Living Wittily

Make no mistake! Jesus is Risen! The Unambiguous John Updike.

Sometimes Christian theology needs to stop qualifying and nuancing and just announce what it believes is the truth that dissolves all other claimed certainties. Now I know that when it comes to the central mysteries of our faith the last thing necessary is strident certainty, shouted loudly, with eyes closed to other possibilities and mind sealed against deeper apprehension, so that the truth so mistakenly protected is limited to our own human criteria.

Still. There's something refreshing when someone decides to draw an epistemic line in the sand, to say it as he sees it, to do a Thomas from the other side of doubt and say My Lord and My God. That's what John Updike did in 1960 when he wrote his Seven Stanzas for Easter. Every year I read them, and smile at the take no prisoners bluntness of a poet defending a mystery by insisting on miracle.

Seven Stanzas for Easter

Make no mistake: if he rose at all
It was as His body;
If the cell’s dissolution did not reverse,the molecule reknit,
The amino acids rekindle,
The Church will fall.

It was not as the flowers,
Each soft spring recurrent;
It was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled eyes of the
Eleven apostles;
It was as His flesh; ours.

The same hinged thumbs and toes
The same valved heart
That-pierced-died, withered, paused, and then regathered
Out of enduring Might
New strength to enclose.

Let us not mock God with metaphor,
Analogy, sidestepping, transcendence,
Making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the faded
Credulity of earlier ages:
Let us walk through the door.

The stone is rolled back, not papier-mache,
Not a stone in a story,
But the vast rock of materiality that in the slow grinding of
Time will eclipse for each of us
The wide light of day.

And if we have an angel at the tomb,
Make it a real angel,
Weighty with Max Planck’s quanta, vivid with hair, opaque in
The dawn light, robed in real linen
Spun on a definite loom.

Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
For our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
Lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are embarrassed
By the miracle,
And crushed by remonstrance.

Liberation Theology is the original Gospel - If the Son shall set you free....

Amongst the many debts I owe to Jurgen Moltmann as theologian and disturber of the Christian peace, is his eye for the connection between Trinitarian theology, and the way we structure our lives - in society, in church and in our personal ambitions and lifestyle. A conversation with some students this morning produced another of those enjoyable exchanges - Moltmann's book on the Trinity was tough, at times infuriating, or obscure, they struggled with it, and except for class requirements I think would have given it a body swerve. But they all were glad they persevered, read, wrestled and faced up to Moltmann's theological challenges, and they came away with a changed view of what Christian theology and life can be, what church is, and what it means to talk of the Triune God of love.

In one his less known books, a collection of occasional essays very loosely tied together by the title Experiences in Theology, there is a section of what could almost be called Trinitarian Tracts - 7 pieces amounting to just over 30 pages in total, entitled "The Broad Place of the Trinity". The fifth one, The Trinitarian Experience of God begins like this:

A few years ago, in Granada, Spain, I came across an old Catholic order which I had never heard of before. They call themselves 'Trinitarians', were founded in the eleventh century, and have devoteds themselves ever since to the 'liberation of prisoners'. Originally that meant the redemption of the enslaved Christians from M oorish prisons, but not only that. The arms of the Church of the Trinitarians in Rome, St Thomas in Formis, show Christ sitting on the throne of his glory, while at his right hand and his left are prisoners with broken chains, on the one side a Christian with a crossw in his hand, on the other a black prisoner without  a cross. Christ frees them both and takes them into fellowship, with him, and together. 'Trinity' was the name for this original liberation theology more than eight hundred years ago." (Page 324)

It's interesting he talks of the Arms of the Church - because the m osaic does indeed show the arms of Christ reaching out in welcome and firm grasp in a way that is so radically inclusive it must have raised eyebrows and blood pressure amongst the hardliners about who is in and who is out, when it comes to the Church.

It is a beautiful, subversive, inclusive, uncompromising, boundary-breaking image, of a Love that is also all these things. 

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Look at the Birds of the Air: Epiphany Moments in the Company of Birds

Epiphany moments come as gifts.They cannot be contrived, rehearsed, controlled or repeated.

They are unique moments of insight, seeds of wonder, which grow into praise, thanksgiving and a humble surrender to the beauty, the surprise, the daily miracle of life.

My earliest years in Ayrshire and Lanarkshire gave me a love for birds that is now part of who I am and how I see the world. I notice birds, their songs and sounds are signals and summons to attention. I trekked for miles, risked life and limb, read books and remember the first pair of old binoculars given to me by the farmer who was my father's boss. By secondary school age I was an amateur encyclopedia of evidence based research on Scottish birds. If there had been a Higher in Ornithology I'd have done it in half the time and upset the invigilator by walking out early.

To this day the sound of the curlew, the whirring of the snipe's wings, the oyster catcher's alarm, the mimicry of a starling, the concerto of a skylark, the song of a mavis, the aerobatics of lapwings, the choreography of starlings before roosting in the hayshed, the white flash of a looping pied wagtail, the miracle of motionless flight that is a kestrel balancing in the wind, the ned-like behaviour of magpies, and the gossipping chirping of house sparrows, remind me I live in a woerld that I share rather than own. And that the voice of the birds is no lesser voice than my own.

And some of my epiphany moments have come from a surprise encounter with one or other of those other residents of this country whose right to live, have a habitat, be free of pesticide contaminated food, and whose contribution to the richness of our lives is also essential to the welfare of our country, and our spirits.

One of these was in 1982. Thirty years on I remember Sheila and I looking out the window at the wall along the garden that retained a fastflowing burn. The water was frozen during a long spell of frost. And sitting within 20 feet of us, bathed in frosty sunlight, was a kingfisher, hoping for a thaw soon. It is one of the most beautiful moments of our married lives which we still remember as vividly as the colours that vibrated with light and seemed to cast an irridescence across the space between bird and birdwatchers.

That memory is an inevitable hermeneutic to this poem, which sits way up the modest list of poems that are themselves capable of being epiphanic.

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;

As tumbled over rim in roundy wells

Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's

Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;

Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:

Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;

Selves — goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,

Crying Whát I dó is me: for that I came.

I say móre: the just man justices;

Keeps grace: thát keeps all his goings graces;

Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is —

Chríst — for Christ plays in ten thousand places,

Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his

To the Father through the features of men's faces.

   As I said at the start.
Epiphany moments come as gifts.They cannot be contrived, rehearsed, controlled or repeated.
They are unique moments of insight, seeds of wonder, which grow into praise, thanksgiving and a humble surrender to the beauty, the surprise, the daily miracle of life. Praise God. 

Paradise Lost: Where Inevitable Human Failure meets Infinite Divine Resourcefulness

Sorry. Not been here for a few days. Two reasons. Tired. Busy. Answer to both - take it easy.

On the other hand I've just been reading Leland Ryken on John Milton and came across the moment of epiphany at the end of Paradise Lost, when Adam finally realises what the loss of Paradise means, and how to live in a post-Paradise world. The sympathy of the poet for the human condition, the hopefulness that even cosmic tragedy is not final in the providence of God, and the psychological and spiritual sensitivity by which Milton describes not only repentance, but the positive outcome of repentance in a life of trust, risk and obedience to God.

Having spent recent weeks immersed in several psalms, as texts to nourish and console the heart, as poems to interpret and pray with faith defiant or reticent, and as images to stir my imagination as I worked the Shalom tapestry which is now ready for framing, Milton's pastorally valid descriptions of the heart's desire towards God resonate deeply and comfortingly. Because what is portrayed in the lines below is the reality of failure, and the deeper reality of grace; the inevitable consequences of sin, and the infinite resourcefulness of Holy Love to meet that inevitability with new possibility; and for the forgiven penitent the promise that walking in obedient trust and costly love, we serve once more the "love that moves the Sun, and other stars" - I know - that's from Dante, but why not bring two epic poet visionaries together?

Henceforth I learn, that to obey is best,
And love with fear the only God; to walk
As in his presence; ever to observe
His providence; and on him sole depend,
Merciful over all his works, with good
Still overcoming evil, and by small
Accomplishing great things, by things deemed weak
Subverting worldly strong, and worldly wise
By simply meek: that suffering for truth's sake
Is fortitude to highest victory,
And, to the faithful, death the gate of life;
Taught this by his example, whom I now
Acknowledge my Redeemer ever blest.

Book12. ll. 561-573

Learning when to shut up as a Christian virtue.

Like many other people I have no trouble speaking, and a great deal of trouble listening. Few human characteristics serve the ego more faithfully than our ability to speak, to talk, to occupy the space between others and us with out noise, our agendas, our thoughts, and if we are honest, often with our emotional needs. One of the writers who helps me to perceive my need of words, talk, speech, that all too seductive facility with words as conduits of thought, and as vocal chess pieces outflanking the other, is Jean Vanier.

I have no hesitation in counting Vanier one of the most remarkable Christian leaders of the past half century. His book Community and Growth is a textbook on courtesy, compassion and presence to the other beyond myself. Courtesy is much more than good manners though it is that - it is respect for the other, communicated by service, deference and a readiness to listen. Compassion is more than emotional feelings of kindness - it is a spirit of welcome, love and acceptance of the other in their need, not as the need meeter, but as one who feels with them, accompanies them and values them for who they are. Presence is precisely what is not given if all we offer are words. Presence is most deeply felt either in silence shared, or in attentiveness to what the other says and who the other is, for it is that attentiveness, such paying of loving attention, that conveys the value and the significance of this other person, in whose presence I am.

Jean Vanier is someone whose presence is unignorable - tall, distinguished, stooped, a face now wrinkled and set in a combination of smiling and thoughtfulness (at least as photographed on the front of the book above. Yet this powerful man, charismatic and accomplished, moves amongst many of the most vulnerable people in our world, and does so with unselfconscious humility, meekness of spirit and a contagious wonder at the miracle and beauty of each human being. In this book of letters he often talks about his own spiritual hopes and disappointments, deeply self-aware and therefore neither exaggerating his guilt nor understating his achievements. His spirit and the spirit he seeks to teach and embody is glimpsed in a couple of sentences as he tells of his inner thoughts while being interviewed for Moscow TV in 1989, at the height of perestroika and glasnost:

"I spoke mainly  of the need for love in each human being, especially in the poorest. I spoke of love which is stronger than hatred, and trust which is stronger than fear. Throughout the interview I tried  to remain in the presence  of God, in order to speak from the depths of my heart, from that place where Jesus lives within me, and thus to speak words from God."

It takes a saint to speak with such innocence of his nearness to God, and for me, Jean Vanier is simply that. An entire pastoral theology of speech and silence could be woven from such comments in this book of letters. A lot of them are more interesting for those interested in the history of L'Arche and the developments of communities for vulnerable people across the world. But in most of them there is wisdom, spiritual reflection, and a humane devotion to others that is so counter-cultural in recession ridden culture, that the values and convictions Vanier espouses and embodies become a powerful witness to the love of God in Jesus Christ.

Their prayer is in their work... and they maintain the fabric of the world...

These selected verses from Ecclesiasticus are amongst my favourite Wisdom texts. They capture exactly for me the importance of good work, diligent and conscientious attention, skill harnessed to creative purpose, and human activity that helps maintain the fabric of the world. The labourers and artisans mentioned here are not politicians, lawyers, academics, consultants, CEO's, movers and shakers - if anything, they are the ones who make sure that life goes on, things are done, necessities are made, and that this activity is every bit as important as professional, financial, and management in the building of community and the provision of what is essential in human life. The passage is really saying that these are people who let their hands do their talking - leaving the talking to those who have time for it!

The photo of Paisley Abbey was taken from the steps of the Town Hall, in  a hurry, during the interval at a concert on a summer evening. There wasn't time to outflank the lamp post or move the parked cars - so it looks like what it is, an 850 year old place of worship plonked right in the middle of the town. It too shows the skill and work of those who maintain the fabric of the world.

 

Maintaining the Fabric of the World

The wisdom of the scribe comes by opportunity of leisure;  And he that has little business shall become wise.

How shall he become wise that holds the plough, That glorieth in the shaft of the goad, That driveth oxen, and is occupied in their labours, And whose discourse is of the stock of bulls? He will set his heart upon turning his furrows; And his wakefulness is to give his heifers their fodder.

So is every artificer and workmaster, That passeth his time by night as by day; They that cut gravings of signets, And his diligence is to make great variety; He will set his heart to preserve likeness in his portraiture, And will be wakeful to finish his work.

 So is the smith sitting by the anvil, And considering the unwrought iron:

The vapor of the fire will waste his flesh; And in the heat of the furnace will he wrestle with his work: The noise of the hammer will be ever in his ear, And his eyes are upon the pattern of the vessel; He will set his heart upon perfecting his works, And he will be wakeful to adorn them perfectly.

So is the potter sitting at his work, And turning the wheel about with his feet, Who is always anxiously set at his work, And all his handywork is by number;  He will fashion the clay with his arm, And will bend its strength in front of his feet; He will apply his heart to finish the glazing; And he will be wakeful to make clean the furnace.

All these put their trust in their hands; And each becometh wise in his own work. Without these shall not a city be inhabited, And men shall not sojourn nor walk up and down therein. They shall not be sought for in the council of the people, And in the assembly they shall not mount on high; They shall not sit on the seat of the judge, And they shall not understand the covenant of judgement: Neither shall they declare instruction and judgement;

But they will maintain the fabric of the world; And in the handywork of their craft is their prayer.

Ecclesiasticus 38.

The Wooden Wonderlessness of a Football Pundit, and the Doctrine of Creation!

I like football. I still play 5 a side for an hour on Friday nights. Each year I'm probably some centimetres slower, and some millisenconds slower on the uptake. But now and again, there's still the move, the shot, the feint, the turn, and yes, even the goal that for the senior footballer is every bit as satisfing as the straight drive for the golfer, the ace serve for the tennis player, the try saving tackle of the rugby player. Yes I watch football on TV, occasionally in the North East Arctic Saturday risk the South Stand in Aberdeen, but still nothing like scoring in the glorious ordinariness of the Torry Leisure Centre on a Friday night.

So I feel qualified to laugh at the silly punditry of this article here.

Premier League - Leon Osman's wondergoal: genius or mis-kicked fluke?

What a fatuous, wonderless, unimaginative, right brain no brainer question that is! The armchair experts looking at video footage try to judge a spectacular goal on technical merit, artistic impression and amateur geometry!

Given the combination of human intention, learned skill, inherent gift and ability, training, tactical awareness, alertness to opportunity, instinct to move and be in certain positions at the right time, team awareness and individual co-operation, the strengths of the opposition, balance, physical fitness, height (yes sometimes size matters) age, weather conditions, flight of the ball - och and any other of the multi-variables I've not mentioned - given all that it could be argued every goal is a mis-kicked (sic) fluke; and every goal is an act of genius. Neither is true or false - what it is, is a goal, a joyful indication that we are quite good at this game, a successful fulfiulment of effort and energy harnessed to purpose and held within the constraints of the game's rules and regulations!

It is a wondergoal - the more enjoyable because technology shows you how unsaveable it was - except it would have been saved easily if the goalkeeper had also chocen amongst a multitude of variables and was standing nearer his right hand post. In a contingent creation, football is possible. Analyse it with nonsense like the above and you are arguing for a world where all that ever happens is deserved, precictable, analysable and wonderless world. 

Or to put all this more succinctly, the so-called experts who dissect a goal, dessicate spirits - from such those who live wittily cheerfully dissociate :)

 

Intercession as Unselfish Prayer

The prayer of intercession below was written for our shared worship this morning where I'll be preaching down the coast a bit. (The photo was taken on a sunny day on Inverbervie beach). I guess one of the besetting sins we find it difficult to identify and name is the sin of praying more to our own advantage than to the world's. So it seems to me.In one sense a sin of omission, not praying for others. In another sense a sin of commission, as the self elbows out the needs of a whole world.

Intercession is a de-selfing of prayer, a silencing of our own pushy at times noisy agendas. Compassion is something we feel that only grows towards fruitfulness when it acts. Intercessory prayer is enacted compassion, as important as, and never a substitute for, costly giving, the inconvenience of putting others first, imaginative action that makes a difference and gives love embodied presence.

Put simply, prayer is something we do because we believe in the compassionate mercy and self-giving love that lies at the heart of all reality as the Triune God of Eternal Grace. To not intercede for others, to pray mostly for ourselves, our church our personal spiritual lives, is a failure of compassion; more it is a failure of faith. As if I didn't believe praying for others would make any difference to their lives. Anyway out of such thoughts, comes this prayer. The responses by the congregation are sung, using the familiar praise song.

 

Creator God, Who gives us life,

who gives life to the world,

who loves and cares for all people,

forgive those narrow windows we look through

seeing only our own life,

anxious only for our own needs.

Forgive us our self centred perspectives

our prayers first of all for our own blessing.

Forgive our limited horizons,

thinking first of our selves, our church, our plans,

at times blind to the beauty and brokenness of your world,

until catastrophe opens our eyes

and make us see a suffering world as you see it,

with determined compassion and redemptive purposes.

 

Be still and know, that I am God   (x3)

 

Lord widen our windows so see beyond ourselves.

You teach us to look at the world through the eyes of your love.

Your Spirit pushes back our horizons and opens our hearts 

to include those far from us, and different from us,

yet all are yours.

Teach us what love is,

the self-giving that we believe lies at the heart of all reality,

because you revealed it in Jesus Christ, crucified and risen. 

 

So as we pray for our broken world;

its wars and conflicts;

the hatreds and the enmities;

all injustices and poverty;

the greed and the waste;

the lost hopes and the growing despairs;

mega-problems that threaten to overwhelm,

disasters that all our technology and resources can’t fix.

As we pray then, for our broken world,

Where people face famine and disease,

loss of home and the crushing of freedom,

the fear of war and co nsequences of conflict,

we lift this world you love before you,

the God of all grace and love,

and ask the blessing of your peace

and the healing of your mercy,

through Christ who is our mercy and peace,

in the power of the Holy Spirit of life,

Amen

In Thee O Lord, I put my trust (x3)

 

In Thee O Lord, do I put my trust (x3)

Satelite images of the Alps, and the God Who Raises Mountains.

When it comes to satellite images of the surface of the earth they are endlessly fascinating and beautiful. Rocky mountains covered in snow, the merging of shade and colour, mostly gray, black, silver and white, a geological kaleidoscope that reflects light and captures shadow. I still remember flying over the alps at about 35,000 feet on our way to Austria, the first time I'd looked down on mountains from  that height, and wondering wide-eyed like a child hungry for experience and explanation.

No wonder mountains play such a role in the Biblical images of majesty, power and permanence. In the Bible either God raises mountains, shakes them, throws them into the sea, speaks from them or dwells on them. Around Zion the mountains symbolise the protection of God.

The two images above are not satellite pictures, and are only distantly related to the Alps, mainly by geological affinity, though that too is a guess. They are close-ups of a 13 centimetre across stone I found on the beach yesterday. Heavy, rough, sparkling, slightly oxidised, and in its way a thing of beauty quite beyond the polished varieties of smooth shiny gee gaws! It is neither objet d'art, nor artefact, it has no therapeutic qualities I know of, its history is millions if not billions of years in the making, how it came to be on the Aberdeen beach and why I noticed it and paid attention - sheer serendipity, random coincidence, juxtaposition of unplanned circumstance. Yes, all of these, maybe.

And then I remember that small gem of a book, Gift from the Sea, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh:

"The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy or too impatient. One should lie open, empty, choiceless as a beach - waiting for a gift from the sea."

And that's all this flat sliver of silver laced stone is, a gift from the sea.

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Unfearingness - A word of semantic clumsiness but real liturgical class!

In the Celtic Prayer book of the Northumbrian Community, there is an odd couplet from the Hebridean Altars:

Though we prospered little,

yet we were rich in faith and unfearingness

Sometimes the clumsiness of a word gives it a jarring aptitude. Fear is a destabilising word, and an undermining experience. Fearingness is that fear made chronic, a state of apprehensive mind, a continuing anxiety suspicious of reassurance. Unfearingness is the opposite of each of these. Not chronic fear but inner constancy of peace; not an apprehensive mind but one comprehending something of the unchanging love of God in Christ; not suspicious anxiety but confidence born of trust and persuaded that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Unfearingness is what Jesus tried to make the disciples experience when he said to them "Fear not for I have overcome the world". Unfearingness is what isaiah described when he said "When you walk through fire the flames will not harm you, and through the waters the waves shall not overwhelm you." Unfearingness is precisely what is described in Psalm 23, lying down by still waters, led in a pth of righteousness, and goodness and mercy dogging our footsteps every blessed mile we trek.

Unfearingness is to listen to the wisdom of those ancient travellers who were pilgrims to Jerusalem, and who wrote their poems and prayers to the God who, they hoped and trusted, would keep them safe. "The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night..." The photo was taken on a February evening, frosty, silent and I have to confess not the slightest bit menacing. But then I wasn't trekking hundreds of miles across desert and bandit country, and doing so, not for trade and profit, but to go and worship the God by whose mercy I lived, and in whose covenant love I trusted come hell or high water. What I like about the Psalms is their honesty and unashamed admissions of fear, anger, depression, anxiety - the whole gamut of fearingness - but still, like needles drawn to the magnetic north, they turn to the Lord, in hope and trust, and pray for unfearingness.

This is a word I want to think about for a while - linguistically clumsy, but spiritually and theologically a word bespoke for the heart.