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> What is Remembrance Sunday about? How has it changed over the 90 years since Armistice Day?
These were some of the questions we looked at yesterday.
Remembrance Sunday remains a day of mourning. One day that we have set aside in our year to remember the victims of war, human nature and its consequences. But our thoughts will not be the same as those celebrating the hard fought peace of 1918.

Significant changes include
• The development of international institutions like the United Nations and the EU – great political achievements representing a cooperative relationships instead of the colonialism of the past.
• War has changed and its weapons have changed. Now civilian casualties are far higher. In WW1 civilian casualties were 5% of total casualties. Now that figure is 75%.
• Communications have changed. We now live in the “global village” where “everyone is networked and nobody is in control” – which makes wars far less winnable. As a child of the 50’s I was told how lucky I was that the wolrd was at peace. Now, because of news media and globalisation, we know that there isn’t likely to have been a moment of our human history when we haven’t been fighting one another.
• We know – especially as awareness of post traumatic stress disorder has increased – that, in the words of Jose Narosky “in war there are no unwounded soldiers”.
• We know more about “child soldiers”. Children as young as 8 are involved in conflicts in at least 17 countries – acting as spies, messengers and brandishing rifles.
• We know that there are over 34 million people displaced by war.
These are some of the things that come to mind as “I remember” – the thoughts for my two minute silence. I carry on remembering the “fallen”, those killed, their loved ones, parents and communities. I remember all those who have been on the front line. I remember the civilian casualties, the child soldiers and the refugees. I remember the violence that is part of being human and I remember that we are made in God’s image – and called to pray:

God our refuge and strength,
bring near the day when wars shall cease
and poverty and pain shall end,
that earth may know the peace of heaven
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

(the poppy picture was pianted by friend Pam Kelly – member of St Andrew’s Painters’ Group)

>Yippeeeeee

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> Today’s election victory by Barak Obama has something biblical about it. It feels like an exodus. The 44th president elected 40 years after the assassination of Martin Luther King, who in the midst of tremendous racial hatred and bigotry had a dream. The alection of an a black president must feel wonderful for black Americans. Already the excitement is capturing the imagination of people around the world with the hope that he may provide a visionary and mature leadership.

I am reminded of Moses who led his people from oppression in Egypt and who also had 40 years to wait between dream and reality, and I am reminded of Joseph the dreamer of Egypt – and his coat of many colours.

I hope we remember how the Afro-Americans have been oppressed. I hope the great indignities of their not so distant history are not brushed out of human consciousness and that hoods of the KKK, the burning necklaces and the chains of slavery may continue to testify to the shallowness and shortsightedness of those who cannot see beneath the colour of a person’s skin.

Yes. This seems like an exodus story. The end of an oppressive age governed by puerile thinking. Until the next time ……..

Teaching and Learning

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” A man began to give large doses of cod-liver oil to his Doberman because he had been told that the stuff was good for dogs. Each day he would hold the head of the protesting dog between his knees, force its jaws open, and pour the liquid down its throat.

One day the dog broke loose and spilled the oil on the floor. Then, to the man’s great surprise, it returned to lick the spoon. That is when he discovered that what the dog had been fighting was not the oil but his method of administration.”

From the ‘Education’ section of Anthony de Mello’s “The Heart of the Enlightened”

>Jubilee

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>Morning Prayer today included the wonderful reading from Leviticus 25 outlining the teaching on Jubilee.

It’s green – recognisnng the rights of the land – every 7th year was to be a sabbath of complete rest for the land – a time for the land to sigh.

After 7 lots of 7 years – ie the year after the 49th, the 50th – “and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants”. All capital transactions were to use the Jubilee as its basis. So if land was sold it was sold until the next Jubilee year with the land returning then to its original owner. The price for the sale was to be linked to the number of crops.

How amazing is that! In our country we talk about ‘old money’ and ‘new money’. We talk about the ‘landed gentry’ who are the beneficiaries of a capital system which knows of no Jubilee.

Is it surprising that there is no reference in the Bible to the Jubilee principle being put into practice? Of course it isn’t. Because in this world of ours people like to accumulate power (and property). We shouldn’t be surprised that vested interests prefer the status quo. The consequence is that inequality, oppression and poverty become systemic, and people become alienated. It also means there can never be Jubilee, because that is when liberty is procalimed throughout the land to all its inhabitants.

(This picture was taken by Jeanette)

I live in a village community which would be transformed by the Jubilee principle. Inheritance (particularly land) is an enormous issue within families and grievances stretch generations back. Fault lines are embedded in the fabric of community life. It’s not stereotypes that divide communities such as ours. It’s not race, gender or age – though they do paly a part. It’s who snubbed who three generations back, and which side people founght on in the war that counts (the Civil War I mean!)I suspect that when hurts are deeply embedded in the fabric of a community most people don’t even realise that they are there.

The Church is able to offer a breathing space – a place to untangle the past and space to take on enterprise with fresh partners and renewed relationships. The political realignment of the Jubilee principle may not be feasible but the life of the Church (the mission of God) show that the fault lines aren’t inevitable, and that alienation and division are short-lived – certainly less than 50 years. This sounds very idealistic doesn’t it? Why’s that?

>Finding Happiness

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>It was good to hear Christopher Jamison on R4 this morning. He is Abbot of Worth Abbey and has written a book called Finding Happiness.
He says definitions of what happiness is are hard to find, but most boil down to being about “feeling good”. Life isn’t like that though because we have good days and bad days – as well as sickness and suffering. He made the point that happiness is about knowing good and doing good.
He also referred to good worship being an experience of the imagination of God.

>Desks against the wall

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>It is not good for man to work alone – especially when the desk is piled high with paperwork (see Genesis). Friend Simon led an excellent session on delegation yesterday on our leadership programme – going through the continuum of leadership styles – tell, sell, consult and share and sharing the grid of confidence and competence.

One phrase that keeps cropping up in relation to delegation is “letting go“. It’s a funny expression but indicates the difficulties of delegation and that it involves grief.

Just wondering.

Just wondering whether better words might be “letting in” – then delegation becomes an issue of hospitality, celebration and fun.

It also gives a eucharistic reference to delegation – as this icon by Rublev of the Trinity shows. God is letting/inviting us in in the ultimate act of delegation and self-giving. His mission/work is placed in our hands and on our lips as he trusts us with his work. He doesn’t “let go” in the sense of leaving us to it but “lets in” as he promises constant companionship (bread sharing).
“Letting in” sounds as if it could be so much more fun than “letting go”. It sounds as if there is more room for celebration – and more chance of continuing relationship. There is nothing worse than letting go of something important and not knowing what on earth has happened.

So what are we saying when we have our desks against the wall? The Lord does indeed prepare a table before us, and that table often looks very like a desk of paperwork. How hospitable are we with our work? Shall we let people in? Shall we keep it to ourselves?

Politics

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Politics is not just a tiresome consequence of human shortcomings, it is an ongoing conversation about how to bring out and empower the ocean of different gifts and talents in a community. It is not about the limited money in people’s pockets, it is about the limitless potential in their hearts and minds and souls and bodies. It is about how to engage all the energy that is about, and how to discern and embody that which constitutes the goodl life. It may not always be happy, beautiful, or rich, but if a community can express such a notion of politics, it can experience a goodness that other communities, with their impoverished politics, can only envy.
Sam Wells: God’s Companions (2006) p169

>Pause for Reflection

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>
This picture is from Estaticist’s photostream and is from Butchart Gardens on Vancouver Island called Pause for Reflection.
Sam Wells refers to the way sherpas in the Himalayas will suddenly stop their climbing, put down their equipment and rest – as if waiting for shomething or somebody. This causes great consternation to westerners. “Why do you do that?” The sherpas’ reply is “We have travelled a long way; we are waiting for our souls to catch up with our bodies.”
This seems to represent an essential spiritual discipline – and we westerners need to learn that though we have moved on so fast, and been through so much change, we haven’t always given our souls time to catch up. It is the same principle as the sabbath – a regular time, once a week for us to catch up with ourselves. And for the same reason, we need family holidays and celebrations to allow ourselves to catch up with one another and to realise that we have missed each other in all the busyness.
Sometimes though, our soul is never going to catch up with us. We can wait until the snow melts, but our soul is never going to find us. Being lost like that signals the need for us to retreat – with retreat being another essential spiritual discipline, Retreating far enough helps us regain soul and and the location of what we value most. The story of the Prodigal Son is the classic tale of the retreat of a man who finds all that he ever wanted and all that he ever needed.