The Long Ash Wednesday

Sometimes you try to be creative in liturgy and it just goes wrong. I'm not afraid to admit it. The important thing is to learn, then move on.

Take last week's Ash Wednesday service.

Just because I ran out of ashes and had to use ink.

How was I to know it was registrar's ink?

It'll all come out in the wash.

Eventually.

Giving thanks for Bald People on Ash Wednesday

Let us give thanks for bald people

On this Ash Wednesday

Those who offer up to the ashing-person

A blank and ready canvas for our cross-drawing

Whether a neat, austere, Puritan kind of cross 

Or something swishy and baroque 

Like the sort of thing you see on a clipart on Facebook.

Not so when confronted by an hairy man

Or those women who pull not back their locks.

For their foreheads are a minefield of artistic and safeguarding danger.

Can one move their hair?

Or must one break the mystery of the event to ask them

Or just plough on regardless?

Their crosses are a mess

Bits of ash on stray tresses

Blobs of black on their foreheads

Of no discernible form.

On the whole, the ideal Ash Wednesday crowd would be woman footballers.

Those ponytails leaving the foreheads clear would be the perfect base.

Stylish black cross beneath dyed-blonde frame.

Simply the best.

Ash Wednesday 

Because you're worth it.

Amazing Grace for Pedants

All:  When we've been there ten thousand years, 

Bright shining as the sun, 

We've no less days to sing God's praise

Pedants: Fewer 

All:  Than when we first begun.

Pedants: Began

Saint Paul Pops Home

"Hi, Hannah, I'm home!"

"Saul, you said you'd gone out to hold some coats. Where have you been?"

"It's quite a story. I went to Damascus, and you'll never believe what happened."

"I will. I've read Galatians."

"And then so many journeys, all the time spreading the Good News: Macedonia, Collossae, Ephesus..."

"And all the time writing letters to all those churches, and not one to your wife?"

"I remembered you."

"I know. Telling the Corinthians, 'oo I wish I could bring my wife along like Peter does.' Well, Peter obviously loves his wife."

"Look, I'm not some unreconstructed dinosaur. I've been raising the status of women: 'In Christ there is no male or female."

"I read what you told the Corinthians. Women should keep quiet, you said. And as for what you instructed Timothy..."

"Ah, but I didn't write to Timothy."

"What do you mean? I saw the letters. They've got your name on. In suspiciously big writing."

"No, in 1900 years, some Germans are going to decide that I didn't write those letters."

"Germans? Those hairy illiterate weirdoes who hang around  the Rhine massacring legions? You think they're going to start adopting source criticism?"

"You obviously aren't going to listen to anything I say. I'm off to Rome tomorrow. And I wouldn't be surprised if I get executed."

"Ah, Paul. You and your martyr complex. Ah well, I won't stay up tomorrow then.

Candlemas

Layer upon layer in the story of the Presentation.

The Holy Family go to Jerusalem. To the Temple. To achieve two things:

Mary must be purified. She has given birth and so she is ritually impure until the priest has made a sacrifice which will make her ritually pure.

Not a curse. She isn't bad because she's had a baby. And the other women down the ages of this ritual law hadn't been bad because they'd had sex. 

It's part of the whole Hebrew law code where the people of Israel had to be super-careful to make themselves distinctly holy before they could worship. Other things could make you impure quite innocently.

But there's a sacrifice set for purification in Leviticus 12. And if she's poor, it's two doves.

And then the visit’s also because Jesus is a firstborn male.

In the Passover, the Angel of Death killed all the Egyptian firstborn sons. But passed over the Hebrew firstborn because of the blood of the lambs on the doorways of the Hebrews.

As a result, the Hebrews had to redeem their firstborn sons - ie pay God the price of getting them back - with a sacrifice. And the cost of getting your firstborn son back was money - five silver coins.

Expensive business, having a firstborn son. Second sons were cheaper. And daughters. Though for daughters, the mother was impure for longer.

So there's a redemption and a purification here. Two sacrifices.

But as well as the Jewish purity laws, and the story of Passover- there's another story of sacrifice underlying this visit. And another sacrifice overlaying it.

There's the story of when Abraham goes to sacrifice his son Isaac on Mount Moriah. And God's angel says “don't do it. The Lord will provide.” And Abraham finds a ram.

According to the 2 Chronicles 3, the place called Mount Moriah is where God appeared to David, and where Solomon built the Temple. 

So the Holy Family are standing- and the sacrifice for purity is being made - where the Lord provided for Abraham and Sarah's firstborn son. And they're paying for Jesus's life in the place where a price was paid for Isaac's.

Layer upon layer of meaning under this little story of the Presentation. And then another layer is added by the author to the Hebrews.

The child lying there in Simeon’s arms isn't just a six-week-old baby.

He's also a sacrifice. God has sent his Son into the world to pay a redemption price for us. Not for angels- for human people. As God provided a ram for Isaac, he's now providing himself for us. 

And he's not just the sacrifice. He's also the high priest who makes the sacrifice. God the Son chooses to come into our world. Given the choice between power and sacrifice, he will choose sacrifice. He will be raised up on a cross and pay the price that brings us back to God.

God the Son becomes fully human to join our lives. Is our sacrifice, our high priest, our representative. He pleads for us with our Father and sends his Spirit on the church.

The Holy Family go to Jerusalem. They're young and poor and apparently nothing out of the ordinary. But through God's Spirit, Simeon and Anna know who they are meeting. They welcome them, they sing the praises of this holy baby. And they fade back out of the story. The baby was safe in Simeon's hands: is safe in Mary's.

Now they know the world is safe, in this baby's hands.

(The Presentation: John Opie, in Norwich Cathedral)

Celebrations for 5 Years of Brexit

 I've been absolutely overwhelmed by demands from a Mrs Trellis of North Crawley, asking me what we are going to do to mark today's auspicious anniversary. And though I generally regard it as the single most damaging self-inflicted wound by a country since the island of Zanzibar declared war on the British Empire, I am by nature a democrat. And the people have spoken.

 So the schedule for celebrating five years of Brexit this afternoon will go as follows:

1 pm - Playing of "Land of Hope and Glory"

1.01 pm - Reading out of all Brexit Benefits

1.02 pm - Going to the pub 

Unifauns on the Lawn

Please could all Beaker Folk be careful around the main lawn. There's a small herd of unifauns grazing there.

We're really pleased to have the wild unifauns here. As such an endangered species - they've never quite found quite the right countryside to inhabit - there have been many failed attempts to breed them in captivity. But here on the edge of the greensand ridge, they get that combination of well-drained heath and boggy lowland that they crave.

Please if you meet a unifaun, walk straight past it. They don't like eye contact, and they will run away quite recklessly, crashing into hedges, walls, and sheep, if you panic them

Please keep squonks on leads.

Death of Thomas Hardy (1928)

Yokel 1: I see that Thomas Hardy have gone 'n died.

Yokel 2: 97 years ago, aye.

Yokel 1: Spose in 3 years, the Thomas Hardy Society will have a big memorial?

Yokel 2: Spose they will, aye.

Yokel 1: Shall us get down to Peter's Finger in Mixen Lane? I hear their latest brew is a pretty drop o' tipple.

Yokel 2: Aye, after I've made these souvenirs.

Yokel 1: Souvenirs, Abel?

Yokel 2: Thomas Hardy 100 years medals, pots, shawls, tea lights, drip maps, dinosaurs, replica tombstones, model cats, little tiny Wessex the Dog to the Households, women being hanged... 

Yokel 1: Thou dost reckon th'art goin' to cash in, Abel?

Yokel 2: That I do, Cain. That I do.

Yokel 1: See ye leanin' over the rail later?

Yokel 2: I' faith. I'll bring a straw.

The Nightmare After Christmas III

How long O Lord until I can do something? Why did I let Charlii talk me into taking a week off?

I went for a walk in Aspley Heath. A very Beaker Folk thing to do, with all the nature completely not happening because it's so cold.

A couple of doggers were complaining that I put them off. But just as really. They were going to catch their death, up there like that in this weather.

This is just a picture of Aspley Heath, not the doggers. So don't waste your time squinting.

But of course I took some other shots, so thanks to my contacts with Keith's uncle, the Police Sergeant, there will a couple of blackmail letters going to their home addresses. Which is all good, light, after-Xmas entertainment. And every little you add to what you've got is a little bit more.

But the one thing that my phone would be useful for, it currently isn't. I always make an exception on weeks off for answering  calls from the local funeral directors. I feel it's a pastoral necessity.

But they have blacklisted me till next week. They said having me phoning up every hour asking if someone's died is putting them under unnecessary pressure.

And they've said if they suspect I'm "drumming up trade", as they put it, this time they're calling the police.

Maybe I'd better learn to knit.

The Nightmare After Christmas II

My post-festive break continues.

I've taken to checking my emails just in case an emergency comes up. I don't know why it should. Nothing ever has.

I thought I'd walk round in case anyone needed spiritual guidance. But everyone taps the side of their noses to show they know the rules, and talks to me about football. Which, given Liverpool's position in the league, isn't so bad. But nobody wants to share any crises with me.

I'm starting to realise why vicars in the Church of England never really retire - just keep coming back in increasingly lower-paid roles.

Maybe I could reorganise the Beaker Common Prayer books in the Moot House.

That's not really work, is it?

The Nightmare After Christmas

Second day genuinely off after all the Yule and Christmas activities.

Day one was fine. Just laying around drinking gin and watching the Last of the Summer Wine CDs that Keith bought me for Christmas.

Day two is rather different.

First up, I've already watched as far as the Seymour years. And I don't need to listen to any more comedy Northern accents.

And I like to deliver things. Occasions, ceremonies, studies, meditations.

Just not delivering is very challenging. I tried reading a book but they're so... booky.

Maybe I could just do a rota?

Burning the Greens

 Apologies for the lack of posting over the Festive Period - such a lot of activity, what with celebrating all the ancient Pagan festivals and the Christian ones.

But we emerge from the tinsel, turkey, and trauma to the wonders of Epiphany and Orthodox Christmas Eve, when we start all over again for another 12 days. It's a short life but a merry one, being a Beaker Person.

There go the baubles

Last night, Dragmir was inspired to recreate the ancient tradition of "Burning the Greens". Thomas Hardy wrote about it in his deeply sad poem, "Burning the Holly": 

" But we still burn the holly
On Twelfth Night; burn the holly
As people do: the holly,
Ivy, and mistletoe."

And you may think burning the dried-up evergreen decs isn't such an environmentally-friendly thing to do.

But I can tell you, it was even worse when Dragmir set fire to all the tinsel, plastic trees, and fairy lights. Things were still exploding in the skip well into the early hours.

Some old traditions can be brought up to date. 

Maybe not this one.