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>
So the NHS is 60 years old this weekend.
Apparently, in the summer of 1948 every household received a leaflet explaining the new NHS. It said: “Your new National Health Service begins on 5th July. What is it? How do you get it? It will provide you with all medical, dental, and nursing care. Everyone, rich or poor, man, woman or child—can use it. There are no charges except for a few special items. There are no insurance qualifications. But it is not a charity You are all paying for it, mainly as taxpayers, and it will relieve your money worries in time of illness.”
What an amazing national achievement is the NHS. Of course there’s stuff wrong with it – but none of it is terminal. I hear staff are demoralised, but people have always complained like that. What is amazing is the commitment of so many to the enterprise – doctors, nurses, researchers, admin staff and ancillary staff.

Birds without Wings

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You and I used to fancy ourselves as birds, and we were very happy even when we flapped our wings and fell down and bruised ourselves, but the truth is that we were birds without wings. You were a robin and I was a blackbird, and there were some who were eagles, or vultures, or pretty goldfinches, but none of us had wings.
For birds with wings nothing changes; they fly where they will and they know nothing about borders and their quarrels are very small.
But we are always confined to earth, no matter how much we climb to the high places and flap our arms. Because we cannot fly, we are condemned to do things that do not agree with us. Because we have no wings we are pushed into struggles and abominations that we did not seek.
conclusion of Birds without Wings by Louis de Bernieres

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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 of 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.”

A “story meditation” from the ‘Education’ section of Anthony de Mello’s The Heart of the Enlightened

>Radicalising Culture

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>Great day yesterday led by Dr Andrew Smith from Youth Encounter (part of Scripture Union). Youth Encounter has an emphasis on helping Christian and Muslim youngsters to dialogue and it sounded like Andrew really enjoyed this work. There doesn’t appear to be any proseletysing – just a desire to know the other as hospitable and faithful.
Title of the day was “Radicalising Culture” which made me think how much radical has changed since I was in my more “radical” days. Now it’s much more about polarising culture – but Andrew did manage to help us think that today’s problems are no more polarised than 30 years ago – the time of Brixton rioys, poll tax protests etc etc – just that the discourse has changed to being a “religious” one, as opposed to an “ethnic” one.
Made us think about whether we operate as followers of Christendom or the way of the cross.
It was good to be welcomed to the Storehouse Church. Great facilities – comfy lounge, various rooms, TV, fruit – modern hospitality.

Initiative

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Until one is committed there is always hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. COncerning all acts of inititative and creation there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans. The moment one moves, then providence moves too. Multitudes of things occur to help that which otherwise could never occur. A stream of events issues from the decision, raising to one’s favour all manner of unforeseen acccidents, meetings, and material assistance which no one could have dreamed would come their way: “Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”
W N Murray; The Scottish Himalayan Expedition – last two lines commonly attributed to Goethe

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Great ideas come into the world as quietly as doves. Perhaps then, if we listen attentively we shall hear, among the uproar of empires and nations, the saint fluttering of wings, the gentle stirrings of life and hope. Some will say this hope lies in a nation; others in a man. I believe rather that it is awakened, revived, nourished by millions of solitary individuals whose deeds and works every day negate frontiers and the crudest implications of history. Each and every one, on the foundations of their own suffering and joy, builds for all.
Albert Camus – quoted by Dee Hock p310

>Gafcon

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>How sad is Gafcon?
But Father Christian has a good blog about the Big Pete and Little Pete Show – dummies for ventriloquist Martyn Minns.
Personally I think it’s a battle being waged by those who want a command and control church against those who want something rather more grown up and self organising, where people can be trusted to make spiritual judgements for themselves – not having to rely on a moral dictatorship.

IF

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IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings – nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!

Alcoholics Anonymous

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AA twelve steps

1.) We admitted we were powerless over alcohol–that our lives had become unmanageable.

2.) Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3.) Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

4.) Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5.) Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6.) Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7.) Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

8.) Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9.) Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10.) Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11.) Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

12.) Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.