Adopting Myth-Time

And so, for those that do, we stand on the threshold of Lent and knock.

Not Hnaef, of course. When he fell over at the end of the Pancake Race we thought he'd something seriously wrong. But the blood tests have revealed that he is currently 64% Pancake. Which is high, but not terminal.

So, some might say - do we need Lent? Is the annual Beaker cycle of fast and feast, high days and low times a distraction?  Isn't goodwill to everyone for life, not just for Xmas? Shouldn't we examine our crummy hearts all the time - not just in Lent? Isn't it bizarre that the Beaker Fertility Folk rush out into the woods to frolic at St John's Eve and not other times?

These are all good questions. Apart from the one about the Fertility Folk. They're up for running out and frolicking in the woods pretty well any time. Just happens the weather is better for that sort of thing at Midsummer.

I guess where I come from is, that life is linear, has a start and - unless other arrangements are made - an end.  But Myth-Time isn't like that. The metaphors - some so strong as to be historical - of life are eternal. The start, and end, exist outside of what we can understand as "time". While the event right in the middle of it all only happened once.

And so how do we accommodate the one-off and the never-seen within a bounded life? Within the circularity of the world we inhabit. By celebrating Pouring-Out of Beakers daily, we join the continual blessing we experience with the circles of the world. By marking all things scary at Winter Solstice, by setting fire to everything we can legally ignite, we're remembering that, in Myth-Time, darkness is forever banished.

By marking Lent, if we have that much discipline, we remember we fall short, that as we pass through this world we are too often distracted by shiny things, by quick fixes and short-term nice feelings, and apply ourselves to joining the eternal struggle to let goodness asset itself over cheap tricks and dodgy shortcuts.

By linking the death and resurrection of our God to Spring Solstice (or vice versa, I guess) we remember that there's always victory beyond defeat; hope beyond despair. But also that the victory comes through the defeat, not despite it. That, to have Spring, we must endure Winter. That green leaves spring from last year's dead buds or dried seeds. That there may be sobbing for the night, but joy comes in the morning.

And so, in memory that God died and rose once, we celebrate it every year, as the season themselves remember it.  And as it was foreshadowed before it happened. And as we remember it every year, we remind the world itself that it's only rehearsing the big reawakening it will get sometime.

To anyone who has the faintest what I'm on about, have a joyful Lent. To those in the Southern Hemisphere - this post might make more sense if you turn your iPad  upside down. And if you think I'm just talking drivel - better hurry up. You've only another seven weeks to buy Creme Eggs. Get your priorities right!

From the Department of Bleeding Obvious Studies

I realise that by sharing this, I'm wasting your time in the same way mine was wasted. But maybe there is something to be learned about how some people get scientific funding, and of how we are patronised on health matters by media types.

Researchers at the University of Missouri have discovered that having a hangover doesn't affect when people next have a drink. Well, insert your own favourite three-word expression ending in the name of a Victorian literary detective. I would have thought there's actually an averaging out, with those who vow to lay off the sauce balanced by those who head straight back to the pub for the hair of the dog.

But in case this isn't enough to shock us with health-related novelty, the BBC, in their desire to inform and generally nanny us, feel obliged to give us some advice on how to avoid a hangover.

Apparently the trick is not to drink too much.

If only someone had told us this vital information before. I reckon there's been a conspiracy to keep this dangerous knowledge out of the public domain.

If Matthew Hopkins did Thought for the Day

In this multicultural world we live in, people look for truth in many ways. Some look for healing using crystals. Some look to the old gods of the forests of England. Some speak in metaphors, of Diana, Apollo and Dionysus.

It really tells us that people are looking for spiritual reality wherever they can find it - whether in the ancient myths, or in the ancient sites - stones and barrows - of modern England. But how can we of the mainstream churches best respond, so that we can learn from each other?

I think that,  in a very real sense, we need to approach people

Matthew Hopkins lives in the East of England.
He likes being paid large amounts of money,
and looking for extra nipples.

following these new ways with care, and a willingness to listen.  We don't believe in rushing in and burning them as witches!  Oh no, not these days.

No, first we have to hear their confessions. This is a valuable exercise, as we may be able to find out who their fellow-witches are. Then, only if they won't confess, do we duck them. And, if they're guilty - and they are, let's face it - even then we don't burn them.  This isn't the middle ages. No, we hang them first. Then we burn them. We're not savages.

I really see this as a most exciting new endeavour in inter-faith dialogue. And I'm going to be moving the agenda forwards just as soon as we've tried John Humphreys for witchcraft.  He has an infernal machine that means you can talk to people all over the country. In fact a disembodied voice in my ear - a devilish voice, I suspect - is telling me they've tricked me into speaking on it now. It would appear that I am surrounded by witches.

Radio Four, ye are all nicked.  Stearne, hail a fleet of ye magic black horseless taxis. I want them at Tyburn this hour.

If Only We Had a Way of Deciding

Heated debate last night over this picture of William of Ockham ( via Wikimedia).

I say his beard-free chin is  proof that Ockham was a hermaphrodite, whose lack of testosterone meant he was unable to grow facial hair.

But Hnaef just reckons it just means he used to shave.

If only we could find some piece of evidence to help us resolve this issue.

Meditation on a Rood Screen

I got to thinking, one day at Great Tremlett Church, about the idea of Rood Screens.

They were as popular before the Reformation as hagioscopes and monkey business among the monks, were Rood Screens. And come the Reformation, when the crosses and adoring / grieving figures around the Rood itself weren't so popular, it wasn't the screens themselves that got destroyed. Oh no. It was the figures on the top. The screens themselves stayed - normally whitewashed, to deface - quite literally - any saints who might have been painted on.

The Catholic Church, oddly enough, was the one that mostly got rid of them completely. Not in a frenzy of iconoclasm, as might have happened if the Puritans had decided the whole thing was suspect. But, rather, because the theology had changed. They wanted a clear view.

The thing about rood screens is - they're a combination of things for obscuring, and things for revelation. They mostly block out the congregation's view of the choir - no bad thing, at Great Tremlett, in my opinion. But they also block for the most part, the view from the congregation of what is happening at the altar.

But not quite. The congregation just gets glimpses of the holy action - the flash of some gold on the celebrant's sleeve, a glimpse of the host as it is raised (a bell being rung, to give you a chance of seeing it), the shine of the chalice as it's lifted up. Just glimpses of heavenly glory - God once more being poured out as flesh and blood for us.

Maybe a bit like up on that mountain. There's Jesus - the same one they've known these three years. The one who's sweated with them as they've walked across that hilly and hot land. The one who's laughed and hurt with them. The one who had just as much need of the roadside facilities of hedges and ditches, if you see what I mean, as them.

And there, on that mountain they see him - not as he really is, because that bloke they've walked with around Judea, Galilee and Samaria is who he really is - but as he also really is. The man who is God they've seen, heard, hugged, given a helping hand. The God who is human is a new one on them. But suddenly there he is, shining with his Father's glory - just as he has been from the beginning.

It's all too much for them. Peter wants to build some tabernacles - one for Jesus, one for each of the prophetic forerunners who've just shown up. He wants to put them back into tents - the place where Moses put the Ark - where he can be happy knowing they're there. But not have to look too closely at them. Maybe he remembers the story of how, when Moses went to talk with God, his face would shine so brightly that he would have to cover it up so he did not dazzle the Israelites. This is all too much. If he were an Oxford Movement cleric Peter would be wondering if there was any way of putting up a rood screen.

And it's over. And they're coming down. And Jesus isn't shining any more. Far from it. He's talking about the trials that are to come. For all the white light and heavenly clouds on the mountain, this isn't God moving in on the world like a Russian move on Ukraine. No, this is God as the European Resistance - underground, quietly carryng out one act of rebellion against the ruler of the world. There's going to be another moment soon when God's glory will be revealed - but it's not gonna be one anyone would expect.

And then the veil in the curtain will be torn, ordnary humans will have access to the Holy of Holies, and God will - quietly, gently, in such a way that you'll only notice if you really pay attention - make a home among us.

Jesus isn't God's rood screen - hiding holiness behind a human exterior, so we just have glimpses. This isn't Moses's mountain, thst we can't approach or touch. We gather round Jesus, who is God's altar, where the human and divine meet and mercy is poured out, and carry God within us, wherever we go.

In the Shadow of the Southampton Roundabout

King David's been on the phone.

He'd like Psalm 23 to read "though I ride my bike around that new roundabout in Southampton, I shall only be moderately terrified."

If the Prophet Amos did Thought for the Day

Hello John, hello Sarah.

You know, we hear a lot in the news these days about international affairs. And the question is asked - where is God in all this?

And I think, in a very real sense, God is saying to us this. They're all sinners and they're all doomed. All of them. Don't think your European Union will save you. That's doomed. Especially France. Oh boy, are they doomed. Sinners, the lot of them. Including that frog-faced fornicating president of theirs. And the old Soviet Union? Doomed. America? I can't even start to tell you how doomed that is.

Amos is a self-supporting prophet
who likes sycamore-figs, shouting,
shepherding, and denunciation.

But in this country, things are different. Everything's really doomed. Bloody idle women, exploitative men, rapacious businesses, dodgy so-called public service management, manipulative media. It's all doomed. Radio 4 - with your so-called equal opportunities and your lip-service to equality, while you put the same middle-class faces into jobs, or make sure they all toe the line, keep things "nice" - doomed. Broadcasting House - nation will speak peace unto nation? You having a laugh? Doom's too good for you.

Look, it's quite easy. You've got the word, you've got the clues to how God is in the world - scary but loving, consistent but awesome. You've got consciences, haven't you? You don't have any excuses - churched or unchurched, whatever your religion. Yet you still carry on worrying about yourselves, piling up tellies and computers, cars and nice new furniture. You watch Towie while people starve. You care more about who wins X-factor than the poor in your own land. Doom? Doom's just a child compared to what you're getting.

Have a nice day.

The Times they are a-changing

A reminder that today is the day in the Liturgical Calender when we change over from Common Time, which we've had since Imbolc, to March Time. As a result all our music is going to be somewhat livelier, and we're going to be doing a lot more processions. In April we'll be celebrating the spring by moving to Waltz Time. This is lovelier again, giving us a little skip in our step on every third beat.

In the Autumn we'll be moving into 7/8 time, which will leave everyone feeling edgy and nervous. And then, in Advent, into 9/8. If you want to know why, the answer is in Genesis (let the Reader understand).

The Notorious Creationist, Justin Welby

Doug at Catholicity is asked the all-important question, "what is the Church of England's official line on Genesis 1?"

I'm guessing the C of E doesn't have an official line on creationism. It's not great at official lines. The ones that are really official - such as the 39 Articles - are mostly ignored. And any advice from the House of Bishops is immediately fisked, filleted and generally dismembered. Best to assume the C of E has no proper official lines, but is actually just a bunch of people who like drinking poor-quality coffee in cold buildings. But are, generally, pretty nice.

Anyway. Back to the question of Genesis 1. There's no official line. But let's think about the current Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, whose career before he became an Archbishop was in the oil industry. Quite high-flying, at that.

In fact, as the article at archbishopofcanterbury.org (which I'm guessing is at least semi-official) says,

For 11 years - five in Paris and six in London – he worked in the oil industry, becoming group treasurer of a large British exploration and production company."

So let's ponder that for a minute. An oil exploration and production company. So - do we think, in the company where Archbishop Justin formerly worked, the people responsible for finding oil - people he had to be group treasurer for, responsible for things like income and profits - came to work in the morning and said "Cracking! That particular sedimentary rock is just the sort of Jurassic/Cretaceous formation from which we can often expect to extract petroleum - the compressed organic remains of vegetation from eons ago. Let's try drilling there!"

OR do you think they used to say "We've no idea what to do. Oil is just some black stuff that God scattered randomly around, 6,000 years ago. It could be in sandstone, it could be in limestone - frankly, it could be in granite. Let's just drill holes randomly all over the place and see what we find! There's got to be some somewhere - but who knows where God might have hidden it?"

If you think the latter is the right answer, I have an oil well I can sell you. It's in Bedford, but don't worry. It's as likely a spot as anywhere else. If you think the former is the answer, you've got a reasonable idea about whether the leader of the Church of England, at any rate, thinks Genesis 1 is a literal account.

Reddit, Reddit

"Reddit, reddit", Burton was shouting at me this morning.

Naturally I thought he was trying to impersonate the frogs that have lately hove into view in the Beaker wildlife pond. And, since it's the frog mating season, and he does have a certain batrachian look about him, naturally I hit him with the old Slazenger 400 cricket bat. Its best days may be behind it, but it's still capable of knocking one straight into midwicket, if you get my drift.

But, once he could speak in a baritone voice again, it turned out I'd done the old bean-counter and byte-mangler a disservice. Because somebody has referred to us on Reddit.

Needless to say, after a nice introduction, some other person who'd obviously taken an accidental left turn looking for "Comment is free" came up with the remark:

"]joeflux 1 point 4 hours ago

I love how friendly and nice and welcoming they try to make a religion that promises to burn your children in hell if you don't worship God." 

Well, joeflux, if that is your real name (which I doubt), at the Beaker Folk we won't burn your children (if you have any) in Hell if you don't worship God.

Actually, I don't know any religions that would promise to do that. If I recollect rightly, those people, of whatever religion, that believe people will burn in Hell don't promise to do it themselves. They generally assume that's between the (non) believer and God.  They don't have the fuel, or the lighting equipment, or indeed the access to Hell. And they're even less likely to want children to burn in hell because their parents don't believe in God. Nope, those people that think burning in Hell is an option, allow people to burn therein because of their own beliefs or lack of them, not because of somebody else's.

Otherwise, good point. Well researched, and well made. I would respond over at Reddit, but I don't actually own an anorak.

If King David Did Thought for the Day

It's a world full of sadness. Every day in the news, we hear of war, bloodshed, promiscuity. Young men resorting to sex, violence and a rock and roll lifestyle.

And that's mostly just me. Oh yeah. Whether it's pinching somebody else's wife, collecting concubines like they're going out of fashion, or indulging in a nice bit of genocide and city-destruction - David's your man. Have sling will travel, I say. Travel and kill loads of people, obviously. And get another wife. And then do a bit more killing. And then maybe have a census. And even that kills people! I tell you, I can't stop - it's just the way I roll.

And naturally, I've been worrying about the situation in the Middle East. And I've come to a conclusion.  It's nothing that a good round of wiping out small tribes and taking over their cities can't sort out. Look at those Philistines, for example. Strutting around like they own the place. And, in a spirit of loving kindness, there's only one way to go. Kill the lot of them. Oh yeah. Drive them into the sea. Let them know who's boss. Oh sure, you can talk about human rights. You can tell us we should respect other people's freedom of worship. You can whitter on about how everybody's got their own path up the Truth Mountain. But there's nothing like chopping down a few Asherah poles. And killing everyone, obviously.

I'm finishing this thought with a little bit of Liturgical Dance. Let's just say it's a shame for you womenfolk that it's radio. Oh yeah. Enough to make the Missus go green. You know that statue Michelangelo did of me? Well, I've got my complaints about just one small detail, but let's just say he got it mostly right. Love the muscle tone, Micky! Oh yes, ladies. Is that a lute in my loincloth or am I just glad to see you?