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archives
WHY CHRISTMAS DAY IS OFTEN A DISAPPOINTMENT
"Many people speak of a feeling of deep anti-climax on Christmas Day when the long expected day does not live up to expectations. One of the reasons for this is that we live forever in the future, so that, when the future becomes the present, we are ill equipped to deal with it, and have lost the ability to be fully present, right now" Paula Gooder - Church Times 28//11/2008
ON WONDER
Past certain ages or certain wisdoms it is very difficult to look with wonder; it is best done when one is a child; after that, and if you are lucky, you will find a bridge of childhood and walk across it. (Truman Capote)
ILL FITTING GARMENTS
'The mystery of God is infinite, and yet conveys a simplicity which the centuries have tried to clothe in ill fitting garments of social conformity and political expediency' (Thomas Merton)
ON NORTHENNESS
As a young man C.S. Lewis was entranced by the idea of Northernness - an uplifting into huge regions of northern sky which he tried to find by reading. But, as he wrote in 'The weight of Glory'; "The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited."
ON LEAVING THE CENTRE FOR THE EDGE
"It depressed me that some clergy spent so much time policing their version of Christian truth" ... and that ... "worship is not an encounter with an unknown God but a feel-good experience, or that prayer is little more than a request for help finding a parking space in the supermarket." (Mark Vernon - former C of E minister - writing in April 2008 edition of 'Chrisitanity')
ON THE SEARCH FOR GOD
'I laugh if I hear the fish in the sea are thirsty. I laugh if I hear man goes in search of God' (Kabir)
ON CLIMATE CHANGE
There is a rather ugly car sticker which reads. "You toucha my car, I smasha your face". Which neatly sums up the attitude of many to any suggestion of personally taking any practical steps to beat climate change. |
