It has taken me a lifetime- let the reader understand I am a slow learner- to realise there is a difference between being 'pi' and being holy; between being convinced in the head and believing in the heart; between asking God for a heap of stuff for a needy world, and praying; between telling God stuff he already knows and praying; between fretting over whether I am walking in the predetermined will of God for me every second of my life, and accepting the freedom God gives to choose the good ( and regrettably, sometimes  choosing the bad), between western liberal values and what Jesus means by 'the kingdom of God'.

And these are only the most obvious things that come to mind. If I were more insightful, less fretty, less pi, then other things would hit me in the eye, and. I hope, lodge in my heart too. There is a lot to learn along the way which Christians follow, but there is a lot to unlearn too. I have difficulty in distinguishing which is the more important at times.

There is solid ground, however, to stand on. A light to guide. I keep in mind and heart Jesus' words about being the way, the truth, the life. Heard many, many times, but learned deep in the heart- at least for this slow learner- far less frequently than I would wish. The 'L' plates are still firmly attached and the prayer, as always, is 'Show me the way'.
   

And.....breathe

As I write this, it is a sunny afternoon in Sark, and I am listening to the lapping of the swimming pool about two metres away. The only other sound comes from the birds. On an early morning walk earlier today to the Pilcher monument, I was surrounded by the perfume of honeysuckle from the hedgerows all the way there and back. Needless to say, in this haven of quiet I was asleep again before lunchtime.
The days are taken up with walks, contemplation of the views, wondering at the glorious flora in the hedges, eating and sleeping. I might get to swim, if I manage the effort......... oh, ,and a five spot burnet ( a daytime moth of great beauty) has just landed nearby.
Time to recharge is in short supply in our rushed lives. But is perhaps needed more than ever, given the increasing clangour about mental health, and indeed all other sorts of health, that of the spirit and soul included. Jesus himself called his disciples away from the crowds to to spend time with him alone, and he withdrew ‘to a quiet place’ as the gospels record, as a matter of habit.
So, while I can, I will recharge, revive, reconnect, in that classical Anglican way with God, with neighbour, and with self.

In  one of the by-ways of my reading this week, I came across Joseph Glanvill- well-known to all of you, I'm sure- a 17th century English philosopher, writer and clergyman. He must have possessed some second sight, in that he predicted there might be 'conferring at the distance of the Indies by sympathetic conveyances  ……. as usual to future times, as to us in a literary correspondence'. That is, the telephone, and other modern stuff which enables almost instantaneous communication.

Maybe it's not too difficult to imagine a future age with all sorts of gizmos we presently do not possess, although I imagine it would have been more difficult back then. Nowadays we are used to the fast pace of technological change. Yesterday's sci-fi is today's reality. But the moral issues in every sci-fi novel or film are those we face today- nothing has changed in that respect. It 's the choices we make, the consequences of those choices, good fighting evil- the familiar stuff of our everyday experience.

We are often seduced by the siren calls of new technology, and the hope, and sometimes the reality that our lives are improved by the kit we buy. But that still leaves us with the choices for justice and peace, or their opposites, which we have to make day by day. We need a firmer foundation, a clearer light for life, than the latest phone.
'I am the light of the world' says Jesus. Who managed life very successfully without gadgets, gizmos, gewgaws. And still provides light, to stumblers in the dark like me, and millions like me.  

The 'Rambling Rector' rose

We moved into this house last August, and began to plant a garden in what was a bare patch of green, surrounded by solid, but again bare, fences.
The first fruits of this holy task of garden-making are now becoming evident. I'm particularly struck by the profusion of flowers on the 'Rambling Rector' rose. Although it was only planted last November, and is less than two feet high, there are more small, creamy, orangey-scented flowers on it than I can count. In time it will cover the fence- that is the idea- but it will also, if true to type, become a bit of a thug, and need to be radically kept under control. Prune, prune, prune will be the order of the day. I heard recently of one 'Rambling Rector' bringing down a fence-  unattended and rampant, it had become so heavy its support gave way.

I guess I'm talking about balance; unrestrained growth versus something more controlled. Most of us  think we are balanced and it's probably true that most of our friends and family think we are at least slightly out of kilter. I put myself under the rule of the one who said 'I am the true vine, and my father is the gardener'. I do this in the hope and belief I will not turn out to be a thug of any sort, someone who brings self and others crashing down; but that with appropriate pruning, and feeding, will produce something of beauty and use - a life well-lived for God.

It was the feast of Corpus Christi earlier this week; I had the privilege of presiding at Communion on the day. Corpus Christi goes back to the thirteenth century, in part due to the lobbying of a Belgian religious who after her death was canonised- St. Juliana of Liege.

The central notion of the day is to give thanks for the service of the Eucharist, or Holy Communion; it is more usually remembered as part of the events of Holy Week. Juliana's thesis was that its place can be somewhat overlooked in the rush of events leading to Jesus' trial and execution. Hence a day where it stands by itself, and due consideration can be given to its 'weight'.

As a priest, I see people's faces as they take communion. Few others do. I have written before of the devotion of older folk who at pain to themselves, will kneel to receive the bread and wine; the struggle of some disabled folk to come to the altar rail to receive. I have no idea what goes on in people's hearts and minds as they eat the morsel of bread, take the sip of wine, but I sense their thankfulness, their love, their devotion, to this simple but profound act and its meaning.

'I am the bread of life' says Jesus in the gospel reading for Corpus Christi. To see the faces of the believers on that day was to believe it.

Did we get to the end.....?

I've just finished Patrick Leigh Fermor's 'The Broken Road' - the last part of his journey across Europe in the  1930s to Constantinople. In three books of magical prose he charts his walk through a vanished world. I came to his books in the late 80s - eleven years after the first describing his walk - 'A time of gifts'- was published; and was immediately captured by that, and when it appeared, by its successor 'Between the woods and the water'. This last part of the journey was a long time coming; Fermor found it difficult to write in his increasing old age, and it's more discursive. Still, the old sparkle shines through.

But the journey breaks off before he reaches his destination, and we have no coruscating descriptions of Constantinople. Hints of what might have been are found in writing of the remains of Byzantine culture along the way in south eastern Europe, but Constantinople itself? Yes, he arrives there, yes, he is absorbed by those in the city who expected him, and to whom he is introduced, but nothing remains in his prose to tell us of those days, what it meant to arrive, what he felt he had accomplished.

It's a disappointment, to this reader at least. But maybe it's a fitting end, on further reflection; maybe the journey is always more important than the arrival. For Christians, the notion of journey, and especially of pilgrimage has been a significant way of structuring understanding of the life of faith. I cannot tell my journey in such wonderful prose, my encounters do not scintillate like his, but the journey has been an endless source of recollection, recapitulation, learning, reflection. It has been a time of gifts, sometimes a broken road, but the road lies ahead, and I intend, with God's grace, to walk it to the end, to a city more captivating even than Byzantium of old.    

I'm  applying to renew my passport; my present one runs out early next year, and  now is as good a time as any to begin the process. My vicar will come  by on Wednesday to countersign the photo which will accompany the paperwork, that it is 'a true likeness ' of me.
Wait! Surely I'm not that old-looking, care-worn, lined person who looks out at me from the small square of glossy paper in front of me. What a fright! I'm younger! More handsome! Please!

True likeness- ouch! I'd better get back to reality, and accept the fact that this is me. True likeness is close to the heart of the faith we profess, unwilling as we may be at times to embrace it. Firstly, that Jesus is a true likeness of God- which my experience of God over the years has led me to believe. See Jesus, see God. That, for me is the easy bit.

The harder bit is what follows from that. God's promise is that 'we shall be like him'; one of the outcomes of this Ascensiontide and Pentecost season is that we become 'divinised'- the life of Christ is poured into us, to make us more like the Jesus we read of in the gospels. Somehow I am becoming a 'true likeness' of Christ. Unreal and unlikely as it seems, and especially for me, knowing what goes on in my interior life. But this is the reality of the faith I profess, and I had better accept that this is me.  Massive imperfections; still, after all these years wearing 'L' plates; but with the life and light of Christ in me,  trying to show a true likeness of the life of God. It looks, from my point of view, a perfect fright, but there is the hope in me that God is at work in the mess, pulling some resemblance of Christ into a focus that the world can see.