An Iconic Advent

I have not been around much recently. I seem to have been some what swept up by the comings and goings of life. The times I have been able to sit and reflect have been few and far between. But now is the season of Advent, a time set aside for reflection. A few weeks when we should try and hit the pause button, slow down and focus on the magnificent and humbling gift that is about to enter into our lives. One small tiny little life born in a manger vulnerable and defenceless, that will with time will become our salvation.

There seems to be a hundred and one examples of what Christmas should mean to us all going round. But to me there is nothing more iconic about Christmas than the Nativity scene.  I choose the word iconic deliberately, it is an image to be respected and revered. It is a leading example of all we should hold dear at Christmas and not just for the light of the world at the centre. The illustration, known so well to us all, is the image of a family, turned towards and centred on Christ. No matter how many thousands of times I have seen this image in it's many guises, both gaudy and plain, I never tire of it. Never cease to find a new message in it. It is a calling to all, to take your family, be with your family, share with your family and focus all those wonderful gifts and blessings in on Christ. My favourite images are those of a kneeling Mother and Father, these to me symbolise more than centring just the amazing in on Christ. To me it symbolises us as we come through our Advent pilgrimage to kneel at Christ's birth in prayer and thanksgiving and also maybe in fear and sadness asking the saviour to light the path to our own salvation.

I know there are many references of what Christmas means in today's world, which bits of secular life best reflect the Christian message in the modern world. I can not hope to compete with the great and glorious theological minds of our Bishops and their clergy. But for me this image of family is best reflected not when we gather to watch TV, hide in our phones or open our gifts. It is when we gather to share a meal. No matter how grand or how small a meal we have, the fact that we gather at the table, face each other, share one thing between us, talk, love and essentially break bread together, we share this image of family far better than at any other point this season. It is a starting point, for all the other love, sharing and giving we should do at this time of year. Both our Christian family gathered at the altar to share our meal and our own immediate family gathered round a table. Neatly poetic, neatly reflecting each other and the image of the nativity, a family centred on Christ that will turn and share his light with the world so the family gathered at the stable may grow.

Not just one life, every life

Almost 11 years ago I gave birth to my second son. He was a perfect little bundle of joy and compared to my older son his birth was easy. We sat and cuddled him beaming with joy and pride. However he had a slight whistle when he was breathing, gradually this got worse. He was whisked away and put in an incubator. Next to all the tiny premature babies, his massive 10lb figure looked to healthy and out of place. He was vulnerable though and they watched turning up the oxygen as his saturation fell. Eventually the identified the problem as a tension pneumothorax. They put in a chest drain, but this did not work either. So in the middle of the rush of post pregnancy hormones they took my precious child to another hospital. Both my husband and I followed. The problem however was sorted and one of the scariest 48 hours of our lives was over.
As the anniversary of his birth comes round again, we found ourselves anxiously watching monitors again. Hoping and praying that the medication will work and his breathing will normalise. It is a sudden awakening to just how lucky we are to have been given the gift of three children and how fragile that life is. Watching your own child struggle to breathe, whilst watching others washing up on a beach with their life extinguished is of course a difficult thing to see. The death of those children is tragic and wrong. The simple fact though, is that they were not the first. They are not the only children to die, they are just the first that washed up near our doorstep.

Our country now so suddenly moving to help these vulnerable people, is a good thing. Though slightly ironic that at the same time our politicians are debating on whether we should be allowed to kill our own people. We seem focussed on one set lives and one issue. Why are we so determined to fight for these lives, when we have watched others raped, masssacared, be-headed, tortured and bombed? Why fight for those when we want to kill those who become a burden in our country and those unborn lives that might make our own lives difficult. Why are some lives more important to us than others, why do we want to fight for some and destroy others. The answer is we want to do what makes us feel better. It makes us feel better to offer a home or throw some material things in their direction. It is a short term solution to a long term problem. Absolutely we should welcome them in and give them homes and love, but it is not going to stop people drowning trying to get here. It is not going to stop people suffocating lorries as they are trafficked into Europe. It is not going to stop those that can not leave Iraq, Syria and all other tormented countries from dying. We have to solve the whole problem and protect as many lives as we can from the Evil that is creeping not very subtly into the world around us.

When Christ knocks on our door he is not in just the most emotive headline story, he is in every vulnerable life. We have to be able to see him in every life, not just the convenient ones. Welcoming Christ in is not meant to be comfortable or easy it is meant to be hard. Every life is a gift from our Eternal Father, from the unborn one to the terminally ill one, each one needs our love and our protection. Can you see Christ or are you going to ignore him?

In the face of terror

I have been sitting here this morning sewing my sons badges on a blanket for camp, just as my Mother had done for me. On the telly I have been watching a docudrama about 7/7. The programme is just on in the back round but it is enough to make me think. I remember to, this day and what I was doing that day. I had our young baby and small toddler at home, I sat down with a cup of tea and put on the news. I texted my husband at work in Durham and then in turn checking all our family were safe in London. But what if I had not had an answer, what if the phone had been silent. It is a thought that none of us want to have and an experience no one should ever have to experience. Sewing these badges on, stitch by stitch keeping our family together both past and present, I don't want to go there. I can not even begin to imagine or feel what it might be like. Yet this grief that is not mine and these events I did not live through are making me cry. So many questions, why did they, how could they? Will we ever learn? What causes such hatred? They are questions none of us can answer, but that we all ask.

Not quite ten years on from this atrocity we all stood and prayed for more victims, of yet more terrorism. At precisely midday last Friday, when I was in Leeds. The city stopped.  The bell from the clock tower echoed around the buildings as we all stood remembering.

When these atrocities happen, we are drawn together, almost pulled together like magnets. The hatred and fear that causes these massacres of human life, always end in love. Those of us that are left, answer with love, courage and bravery.

These incidents happen so infrequently here. In other countries they happen almost daily. People's lives are lived constantly in fear. They have no strong army force or world class police force to protect them from 95% of the terror that could come their way. They watch friends and family blown to pieces. Fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, raped, beheaded and tortured. We are losing hundreds of young people to these countries to be radicalised and commit these atrocities to others.

We don't have the answers. However many people we stop or destroy or imprison, evil will still exist. While there is free will, some humans will always chose evil. It is the inevitability of the human condition, we are all unique therefore we are all different and will take a different approach to morality. What we can do as Christians though is show the world is not all bleak. We can answer the hate with love. We can bring compassion into daily turmoil. We can bring peace into anarchy. Even if we touch just one life, we change the whole of their world. If we can do just that we have made a difference and that person will take that out with them. Remember it, talk of it and maybe show others a bit of Christ's love too.

We can be the beacon of light in the darkest of places because we are part of the light that conquered all that is dark and evil.

Your life and my life

After receiving the Blessed Sacrament this morning, my daughter grabbed my first finger just she had as a baby. She held on so tight with grim determination to never let go. In fact as babies all my children did this for the first few months. Their first way of communicating faith and trust in me and my husband. They knew even then that we loved them and would protect them no matter what. We needed no one to tell us, we just knew we were responsible for this tiny defenceless life. When you conceive a child you feel instantly a surge of love and responsibility of the likes you have never felt before. It is perhaps the first sense you have that life is a valuable, precious and irreplaceable gift from God.

Once we have the value of life revealed to us, we begin to understand the sheer burden of responsibility we have. For it is not just this precious bundle of joy we are responsible for. As Christians we are responsible for the respect and upholding of all life. Different to that unique and ultimate bond we have for our children, it requires us to give of ourselves none the less. God came down to us on Earth and demonstrated once and for all, the value of life and the responsibility we have for it. The actions of humans caused his death, yet he sacrificed everything in order to show us the totality of his love and forgiveness to us.

Everything on this planet has been given to us from God. Each and every life from the tiniest insect to the largest living thing on earth. We should not need to be told to respect them. Governments should not need to force us to help them. It should come to us as a second nature. Sacrifice of ourselves and our comfort for the sake of others is meant to be the point of our faith. We are meant to love one another as he has loved us. When someone knocks on our door, we are meant to welcome in whoever stands there waiting.

We have become so self orientated that I think very often we lose our way slightly. We are surrounded by the message self is more important. How we feel, what we think is right, what we want is more important than the good of the many. Our lives have ceased to be God centred. Life centred. Truth Centred. It is ME centred.

If ME is all we are responsible for and ME is all we look after, then we disorder the delicate environment around us. We destroy communities, we destroy ecosystems and we corrupt the planet with our own self centred greed and we leave nothing for our children and their children's children. It will be gone.

It frightens me sometimes, that the very life I feel so defensive of  faces a very different life to the one I had, as does their children. We have a responsibility to live a Christ like life on this planet. If we are to truly honour our baptismal and confirmation vows, it is an essential part of our lives to sacrifice some of what we have and who we are to protect and nurture the valuable gift of creation God has given us. Each life as valuable as the one before it. Every life is someone's child, someone's flesh and blood and is as valuable as you and me.

Taking it Slow

I know I have not said much recently but I have been taking it slow. SLOW, I hear you say. Yes I have been very slow and this has not left me with more free time but less. This is because taking it slow has not meant sitting around. I have been taking the time to remove the convenience from my daily tasks.I have been making my own pasta,bread,  detergents and cosmetics. It has only by going back to these basics and learning what goes into my food and detergents that I have begun to realise the sheer amount of chemicals we heap into our bodies on a daily basis without even thinking about it and sometimes without even knowing. We are so eager to find the most convenient way of getting what we want, at the lowest price possible, we do not stop to think about the consequences for our own health, the planet or the other living creatures on it.

We have a habit of doing the same with the our faith. We constantly seek to make Church convenient, shorter and more relevant.  The Church has sought out Fresh Expressions of our faith diluting the Gospel and in some cases ignoring the sacraments entirely. We have diluted what should be central to our faith so much that many people do not understand what should be central to their faith. When you teach people shallow meaningless faith, you will only get a crowd of people who will stay as long as they want to consume your product. When your product ends or changes they leave. Their presence is not based on a faith in Christ or his teachings but on a shallow gimmick. When the gimmick ceases to be useful or changes into something they do not want they leave.

As a Church we need to look back at what should be central to our faith, return to putting Christ at the centre of our faith, mission and evangelism. It is only by spending time encountering Christ, learning the truths of our faith and by sharing them with others. Inviting them to join in our weekly meal, teaching them it's significance, allowing them time and space to encounter his love. This slow steady way of revealing Christ through our actions and his presence is the only sure way of growing the Church in any long time way. Christ is as relevant today as he was 2,000 years ago, he is present in our lives through the sacraments. He has not abandoned us, I only hope we do not abandon him.

When I got home........

Today you came home from your day and found your street gone. In it's place is a pile of rubble and smouldering ruins. In a state of shock you stand there for a few minutes unable to quite process where your life has gone. When you finally realise that you can not stand in the streets with your screaming and confused kids, you try to find a refuge. You are surrounded by destruction and fear. No one knows what to do. You are part of a crowd of hundreds wandering trying to find safety. Money means nothing now, there is nowhere that is safe. You have to keep moving, fleeing from what is around you. Who do you trust and where can you go. You are hungry, cold, frightened and you have nothing left but each other and what you have on.

Has that got your attention. Good.

For many people this living nightmare of hell is all the life they have. They are fleeing people who want to not just kill, but maim, torture, dismember and viciously cause as much violent mayhem as they can. Others live in the middle of war zones, constantly in fear of loosing their homes or each other. Others living in refugee camps that we would not dream of ever inhabiting. Still more live on the streets around us, who but for a few bad choices or mistakes have nothing left but the cardboard box they are sleeping in. We see images and news reports but do we really see. What if it was us?

I have lived two extremes. I have been the very middle class kid at a posh school. I have been the person living off ofthe grace of others, with only enough money to buy 10p crisps for my meals. Fortunately, I did not have to suffer long and with God's grace I got my life back on track. However it gives me a some what unique insight. I know what it is to suffer, but I know what it is to be distracted by the comforts of heating, houses, food and family. It is easy to turn a blind eye when we have comfort to the suffering of others. Yet it is a very thin line between comfortable and losing it all and between war and peace. We are all a ,ot closer to disaster than maybe we would like to admit.

On Sunday we heard how Jesus overturned the tables at the temple. His Father's house had become full of distractions. So distracting that the people no longer noticed what it was they were doing wrong or no longer cared. Our lives are so full of subliminal messages that what we as Christian's know to detract from the gospel. Yet because they constantly bombard our lives we begin to get distracted, then we make excuses and then we forget. We forget our neighbours, we forget our brother Christians.

What is worse than that is we convince ourselves we are doing nothing wrong.  We have our lives, our safety and security, we do not wish to sacrifice. So we sit watch the news, say our prayers and do nothing more. That is not right. Jesus did not come and see us riddled with sin and selfishness and say "Well this life thing is kind of nice, you are not worth the sacrifice"  Jesus used his body as his Father's temple. We tore it down and he rebuilt it in three days. He suffered, was discomfited and he sacrificed. It was not pleasant, it was not easy but we will reap it's rewards for eternity.

We receive Jesus into our lives via the Sacraments. We eat that broken body and that spilt blood, that we might receive God's grace. In receiving that grace we should be willing to share it with others that we might show his love through our actions. It won't be easy, it may not be pleasant but it should involve some form of sacrifice. Not only will we change lives but we will know our God better. It does not have to be much but one extra sacrifice this Lent for those in need, will bring you closer to others and your God.

Retreating from life

RETREAT

 The act or process of moving back or away, especially from something hazardous, formidable, or unpleasant 

Once a year I go on retreat. A chance to step back from a busy, hectic and sometimes hazardous existence that is my day to day life. A few days in which I can stop and eradicate everything that  normally surrounds me and find what is truly important. I can listen to the silence, find God and in turn find myself again.

We are so busy rushing to obtain ourselves in a secular existence. We leap from task to task, aspiration to aspiration, possession to possession looking for love and satisfaction. Each year I return from my retreat resolved not to let these things take over my life again. However surely as the day will begin, they creep in without me even noticing. It is not until I stop, remove everything and listen again,do I realise how much I have been overpowered by my own desires, wants and needs. 

When we remove ourselves from what we perceive to be our comforts and crutches, it is only then that we realise that they are in fact the things that are causing us to struggle in the first place. I have not been on retreat yet this year. Lent is however in itself a mini retreat of kinds. It serves as a small reminder to oneself that all we perceive as necessary, is not. It is a time to pause and assess what we are dependent on and how that affects our faith and trust in God.

There is so much surrounding us that appeals to our impulsive and petulant desires, more so than perhaps in any other generation. There is food, clothing, technology, possessions and sexual pleasure in plentiful quantities all around us and they are all so easy to acquire. Things that were once taboos are freely available over counters and monetary restrictions on what were once perceived as luxuries are now considered measures for poverty. They are all distractions and temptations, they all take away from the simplicity of life and a faith in God. They are not necessary.

When you go on retreat, you remove free and easy access to communication (with any luck). You have a simple and basic room and basic food. All the immediate pleasures and pressures of modern life removed. When you remove all temptation and when I say temptation I do not mean necessarily a big evil thing, I mean the small distractions that take God out of our sights. When you remove these you can see clearly the overwhelming and overpowering love of God. You realise that all your hopes, ambitions and desires are not needed to be loved, to exist and to live. In fact they stop you in your tracks and send you down a long and empty journey where love is always on the next step, achievement round the next  corner and acceptance over the next mountain. In reality you have achieved, you are accepted and above anything else you are loved just as you are now.

I appreciate that in busy lives we do not always feel that we can take a few days to remove all of these things from our lives (though I if you can, give it a go). I often find that when life feels to much and I need to retreat from all around me sooner than I can get away. A small time in Church is often the answer, a mini retreat if you like. There is nothing more rewarding than spending a few minutes in still silence, listening and finding a grounding in your faith again. Finding God's peace and place in our lives. 

At the waking and closing of each day I hope that God is centre of my life. That I have not been distracted by the commotion around me.  At the close of each day, when all is passed I am thankful for all the times when I have been distracted that God has reminded me that he is there. That he loves and forgives all the has been and all that shall be. 

Marked for life

There are many times in our lives when we are marked by God. At Baptism we are washed clean and anointed and welcomed into God's family. At confirmation we are marked by the Holy Spirit as the Bishop lays his hands on us and claims us for Christ. On Ash Wednesday we are marked with the cross. Quite possibly the most visible of the marks we receive, particularly if like me you forget it is there. But to be marked with the cross at this point in the year is significant on many levels. First of all, we are reminded of our mortality. "From dust you have come and to dust you will return". But also in receiving this mark you are reminded that though you are dust the cross has saved your soul for eternity. The cross reminds us of the sacrifice that was made for us to receive such grace. This tiny mark is the starting gun for our minds to focus on the Lenten period.

Gone is ordinary time and we turn to the purple of Lent. We turn our thoughts to the journey towards the cross. We take this journey through the stations of the cross, devotions and services in the lead up to Easter. There is also another more personal journey we must take alongside the set religious one. We also turn our thoughts to self examination, penitence, reconciliation and renewing our relationship with God.

I have a love/hate relationship with Lent. I like the idea of Lent but the cold hard reality of examining my conscience, seeking confession, absolution and then 40 days of penitential fasting is just a bit daunting. I know that once I have got the first bit over I will be more prepared for the latter. But that first jump is always the hardest, even though I know it will do me the most good. There is nothing comfortable about going to confession when you have your eyes fixed on the cross. You know that that suffering only exists because of what you (and others) have done. Yet that suffering also exists that we might be absolved. Nothing is better than that whiter than white feeling you get from being absolved, even if , like me it does not last long. Will power and discipline do not come easily to me. They are things that really have to be worked at and I need to be in the right frame of mind to succeed.

But Lent is a time for striving to be better, to make ourselves that little bit more worthy. Though we still be inherently stained by our own fallibility during our life on earth. We will ultimately be washed clean in the grace of God and kept safe for all eternity.

Christ's sacrifice for us is far more than we can ever give, but we can at least start Lent by being sorry for all we have done wrong. So if you have not already been to confession on Shrove Tuesday, might I recommend you give it a try.

And with all the company of heaven

There have been many occasions in the last few days when I have been reminded about the closeness of heaven to our lives. Some reminders have been painful and others more pleasant, even uplifting and regenerating. Nothing reminds us more so than the reading from Mass this morning, the narration of the transfiguration of Christ. In a dramatic revelation for those closest to Christ, whose minds were willing to see the revealed truth, he was transfigured before them. Christ bridged the gap between heaven and earth.

The temptation to think of heaven as somewhere far off that our little souls float off to as we shuffle off our mortal coils is convenient and very neat solution. It means we do not have to think about the complexities involved in the intertwining of our lives and that of the divine. Yet, we bring ourselves to Mass each week (hopefully) and witness right before us that intertwining of the mesh of heaven and earth. Our Priest invites us to join with all of heaven with these words :-

"Therefore with angels and archangels,

and with all the company of heaven"

Then after the Sanctus, we ourselves see the bridging of the gap as the bread and wine before us is transformed into Jesus at the hands of our Priests. 

When we stop and pause, when our minds are open and willing we can see the divine touch our lives. Be it in moments of pain and anguish or those of joy, God is closer than we like to think. He is there and present in every part of our lives. Sometimes his presence is thrust before us in obvious ways, such as through the sacraments. At other times he touches us in more gentle ways through the ways our lives are shaped. Maybe we should be more aware of how close God is to our lives and view the wonders and miracles of our lives with a more open mind.There are so many beautiful miracles all around us. We are so busy rushing and bustling around that we don't open our minds to the true miracle of life itself.

This week as we enter into Lent, may Christ touch your lives and mine in new ways each and every day. May we learn to see the divine in all around us, that in turn we may treat our life and others with the respect they deserve. 

The butterflies are back

While it is a bit early to be talking spring and new life talk, the mornings are getting lighter and it is warming slowly.However we have seen a lot of new beginnings in the last few weeks and best of all the butterflies are back. They reappeared just in time for the incumbent to hold up the bill for heating during the stewardship sermon. It seemed to me a brief and subtle "thank you Father" for keeping me warm.

These tiny vulnerable creatures have survived a cold winter and have started out a new year strong and new born from their cocoons. They will flutter around our Church for the best part of the year taking advantage of our hospitality, heating and flowers. They are our guests, without us they would die.

Once upon a time these butterflies must have journeyed into our Church, either through the door independently or on some flowers. Now they have made a home here. We all have a journey that led us to faith and ultimately through the doors of a Church. When we came we received that welcome, hospitality and for us biscuits (we don't find flowers so yummy). Welcome is not just important, it is vital,  Chances are that there is a reason why that new person stumbled through your doors this morning. They are looking for somewhere safe, warm, welcome and hospitable. They are looking to find Christ in everyone they meet. This does not mean they are looking for perfection, it means they are looking for a touch of humanity.

Much like our first days at nursery, school, university, college and work, our first time in a Church is a bold new step. Unlike the others which we ultimately have to do, we choose Church. Something calls us in. Be it reconciliation,  consolation or questions needing answers. Ultimately these are just reasons for finding our faith in God. They are the foot through the door moments. They are the moments when we can bring Christ into peoples lives, so like the butterflies they keep coming back.

If we get it right, it means we can bring new people and families to faith. If we get right they will keep coming back so they can learn about the Holy Trinity and it's place in our lives. If we get it right they in turn will turn to others and encourage many more through our doors. We should not concern ourselves with bums on seats, numbers, statistics and adaptations to our Church to encourage people in. If we bring Christ into peoples lives through love, hope, faith and charity, they will come to us.

5 years on

When the boxes were packed and the house empty and bare, we went to Church for the last time. I remember turning to a member of clergy at the post Mass leaving party and saying “How do I cope with this?” With the clerical voice of authority and wisdom he said “Do you drink?” Slightly bemused I replied in the affirmative. “Well then a bottle a day should suffice.” He said with a smile. So with these parting jewels of wisdom, we left for the last time.

Packed up in one lorry and down to the warmer end of the country, it may as well have been a different world. Stepping into the life of ordinands and later clergy is like stepping into an alternate reality. It is a time warped bubble of hectic serenity.

You step into a world that is very much like being back at boarding school, complete with afternoon tea with children full of fun running home from school as fast as possible for that all too precious cake.  You live in a world separate from reality, yet you cross the borders of college land and become deeply involved in reality. You encounter friendships and experiences that don’t just change you in the moment but for the rest of your life. So much changed the day the one family from the north east of England packed their bags and left for Oxford.

They talk of Formation (or what was known among spouses as the “F” word), when you leave your life you do so sceptical that such experiences can truly change who you are. But they do. It is like they take a raw family, naive and unaware and scrunch you together, run you through the tumble dryer several times and hang you out to dry in a completely different shape and colour to the way you went in.

You learn more about yourself and your family than you ever thought possible. You learn the meaning of sacrifice and the strength of family bonds that come out of such sacrifice. You know how the Priesthood works, you have seen others live it and work it but nothing hits you quite like the reality of your own husband training and living the Priesthood. The 9-5 is gone, the predictability of life vanishes, and your life stops at the drop of a hat, others become important. Your house is no longer just a home but an office. Simple things like support and confession become treks into the wilderness of next door parishes, because in yours your husband is the support and the confessor.  Most of all nothing is so bizarre and awesome as seeing your husband vested and offering Mass and baptising the faithful.

It has turned our world upside down. Would I change it for a minute? NO, never. It is chaotic and it has changed all of us but it has made us stronger, happier and the changes you see your husband make to other people’s lives is worth every single sacrifice. The joy is in the giving but also in the receiving and we have received the best life filled with so many blessings. Deo Gratias.

Into the unknown

It is dark, it is cold and the last thing I want to do is get up and catch a train. Looking back through my posts I realised how much the unknown used to terrify me. Moving around, going new places and meeting new people used to fill me with dread. However despite my reluctance to go out into the cold so early in the morning I realised I was feeling adventurous. No longer absolutely petrified or frozen by fear I was actually looking forward to it.

We all go on journeys, we usually know what our destination is and although the road sometimes takes detours or suffers traffic jams we get there. Indeed this was true of our journey, a few hiccups and minor detours but we arrived and in one piece. Rather like our move to Ilkley, I knew where I was headed but the rest was unknown.

Moving to Ilkley I had a 101 questions floating in my head. I agonized, fretted and lacked the ability to just trust. The experience taught me to trust a bit more, to hold my hand out a bit wider in the of chance someone might catch me. I will not say the more stationary emotional journey since arriving has not been without it's detours and traffic jams but we seem to be making good progress on the road, so to speak.

When we stand at the beginning of something new, we look at all the things that we anticipate with fear. You look at them, you focus on them and they grow until they fill the road ahead and you can not see a way around. What I have learnt since coming here is these road blocks are often the points in our lives where we might have a minor (or indeed a major) clash with another driver but the results are often unexpected and more often than not the end up going down the road you were headed in the first place but now the road is clear.

Learning that these obstacles in the road are not going to stop you forever is a valuable lesson. It is about having faith. It is about putting those fishing nets down as the early disciples did and following the path into what many would see as impossible. Following Christ is not impossible. It is not an easy journey but it is a rewarding one.  Christ himself faced the impossible, he died for us. When you learn to accept the fact that God made possible the impossible and gave us life eternal, you know you can conquer the smaller impossibilities.

Then all of a sudden going into the unknown is no longer impossible, In fact something really quite wonderful might happen. We got up, we took the train and we had a fantastic weekend. Today in the face of impossibility put down your nets submit to Christ and his teachings and see where he takes you. You might be stopped temporarily, stuck in a traffic jam or maybe take a detour around but one thing is sure, we can and we will find ways around the impossible because Christ will helps us through it all.

Freedom to........................................

Freedom suggests a bounty of ability, an unlimited licence do as we please because we can.  Some of the many guises of freedom have recently been up for debate. Freedom of speech, freedom of belief and freedom of equality. Many people took to the streets in a peaceful defence of our right to these things. As Pope Frances said we not only have a right to these things but an obligation to do them if we genuinely believe it is in the interest of the general well being of humanity. However, what he went on to say (in perhaps a misguided way) was freedom should come with it's own self imposed limitation, that of respect. We have the obligation to say what needs saying, but it should be done in a fashion that does not hurt or set out to offend. If we prod to much in a disrespectful manner, we can expect people to respond. We should not however have to live with violence as a response. Violence solves nothing. Healthy debate in which our freedom to air our concerns can be done intellectually and respectfully.

The trouble with freedom and equality is it has to work both ways. This is a bitter pill to swallow. For while we defend our right to say and believe what we want, we also have to listen to the opposition. We do not have to just listen but if we truly believe in freedom and equality we actually have to defend the oppositions right to say and believe what they want. Again this self limitation of respect for each other and life has to come into play here too.  But we have an obligation to listen, we have to accept and tolerate, no matter how hard this is. We should not and must not seek to silence or offend. We must keep our speech and our listening to reasoned debate. Seeking to place blame or name calling to silence those with whom we disagree is not part of the deal.

Freedom, therefore is not the limitless promise it at first glance appears to be. Equality is not a grasp all the power and step on those who have in our perception wronged us. We have all at points in our lives been entirely hypocritical in saying we believe in freedom and equality, when in reality we mean we believe in the freedom to do what I want and delivering that to the world is equality. We are at our hearts are all selfish beings. But because of this we can not and should not stand in judgement of those who have done the same. We should learn from our mistakes and our discomfort, and afford others an ear and freedom to state their beliefs. We should be prepared to hold together that which we so defiantly defend.