Thank you & Happy Birthday

My granddad turned 90 the other week. They threw a party for him at the sheltered accommodation where he lives. During the do we at together and talked. Well actually he did most of the talking and I just listened. This is often the case with family and it’s the way I like it; it’s like panning for gold or precious stones. There are always one or two priceless gems in there. One of the things I always get a sense of when sitting with him is his simple sense of gratitude for having lived his life; he respects the fact that he has had the opportunity to live a life, something I’ve certainly not always had myself. During the conversation he recounted a tale from the war. He was in the Royal Navy and it was at the time when the allies were invading Italy. He told me that the "American’s" had made a big error and that his ship was under bombardment. During the battle the ship was hit by a shell that went right through to engineering. Somehow it never went off and as a result he and his crew mates were spared. His friend Percy, who went to sea with him, was not so fortunate he never came back. He later said that he has been a very fortunate man throughout his life. Like everyone he has known his share of suffering, but he knows how fortunate he has been to have had the chance to live the life he has had.

As I was driving back home that evening I was really struck by what he had said. If that shell had gone off you may well be reading something far more interesting right now. Think about it if he had been killed that day I would not be here and none of my family would have been born. Think about it we are so fortunate to experience life at all, in so many ways we all beat the odds. How many bullets have we dodge to get where we are today? How many shells have landed in our engine rooms and yet somehow failed to go off?

Often in life when trouble strikes we all ask the question why me? Why is this happening to me? It’s a universal question and yet is a senseless one. It is a question born from taking life personally, it is a self centred question and one that is probably the curse of the modern age. The truth is that when bad things happen they are not just happening to us personally, they are happening to others too.

The question “Why me?” always brings that 1960’s classic film “Zulu” to mind and one particular scene just before the encampment at Rorks Drift is attacked. The soldiers are waiting as the Dutch missionary is being sent away crying out “you are all going to die, can’t you see that, you are all going to die.” The camera then focuses on one private who has fear written all over his face he asks the question out loud “Why, why us” to which Colour Sergeant Bourne answers “Because we’re here lad and nobody else, just us.”

Clip of Colour Sergeant Bourne aswering the question Why?

Because we are here, we have been given the most precious gift that is life. We have been given the opportunity to live life. Yes sometimes that is hard and painful, but it is life, a privilege I have not always appreciated.

Birthdays are oh so important and they should be marked and celebrated. They are truly “Holy Days”; they are an opportunity to honour the sacredness of our lives; they are opportunities to recognise one another’s sacred uniqueness. As Henri Nouwen so delightfully said “We should never forget our birthdays or the birthdays of those who are close to us. Birthdays keep us childlike. They remind us that what is important is not what we do or accomplish, not what we have or who we know, but that we are, here and now. On birthdays let us be grateful for the gift of life.”

Now some people have two birthdays. I am not just talking about the Queen here by the way. Alcoholics in recovery also celebrate a second birthday. They celebrate their sobriety birthday as well as their belly button birthday, a kind of re-birthday if you like. Mine is the 10^th October 2003. On this day I began a journey turn down a different path, I began my life journey again. I turned from non-being to living. Forrest Church when reflecting on his new life after 10 or more years of sobriety wrote the following in the last few months of his life as he was succumbing to cancer:

"Taken literally (in Hebrew and Greek as well as Latin), "conversion" is not "re-birth" but "turning". Once converted, we re-direct our journey. The American short-story writer Raymond Carver turned his life around by a decision to stop drinking. From that point forward, he met life's trials with equanimity and grace. When dying of brain cancer at the age of forty-nine. Carver summed up the nine years of freedom he had enjoyed during what turned out to be the final decade of his life with same word that lept to mind when I give daily thanks for a yearlong reprieve from my cancer: "gravy".

When we see life as the precious gift that it is, when we celebrate our birthday as a truly holy day we see that everything is indeed “gravy”

Rumi the Sufi mystic said:

“For sixty years I have been forgetful,

every minute, but not for a second

has this flowing toward me stopped or slowed.

I deserve nothing. Today I recognise

that I am the guest the mystics talk about.

I play this living music for my host.

Everything today is for the host.”

We are all guests in life, guest of this world. Surely we should offer thanks and praise for the very fact that we can take the breath of life into our lungs?

Meister Eckhart said that “if the only prayer you said the whole of your life was "thank you", that would suffice.” "Thank you" is the greatest prayer of them all. I have a friend who recites that prayer with every breath when he goes swimming. This man has known the pain that life can bring; he's also been responsible for creating plenty of it himself. He has changed though and as a result is grateful for the fact that he can draw breath. He says thank you for every single breath.

...that takes my breath away...

Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, the author of “Gigi” once said. “What a wonderful life I’ve had. I only wish I had realised it sooner.” These are very similar sentiments to those uttered by my granddad. Now who would have thought that a French novelist and a former market trader from Batley would come from the same school of philosophy?

I wonder how often we give thanks and praise for the fact that we draw breath at all; I wonder how often we give thanks and praise for all the things in our lives that are given to us through no real effort on our part. I believe if we saw each second as a precious grace, a free gift, we may just begin to see life as an invitation; an invitation to who knows what? Well isn’t that the great mystery of life, we do not know what is coming.

Religion for me is essentially about how we live with ourselves, one another and whatever it is that we believe permeates all life. For me everything matters; it matters what we do and just as much what we do not do. That is why I believe it is so very important to give thanks for life. I believe that every time we say thank you for what life has brought to us we instantly give back to life in a loving positive way and by doing so we invite more of life to us. In that creative interchange, in my experience, God comes to life. We need to say thank you.

We also need to say thank you to one another. Why you may well ask? Well because when we do so we encourage others to do likewise, to give thanks for life itself, we encourage others to bring to life that create interchange and incarnate thanks, thanks for life.

I have written before of my belief in the “Chaos Theory of Compassion”, well maybe this is the “Chaos Theory of Thank You”. If we each of us focus on offering thanks for all that is our lives, especially to one another we may just spark chain reactions of thanks all over the world. Just imagine what our world would be like if each morning we awoke and simply said thank you for the fact that we can draw breath and then continued offering thanks and praise for all that life offers to us. Just imagine that for a moment.

This is no great task, anyone can do it. Try focussing on offering thanks and praise for the simple fact that we draw breath at all; Look at the world through thankful eyes. Yes we all have burdens to bear, of body, mind and spirit but I suspect that these may become easier to carry if we gave thanks for life for truly it is the measure of our days.

“For the sun and the dawn

Which we did not create;

For the moon and the evening

Which we did not make;

For food which we plant

But cannot grow;…

We lift up our hearts in thanks this day.”

By Richard M. Fewkes

Courage: We can be heroes every day

One thing about the modern multi-media age is that it throws up instant heroes. People can do a heroic act in some part of the world and if it is caught on film or the person is filmed shortly afterwards within hours it can have gone viral and people all over the world soon get know of their heroic deed. Well such a thing happened last week.

I'm sure you heard about  Charles Ramsey?

He became famous by responding to screams he heard coming from a home in his neighbourhood. He thought it was a domestic dispute and broke into the home to free three women who were held captive there. The three women turned out to be Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus and Michelle Knight. They had been missing for ten years and were presumed dead. They had in fact been held prisoner in the Cleveland home that Ramsey had rescued them from. Ramsey did not consider himself a hero and said he was only doing what any right minded citizen would do and certainly did not feel he ought to rewarded for his actions and any rewards ought to be given to the three women. Nevertheless he has become a modern day hero and has been held up to acclaim all over the world. He has become a modern day hero, if only for one day.

Heroes can be found in every single human tradition. They have existed ever since we began telling stories around the camp fire. Ancient Greek and Roman mythology spoke of Aneaus, Hercules, Odysseus and Theseus. The Hebrew Scriptures describe the heroic deeds of David, Joseph, Moses and Samson. Similar stories can be found in every culture. They describe heroic figures who stood up for righteousness and made a difference in their time and place.

The stories we tell today are full of heroic characters. We only need look at the recent remaking of the comic strip super heroes such as Spiderman, Batman, The X-Men, or Star Wars, Harry Potter, Dr Who, the Lord of the Rings, James Bond, Indiana Jones, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. These are modern day heroes, but they are no different in character to the heroes of ancient times.

The heroes of ancient times were endowed with great strength and were often descendants of the gods; while the modern day heroes tend to be superhuman mutations. Both the ancient and modern seem beyond the reach of mere mortals. Even momentary acts of heroism seem to be outside the scope of ordinary people. Charles Ramsay has become a modern day hero because he did something outside of the norm and also reacted to what he did in such a humble and almost startled way.

So is the song true, can we all be heroes just for one day?

I was recently chatting with my brother law. In the middle of the conversation my niece Aimee asked what the difference between heroism and courage was? Dave struggled to answer and I thought about it for a short while and then said something like “heroism is a single act a momentary thing that a person does on the spur of the moment without really thinking about the consequences, it is also something that is recognised by others. Where as courage seems a quiet consistent ordinary activity that almost goes unnoticed and is rarely glorified. It's about sticking at something despite the presence of real fear. As I see it courage is something that materialises in the ordinary.”

I recently came across the following, it speaks beautifully and powerfully to me about the everyday characteristics of courage:

 "The Art of facing Things" By Mark Nepo

"What people have forgotten is what every salmon knows.  Salmon have much to teach us about the art of facing things.  In swimming up waterfalls, these remarkable creatures seem to defy gravity.  It is an amazing thing to behold.  A closer look reveals a wisdom for all beings who want to thrive.

What the salmon somehow know, is how to turn their underside—from centre to tail—into the powerful current coming at them, which hits them squarely, and the impact then launches them out and further out and up the waterfall; to which their reaction is, again, to turn their underside back into the powerful current that, of course, again hits them squarely; and this successive impact launches them further out and up the waterfall.  Their leaning into what they face, bounces them further and further along their unlikely journey.

From a distance, it seems magical, as if these mighty fish are flying, conquering their element.  In actuality, they are deeply at one with their element, vibrantly and thoroughly engaged in a compelling dance of turning-toward-and-being-hit-squarely that moves them through water and air to the very source of their nature.

In terms useful to the life of the spirit, the salmon are constantly faithful in exposing their underside to the current coming at them.  Mysteriously, it is the physics of this courage that enables them to move through life, as they know it, so directly.  We can learn from this very active paradox; for we, too, must be as faithful to living in the open if we are to stay real in the face of our daily experience.  In order not to be swept away by what the day brings, we too, must find a way to lean into the forces that hit us so squarely.

The salmon offer us a way to face truth without shutting down.  They show us how leaning into our experience, though we don’t like the hit, moves us on.  Time and again, though we’d rather turn away, it is the impact of being revealed, through our willingness to be vulnerable; that enables us to experience both mystery and grace”

Courage in many ways is the essence of life, maybe it is our daily bread. Anais Nin once said “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.” I think that there is something very powerful in these nine simple words. I’m sure we can all think of moments when our own lives have either expanded or shrunk in proportion to our courage. Courage itself comes from the French root “Cuer” meaning heart. To have courage is to have strength of heart. Courage is a consistent and sustaining love, it is a spiritual energy that sustains us in sickness and in health in loss or disappointment.

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to the size and inclusiveness of our vision and our heart; life shrinks or expands in service of high and noble ideals that allows life to evolve to a higher plain. It is not just about risking everything and overcoming fear, that may well be bravery or even heroism, but I'm not sure it's courage. Many people risk and sacrifice their lives but not always in the service of love and life, they do so in a destructive way that is against life. Such people are fearless, but I’m not sure that they are courageous.

So how do we know if what we are doing is expanding or shrinking life?

Well during the 3^rd century the theologian Origin came up with a two part test to determine whether a person was interpreting scripture rightly. I think that we can expand this same test and apply it to how we live our lives in 21^st century Britain. Origin’s formula claims that our course of action must always meet two criteria it must be both useful to us and at the same time worthy of God.

This to me seems to be the essence of courage it must be useful to humanity and at the same time worthy of God. To have courage is to have strength of heart and to live from our hearts in our ordinary everyday activities.

Howard Thurman said the following on "Courage"

"There is a quiet courage that comes from an inner spring of confidence in the meaning and significance of life. Such courage is an underground river, flowing far beneath the shifting events of one's experience, keeping alive a thousand little springs of action. It has neither trumpets to announce it nor crowds to applaud; it is best seen in the lives of men and women who do their work from day to day without hurry and without fever. It is the patient waiting of the humble person whose integrity keeps his spirit sweet and his heart strong. Wherever one encounters it, a lift is given to life and vast reassurance invades the being. To walk with such a person in the daily round is to keep company with the angels"

Courage is a way of living and breathing it’s about living openly and vulnerably in the world. It is about bringing this attitude of Origin’s into life itself, it needs to be useful to us and worthy of God. We can bring this attitude into any situation, even the most difficult. It is not just present in the middle of a crisis when all is going wrong it is also there living and breathing as life returns to normal at the end of a crisis as we start to rebuild life when the storms have blown away. Courage comes in those ordinary acts of love as we walk slowly through life. It is courage that allows us to learn that even when life has betrayed us, love is still present. 

It is courage that allows us to stay open to life even when the storms are really blowing. It is courage that is formed in the heart; it is courage that is the ultimate act of faith; it is courage that keeps us open to life so that we can live in ways that are useful to everyone and worthy of God.

Yes we can all be heroes, we can perform heroic acts, we can all be heroes even if it is just for one day. Courage though is something more, something deeper, something that comes from the heart, from that place deep within each of us...it is something that has to be useful to life and worthy of God.

I’d like to end this little chip of a blog with the following words on courage by J. Ruth Gendler.

“Courage has roots. She sleeps on a futon on the floor and lives close to the ground. Courage looks you straight in the eye. She is not impressed with power trippers, and she knows first aid. Courage is not afraid to weep, and she is not afraid to pray, even when she is not sure who she is praying to. When courage walks, it is clear that she has made the journey from loneliness to solitude. The people who told me she is stern were not lying; they just forgot to mention that she is also kind.”

Water water everywhere

I awoke on Monday morning with a completely empty mind. I had no idea what to explore this week. I went through my usual morning prayer and meditative routine which continued as I enjoyed my shower. Now as you may or may not know I have a brand new bathroom, with a wonderful shower. As I stood there washing and just enjoying the heat of the water splashing all over me, as my senses woke fully to life, it came to me what I wanted to explore this week, water.

Water the most basic element of life, both of the external life and our own bodies. We are made of water. We live on planet earth and yet truth be told if we look at picture of our world from space should we really call it planet earth, surely it is planet water. The surface of our planet is two thirds water. Physically we are mainly made up of water.

We are like water. Yes our physical form is solid and unbending but our psyche is not. It can be bent and shaped in all directions, much like water. The bending and the shaping does not really occur at the physical level, more the metaphysical one. People change, although physically they may well look the same.

Although our world is mainly water so many people live without this basic resource. I’m very aware how fortunate I am to live in a time and place where clean, hot, running water is readily available. A hundred years ago this was not necessarily the case in this country and it is not the case for so many people who live in many parts of the world today.

I remember being made aware of this during my trip to Transylvania a couple of years ago. I noticed that there were wells in several of the yards of the homes I visited in Maros St George. Now as it happens these were no longer in use as the town now had a general water supply. That said this was not the case for the more remote village of Icland. The homes there were still supplied by well water.

For many folk in many parts of the world the situation is far more desperate. How many lives perish each year because of the lack clean or any water at all?

We cannot live without water, well not for more than one week they say. I know I can't if you've ever seen me lead worship you will see I guzzle large amounts of it throughout the hour. What that is about is a mystery to me to, maybe it’s that living breathing spirit coming out of me? God knows!

With water being so central to life it is hardly surprising then that it would play such a large role in the many religious traditions of humanity. It is central to many of rituals of most faiths. It symbolises birth and re-birth and is seen not only as a sustaining substance but as a cleansing and therefore purifying one.

God or the Divine is often portrayed by water. This is hardly surprising when you think of its many qualities. It can bend into any shape and cover and over power all life. It is life giving and sustaining and can be immensely powerful. It brings to mind some words by Forrest Church on God. Forrest said “God is not God’s name. God is our name for that power that is greater than all and yet present in each.” Isn’t that what water is a power that is greater than all and yet present in each.

The spiritual, the religious life, is about living in a certain way. The question I suppose is what is the right way? Well maybe water or the qualities it possesses can teach us the way. Perhaps the way is to live like water; to live with the qualities that water has.

Taoism teaches this, claiming that we must go with the flow of life, like water:

Nothing in the world is softer than water,

Yet nothing is better at overcoming the hard and strong.

This is because nothing can alter it.

That soft overcomes the hard

And gentle overcomes the aggressive

Is something that everybody knows

But none can do themselves.

Therefore the sages say:

The one who accepts the dirt of the state

Becomes its master.

The one who accepts its calamity

Becomes king of the world.

The Martial Artist Bruce Lee offered similar advice when he said:

“Be like water making its way through cracks. Do not be assertive, but adjust to the object, and you shall find a way around or through it. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves.

Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You can put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You can put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”

I believe that there is real wisdom in this. We can’t physically bend and shape much like water does, but I don’t think this is what is being meant here. I think this is talking about how we live. It’s our persona, our spirit, it is this that needs to bend and shape in order to be in harmony with all life and that eternal spirit that flows like water through all life.

There is something in this formlessness and the bending and shaping that speaks to me of truth, particularly religious truth. In the introduction to “One River Many Wells” Matthew Fox states:

“Meister Eckhart says: ‘Divinity is an Underground river that no one can stop and no one can dam up.” Fox himself says that “There is one underground river – but there are many wells into the river: an African well, a Taoist well, a Buddhist well, a Jewish well, a Muslim well, a Goddess well, a Christian well, an Aboriginal well. Many wells but one river. To go down a well is to practise a tradition, but we would make a grave mistake (an idolatrous one) if we confused the well itself with the flowing waters of the underground river. Many wells, one river. That is Deep Ecumenism.”

Again this teaches something of the qualities of water that we can learn form. We can access water as we can access truth but we can never get the full picture, the whole truth and how ever we access the truth is always limited. That said if we come together we can drink from one another’s sources and share the one universal river of life.

We are one we are interconnected as we are with all life.

Water is the basic element of life. We are mainly made from it and we depend upon it. It unites everything that lives on this earth and links us not only to one another but to all that is. It is a power that we can work with and therefore live successfully or against and therefore struggle with.  If we remain rigid in all things we will struggle but if we can be moulded and bend ourselves to fit with life and that spirit that permeates all life we can be in harmony with everything.

Today I offer praise to water, that power that is greater than all and yet present in each.

Water the most basic ingredient of all life, may we absorb the lessons you offer us.

Bend us, shape us, form us in your image.

Amen

I will end this little chip of a blog with following words by Denise Levertov

“The Fountain” by Denise Levertov

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water

to solace the dryness at our hearts.

I have seen

the fountain springing out of the rock wall

and you drinking there. And I too

before your eyes

found footholds and climbed

to drink the cool water.

The woman of that place, shading her eyes,

frowned as she watched — but not because

she grudged the water,

only because she was waiting

to see we drank our fill and were

refreshed.

Don’t say, don’t say there is no water.

That fountain is there among its scalloped

green and gray stones,

it is still there and always there

with its quiet song and strange power

to spring in us,

up and out through the rock.

Amazing Grace How Sweet The Sound

“Amazing Grace how sweet the sound...”

I was recently asked to lead the singing of the classic "Amazing Grace" at a friend’s wedding. It was an incredible experience. What a gift! It is the first time I have done so at a wedding. I have sung it in the past to end spiritual gatherings I have a part of. I also sang it at my grandma’s funeral and I was asked to sing it at the side of Ethan’s grave. God only knows how I found the strength that day. That was pure grace, as his short life was perhaps the ultimate grace; the greatest free gift of my life.

I took a few days off last week. I spent quite a bit of it with family. On the morning before I set off over to Yorkshire I was awoken very early, at the crack of dawn, by the most beautiful singing. It seemed to be a new song that I’ve not heard before and I wasn’t sure exactly where it was coming from. I discovered the answer on my return a few days later. As I was getting out of my car I once again heard this same song and began to look around to find out exactly where it was coming from. I eventually looked upwards and found the vocalist, perched on the roof of my cottage. It was a magnificent blackbird. I paid homage to him and even sang back at him. As I did he seemed to change his tune ever so slightly. At which point I bowed as his was the superior tune and went inside. He carried on singing, as he keeps on singing.

I digress. That morning I took my usual route on the M62 and as I drove up the Pennines and past the White Rose sign and towards Stott Hall Farm I began to think of grace of the free gifts that have been given me in my life; life itself being one of them. “Amazing Grace” was on my mind too and the times I have sung it. I was, as I often am on this journey, filling with tears. Not with sadness, but with an overwhelming sense of gratitude for life, for the gift of life and the gift of love despite all the troubles in our world. Over the next couple of days I enjoyed the gift of family and loved ones as I simply listened to them and remembered and reconnected.

Amazing Grace is a classic hymn that has grown in popularity over the years. Some of the words can be challenging. That said it is one of those pieces that can send a shiver down my spine. The hymn itself may well be a grace.

It has been described as a classic.  David Tracy claimed that classics are "those texts, events, images, persons, rituals and symbols which are assumed to disclose permanent possibilities of meaning and truth”. Amazing Grace certainly fulfills this requirement. It has been doing so for over two hundred years. It is quoted in Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel "Uncle Tom's Cabin" It was adapted by Cherokee Native Americans during their forced migration, known as the trail of tears. It became and remains a favourite amongst the civil rights movement.

Amazing Grace is usually sung to the hymn tune "New Britain". It has been recorded by a rich diversity of artists including Rev J.M Gates, Judy Collins, The Royal Scottish Dragoon guards, Aretha Franklin, Kylie Minogue and Joan Baez. It was even played by Mr. Scott at Mr. Spock's funeral in the film Stark Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. It has surfaced and resurfaced in a variety of forms, both religious and secular and across the generations and there seems little doubt that it will continue to do so.

But what exactly is “Grace”? Well the word itself has both secular and religious connotations. We can be given a period of grace with regard to payment of goods procured. We can be in someone else “good grace”, meaning we are in someone’s good books, we have gained their favour. We might compliment a person by saying they are graceful in the way they hold themselves or gracious in the way they act with others. In music a composer may add “grace notes”. These are added extras that are not essential but may add an artistic flourish to the piece.

At the recent ministers conference the ministerial fellowship’s president suddenly asked me to offer a grace. I was flummoxed at the time but somehow found something to utter. Many people offer a “grace” before mealtime. Something I am unfamiliar with, but am becoming more use to it. It is certainly something that is part of my duty as a minister. Bizarrely it is something I had no experience of until I became a Unitarian. A grace at mealtime is basically a prayer of thanks giving for the food we are about to eat and the company we are about to share in. By saying the grace before the mealtime we are of course acknowledging the sacredness of breaking bread together, the sacredness of life and of course the sacredness of one another.

Now of course classically speaking the “Grace of God” is a freely given gift of spirit that is unearned and undeserved; something that comes to us, from beyond ourselves. You can’t touch it, but you can know it. You could say that grace is a favour or perhaps a fortune that comes to us unbidden. It does not come because we have done anything to deserve it or not deserve it, it just comes. The part we can play is in recognizing it when it comes and making the most of what it offers. Life itself is probably the ultimate of graces. Think about it we did absolutely nothing to deserve the gift of life itself, in all its joy and suffering. 

As is my way I had a look at the etymology of Grace. It is related to thankfulness, certainly in the Latin languages. Think of the Spanish “gracias”, the Italian “grazie and Latin “gratia”. Both grace and gratitude are clearly linked. One step beyond is the Latin word “gratus” which means pleasing and from which words like gratifying and gratuity are formed. On the other side of the coin comes the phrase “persona non grata” which means an unwelcome person. Likewise a person who has fallen from grace may be known as a disgrace. These though are often deserved states, they are the result of actions, therefore they do seem somewhat removed from the original meaning of grace.

Does any of this help us? Does any of this tell us what Grace actually is? No not really. Why? You may well ask. Well because Grace is an experience. It is something that you have either known and therefore recognised or you haven’t.

So what is Grace?

Paul Tillich in “Shaking the Foundations” stated that

 "Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when we walk through the dark valley of a meaningless and empty life. It strikes us when we feel that our separation is deeper than usual, because we have violated another life, a life which we loved, or from which we were estranged. It strikes us when our disgust for our own being, our indifference, our weakness, our hostility, and our lack of direction and composure have become intolerable to us. It strikes us when year, after year, the longed for perfection of life does not appear, when the old compulsion reign within us as they have for decades, when despair destroys all joy and courage. Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness. If that happens to us, we experience grace. After such an experience, we may not be better than before, and we may not believe more than before. But everything is transformed."

"Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness.” This speaks to me of my experiences although it’s usually my ears that attune to it more than my eyes, it often speaks to me in birds and song…”a melody of love”. It first came to me at my darkest hour a few years ago and it has kept on coming to me ever since. It stirs something inside of me that enables me to connect to life, to live with purpose and meaning and to know love. That moment changed me forever. You can’t really describe Grace, only the impact it has upon you.

It is the impact that Grace has had upon me that I was thinking of during that drive through the Pennines. Of that first little bird that spoke to me and then flew away and of all the other times they have spoken to me and continue to speak to me. They truly are a Grace that saves and inspires and keeps on moving me forward. 

“Amazing Grace how sweet the sound”

Grace is all around us. Life itself is the ultimate Grace; the ultimate free gift. Let’s give thanks for it.

I continue to be amazed by "Grace" it is the sweetest of sounds...

A Second Anniversary Waltz

To mark the second anniversary of this blog I thought I'd post some words that have inspired me these last twelve months. I hope that touch your soul, the way they have touched mine.

The first is a short tale on the difficulty of silence...

Four monks decided to meditate silently without speaking for two weeks. By nightfall on the first day, the candle began to flicker and then went out. The first monk said, “Oh, no! The candle is out” The second monk said, “Aren’t we not suppose to talk?” The third monk said, “Why must you two break the silence?” The fourth monk laughed and said, “Ha! I’m the only one who didn’t speak.”

Here are some words by my hero Forrest Church on the courage to be who we are...

"No one needs to try to be unique. Nevertheless, being who we are remains a daily challenge. The three things required – self-acceptance, integrity, and the courage to be – don’t happen on their own.

Self-acceptance demands that we aspire to be, not disdain , who we are; it rejects disguise, knowing that it is neither helpful or necessary. Integrity is oneness – being in harmony with ourselves and neighbour. The courage to be is nothing more and nothing less than a fundamental affirmation of our own uniqueness conditioned by the limits imposed by life and death. Practiced together, self acceptance, integrity, and the courage to be lead to human freedom. In contrast, fear disguises reality, trades in duplicity, and rejects human limitations, thereby making freedom impossible..."

"The courage to be" Forrest Church

I've been thinking of these words by Wordsworth all year. My favourite "spot of time" occurs on the M62 as I travel back to Yorkshire it starts to happen as I pass the White Rose symbol and ascend towards "Stott Hall Farm" 

“There are in our existence spots of time,

That with distinct pre-eminence retain

A renovating virtue, whence–depressed

By false opinion and contentious thought,

Or aught of heavier or more deadly weight,

In trivial occupations, and the round

Of ordinary intercourse–our minds

Are nourished and invisibly repaired;

A virtue, by which pleasure is enhanced,

That penetrates, enables us to mount,

When high, more high, and lifts us up when fallen.”

 William Wordsworth, The Prelude (Book XI, ls 258-278)

And here are some words on the importance of listening...

In “Forgotten Art of Deep Listening” Kay Lindahl asks us to:

“Think of the difference it would make if each of us felt really listened to when we spoke. Imagine the time it would save to be heard the first time around, instead of having to repeat ourselves over and over again. Envision a conversation in which each person is listened to with respect, even those whose views are different from ours. This is all possible in conversations of the heart, when we practice the sacred art of listening. It takes intention and commitment. We need to slow down to expand our awareness of the possibilities of deep listening. The simple act of listening to each other can transform all of our relationships. Indeed, it can transform the world, as we practice being the change we wish to see in the world.”

I recently came across the following story in Bill Darlison’s wonderful book “The Shortest Distance: 101 Stories from the World’s Spiritual Traditions”

It is simply called “Dandelions”...

A certain man took great pride in his new lawn. He mowed it regularly, watered it daily, and sprayed it with all kinds of substances to make it grow thicker and look greener. One day he woke up to find his precious lawn covered in dandelions! What could he do? He dashed into the shed, took out his lawnmower, and gave the grass a thorough mowing, cutting off the heads of all the dandelions in the process. “That should do it,” he thought, feeling very pleased with himself.

Gazing out of his window the next morning he discovered that the dandelions were back! Down he went to his garden, but this time, instead of mowing the lawn, he pulled out each dandelion by the roots. Surely that would be the end of it.

But he was wrong. In a few days, dandelions were there once again; their little golden heads were completely ruining his beautiful green lawn. He hurried off to the local garden centre and told one of the assistants about his problem. “What you need is some weed killer,” said the young man. “Take this”, he said, handing him a bottle.” It is the most powerful weed killer we have. Mix it with water, spray it on your lawn, and tomorrow all your dandelions will be gone.”

The man did as instructed and sure enough, the next day there were no dandelions in his lawn. Success!

But his joy was short lived. Within a week the dandelions were back. He returned to the garden centre. “What can I do about those wretched dandelions now? he asked the assistant. “I’ve tried mowing them, pulling them up by the roots, destroying them with weed killer, but they still keep coming back. Do you have any suggestions?”

“Yes,” replied the assistant. “I suggest you learn to love them!”

I first heard the following by colleague Rev Margaret Kirk at our General Assembly Anniversary service a few years ago...

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall” by Rev Margaret Kirk

We see barriers erected between people of different lands,
We see sheets of steel and towers of concrete called Protection.
We see boundaries policed,
watch men, women and children running from hunger and persecution,
looking for a gap in the wall………

Something there is that doesn't love a wall…………

We see walls of fear –
Fear of the young, fear of the stranger,
Fear of sexuality that is different, fear of the educated, fear of the poor,
Fear of the Muslim, fear of the Jew –
Fear upon fear, endless and perpetuating,
And we offer our silent prayer that solid walls of fear will crumble to dust.

Something there is that doesn't love a wall…………

We hear the language of separation,
The jingoistic chant, the racial slur,
words of indifference and dismissal,
words arranged for the purpose of exclusion,
words that sting and taunt,
words that lie.
Let us find words that ring with love and truthfulness,
that reach out through the emptiness of separation.

Something there is that doesn't love a wall…………

We see the deluded barriers of the mind protecting self,
We see relationships stripped of affection
as one person becomes closed to another.
We see people trapped in misunderstanding,
old hurts re-ignited,
bricks placed higher on the wall,
goodwill and trust suspended.
and we ask for boundaries that are not impenetrable,
through which light can shine and distance be dissolved.

Something there is that doesn't love a wall………….

And when we need these boundaries for our own well being,
Let us know them for what they are,
Use them wisely and kindly,
Recognising our own vulnerability and that of others –
So each of us can find the space for retreat and succour,
find that peace that passes all understanding
and be renewed with strength and love
for the task of living life joyfully in communion with all others. 

The following is by that famous author anonymous...how many of us truly take time to pause...

There is a story told of a workaholic businessman who decided to take an African Safari. He plotted a course and determined a time-table. He hired workers from a local village to carry the various containers and cases. On the first morning, the entire party roused early, travelled very, very fast and went very, very far. On the second morning, they roused early, travelled very, very fast and went very, very far. On the third day, the same. On the fourth morning, the local tribesmen refused to move. The man gestured irately and fumed at the translator to get them going. “They will not move,” the translator relayed.

“Why not?” the man bellowed, thinking of all the time wasted and dollars spent. “Because,” the translator said, “they are waiting for their souls to catch up with their bodies.”

Extract taken from Letters to my Son by Kent Nerburn

"I can measure my life by the moments when art transformed me—standing in front of Michelangelo’s Duomo pieta, listening to Dylan Thomas read his poetry, hearing Bach’s cello suites for the first time.

But not only there.

Sitting at a table in a smoky club listening to Muddy Waters and Little Walter talk back and forth to each other through their instruments; listening to a tiny Japanese girl play a violin sonata at a youth symphony concert; standing in a clapboard gift shop on the edge of Hudson Bay staring at a crudely carved Inuit image of a bear turning into a man.

It can happen anywhere, anytime. You do not have to be in some setting hallowed by greatness, or in the presence of an artist honored around the world. Art can work its magic any time you are in the presence of a work created by someone who has gone inside the act of creation to become what they are creating. When this takes place time stands still and if our hearts are open to the experience, our spirits soar and then our imaginations fly unfettered.

You need these moments if you are ever to have a life that is more than the sum of the daily moments of humdrum affairs.

If you can create these moments—if you are a painter or a poet or a musician or an actor—you carry within you a prize of great worth. If you cannot create them, you must learn to love one of the arts in a way that allows the power of another’s creation to come alive within you.

Once you love an art enough that you can be taken up in it, you are able to experience an echo of the great creative act that mysteriously has given life to us all.

It may be the closest any of us can get to God."

And here is a little more from Forrest Church...

“In every field of human inquiry, ignorance increases as knowledge grows. The Greek philosopher Socrates once said, “I am the most ignorant man in Athens.” He wasn’t indulging in false modesty. He was pointing out that others, knowing far less, had no idea how ignorant they were. Socrate’s ignorance, the knowledge of how much remained for him to learn, expanded in direct proportion to his learning. Of both belief and knowledge, the same is true for us. When reflecting on several years of contemplation on the origins of the cosmos, one cosmologist sighed, “It’s not only queerer than we imagined; it’s queerer than can be imagined.”

“Whether informed by religion or by science, our minds cannot unwrap life’s mystery. This is why, in offering evidence to corroborate religious truth, true believers may more honestly be accused of being too rational than too irrational. They are not alone. We all use our minds to figure out things that can’t be deciphered by anything as small as our minds. On the one hand, the attempt is a noble one. Trying to decode life’s mystery is what makes us human.

Balancing these two apparent contradictions. I base my own theology on contrasting principles: openness and humility. No ceiling limits the expansion of the human heart. Yet, humility teaches that when death visits, we will have attained only a flickering notion of what life and death are all about. The light we discover will be framed by darkness. But, when we ponder the nature of our shared mortality, meaning may begin to emerge. Not unlike when we leave a warm, brightly lit room, go outdoors, and contemplate a dark winter sky: one by one the stars come out.” 

Forrest Church

The following by May Sarton touch me deep in my soul. While our loved ones may no longer be physically with us, they reside with us permanently. There spirits live on in our souls, touching us and speaking through us...

All Souls by May Sarton

Did someone say that there would be an end,

An end, Oh, an end, to love and mourning?

Such voices speak when sleep and waking blend,

The cold bleak voices of the early morning

When all the birds are dumb in dark November -

Remember and forget, forget, remember.

After the false night, warm true voices, wake!

Voice of the dead that touches the cold living,

Through the pale sunlight once more gravely speak,

Tell me again, while the last leaves are falling:

"Dear child, what has been once so interwoven

Cannot be raveled, nor the gift ungiven."

Now the dead move through all of us still glowing,

Mother and child, lover and lover mated,

Are wound and bound together and enflowing.

What has been plaited cannot be unplaited -

Only the strands grow richer with each loss

And memory makes kings and queens of us.

Dark into light, light into darkness, spin.

When all the birds have flown to some real haven,

We who find shelter in the warmth within,

Listen, and feel now new-cherished, new-forgiven,

As the lost human voices speak through us and blend

Our complex love, our mourning without end. 

Another great hero of mine is Viktor Frankl. This is short extract from his essay on "Tragic Optimism" found towards the end of "Man's Search For Meaning"...

 “By declaring that man is responsible and must actualize the potential meaning of his life, I wish to stress that the true meaning of life is to be discovered in the world rather than within man or his own psyche, as though it were a closed system. I have termed this constitutive characteristic "the self-transcendence of human existence." It denotes the fact that being human always points, and is directed, to something or someone, other than oneself--be it a meaning to fulfill or another human being to encounter. The more one forgets himself--by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love--the more human he is and the more he actualizes himself. What is called self-actualization is not an attainable aim at all, for the simple reason that the more one would strive for it, the more he would miss it. In other words, self-actualization is possible only as a side-effect of self-transcendence.”

And finally another piece form that famous author anonymous. It talk of that most precious gift, time...

Imagine if you had a bank that credited your account each morning with £86,000 that carried over no balance from day to day...Allowed you to keep no cash in your account, and every evening cancelled whatever part of the amount you failed to use during the day, what would you do? Draw out every pound every day, of course, and use it to your advantage! Well, you have such a bank, and its name is TIME! Every morning it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it rules off as lost whatever of this you failed to invest to good purpose. It carries over no balances, it allows no overdrafts. Each day it opens a new account with you. If you fail to use the day's deposits, the loss is yours. There is no going back. There is no drawing against tomorrow.