Living Wittily

Living Wittily is Retiring Kind Of.......

Many of those who regularly visit Living Wittily will be aware that life is in process of changing for me. For the past 11 years I have served Baptists in Scotland as the Principal of the Scottish Baptist College, and done so with a burden of responsibility and an awareness of high privilege. When a 19 year old lad from Lanarkshire turned up in the West End of Glasgow on the steps of the Scottish Baptist College, with Highers gained at night school after leaving school at 15, and asked to come and study for ministry, he had no idea that 30 years later he would be appointed Principal. Nor that, untrained, untried and untested as he was then, he would later be entrusted with the formation of women and men towards Christian ministry within and beyond the church.

During my time as Principal I have grown and changed, learned more than I ever conceived I would need to know about Higher Education and ministry formation, and met and worked with a remarkable staff in the College and in the wider circle of UWS staff. It has been a rich time, not without its considerable expenseof emotion and energy and time, but always with an awareness of gift, purpose and shared vision, and it's hard to ask for more.

For the past three years I've travelled from Aberdeen to Paisley, living away from home 4 days a week, and working from home. Family life remains as it should the foundation of my life, and the time has come to be at home more, to reconfigure life around a new sense of vocation, and to plan for the next stages of our lives. That sounds as if I am feeling my age! Well yes, and no. At 62 I am indeed feeling my age, as I did at 52 and even 32. But more important is to accept, even embrace change, as what keeps us alive; to understand that movement is what gives impetus; and to co-operate with the reality that desire and hope and vision give life its energy, direction and purpose. All of that I feel, and clearly recognise in the disjunctions and changes, in the stirring up and invitation, that is the continuing work of the Spirit, disturbing with a deeper peace, and calling into newness and risk.

It would be wrong to say I've been pulled out of my comfort zone! Whatever else the past 11 years have been, it hasn't been that, thankfully.

To teach and share with students at the great creative cusp of life that is study; to encourage and support the discovery of new things that converts monochrome faith to plasma screened subtlety; to accompany students in the at times painful but fruitful work of rediscovering what seemed lost; to bring to birth the recovery of faith as proper confidence, so that life becomes both thoughtfully trusting and responsibly informed, what is not to like in that vocation.

To learn how to encapsulate high vocational ideals and powerfully transformative spiritual principles into the framework and discourse of academic documents, that is itself a gift of the Spirit intepreting the glossolalia of the academy!

To demonstrate in church and academy, that academic excellence, vocational integrity, creative scholarship, and formation of character and competence are hard work, and entirely to be the goal of the student life, and to do so in an intentional community, that is what I mean by responsib ility and privilege. 

I will complete my tenure as Principal on August 31. It is likely I will continue to teach at the College part time, at least till August 2014. My heart has always been in pastoral work and in sharing the life of a Christian community as theologian, preacher, friend and servant. Where opportunities present I hope to still be of service to Christ and to the work of God's Kingdom. And in addition? God knows!

Greeting Death by Celebrating Life

Last week I took the funeral service for my brother-in-law, Sheila's brother. We all have our ways of coming to terms with loss. I had been best man at Ian's wedding 40 years ago, which added to the poignancy, and the fittingness of conducting the funeral of a good, gentle, man.

Inevitably when death comes close we are wise to think about that word inevitable. And to prepare for what must surely come nearer as day passes day. That isn't a morbid, unnatural negative thought - it's simply the truth that needs to be faced so that life can be enjoyed for what it is, precious unrepeatable gift. A human life is a succession of giftedness, each day a miracle of consciousness that we are, and wonder that we are at all. And as a Christian that miraculous wonder borrows the rhetorical prayer of the Psalm writer, "What is a human being that you care for us, mere mortals that you the Eternal pay attention to us?"

Mary Oliver is one of my canonical poets. Her reflection on how to greet death, is an exuberant celebration of how we greet life. I love this poem.

When Death Comes

 

When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse

 

to buy me, and snaps his purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox;

 

when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,

 

I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering;
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?

 

And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,

 

and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,

 

and each name a comfortable music in the mouth
tending as all music does, toward silence,

 

and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.

 

When it's over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was a bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.

 

When it's over, I don't want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don't want to find myself sighing and frightened
or full of argument.

 

I don't want to end up simply having visited this world.

 

~ Mary Oliver ~

A Theological Reflection on Three Mornings of Problematic Commuting!

On the way to College each morning this week I've been delayed.

Monday it was the lolipop man stopping the traffic with a high waving lolipop, stopping the traffic for one adult to cross the road and no children in sight. That got a few irate horn blasts for lolipop abuse.

Tuesday I was a witness to a motor cyclist who came off his bike because a dog on an extension  lead (not the electrical kind) had run across the road and created a tripwire. The biker wasn't too badly hurt but was rightly mad - I've no idea what the insurance issues will be.

Wednesday it was the huge articulated European transport Lorry which stopped within inches of the Nitshill Bridge and blocked the traffic both ways. No way to reverse because backed in by the Traffic queue - no way forward because, well because of the bridge.

Not the best start to the working day - not talking about me, but the lolipop man who thought he was being helpful, the motorcyclist who probably has no comeback for the damage, and the lorry driver who stopped on time but had nowhere to go, and surrounded by impatient to hostile commuters!

Hard to go in after such encounters of commuting life and sit down with a cup of tea and pick up where I left off in my reading of the more abstract realities of contested ecclesiologies, patristic Trinitarianism and contemporary approaches to mission for faith communities on the cusp of a culture fuelled by disruptive innovation and recessional panic!

But such is the life of a theologian - and seriously, the social and civic attitudes that underlie anger at a car having to stop for a walking human being does indeed provide food for theological critique of the values we live by;

and the questions raised by the unforeseen accident, the injury to others we intend or don't intend, and how to resolve situations that have gone wrong between people, there is an entire theological and ethical agenda for the church;

and to ask ourselves what resources we have to deal with those situations where we are stuck at a low bridge with no easy way forward or back, and all around us people just wanting to get on with their own lives.

I guess that embarrassed lorry driver mirrors the experience of so many folk trying to work out how to make their lives work and be able to move forward from the mistake they have made.

And I'm pondering the parable of the church as articulated lorry, confronted by a low bridge, trapped by the traffic, nowhere obvious to go, the driver frantically directing traffic around a vehicle made for movement but stuck by its own shape and wrong turnings.......

The image of the Eagle Nebulae always reminds me of the context within which all the strangeness of the ordinary is held, 'In the beginning was the Word...and the Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us'. And whatever the future of the church, that truth is the intellectual, spiritual and and moral directive for how the Church as the Body of Christ is to live in the creative energy of resurrection, and with trust in the God who in Christ is reconciling the world into the life of the Triune God.

 

Political Argy-Bargying versus the Determination to Make Music

While listening to the replay of yesterday's Today programme in which Minister for Policing, Nick Herbert, was accused by Evan Davis of "talking boring waffle" and evading direct questions, I noticed this, and my heart was glad.

In the torrent of words and cliches, interrupted by the sporadic gunfire of a not to be denied radio presenter, I multi-tasked - and listened to the political bickering while reading this story. The Radio 4 exchange was a cacophonoy of disagreement and non resolution; the story was music to my ears, and set me up for the day. The human voice, and the gift of language, the capacity to communicate and to say outwardly the truth that is in us, is one of the defining characteristics of being human, and humane. Used as an assertion of power, an evasion of truth, as rhetoric to construct illusion and unreality, as an instrument of conflict and a defining of the other as over and against, that same voice obscures that which is humane and enriches humanity. One of the necessary counterpoints is music, the skill and sensitivity, the creative urge and iron discipline, the givinbg of the self to the music so the music can be given. That's why my heart is glad - that a young man has found his own way of making music, against the odds, and with no deficit of excellence. 

Roses and Castles and the Politics of Life

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just spent a few days in Northumberland.  The ruin of Dunstanburgh Castle is one of those impressive reminders of dangerous times, human power games and the labour and ingenuity that goes into territorial defence and territorial aggression. These were built to last, 700 years ago

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then there was the beauty and alternative worldview of Alnwick Gardens. The rose garden was past its best and had been battered by rain, but there's a defiance in flowers quite different from the defiance of stone and rock against sea, wind and human determination.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whether in the shared harmony and profusion of colour and scent, or the single glory of fragile transience shaped into such modest loveliness below, the contrast of rose and rock, garden and castle, vulnerability and power, is one of the distinctions too easily overlooked in the politics of human life. I don't mean we don't need castles in a world of fractured and changing loyalties. But the question of why we need them, is one of the moral perplexities we may be losing the will and capacity to go on interrogating. 

 

I didn't think many of those thoughts while on holiday - they began to assert themselves when looking at photos and deciding what to keep and discard.  It could be argued quite persuasively that the beauty of gardens requires time, and peace, work and investment, and the hopefulness that others won't come and build a castle on the garden site. To prevent such purposes you need strong castles to deter and defend.

But if all of life is about looking over our shoulder, identifying the dangerous 'other', then maybe we need the reassuring space and viewpoint of a garden. Worryingly, both garden and castle need walls, and the wall is both a necessary part of human civilisation, and an ambiguous symbol that tells of our need to keep danger out and what we love safe.

Roses and castles. Hmmm.

Puts You in the Holiday Mood - Ornitheology

The Farnborough Air show brings in around £48 billion in trade agreements, many of them related to armaments, a trade-off which has its own Shard sized ethical question mark for those trying to live wittily in the tangle of our minds as followers of Jesus!

But I love it when God speaks ironically. Like when it is discovered that a pair of very rare black redstarts have nested in one of the show tents. And legislation and the commonsense of the powers that be, including contractors, have left the tent standing and the area immediately around it undusturbed. In a couple of weeks the young birds will have flown, and the world can get on with the business of selling air power, whether for travel or war.

Look at the sparrows of the air, five for a farthing, and not one of them falls but the Creator sees it, notes it, and cares. For sparrow read black redstart. So while the big deals are being done, and the Billions are being traded, two birds weighing an ounce or two between them, go on doing what life does, reflecting the will of God like a sacrament of life and hope - building a nest, raising the next generation, and doing so as an endangered species. And we think humans are the apex of creation....hmmm. And I wonder if the Holy Spirit, the Dove of Peace, was brooding over Farnborough grieved by the uses we make of technology, but delighted with the joy of God at a fragile nest, with featherless nestlings, defying all the hardware, and just needing a little time and peace to show that life, with all its contingencies, is mystery and miracle that puts all our technology in its place. 

The Advent of Smudge

New resident has moved in to our home. As from today goes by the name of Smudge.

 We've had a cat in the home all our lives other than the past two years since Gizmo went to the Celestial Catnip Mountains two and a bit years ago. The advent of Smudge restores the domestic balance and provides an endless source of fun on tap, affection on demand, conversation with and about Herself, curiosity and laughter, ongoing expense, years ahead of inconvenience, and all worth it, totally worth it.

One of the worst mentors for living kenotically is the cat, imperiously indifferent, manipulatively affectionate, instinctively self-interested, morally impervious, purringly contented most times, and furry fury now and again. Such a good balance to help us avoid that anaemic kind of Christian disposition that Thomas Merton called "chronic niceness".

Natural theology in the Cairngorms

After a weekend in Braemar when it didn't stop raining, I put together some photos and words that are the result of just getting on with it. So we went walking up the back of Braemar to see what we could see, apart from mist and drizzle. I know this blog is mostly a theology blog, this time it's natural theology.

 

Drizzled ice cold steam,
Drifts across dark shadowed moor,
Garland of scotch mist.

Mizzle:water falls,
Trillions of liquid life-gifts
Refresh our tired earth.

 

Slow seeping rainfall,
Prodigal irrigation,
Soaking desert hearts.

 

 

A long walk on the cliffs and the beach at St Cyrus - "to consider the flowers..."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is where we went yesterday - a walk along the 220+ foot high cliffs and the sands at St Cyrus. Used to have family holidays at a farm cottage 6 miles inland and spent days here - most of those I remember were sunny.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love the contrast of yellow gorse and everything else around it, especially on a gray, cold day. Walking along the track below you come to corridors of gorse, inhabited by the usual small birds, goldfinches and great tits - no linnets - I miss them, they were very common in Ayrshire when I was a boy.

 

The Scottish Primrose is one of the delights of Spring.

Everyone should have some in their garden, but not purloined from places like this.

Flowers are masterpieces of precision and profusion. There are banks of them here, celebrating Easter.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alfred Noyes described gorse as "great glory of ragged gold", - and close up or far away, it's a sight for sore eyes.

Christopher Smart wrote, "For there is a language of flowers, for flowers are peculiarly the poetry of Christ." I owe that quotation to Bob MacDonald's blog heading - it's a lovely line from an unjustly forgotten poet (who loved cats!).

 It was a good day, in which the isness of flowers was paid attention to!

"Look at the flowers of the field..if God so clothes them, how much more..

 

 

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A Plea for Foolishness as a More Durable Wisdom?

This was published 50 years ago - tell me if it is now obsolete, dated, passe? I have broken up what is otherwise a sustained and relentless paragraph in critique of a fundamental assumption of contemporary Western existence. You may have to read it more than once - that may be because it seeks to expose what we would rather not see.

The whole modern world is one great campaign against risk and uncertainty; as a money dominated world, it is a world of life insurance. 'The modern world as a whole is a world which thinks only about its own old age. It is a monstrous old people's home, an institution for pensioners.

In economics, politics, and constitutional law, as in ethics, psychology and metaphysics, we should, if only we had better eyes, be able to see one thing and one thing only: how much this terrible need for peace and quiet is invariably a principle of enslavement. It is always freedom that has to pay the bill. It is always money that is the master. The glorious insecurity of the present is always sacrificed to the security of the moment immediately following.

That is the real psychology of the contemporary idea of progress: man would like to live his life in the future, to live in advance of the event, so making his present into his past. Taking thought for the morrow, saving for the morrow, actually means throwing away its freedom, castrating its potency and fertility, which are the supreme blessings for human beings.

Every financial transaction is an expense of spirit; the only genuine miser, storing up his treasures, is the lover. This is the most profound teaching of the the Gospel. And we are so much under the domination of money, the Antichrist, that even when we do not openly name it, we constantly take its name for granted. In this commercial world, everything is commercial, even metaphysics, and theology; they too fall into line and cease to have any true presence in their own right. Christianity, like everything else, is detemporalised and thereby deprived of its 'salt'.

Avarice in the form of anxiety about tomorrow is the lord of all the world. The drying up of the heart makes itself felt both temporally and spiritually. The person who rejects the fluiditiy of the living heart, preferring the rigidity of money and conceptual thought, has already chosen the other kind of fluidity, the liquefaction of the corpse.

The question is simply what in any given world is a commercial commodity and what is not. It is by this standard that every world will be judged.

Hans Urs Von Balthasar, The Glory of the Lord III A Theological Aesthetics. Studies in theological Style: Lay Styles, (San Francisco: Crossroads) 1986, pages 478-9

Now I guess you could say those are the words of a grumpy old theologian, and that may be so. And it does seem a wholesale condemnation of economic activity for its own sake. But is he wrong? Does he exaggerate to the point where he can be ignored?

Jesus said you cannot serve God and money - so how do we follow faithfully after Jesus in a money dominated culture? What would be the signs that our allegiances are at times tested to the point of capitulation? In the work of the Kingdom of God, how important are financial questions of profit and loss, assurance and risk, generosity and prudence - and should the Church learn again the counter intuitive practices of giving away, free gift, reckless compassion, unlocked resources - and those as acts of freedom and declarations of independence from a cash dominant culture. 

Or is that the idealism of the fool, the naivete of the enthusdiast, the behaviour of one devoid of any practical, viable and responsible strategy? But maybe the strategy is precisely this, the sacramental use of money and possessions to subvert the secular sacraments of compulsive consumption within the free market by deliberate decisions and intentional actions that demonstrate a Christian use of money.

If there is such a thing?