Snuffing out the candles

 We are in the season of Epiphany. Today I took down the (moulting) tree, put the decorations back in the loft, looked out at the rain, noted that the gloom of early morning had moved imperceptibly into the gloom of early evening, and reflected. I reflected on the past fortnight or so, in which the raging energy brought on by the pronouncement of the Bishops (read back - the links are all there) had been dissipated in singing beautiful music and soothed by the magic of Christmas.

And I have been consolidating something I've known for a long time. It's a long time since I stopped thinking that the gospel accounts of the Nativity are literal truth, half a century or more since I realised that in fact the gospels are full of what a student of literature recognises as the hallmarks of a fictional account. (Think of all that direct speech, for starters). And over the years I've heard sermons that have, in their way, dealt with that - pointed out relevance, invited us to think. And I've thought.

Now, as the rain batters on my study window, I can see clearly what it does, all this magic. I don't care that the stories of the shepherds, the angels, the Magi (and Eliot's wonderful poem about them) - I don't care that they can't possibly be true in the way that it's true that I was born in Glasgow. I don't want them changed in any way, for they are perfect. They are perfect poems that contain a truth that inspires, and they are best absorbed as poems, enhanced by art and music and beauty.

And what does this truth inspire me to? I suppose in one way you could say that it inspired me to become a damned nuisance. It certainly knocked me off a comfortable path and set me climbing the spiritual equivalent of the Aonach Eagach, on a ridge walk that I'm still clambering along more than forty years later. It's exciting, it's bound only by trust and love and balance, and that's how I want it to remain.

What does not inspire is a set of rules. Dogma and authoritarianism aren't very thrilling either. Dry politicking within ecclesiastical structures leaves me cold, and people - men, usually - telling me what can and cannot be done because of history and prejudice will tend to set me off on yet another mountain, to sustain the metaphor.

So what about all the beauty and mystery and the stories that tell us of Love incarnate and inspire us to love justice and truth and our neighbours as ourselves? I can't imagine that our bishops, for example, haven't had a bit of that for themselves this Christmas. None of them, after all, is as old as I am - surely they're not blasé about the mysteries they dispense? Does none of it do something to rekindle the fire that, presumably, used to burn in them?

Because in the end, that 's what it does, this season we've just had. It rekindles a fire. Dangerous element, fire - but warming and wonderful. Gives you courage. Gives you passion. I have heard at least one of our bishops preach with passion - but a new image has just presented itself to me, and it seems horribly apt.

Bishop's mitre as candle snuffer.

Icon, anyone?

Journey begins in bloggers meeting

People who don't know about blogging still - after all these years - sneer at the idea. I'd rather meet people and have real conversations, they say. What they don't understand, of course, is how much more real your conversations can be with someone whose blog you follow - making it possible to meet someone you've met for only five minutes on one previous occasion and know where they are in life, what interests them, whether or not they might enjoy a bacon roll on Largs seafront ... You get my drift.

And so it was, dear, persistent reader, that Mr B and I had lunch with a certain weel-kent blogger known as Mad Priest, along with Mrs MP and two well-behaved collie dogs, at a pavement table outside Nardini at the Moorings, handy for the Cumbrae ferry - of which more anon. I am happy to report that we blethered non-stop for over an hour and a half, ranging through various ecclesiastical topics (liturgy, for example) to the merely gossipy (you can guess that bit, especially if you're a Pisky). We were heading on to Ayr for a party, and the MPs were - on my recommendation - taking the ferry to Cumbrae.

It's always a risky business, commending something you hold dear to someone else. This holds for poetry - oh, the risk of exposing your favourites to a new class of students - for music, and certainly for special places. People who know me know how special the Cathedral of The Isles has been to me for the past 43 years; now I was sending two people there without me, in the hope that they too would find it special. So it was with immense delight that I read Jonathan's blog post this morning. Quite apart from the relief, there is the interest of a new slant on a familiar place, the lovely photos taken by someone else of features I have grown to love, the affirmation that here indeed is a special, holy place.

And I even learned something new. About Elton John. Go and read it for yourself.

Not rolling stones then

It is the Wednesday of Holy Week. The day before Maundy Thursday, when for the hours before midnight the sacrament will rest on an altar decorated with moss and tiny trees and candles, many candles. But today it is only Wednesday, and two women are to be seen heading up the hill opposite the gates to Benmore Gardens. They are accompanied by two rampant spaniels, and their pockets bulge strangely.

Some way up the hill, they pass a fallen tree and come to an abrupt stop, exclaiming in delight. The tree is draped with curtains of moss, and it is this which has caught their attention. Moments later, they have produced plastic carrier bags from their bulging pockets and filled two of them with the moss. They then continue uphill. Later, they can be seen scrambling precariously up a steep bank to reach some particularly succulent sphagnum. It seems to matter little that they are not in their first youth, nor that they are rapidly becoming somewhat dishevelled. They press on, each now burdened with two bags. They are laughing as they speculate what any passer-by might think. Escaped lunatics? Eccentric campers with their shopping? But in all the years in which they have done this, they have never met a soul. No-one has ever had to wonder.

This day, however, is graced by fleeting sun. It is, after all, April. The schools are on holiday, and there are trippers in the land. People who have come to Cowal to walk the forest paths, in these straitened times, rather than flee to the Canaries. And so it is that a host of such travellers appears on the path. The first four pass quickly, perhaps because they have dogs who may become entangled with the rampant spaniels. But the remaining two greet the women… pause …and then it comes.

“What have you got in the bags?”
“We thought it might be shopping.”

And they laugh. And so Mrs Heathbank and Mrs Blethers – for our mad women are indeed the writer of this blog and her pal - have to come clean, for the first time in ten years. And the great thing is that it is a joyous moment, that the strangers think it sounds a wonderful thing, that they regret that they are only visiting for the day. We tell them that they are the first people ever to ask about the bags of moss, and the woman tells us:
“Don’t mind me – I’m just a nosey bitch.” And then she gives us a hug, for good measure, and we part as if we had known each other for years.

A good day, I think.

I wonder slightly about the change in person at the end of this account, but it doesn't work if I keep it in 3rd person. Purists can save their comments for another time...

Ancient things

Wales - the bit near us anyway - is full of tiny, ancient churches. This one is St Bilo's Church, Llanfilo, and is obviously very much loved and cared for. The mediaeval rood screen inside sags to the right; we learned that recent subsidence meant that the north-east wall had to be pinned, but didn't know if the two were related. Prince Charles seems to have paid a flying visit last month, presumably in his Prince of Wales mode.

Earlier in the day, when the sun had still to reappear and the wind was discouraging, we ate our picnic in the porch of another tiny, mediaeval church : the Church of St Ellwye, Llandieu, Telgarth, at the foot of the Black Mountains in the Brecon Beacons national park. This church was a sad contrast to St Bilo's, looked after only by the Friends of Friendless Churches and used only once a year. Sheep wandered among the toppled gravestones, and bat droppings littered the porch floor. There were remarkable traces of mediaeval painting on the walls, including one of Adam and Eve and The Tree of Life of which only their feet and legs remained; I'll post more photos when I'm back at my own computer. I even forgot my camera on this trip - the pics are from my phone.

Having bodyswerved Matins as our Sunday worship, we said some prayers and sang "Come Holy Ghost" in St Ellwye's - so perhaps we doubled the worship in this place for this year. It was another of these Celtic thin places - a special place on a grey, quiet morning.

And then the sun came out.

Virtual Christians

As I write this, I’m listening to a sermon. On a Friday, and on my laptop. It’s about the church and the possibilities of using new technologies for mission, and it’s to be found here, along with other posts on the subject of the speaker’s virtual ministry. I met him last night, in his virtual Anglican cathedral in Second Life, and reflected later that even if I were to go no further, I’d have noticed the difference in attitude between him/his avatar and some I’ve met already. It’s heartening to note that educators and Christians share a concern for encouragement and a willingness to approach and help the stranger in a virtual world – because if I notice this, then others will as well. And that, if I’m not mistaken, is ministry.

With any luck, I’ll attend a virtual church service on Sunday – though the time differences make for odd service times in the UK!