Category: Blog Entry

I’ve had what they call a ‘catch-up’ day today.  The E Mail is reasonably up to date but the pile on the side of the desk isn’t so good.  And I’ve been trying to put together the Working Groups for the Diocesan Strategy.  There’s another meeting this evening in Bridge of Allan as part of the reception process.

Meanwhile, here at Blogstead Episcopi, we are tentatively beginning discussion about The Sign At The End Of the Lane.  It clearly must demonstrate a proper welcome and inclusiveness – the more liturgically-minded residents pondered, ‘Grace and Peace ..’  It must not be suburban and needs to have an eye to the animal and pet issues – Poppy and the deer.    We need a committee.  It could also organise the Christmas festivities.  Watch this space.

81,016 – number of people in prison in England and Wales on Monday night

64,530 – number of people in prison in June 1999

193,700 – number of abortions in England and Wales in 2006

22,000 – number of abortions in 1968

No head for maths.  I am driving in Bamm Bamm’s Mini Cooper from Londonderry/Derry/Stroke City etc., etc. towards Belfast.  Ulsterbus’s posh new coaches are leaving Belfast about every 15 minutes and coming towards us.

Compare my situation to that of a person standing in the rain on the top of the Glenshane Pass.

Do the buses seem closer together because I am driving towards them?  Do I see more buses than the person standing still?  Compared to this, the doctrine of the Trinity seems child’s play.

Alison and I roared up to the little church in Dunfanaghy – the local for Blogstead Na Mara – this morning in Bamm Bamm’s Mini Cooper.  The bell was still giving that distinctive sort of tinny sound which is so characteristic of small Church of Ireland Churches and heralds Matins from the proper Prayer Book and Churchwardens with big rough hands giving out the hymn books in the porch.

The Service was conducted by Doug the Lay Reader and, as we struggled with the Urbs Fortitudinis, I remembered his other role as Starter at the Golf Club.  When our two boys were Junior Members, he used to give them the ‘gruff but kind’ treatment when they broke the rules like ‘NOT STARTING YOUR ROUND AT THE FIRST TEE’

 Clergy of course find worship in the pew a bit difficult.  But there was a magic moment which illuminated the whole service for me.  While Doug was reading to us about ‘de armies of de Ammonites’, I watched the organist go over to her severely disabled child in her wheel chair.  She wiped his mouth and gave her a wonderful smile – and she smiled in return.  It was a ‘murmur of angels’ wings moment’.  Forget the Diocesan Strategy – that’s what it is about.

And finally, today’s Independent on Sunday has an article suggesting that Arthur Ransome was a Bolshevik spy.  Is nothing sacred?

 

 

Remarkable place.

Sign close to Bamm Bamm’s apartment says, ‘Stop the new cemetery.  Don’t take it lying down.’

And, a little further along, Hillhall Presbyterian Church’s Wayside Pulpit says, ‘Always use sunblock.  Don’t block the Son’   It’s the theological sophistication of it that gets you.

I went on some church visits in Edinburgh today with Dom.  Our aim was to explore how worship is developing in different types of congregations within the SEC.  We’re partly exploring how we would shape an agenda for worship development with our congregations.  I find it surprising that, with all the focus that there has been on becoming inviting churches, etc., etc., there seems to have been less concentration than one might expect on worship.  Our worship is primarily eucharistic.  But that can be a piece of culture which, at worst, defines us on a ‘take it or leave it’ basis.  At best, the eucharist becomes a meeting place for people of all sorts of different traditions and none – and offers the integrity and reality of worship which may meet the needs of some of the people who are searching for the spiritual in our secular society.  But how?

Our clergy met today with Cecelia Clegg of the Centre for Theology and Public Issues to look at ‘applied spirituality’.  No I’m not sure either.  But it became a searching and very productive discussion about what happens in the interface between ourselves, our ministry and our spirituality.  And we talked about guilt – about how we beat ourselves up over things and allow others to make us feel guilty.  It’s hugely refreshing not to have to struggle to preserve the fiction that everything is just fine all the time.  Thank-you.

We’ve just had the second of a series of meetings across the diocese to look at our Strategy Document. It’s seems remarkable to me – about 25 came last night in Coupar Angus and another 35 in the Cathedral – as well as a meeting I had with Mothers’ Union Trustees. Life for some of our congregations is difficult but I find people both hopeful and delighted to be given hope and listened to. It’s very encouraging. I try to tell them that this is not about picking particular changes off the shelf and thinking that they will ‘do the trick’. It’s more a commitment towards growth, an inner buoyancy and trust which somehow oils the spirit-driven wheels of change and helps us to make the right choices.

Meanwhile here at Blogstead, our neighbour at No 3 [she-who-sleeps-between-two-bishops] is concerned that the newly-planted gardens will be eaten by the deer. She tells me that I must attach some gaudy and tinselly strips to the fence to discourage them. Or maybe I could just stand around in cope and mitre for a while?

It’s sad to see Scotland at the bottom of the league table behind Iceland, Norway and Ireland.  Scotland still gives me the impression of a society which works – small and cohesive communities; beautiful scenery, etc.  One of the markers of quality of life for me is the number of people who choose to stay in Scotland for their holidays.  In Northern Ireland it was always, ‘Last one out please turn off the lights’  But there is no doubt that there is shocking deprivation – my recent flight to the Costa Brava from Prestwick was a bit of an eye-opener and our Mark’s career as a physiotherapist at Monklands will bring him face to face with it.  But there seems to be an increasing readiness to ask hard questions about why Scotland’s economy seems a bit moribund and to look beyond the sloganising about ‘our oil.’

Interesting visit to our church in Alloa yesterday – it’s kind of catholic, charismatic and evangelical all at the same time.  They had three confirmation candidates.  They have no stipendiary clergy and in their strong commitment to the Community House, they probably have as much or more community engagement as any of our congregations.  They’re lovely people and they just did the practical thing of putting a fully-fitted kitchen in one corner of the church.  Why not?

No sooner back from General Synod – a complicated operation involving Brompton, car and 40 minute delay on the Forth Bridge – and it was straight into the planting of the Blogstead Gardens.  I am still bruised from my encounter with the rotivator last weekend.  So it was something of a relief to be laying out the lavender walk and thinking of my successors who will stroll there on sunlit mornings after saying the Office with their Chaplains.  By the way, has any member of the clergy ever anywhere moved into a church house where the garden has been maintained?  In our four previous houses, the gardens were all in a completely disastrous condition.  Why?