tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-73305663084382586742024-03-13T21:14:46.732-07:00Dances-with-MidgesMinistry, thoughts and God in Cowal & Bute, Argyll & The IslesBishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.comBlogger172125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-76999076984131681412018-07-23T03:11:00.003-07:002018-07-23T03:42:03.076-07:00Moving onThis will be one of my last posts on this blog, as my "Dances with Midges" in Argyll end in just a short while.<br />
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I have spent the last eight years as a priest in one of the most beautiful places in the world - not an exaggeration - and have been profoundly affected by my journey with the Christian communities I've served in Cowal and Bute and the wider area.<br />
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In just over two weeks I will move, with my family, to live in Dundee, on the East coast of Scotland. I suppose I am a natural 'East-coaster', being born in Aberdeen, living in Edinburgh and Fife for quite a few years as a young adult, growing up in a Central Belt house that took 'The Scotsman' newspaper (the Edinburgh paper, for those reading further afield). A couple of weeks after I move I will start my new role, as I will be consecrated as the Bishop of Brechin in the Scottish Episcopal Church. *pauses for effect*<br />
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More on that elsewhere...<br />
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For now I am in that strange transition time of leaving churches where we have put down some very strong roots. A leaving dinner, last services in churches on Sundays and weekdays, farewells with people in the local community: it is a very extended, lovely, but hard goodbye (even if we are smiling still...)<br />
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Someone asked my what had been the hardest thing about my time here. Many people have asked what the highlights have been. It still feels a bit too much like being sat in the middle of the ministry, the God moments, the relationships, to be able to make too much sense of those questions. The goodbyes are hard, and they should be, as being a priest is making strong connections and bonds with the people that you serve. Breaking those bonds and moving on to something else should be difficult: it is worth it.<br />
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Overall, God has been here with us in so many ways in the past eight years. The pattern of eucharistic worship, with bread and wine blessed and shared, three times per week, on the same days in the same places, has been a heartbeat throughout the time. The faces have changed, as some have died, some have moved away, some have left for other (harder) reasons, and new people have come, have encountered the community, have held out their hands to receive the broken body of their redeeming God, taken the cup of the blood of their new covenant. That has underpinned the prayers said in people's homes, the profound (or trivial) discussions in meetings, at events, in the freezer aisle in the local supermarket. The pitta bread broken in the secondary school as part of the years of Experience Easter outreach projects. So, so many other ways that a Christian community grows, forms, reforms...<br />
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That priestly heartbeat will continue here (a little slower for the vacancy). It has been, for me, a thing of great wonder, value and encounter. That heartbeat will change for me now - it will still be a Sunday heartbeat, but in different places each week. I will also look for the eucharistic heartbeat on other days in those other places. And the new styles of encounter, the new ways that God will be glimpsed. I feel a new blog coming on...<br />
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Someone asked me if have learned much in my eight years here. It was a very loaded question (I may not have always done what they would have liked me to do...). But I reflected: I have learned to be calm and thoughtful, and to listen for God. To be rash and impetuous, and to take risks for the gospel. To keep going when your stomach is tight with the tension or anger. To keep going when your heart is singing with the joy and wonder. To keep going, and trust that God is with us. I have been formed, my vocation developed and tested and stretched. I have done nothing but learn and be transformed. It never stops!<br />
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It has been a wonderful dance, this 'Dances with Midges' of the last eight years. The dance here will continue, but with others taking the lead. Praise God!Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-16993958336402868682018-04-17T06:38:00.001-07:002018-04-17T06:44:05.538-07:00Faith in a time of war...There's been a lot of coverage and conversation about war on my various social media feeds. We even interviewed our youth in the sermon-slot at the service last Sunday about this: quite how apocalyptic it can feel, in a time of nerve agents, false news, missile strikes, political positioning, environmental catastrophe, or not...<br />
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How can people of faith respond to a situation where countries attack each other? What is right or wrong?<br />
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There is a Christian view that is to be a pacifist. In that view, war is never acceptable. That is fine, and is a valid and legitimate place to be. Most Christians would use a 'Just War' approach, however, to making judgements about war. The primacy of a 'Christian' Just War theory rather fades into insignificance in the modern world. The ideas that have populated such a theory, from Augustine through Aquinas, have been subsumed and adapted into the modern day UN Charter. Christian 'Just War' is ultimately rooted in maintaining order so that true religion can flourish (if one takes it all the way back to Augustine, trying hard to reconcile Christianity with a military Roman Empire). The UN charter has a different absolute value for judging the making of wars: sovereignty of nations. None of which really helps the Christian make sense of war and the modern world. Does God really care about one country over another? Things change, systems and political structures wax and wane.<br />
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But Christians must be rooted in values that place humanity first: God did that by becoming one of us, becoming a human. God's grace is open to all, every single human being. Hairs on our heads are counted. So in looking at any issue of justice and ethics, where is the path that values humanity the most? Is fighting a war a way that humanity can be built up, valued, cherished and affirmed? Sometimes, yes. What if the second world war had NOT been fought, and the dark of Nazism had not been challenged. But what about firebombing Dresden? The "jus in bello" subtlety of Just War theory (if you must fight a war, fight it nicely, essentially) rears its head again. History does a fine job of judging which wars are just or not, even given the victors' habit of writing that history.<br />
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So what do we do at the moment? Do we actually know what is going on, who has done what to whom? Have we been manipulated by regimes or news organisations or troll-farms to have a pre-conceived pro- or anti-war view? How can we, as individuals, even start to make that judgement?<br />
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But we can, as Christians, engage in the processes that are open to and are around us. We can challenge the politicians that represent us to be accountable and make decisions that are just and humane. We can protest and take direct action to force such accountability. We can preach and blog and tweet about the issues: to get others to work for accountability and human value. We can always even pray about it. A lot.<br />
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Can we get to a place where we, as Christians, can make definitive statements about whether war should happen or not? Unless we are truly pacifists, I think not, in the modern world of media and fluid truth (did I make that term up? I suspect I didn't) as we can never really know all the facts. No, I believe that is an anachronistic and arrogant view for 21st century Christians in a plural and secular world. We no longer own the right to define a "Just War". But we can be agents of light, agents of pressure, agents forcing accountability onto the powers and structures that act on our behalf.<br />
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Jesus appeared among the disciples and said, "Peace be with you." And they were glad...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-84312216455064761872018-04-03T07:51:00.002-07:002018-04-03T07:53:40.508-07:00Easter begins again...Holy Week and Easter Day are past. The new week, the Octave of Easter, is calmer and forward looking, the fifty days of Easter stretching before us. But isn't it all a bit backward looking, this commemoration of events nearly 2,000 years ago?<br />
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Good Friday is central, for me, to the flow of Holy Week. It is hard and gritty and uncomfortable. Lots of people stay away from the reading of the Passion, the starkness of the cross, the harshness of death. This Holy Week I led the Good Friday service on Bute, in the little pisky church in Rothesay. Inside, just over a dozen of us lived through the last hours of Jesus' life. Outside it was an almost-holiday-Friday, with shouts and laughs, children out of school, swearing, police sirens, cars and seagulls squawking. Normal life was running past the hard place of our remembrance.<br />
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I reflected, in the service, that this was just like that first Good Friday, so many years ago, from Pilate's court to the rubbish dump of Golgotha. A normal bustling eve-of-the-Passover-sabbath was going on. Shouting, children playing, shops selling wares, people getting ready for the holiday. And a crucifixion, too - another bit of normality in a first century CE Roman occupied state. A spectacle for the masses, suffering as a tool of population control and political expediency. All very normal...<br />
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But Easter Day comes. The New Light is lit.<br />
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Is this still normal? The disciples' lives are about to be turned upside down (again) - but this time by the risen Jesus. Can that same impact be found in the busy world that looks pretty much the same as it did on Friday? Do the holiday makers of Bute, or wherever, really care about the empty tomb? Can they see past the gothic buildings, anachronistic ways of talking and dressing, the rich traditions that can attract or scare: and can they see the love of God, embodied in blood and pain, and embodied in light and new life?<br />
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Well, that is what we are here to do, this Easter and every day, to help people see past the medium to the person of Jesus Christ, our Saviour.<br />
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Does anyone care? God does - and that is why we will continue to shout, "Alleluia, Christ is Risen", and watch as, life by life, the world is transformed into the Kingdom of God!Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-35315853225323259572017-12-12T08:56:00.001-08:002017-12-12T08:56:12.871-08:00Advent again...A beginning of the church's year, just as the rest of world descends into the commercial chaos of Christmas celebrations and purchase.<br />
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We try hard for this to be a time of year for waiting, for preparation, for holding onto the richness of the darkening nights and the browning hillsides.<br />
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What are we waiting for?<br />
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For God to come and make it all well? For the Christ child to be born? For light to come into the world? It can be a tiring wait, as the millenia start to click by. And what are the people of the world waiting for? It's not a Messiah they look for now: it's to be loved, to be fulfilled, to be assured of their worth and self-respect.<br />
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Which the gospel that we serve brings.<br />
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We wait for the sonorous tones of, 'In the beginning was the Word...' and we can know that we ARE loved, we are fulfilled, we are worthy of respect. All from the God who became human, ever distant and close enough to touch.<br />
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We really are waiting for rather a lot. And it is here among us already...<br />
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Advent.Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-40897996360915202612017-10-06T01:00:00.003-07:002017-10-06T01:01:52.855-07:00Sex and violence...The world has always been obsessed with sex and violence - usually inextricably linked together, as power and dominance at a personal, social, national and international level. That's a big proposition, but just glance at the papers any day and you see it right in front of you.<br />
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And the church? Surely different? Not at all!<br />
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The recent flurry of interest in the Anglican Primates' meeting - with the Scottish Episcopal Primus attending, a few months after the church amended its canon on marriage - is all about sex and violence! The visceral response to same sex marriage, which is less to do with the nature of marriage and more to do with perceived physical aspects of (male) homosexuality is right at the heart of church (and human...) fascination with sex. There are some who debate on theology, on the nature of sacramental covenanted partnerships, on reading of scripture: but in most human beings there is a sexual response that fascinates and attracts or repels (or both).<br />
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Jesus did not teach much about sex. He didn't, as far as we can ascertain, ever have sex or even express an interest in it. He was unusual, in someone who ended up (maybe inadvertently) spinning off a religion, in not tightly defining sexual behaviour, as Judiasm, Islam etc. all do. So Jesus' teaching treats sex as a secondary issue. But the church has always had a fascination and obsession.<br />
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But violence? Surely there isn't actual violence in the Anglican Primates applying 'consequences' to the SEC? Any judicial process is based on violence, explicitly or at least implied. To have the power to limit someone's participation IS power. And that is the thin end of the wedge that ends with imprisonment, chemical castration and execution. The Primates' meeting is NOT judicial - that's what ++Justin has said - but is rather a group of people with shared responsibility who gather to talk and listen. But there is an undercurrent of desire in some quarters for judicial punishment for those Christians who have 'transgressed' in sexuality. That's certainly what the media are looking for...<br />
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Jesus did not teach much about violence. When he did, it was passive and pacifist. Turning the other cheek. Going the extra mile. He did not fight. He went, eventually, willingly to a dreadful, violent death. Jesus was only ever a victim of violence. And changed the world by that willingness.<br />
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The world is driven by sex and violence. Jesus was not. In fact, he was so NOT driven by sex and violence that he changed the world forever, saving all humanity from their brokenness, sinfulness, their darkness.<br />
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The church is in the world, and the obsessions of the world run through it like marbling. We have structures and rules and membership and punishments with veiled violence (the gloriously entitled SEC Canon 26: "On the Repelling from Holy Communion"...) But the grace and salvation of Christ Jesus can transform even something as fragile and provisional as his people and his church...<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(with major idea acknowledgement to David Martin, "Ruin and Restoration", 2016) </span>Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-35066102258589193582017-07-27T23:57:00.002-07:002017-07-27T23:59:42.989-07:00Feet of ClayChristian ministry is a tricky thing, wherever you're doing it. In my own contexts, in charges in small Scottish towns, and also as a senior leader in the diocese, it can feel almost impossible to be able to do all that needs to be done, to be able to meet the demands and expectations of all the people I serve.<br />
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At one level, I know all too well that I am supposed to be meeting God's expectations, praying, studying, discerning the spirit and image of God in the world and people around me. I've been trained, I've read, 'If You Meet George Herbert on the Road, Kill him', all that's very clear after over a decade in ordained ministry.<br />
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But it then meets people. And it meets those people where they are, with THEIR expectations, and hopes and fears and baggage and experiences of rectors and deans from the past. And those people treat you in a strange way. I am very, very privileged in ministry, as I am a) male, b) white, c) straight, d) university educated, e) married, f) with children, g) fairly tall, h) clean shaven (ok, that's my choice). But I am a rector/dean that doesn't press many of the prejudice buttons that congregations might have. That is an immense privilege, and it would be all too comfortable to minister, maybe for a whole career, from within that privileged and comfortable position. <br />
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But I would still fail to meet all the expectations of the charges and people that I have been called to serve, in the Church of God. I might be male, but I wouldn't visit enough. I might be white but I wouldn't respond quickly enough when someone was in a place of emotional crisis. I might be straight but I would be a firm advocate and supporter of equal marriage, which disappoints some. You get the idea. Feet of clay.<br />
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I can't even begin to imagine what it must be like if one isn't a) to h) above (well, maybe a) to f)). You are starting, with some people, not with feet of clay but with a whole body and nature of clay. That must be so, so hard. How can you feel called by God, discern the spirit and nature of God in people's lives, when your whole person is judged and rejected by some that you are called to serve.<br />
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But Christian ministers are called to serve God. To do what is right, even if it might feel uncomfortable from a human perspective. When I was licensed as the priest to these charges, just over seven years ago, the bishop who licensed me, now the Primus of the SEC, gave slightly different sermons in the two churches. On the island, among other things, he said that the charges had to support and nurture me, even when what I preached or led or did was not what an individual might want to hear or see. That is a hard thing to hear, when church can be desired as a comfort zone, a place where people want to hear their own opinions given from the pulpit like reading an editorial in their favourite newspaper.<br />
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But Christian ministers are called to serve God. To challenge and to be prophetic, even if that might be an uncomfortable place to be. Even if you can hear that others regard your mere feet of clay to be spreading up your legs and into your very person. <br />
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Where does all this go? Is it about same-sex marriage and its application in our churches? Of course. Is it about pastoral care and meeting the expectations that one should be a pastorally adept mind reader? Of course. Is it about the ghosts of former rectors and their feet of clay being put firmly into the backsides of bruised people? Of course.<br />
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But mainly, it is about reminding myself about those feet of clay. Accepting them and working within them, in my own fragile, flawed humanity. Whilst working out a call from God to be a leader of God's people in this place, at this time. God have mercy on us all. And God's blessing upon us all.Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-60806999761587572672017-07-08T04:46:00.002-07:002017-07-08T04:46:29.415-07:00Wash your mouth out...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Crematorium funeral yesterday. All went OK, insofar as it can on these occasions.<div>
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At the wake, the following episode was told to me by the father in question...</div>
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Small boy, maybe 5 or 6, I would guess, had spoken to his father.</div>
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"What's the deal with THAT guy?"</div>
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"Which guy?"</div>
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"The guy in the funny clothes, doing all the talking."</div>
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"What about him?"</div>
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"Well, he said, 'Jesus Christ' at least two times, and nobody told him off for it..."</div>
Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-3724236296939352842017-06-30T05:07:00.002-07:002017-06-30T10:21:47.951-07:00Nothing makes a difference...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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A very, very small, almost trivial thing happened the other week. Nothing was added. And it made a vast, vast difference.<br />
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The small Scottish Episcopal Church on the Isle of Bute, St Paul's Rothesay, has been present in that community for getting on for 190 years. The current rather bijou Victorian chapel-style church is from the 1850s, but they were in living rooms and temporary buildings for a bit before that. This was one of the missions of the Episcopal Church (once no longer illegal and suppressed) to reach out into parts of the Scotland that needed to hear the gospel, and needed to hear the gospel wrapped in the subtle, nuanced way that only a balanced ministry of Word and Sacrament, as exemplified by Episcopalian/Anglican worship, can do. That's the driver behind a great deal of our Victorian expansion.<br />
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Churches like St Paul's are never going to be 'mega-churches' the way that city centre churches can aspire to be. Set in an island community of maybe six thousand people, it has had glory days of Sunday schools and fuller pews (well, probably) - but there is a confidence about St Paul's presence on the sea front in the resort town of Rothesay.<br />
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So where does the nothing come in? What difference does it make?<br />
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Well, in 1838 (don't you love church blog posts that start that way...) In 1838, a clergyman from Dundee was appointed to be the rector of St Paul's in Rothesay. There was no building, no church as such, just a few people who gathered week by week to worship. Samuel Hood built up those people into a church. He was the dean of the diocese too. Within fifteen years he built a wooden church, then laid a foundation for a stone one, then built that church. He was a classic church planter, as well as operating as the dean of a diocese that stretches from Lewis to the Mull of Kintyre. He is buried in Rothesay, in the main graveyard by the old St Mary's chapel and the High Kirk (now the Church of Scotland United Church of Bute). Dean Samuel ministered on the island and in the diocese for 34 years before he died. He is a founding father of our church in Argyll and The Isles, and also a founding father of modern Rothesay, which he will have seen grown around him as he grew his church, celebrated the sacraments, ministered to the people.<br />
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But the nothing? Yes, I'm getting there...<br />
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After his death, he left more than a church community and his memory. He left land and funds for a shop and a hall, to be built beside the church he founded. This hall and shop is still part of the mission of the church today, nearly 150 years on. And the street that the church, shop and hall created was named after the man who left the land. Dean Hood Place: a Scottish street, named in honour of that Episcopalian founder.<br />
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When I arrived on Bute in 2010, I spotted something strange. At some point in the past a council employee had made an error in transcribing street names. The sign by the entrance to the church said, 'Deanhood Place'. A place named for the abstract concept of a dean? Or the fact of being a dean? Custom and practice had set this error so firmly in place that documents, leases, all sorts of 'official' matters now referred to 'Deanhood Place'. Having checked that the official database is correct (which it is), I tried, rather half heartedly, to contact the council to try and address this, but to no avail.<br />
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Wind the clock on seven years. Much has happened, and many relationships formed in Rothesay. The church has changed, things have developed. Wonderful things have happened, painful things have happened. But the little church community of St Paul's has matured in many ways. Old Dean Hood is often thought about and talked about, and a chance conversation between Margaret, the vestry secretary, and Provost Len Scoullar, of the local authority, suddenly causes things to happen. The issue is raised. A founder of Rothesay has been lost! This feels unjust. Something should be done...<br />
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And it is. Nothing, a space, a gap, is added to the sign on the street by the church. Malcolm, the Rothesay sign man, prints it off, and with little or no fuss, the name of the street is restored to 'Dean Hood Place.' Samuel is back in his place of remembrance. The old Dean, from so many decades ago, is remembered again. It will take a long, long time for 'Deanhood' to slowly slide from usage, and Samuel to be everywhere again, but for the moment, the insertion of that 'nothing' has made all the difference.<br />
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A church planter, who grew a faith community in Rothesay as their context developed and flourished, is restored to his rightful place in society. Does anyone walking past that street name wonder who 'Dean Hood' was? Probably not. But the work of proclaiming the gospel in the west of Scotland goes on, and his restoration on our townscape is a great encouragement to those who follow Dean Hood in that mission today. Nothing really can make a huge difference...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-71352670454679631672017-03-01T00:25:00.000-08:002017-03-01T00:25:02.200-08:00WildernessLent begins today, with Ash Wednesday, services to remind us of our fragility, sinfulness and the grace of God. Lent looks busy. Synod. Vestry meetings. Courses. Extra services. Lots of stuff in the life of the church.<br />
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But Lent is wilderness. Lent is Jesus going into the desert for forty days to be tempted. Lent is space in the church's year to let us try and find God in emptiness. Or for God to find us in our emptiness.<br />
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Some of my earliest church memories are, as a primary school child, going in a long crocodile for a mile or so down to our church for stations of the cross on Wednesdays in Lent. The memory is of dry, slightly chilly days, with dusty roads and pavements. The memory is of not quite understanding what was going on, but living it in a way that was just normal. The memory is of rapid words, memorised responses, kneeling, standing, crossing oneself. I am sure the memory has been conflated with adult understandings (such as we adults are actually able to understand such things), but the sense is of emptiness.<br />
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Clergy may find it hard to achieve that sense of emptiness. We are purveyors of the emptiness to others, and that can be a rather busy and frantic activity. But we need to find that space. Open our eyes to the wilderness around us. Open our hearts to the wilderness inside ourselves.<br />
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Lent starts today. May the wilderness open up a way before us all...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-60256013227013134252016-09-22T01:05:00.000-07:002016-09-22T01:05:00.333-07:00In search of straw...<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Towards the end of his life, Thomas Aquinas, one of the great medieval theologians and doctors of the church, is reputed to have said, "The end of my labours has come. All that I have written appears to be as so much straw after the things that have been revealed to me." In the face of God, all his wonderful and insightful endeavours were, to him, nothing.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">In our ministry, as humans, as Christians, is this a helpful thing on which to reflect?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Churches with mission plans and renewal appeals and directives and initiatives: they are all about (on a good day) the flourishing of a place where the gospel is proclaimed, and (on a bad day) the survival of an institution.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">But is it all straw, compared to the God that is to be revealed in, and through, and sometimes despite the church that is 'the Body of Christ' here on earth?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Of course it is. Nothing that we humans can achieve, or even aspire to achieve, can begin to give even a pale glimpse of the God that we worship, revealed in human form in Jesus. It's even rather precocious and arrogant of me to make a statement like that, as if I, somehow, had a deeper knowledge than others on matters divine. This is all straw too.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">So, whatever we may achieve, whatever honours and admiration and human achievement we may manage as individuals or as a church, before God it is all straw, it is all nothing.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">But we ARE the body of Christ in the world, tasked with living the life that we have been shown in the redacted and revered fragments that come to us in scripture. We search out the straws that are the Christian life, the human life. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, "DejaVu Sans", sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">Does it matter that they are just so much straw? Of course not - salvation and light into all darkness is already assured, by the cross and the empty tomb. Hope for all humanity is complete. The straw of our lives, ministry and mission is infinitely valuable and wonderful.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #181818; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, DejaVu Sans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: #f3f3f3; font-size: 12px;">But let's not forget that it is still just so much straw...</span></span>Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-79052911062951986292016-08-15T03:01:00.001-07:002016-08-15T03:24:59.797-07:00Roland Walls: In the world, but not of the world...That distillation of the lines from the gospel of John, chapter 17, that disciples of Christ are in the world, but do not belong to the world, is a constant challenge to Christians today.<br />
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I have just (a few moments ago) finished reading "Mole Under the Fence", a series of conversations with Roland Walls. Roland died a few years ago, after a remarkable life, especially centred on his time in the Community of the Transfiguration at Roslin. He was a priest, a monk (effectively), a sharp and self-deprecating man who had Christ at the centre of his life. I never met him, but a retired colleague of mine did, and lent me the book. </div>
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Roland lived a life of poverty, and always seemed to be at the edge of things. He turned down an academic career in the Church of England, and lived life in that (ecclesiastically) strange country: Scotland. He also "swam the Tiber", converting to Roman Catholicism, but in a rather Newman-like way, because that is how he and community were taken, rather than the angst-laden protest conversion that one hears and sees these days (usually about women in ministry).</div>
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Why am I blogging about him? Because he has immensely challenged me.</div>
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He talks of Christians taking on the powerlessness and insignificance of Jesus on the Cross, rather than hanging onto the coat-tails of Christendom (I grossly, grossly paraphrase much of what he says). He pretty much rejects institutional models of church (although has such immense and complete faith in church as a place where people ought to be able to encounter God). He is rather non-plussed and embarrassed when people do NOT encounter God in churches. The eucharistic encounter is central to him - to meet the Trinity (love defined and defining) in the simplicity and complexity of that uniting and dividing mystery. And that's not even starting to scratch his views on justice, liberation theology, the social gospel, the Iona Community principles - the things that spill out when you do, really, meet God.</div>
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And I am immensely challenged. I am married, and have a family to (now) get through University. I am not free to drop everything and join the crucified human and divine saviour in a place of emptiness and poverty. I am part of an institutional machinery (in church, and even in a secular, state way) that rumbles on, in a more-or-less well oiled state. It measures success by growth and stability and influence and titles and even (God help us) the clothes we wear. And I can be immensely fed by all that. Isn't it great to be part of something good and shiny and visibly successful (I hesitated over that word - what word is right? The sense of being "in", of being "approved", of being "favoured"?)</div>
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But Roland challenges us all where we are, I hope and pray. I am trapped, just as he was trapped by the poverty of his community and de-skilling of any form of institutional ministry by the community's rule. I am trapped (very willingly) by family, by church, by duty - but in that state of being trapped, I can work (I hope and pray) to help others to encounter God in the communities which I serve. I am human enough to feel my ego and pride being fed when things are grand: but I can try to be human enough to keep looking for the cross, and the broken garbage nailed there to remind us where and how we are actually invited to meet God.</div>
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We are in the world, and the world's "stuff": church, state, society, success, failure - it is all around us.. But I pray that we will not be of the world, defining ourselves by all that "stuff". We are defined by the brokenness of the cross, meeting the delightfully and bewilderingly complex and simple Trinity of God in bread and wine. </div>
Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-42281792261361804482016-07-26T00:23:00.002-07:002016-07-26T00:23:46.509-07:00In the world...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Around a couple of corners from the island church is Mac's Bar, over the road from the castle. It's a pretty regular small Scottish town bar, and you get a bit of a craich and a laugh if you wander in with a dog collar on. Which I do a few times a year. It's not my local: if you peel away a few layers of things and church encounters (mainly not that good) and some real human experience, you get a bar that provides the altar wine for every eucharist in the small island church. It's a point of encounter, not a great state secret (as far as I am aware anyway!) and a piece of connection between past and present, the world and the church. It may look like a carrier bag with some altar wine, but it feels like an encounter between humanity and God...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-88793637577120028532016-02-29T08:30:00.002-08:002016-02-29T08:37:25.115-08:00Obstacles to the gospel...I pulled together a Facebook page for the church I serve on the Isle of Bute:<a href="https://www.facebook.com/stpaulsrothesay/" target="_blank"> St Paul's.</a> All fair enough, the sort of thing that a modern church should be doing to communicate its life and interests. It's a shop window to the world about the life and mission of Christ's body in every context.<br />
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I grabbed a quick shot of the church to start as a profile picture (some more 'peoply' ones will replace it soon) - but there was quite a response to the image as it was published.<br />
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After some years at St Paul's, I don't see the "No Entry" sign placed at the bottom of "Deanhood" Place. But when you see that picture, it just screams at you. A church with a "No Entry" sign at the door! How ridiculous is that!<br />
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For the Facebook page, easily remedied:<br />
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God (or Photoshop) can work in mysterious ways to overcome such problems. <br />
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But in real life, the sign is there. Maybe not a big deal, as you genuinely don't really see it as you walk by (I assume...). But what might it represent? What are the obstacles, the "No Entry" signs that we put up to stop people joining our church communities?<br />
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Well, we might stop judging them and rejecting them. Or even just implying that this might be the case. ALL are welcome. We need to persuade all people, especially marginalised, afraid, broken people that they are welcome to come and make our churches untidy and ragged. <br />
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We must effectively advertise our services, events and overall life. Webpages, Facebook pages, a new, fresh up to date noticeboard would do the trick. <br />
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If someone is determined enough to beat external obstacles and they actually walk through the door (that can be intimidating - can the door be easier to open, or glass?), we could try making the worship accessible to them. That doesn't mean a change of genre or style or dumbing anything down - but do your worship well and make allowances for anyone new. A little explanation. Some friendly guidance through a liturgy. A "pal" to sit alongside and help out. But not swamping. No rotas, or elements, or anything like that as you walk through door. Be friendly. Be kind. Give time. Give space. So many little bits and pieces.<br />
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There's a much longer set of posts here - and nothing here is very new. There have been initiatives galore at making churches more welcoming and removing the obstacles to people coming to see.<br />
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But we can still be surprised when, after years, we once again see the "No Entry" sign that we have completely forgotten was there all along.Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-82514929224857792022016-02-07T00:44:00.000-08:002016-02-07T00:44:12.248-08:00Preparing for Lent...We are on the cusp of the next Penitential season starting - Ash Wednesday this week is the start of Lent.<br />
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I find Lent a wonderfully bleak journey (deliberately so) - although one has to work to make a season like this as sparse as it should be, given everything is quite as busy and lively as it seems to be.<br />
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The wilderness (where Jesus goes to spend his 40 days and 40 nights) is supposed to be a desert, from the middle eastern setting of the tale. Here in Scotland do we find wilderness in the sea, sky, islands? On the later winter sparseness of the scenery (like the beach earlier this week on Bute)?<br />
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Or do we find the wilderness in ourselves, in our hardness of heart, in the lack of time to focus on others with the grace and love that they really deserve, that God would wish them to have.<br />
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Lenten observance - prayer, reflection, space - that is creating a wilderness in the space and structure of our lives to focus on God, on our own shortcomings, on where grace is actually to be found.<br />
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Sparseness, silence, wilderness. Lent is a season of all these things. A journey with and towards God. An uncomfortable journey, but a journey that can lead us into a deeper, richer relationship with God.<br />
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Lent.Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-89937241940799665112015-12-12T03:07:00.001-08:002015-12-12T03:07:18.658-08:00Advent...Roughly half way through our season of Advent 2015, and I am pausing for a day away from the charge and other clerical.church time. <br />
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Some time to have a glance down the feeds of many other people's social media. Social media can be a useful but sometimes harsh lens through which to view the season.<br />
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I love the blogs and series and posts that many of my colleagues are posting through Advent. Pictures, poems, reflections, words-of-the-day. All looks great. I can mostly fight down the twinge that I should be doing a bit better at that sort of thing...<br />
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I love the sharing of the carol services (a healthy mixture of Advent & Christmas carols), the school nativities (traditional, modernised, surreal), the parties and social events (not many clergy at those, yet) and all the rest of the build up that this time, from the end of November to the 25th of December brings.<br />
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In my own charges the preparations follow a pretty familiar pattern - extra worship, a different eucharistic prayer with a slightly hard rhythm, particular choice of hymns, a special discipleship group... For the sixth time in these charges (still early days) there is now a familiarity about the Advent journey. A few things have changed - participants, staff, details - but broadly the Advent experience is familiar.<br />
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Is that a good thing?<br />
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Should Advent feel familiar, year on year? How do we re-capture the freshness and excitement of what it is all rooted in, the realisation of the coming of the saviour? What new thing can we do, what new innovation can we find to re-capture the newness of Advent?<br />
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Or does the very familiarity of waiting (again) for a saviour, actually capture the centuries of waiting that had passed before the birth of Jesus? The cycles of the Jewish calendar and festivals, the celebration of a long-lost-reality of a Passover. The cycles of conquest and despair, followed by hope and (partial) restoration.<br />
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And does the the very familiarity of waiting (again) for a saviour, actually capture the centuries of Christians waiting for it to happen again, puzzling about the words that Jesus said to them: 'Some of those here present will not have died before the end times come...'?<br />
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Waiting is a very human occupation. We wait, from the moment we are born. We wait for our life on earth to end. And we need to fill that waiting with something - life, love, relationships, cures for cancer, an end to wars, universal acceptance of all humanity. It stops one getting bored, to have something to do while we wait.<br />
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A pause in the Advent waiting. A time to reflect. To wait for the Advent waiting to start again, tomorrow...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-25133010046967486982015-11-22T10:28:00.001-08:002015-11-22T11:49:00.239-08:00Strangers in a strange land<div class="MsoNormal">
The oblique reference to <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus+2%3A22&version=KJV">a
passage in Exodus</a>, and direct reference to the <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stranger-Strange-Land-Robert-Heinlein/dp/1442005831">Robert
Heinlein science fiction novel</a> are rather relevant to aspects of church
life here at the moment.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The island of Bute will receive some Syrian refugee families
in the next little while, refugees fleeing unimaginable (for us) horrors of the
conflict in their country. This part of their journey may have started from a camp like the one above (photo Al-Jazeera). Their destination is a smallish Scottish island with
a smallish Scottish town on it. The
people of that town are working to produce a welcome for their new arrivals –
in a carefully managed, subtle, aware style. Some of the press are trying to make <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2015/nov/16/local-newspaper-editor-slaps-down-bigots-to-welcome-syrian-refugees">a
rather more negative story</a> of it, but the overall story is one of goodwill
and a preparedness to welcome these strangers to our strange land. <o:p></o:p></div>
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And it will be very strange – a cold and wet place, compared
to Syria. A place where people speak English, often so quickly and with such a
broad accent that even other Scots cannot understand them. A place where the
customs, traditions, common ideas and conflicts are very particular and
local. So, many prayers and much hard
work ahead to welcome and help them prepare to integrate into Rothesay society. To allow these people to valued and loved and accepted is an enormous gift that we have to offer.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I have been here (Bute and Cowal, the neighbouring peninsula) as a minister for about 5 and one half
years now – and I still have quite a feeling of being a stranger in this
strange land. I am a Scot, but with many
more years of living on the east coast of the country and having a centre of
gravity over there. The west coast can seem a strange and alien land. My wife
is a west coaster – well, a south-west coaster – but it can still all seem a
little strange. As a professional church minister, the hard line drawn between
catholic and protestants seems to wiggle somewhat as it passes through the
Episcopal Church – all rather strange for this strange land. Even the strange land of ministry as one
career – over ten years now, counting my full-time training at college, is a
sometimes peculiar place in which to live.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So the Syrians? Will be welcomed as best as can be managed. Volunteers and others will rally round and support as appropriate, and leave well alone as appropriate. Their stories may unfold as we
get to know them. Their status as <a href="http://www.refugeecouncil.org.uk/tellitlikeitis">official refugees</a>
rather than asylum seekers means they arrive here with as stable and safe
status. There is a lot of misinformation and rumour about. These are people who need our help. As Christians, this is clear from all we believe and try to live out. As human beings this must be done and will be done.</div>
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And we <i>will</i>
welcome these strangers into this strange land.<o:p></o:p></div>
Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-55582938568551597582015-06-02T13:14:00.000-07:002015-06-02T13:14:01.016-07:00ConvalescenceBeing unwell is not something I have much experience with, partly due to (relative) youth and maybe a certain bloodymindedness about struggling on with colds. No days off.<br />
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Until last week.<br />
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After about two years of getting round to it, I finally arranged a minor nose op, to help me breathe, taste etc. No problem, really. Except for the general anaesthetic and best part of a week off work. I was whacked out by it, much to my (male) surprise.<br />
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It was the first time I have ever (yes, ever) been to a hospital as a consumer, other than when I had an outpatient's appointment for verrucae as a 12 year old. Those went away by themselves.<br />
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But this time, feeling a bit ill, a bit tired, a bit vulnerable.<br />
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It has been rather a useful exercise in the vulnerability that we all much accept is being human. Even now, two weeks on, I am still a little bit more tired than usual, as I immerse myself in funerals, synod agenda, vacancy worship rotas.<br />
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But we are all human and we are all vulnerable...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-21758975181375635352015-04-05T23:43:00.001-07:002015-04-05T23:43:16.796-07:00Blogging Holy Week: Easter Day"Alleluia, Christ is Risen!"<br />
Being Episcopalians, the reply comes back, "He is Risen indeed, Alleluia!"<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo by Di Tennent</td></tr>
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The journey through Holy Week is complete, in evening or dawn vigils, the lighting of fires, big and small (see above for our one in Dunoon!) Alleluias are sung, bells ring out, chocolate is eaten. Easter Day has arrived.<br />
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As a clergyperson, we must find the energy to lead the worship with excitement and enthusiasm, even after the marathon that is this week. I reflected on the feelings of the disciples, the women as they approached the Easter revelation - their week had been a churning, destroying week. We still talk about it now, about 2,000 years later, after all.<br />
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What does it all mean? Jesus Christ is Risen Today (sing the Alleluia from the hymn response). But what does that mean?<br />
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Hope for all humanity? Relevance for the church? Human belief that we are not extinguished after our bodies cease to function? A loving God who created us and understands us (became us) and forgives us? A mixture of all of that...?<br />
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The Easter Day message is one of new beginnings - those new beginnings are about the gospel, and the gospel is about all sorts of things, in this world and the next. But we can begin again...<br />
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After Easter Day on Bute I am (pretty much) on holiday for a week. Some jobs to do, a little prosecco with the family, some time to start to unwind and get the rushing thoughts out of my head and relax. But best of all:<br />
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"Alleluia, Christ is Risen!"Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-21290400805148988722015-04-05T07:08:00.000-07:002015-04-05T07:08:02.899-07:00Blogging Holy Week: Holy SaturdayThis blog post should be blank. The emptiness of the day between Good Friday and Easter Day should be empty. Jesus is in the tomb. It has ended.<br />
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The busyness of life kicks in, of course. The preparation of the church for the Easter celebrations, the cleaning, the flowers, the building of the bonfires. Paschal candles (two of them, one for each church) are prepared with transfers and holes for grains. Rosemary is cut for the renewal of baptismal vows. The emptiness is there, but masked by the busyness.<br />
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And in one of the churches, as it becomes dark, the vigil starts. The readings from the Old Testament, the Hebrew scriptures, readings that talk about the promise of salvation across history - they are read in a nearly dark church.<br />
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Until...<br />
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I will leave it there - the blog for Easter Day starts in the middle of that darkness. But that is the next day...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-5237032354043407312015-04-04T06:31:00.000-07:002015-04-04T06:31:16.234-07:00Blogging Holy Week: Good FridayOne of the Sunday school asked the right question last week: "Why is the Friday called "Good" when Jesus is killed? Shouldn't it be 'Bad Friday'?"<br />
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That is a good question indeed. A brief scour of sources (Wikipedia!) has a few views - it comes from "God" Friday, or "Holy" Friday, because of how important the death of Jesus is believed to be (this second one being the answer I gave the young scholar). In Germany it is (apparently) known as "Grief Friday". It can be known as "Black Friday" (again, apparently) although we had no major discounts on consumer electronics at church this week.<br />
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It is the deliberately low point of the week. The churches are bare and sparse, stripped out the night before. I took pity and did allow heating on. But there is little music, much silence. There was an unpreached-upon reading of John's passion. It says it all, without the need to say any more. Simple wooden crosses are on display.<br />
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I recall, as a child, the veneration of the crucifix on Good Friday - kissing the metal nail through the metal feet of the metal Jesus on the middle-sized cross. We wiped the feet between each person's kiss (I was a server). It was profound and strange and stays with me to this day. The little metal figure on the crucifix in Dunoon that I face for the eucharistic prayer draws me back to that memory. Good Friday every Sunday...<br />
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At the Good Friday liturgy in Dunoon there was silence before the service. Except for the contractor's yard next door. Where some ordinary chap was hammering at something, in a solitary, measured way. An ordinary person, going about their business, hammering nails into something. A bit like an ordinary Roman crucifixion soldier, going about his everyday business, nearly 2000 years ago. Death as an ordinary thing, in Israel, in Kenya, in Scotland.<br />
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But something can make it extraordinary...<br />
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<br />Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-88265293346599558662015-04-03T00:25:00.000-07:002015-04-03T00:25:10.781-07:00Blogging Holy Week: Maundy ThursdayTne Triduum starts.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://fatpastor.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/christ-in-gethsemane-p.jpg?w=298&h=300" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://fatpastor.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/christ-in-gethsemane-p.jpg?w=298&h=300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: whitesmoke; color: #333333; font-family: calluna-1, calluna-2, Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 17px;">“Christ in Gethsemane” by Michael O’Brien. <br />Go to</span><a href="http://www.studiobrien.com/" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: whitesmoke; border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: calluna-1, calluna-2, Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 17px; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">http://www.studiobrien.com/</a><span style="background-color: whitesmoke; color: #333333; font-family: calluna-1, calluna-2, Georgia, 'Bitstream Charter', serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 17px;"> for more from the artist.</span></td></tr>
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That sounds rather churchy and maybe just a little bit bewildering for those who don't really get that sort of thing. The Easter holiday for the schools started today, and traffic chaos is promised on the radio as the country seems to decide to travel to wherever the other bit of the country that is travelling comes from. The promise of Bank Holiday entertainment looms large.<br />
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So what is this Triduum thing?<br />
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The days at the end of Holy Week, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday and on to Easter Day itself - there is a certain intensity about stepping into a one-to-one scale model of the last week of Jesus' normal human life. Others have discussed this in some detail, such as <a href="http://thurible.net/2015/04/02/the-triduum/" target="_blank">here</a>. This does actually fit rather neatly into the Bank Holiday spirit - the Passover in Jerusalem 2000 years ago was just such a major holiday, and the excitement of what spectacles might be on offer (maybe even some crucifixions!) might have had the travelling crowds eager to gather for the weekend.<br />
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But today is Maundy Thursday. The Last Supper. Bread and Wine. Footwashing. Misunderstanding (as usual, poor disciples...). Tears like blood in Gethesemane. Betrayal. Finally, open hostility and attack from the threatened political and religious leaders. A lot that would make a fine, dark drama. As it is.<br />
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The day that ran by? A funeral in the morning. Dark and light at that, and a dry spell as the coffin found its rest. Eucharist, stripping of the sanctuary and a time of vigil in a dark and cooling church. And children off from school, ceilidhs and carry outs. Readings photocopied and allocated for the continuing Triduum. Snags with some of those jobs that really could do with being done. Even some odd impulses: new wheels on the nave altar to make pushing it away to its place smoother for the ritual stripping and clearing.<br />
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It has all started in earnest now. The mixture of stepping into the narrative from two millenia ago clashes with the ordinary nature of our life. But that's what it's supposed to do... Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-4199500263533314622015-04-02T07:53:00.000-07:002015-04-02T07:53:36.802-07:00Blogging Holy Week: WednesdayAnother betwixt and between day. "Spy" Wednesday, I suppose, with Judas building up to his task of betrayal, is one option for today. The midweek eucharist on Bute had the account from John's gospel, Jesus dipping the bread and passing it to Judas to start him on his task of giving up Jesus.<br />
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In a more than one church charge (I only have two, so not an extreme at all) it is hard to keep a focus on Holy Week equally in all places. There is (for ecumenical and slightly complicated reasons) no Maundy Thursday service in our church on Bute, so we have elements of Maundy Thursday on the Wednesday. And I stripped the sanctuary, alone and quietly, after the congregation had departed to the rest of their middle of Holy Week day.<br />
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I had never noticed the gilt paint in the open aumbry, seen hazy in the background behind the displaced cross. Hidden treasures?<br />
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But still a day to go until the Triduum starts in earnest. A funeral in the morning, a town person, nothing to do with the church, other than having made connections in the past few years. As bustling and ordinary as Jerusalem at the Passover during Roman occupation. People being born, dying, doing everything else in between. No silence and stillness, just bustle and holiday busyness...Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-1449074776836984472015-03-31T13:02:00.000-07:002015-03-31T13:02:54.530-07:00Blogging Holy Week: TuesdayI'm not the only blogger this holy week: <a href="http://thisfragiletent.com/" target="_blank">thisfragiletent</a> is giving it his particular view and perspective. But my Holy Week continues.<br />
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Tuesday is Holy Week is betwixt and between, taking a scriptural viewpoint. The many activities continue: today I am picking on the tourism of Jesus and his disciples. They wander the streets and look about. Mark's account is the typically tersest (NRSV):<br />
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"Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut in the fields. Then those who went ahead and those who followed were shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!<br />
Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!<br />
Hosanna in the highest heaven!’<br />
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Then he entered Jerusalem and went into the temple; and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve."<br />
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They had a look around. There are fights, teaching and tension. But today they look around. Tourists, in at the big city. What do we make of that? The events still unfold, but there is something delightfully selfie-stick and status updating about that final line...<br />
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Today in my 2015 Holy Week, we told the Holy Week and Easter story to over one hundred 12 and 13 year olds in the local school.<br />
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<span id="goog_1826581352"></span><span id="goog_1826581353"></span>What did they make of it? Were they religious tourists as we played out some of the events of that week? Or receptive young minds hearing the word of God? Or a bit of all of those sorts of things.<br />
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But we remain betwixt and between. Another day of this waiting before the Triduum starts to gain momentum, the events start to get out of control... But an important day of waiting!Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-81493655403173444022015-03-30T13:14:00.002-07:002015-03-30T13:14:20.932-07:00Blogging Holy Week: MondayThe first part of this week is a waiting time, between Palm Sunday and the Triduum ahead of us. There are attempts at a structure to the biblical accounts, making what are not intended to be coherent events coherent.<br />
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What was Jesus doing? What did his followers make of this time? The gospels give us temple cleansing (not John, of course, where this is much earlier), teaching, some miracles. And threats. The steady growing of the threat to Jesus' life.<br />
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Today, as a modern day religious leader, we have photocopying, populating rotas for dramatized passions, encouraging other service leaders and musicians and pushing all for attendance at ecumenical services. And a funeral. And all the usual pastoral niggles and delights. It is a time of busyness, and waiting, and looking forward to the race through the end of the week. And to the golden day at the end. And to the holiday after the end of that.<br />
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But today, on Monday of Holy Week, we photocopy, fold, phone and prepare...<br />
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<br />Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7330566308438258674.post-81039497771513377372015-03-29T13:16:00.000-07:002015-03-29T13:16:13.183-07:00Palm Sunday evening...Clocks went forward, but the people came anyway. The king on a donkey, greeted with the raucous 'Hosannas' of the crowd, is a draw now, just as he was 2000 years (or so) ago. We didn't process outside in the heavy showers - soggy ground underfoot, a church on a hill and no donkey all conspire to keep us indoors.<br />
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But we kept the start of the week. I reflected (morning and evening) on the scene after the event. Abandoned palm branches, a few ownerless cloaks. Some poor souls trying to tidy it all up a little, as the storm clouds start to gather on the horizon in Jerusalem. The ecumenical service on Bute, for the fifth time, is a start to a very different but very common journey.<br />
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And we managed to avoid spoilers about the destination...<br />
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<br />Bishop Andrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11636065918832083759noreply@blogger.com0