revealed the immense power of Our Lady's love and intercession. Maybe you would like to join me in praying the Hail Mary below the picture, so that you to may begin to discover her maternal presence too.

Hail Mary, full of grace,
the Lord is with you.
Blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
pray for us sinners,
now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.

On the washing of Feet (literally and metaphorically)

"When he had washed their feet and put on his clothes again he went back to the table.'Do you understand' he said 'what I have done to you?You call me Master and Lord, and rightly, so I,am. If I, then, the Lord and Master , have washed your feet, you should wash each other's feet. I have given you an example so that you may copy what I have done to you'"

 Maundy Thursday seems a whole eternity away, so the days since have been consumed by waking, school run and hospital and then the same in reverse. It is genuinely beginning to feel like there was never a life before this.  However last Maundy Thursday my husband preached a very personal sermon on how he was going to have to let others wash his feet for a while. While it was meant somewhat metaphorically at the time, it has proven to be more literally true than either us had really anticipated.  I had sat in my seat feeling quite smug, thinking it will do him so good to let others help him. To let people do things for a while. I was maybe a tad too smug, it should have been a warning sign to me.

 Over these last few days Christ has been very much been in our presence both in the Sacraments and in the ministry of our friends. It is easy to let Christ in to our hearts, to minister to others. It is incredibly hard to accept that your shoulders do not have to bear the cross entirely alone. It is harder still, to have the humility to let others in and share the load. I had thought that I had long ago learned to let go, to give my heart, my soul, my everything to Christ. It has turned out, I may have been a little presumptuous in this area. A little resistant to allowing Christ to carry and share the burden. Someone said on Twitter this morning that, when we offer prayers, we offer them to God because they are too painful for us to carry. It has taken me the time to offer those prayers for myself so completely and honestly, to give that pain to God, to allow him to wash my feet. 

Christ's sacrifice, was one of unwavering unconditional love. It would appear that learning to accept that means you are constantly having to learn to accept yourself and allow Christ to love the very person you are. He can see my suffering and he offers his love but I have to accept it. I have to chose him, I have the freewill to walk away, to become complacent, to refuse the help. My shoulders it appears are broad, but they can not carry the world. My heart may carry a world of pain, but it will break. My mind can hold a lot, but it has to give way. Today once more I accept Christ into my life, with a bit more humility and with the acceptance that I need the help and the love and the presence of Christ.

In the presence of the Lord

"Suffering is nothing by itself. But suffering shared with the Passion of Christ is a wonderful gift, the most beautiful gift, a token of love"

Mother Theresa

Anyone who has ever doubted the trans formative powers of  the sacraments, ought to go to hospital with a Priest. Though I have always had a deeply held conviction about the Real Presence and the trans formative powers of the Sacraments, the experience of receiving them amidst your own suffering and trials is something else. For those of you who do not know, my husband has recently undergone surgery for a spinal tumour. The series of events has been a roller coaster of emotions, yet always at just the right moment just when it is needed and without request up pops a Priest with the Sacrament. The previous moments of stress and agitations are for a second becalmed and the Lord is almost tangible in the air. I have had moments in Mass when I have experienced God's amazing grace and presence but never so much as I have this last week. The difference in not only myself but my husband is stark and overwhelming. It is such an amazing grace and force of peace in a time when you feel your heart might just break. The vulnerability that has come from watching my loved one suffer, has been almost unbearable. The ability to accept help, is not something I come to easily. I am not the one who falls apart, I am the one who copes. This week any vestige of such pride filled behaviour has gone. Without the Sacraments and the prayers of others I am quite sure I would be a complete wreck by now. The Lord's presence changes us, and through us changes the world, of that I am more certain than I have ever  been before.

It has been a long time since I wrote a poem, however today I felt moved to do so. The poem tells much more than I could here of my journey these last few days.

Presence

Lord I have walked my life with you.

Sometimes glad and sometimes sad.

Many times I turned away, but I returned.

Every step I took seems easy now.

Cause now I walk through mud.

Dragging, sticking and holding fast.

Still, I feel you here.

Lord I walk this path with you.

Tortured, pained and helpless.

Above I see your cross, your suffering,

The hope in your return.

Each day the nails drive in,

Digging deeper, my strength has waned

Still, I see you here.

Lord I am stumbling with you.

My heart it, cannot bear,

The times I must climb up again,

Only that I should fall once more.

Heavy and burdensome, I struggle.

Still, you carry me there.

Lord I am hanging here,

Fatigued, beaten and broken.

Many times, I fear your absence,

But I trust that you are here.

For as your mortal life expired,

So your divine presence returned.

Still, I turn to you.

Lord I am in your empty tomb.

Searching, frantic and lost.

Your absence here, is not real,

As your presence radiates all around.

Holding, carrying and lifting me.

Every time I lose you,

Your love touches my heart.

Still, you are here.

Your body lifted high before me here.

Offered, received and consumed.

It’s reception sustains me,

Though my body, heart and mind breaks.

Your presence here, hope comfort and strength.

Your peace guides me.

Still, you take my hand.