Where there is doubt - Christmas Poem 2020

It strikes me that this year's Christmas poem turned out to be very much "of its time", a reflection of something of what 2020 has felt like ... to me, at least, and I suspect to many.

Perhaps it is appropriate that it draws in a line which almost made an appearance in a poem I wrote back on Easter Sunday. 

There is possibly some theological point to make here about resurrection and incarnation but I can't quite think what it might be. 

But that aside, it feels fitting and entirely understandable that words which resonated way back in April when we all (or many) of us still sort of believed (or wanted to) that this might all be over in the next couple of months continue to resonate now many months later when things are still, well, not where most of us would like. 

Enough preamble.

When our once solid ground feels like shifting sand 

When nothing, it seems, goes quite as planned 

When all that once seemed certain becomes filled with surprises 

Somehow we find that 

The world still turns and the sun still rises 

When we begin to wonder whether or not we can cope 

When we question what signs remind us there’s hope 

When we scan the night sky seeking flickers of light 

Somehow we find that 

Out in the darkness the stars still shine bright 

When too much of humanity seems guided by hate 

When too many are carrying too heavy a weight 

When we wonder or we weep at our human endeavour 

Somehow we find that 

The love of our God still endures forever

Merry Christmas!

When Mary said Yes

Every Tuesday we have evening prayer and a discussion focused on next Sunday's gospel. As part of it, we take turns to prepare a short reflection on the biblical text. I'm not planning to share them all here, but this week I thought I might.

This week we reflect on Luke chapter 1 verses 26 to 38: the story of the annunciation. It is a passage which I love. Once you get past all the slightly kitsch images associated with it, I think it is rich and deep and beautiful.

Like many overly familiar passages, it is easy, I think, for some of both the promise and challenge of this encounter between Mary and God’s messenger to get lost, consigned to being a footnote in the Christmas story, an excuse for a blue-eyed, blond-haired angel with tinsel on their head to appear in the nativity play.

But it is so much more than that! And there are quite a number of things I could pick out to focus on. Including this: 

Gabriel’s arrival in and departure from the scene are mentioned, but I have often wondered how long this messenger of God stayed at Mary’s side. For me, this is much more than a mere irrelevant technicality: it speaks to the manner and means by which God communicates with humanity. I think we are usually tempted to assume that Gabriel stays for roughly the length of time it takes to read this biblical passage straight through, or, at a push, to sing the Angel Gabriel carol. It gets reduced to an instant and immediate encounter. Mary at home, God interjects with a message, which she hears, understands and accepts, and that’s it, done and dusted … and back to the dusting!

In understanding it thus, it can feel so alien to our own experiences of God, which, speaking for myself, are rarely so instantaneous, rarely accompanied by bright flashes of light and jolly bells ringing in the background. It becomes a beautiful story, but not one to which we easily relate.

But what if, then, the annunciation didn’t happen like that at all. What if the different phases of Mary’s reaction, and the different promises offered by the angel happened not over a couple of minutes, but say a couple of months.

What if Mary’s journey from fear, to total incomprehension, to eventual acceptance of God’s promise and finally to her commitment to serve happened not in the space of the few sentences to which it has been reduced but through days or weeks of gut-wrenching prayer and struggle.

What if, even, this Gabriel, whose name means “my strength is in God”, was not some otherworldly being but the whispered voice of her conscience inside her head; or a friend or neighbour who accompanied her through said struggles to understand how God was calling her to something both deeply human and at the same time extraordinary: inviting her to bring God’s presence into the midst of humanity.

What if, God is still sending messengers who stay for as long as they need to, and who we are more likely to hear if we dare to strip away the glorias and the medieval art. What if God is still calling us to things which invoke first fear, then total incomprehension, calling us in a whispered voice to make the same final step that Mary did … to acceptance and commitment: steps we are only able to take if we keep listening long enough to work through the fear and incomprehension first. Steps which lead us towards actions which may be both deeply human and at the same time extraordinary: inviting us too to bring God’s presence into the midst of humanity.

It may be heresy to say so, but I sometimes wonder how many people said no before Mary dared to say yes. How many others were offered this promise and did not hear it, or turned away from it … I can’t even say I blame them because I’m not convinced at all I haven’t done the same at times! Not in a “will you give birth to my son” way but in a “will you convey this promise of God’s presence to the world around you” way.

I still have so much more to say (but I know this is already more than long enough)! Much of it is about freedom and choice, about a call and promise which is never imposed, about possibilities of new life.

But perhaps much of the essence is already covered here. Because it all relates to this same idea: that in dressing this up as an ethereal encounter, focusing on how different it looks to our reality we lose the deep humanity of it, to which we can perhaps relate. In the church’s temptation to either dress Mary up as pure, perfect, and ‘holier than thou’ or reduce her to a walk-on part only really mentioned at Christmas, we lose her deep humanity, to which we can perhaps relate.

And in so doing we lose the challenge it demands of each of us. And is so doing we also lose the promise it offers to each of us. The challenge and the promise that the incarnation, as well as being a one-off, once-for-all-time historical event is also a reality in which we are each called to play our part: giving birth to God’s presence in the world.

Tired

Whilst there are, of course, plenty of things that I don't write about here (for a whole variety of reasons including the fact that no-one needs to be bored by the minutiae of my daily life!), I have always aspired for it to be a relatively honest and authentic glimpse into the life I am trying to live.

Right now, I think that means acknowledging that I am tired. Not the "I need a good night's sleep and I'll be fine in the morning" kind of tired. Something deeper than that.

This is not an easy thing for me to admit: even to myself. Perhaps saying it here in a public space is almost easier than admitting it in the hidden recesses of my own mind.

I like being able to keep going and keep busy. I have, I know, acquired something of a reputation for boundless, tigger-like energy. I have made no secret of the fact that, rightly or wrongly, purpose and productivity matter to me. 

And I'm not saying any of that has entirely deserted me. I am still saying yes to projects which excite me and inspire me and which have the potential to do good. I am still putting the same energy into singing and telling stories to little people with actions and silly voices as I ever have. I was still mad enough to paddle in a freezing stream at the weekend. I am still trying to be meaningfully present to the people who I care about.  

But I am tired. 

I recognise that some of things I am doing are costing me more energy than they usually would. I have temporarily lost at least some of my creative spark. I am, perhaps, not always being as patient as I have aspire to be. I definitely haven't replied to all the emails I should have done! 

I am not intending to use this space to analyse all the reasons or work out the solutions ... though I have been doing plenty of both in my own head. I am certainly not trying to compare whether I have it harder than anyone else: trust me, I know plenty of people who have it much, much worse than me, but I also know comparison isn't always helpful. I am not seeking sympathy or advice. 

I am just trying to be honest to how I feel right now because that in itself matters.

Happy Advent

 Happy Advent!

Sunday marked the beginning of Advent and the start of a new church year. Also, therefore, the end of ordinary time.

I thought I might be able to write something profound and maybe even poetic about what an extraordinary, ordinary time it has been. And the paradox that, in some ways, what has made it extra-ordinary is how very, well, ordinary it has been: how very mundane and dull and lacking in the extra-ordinary things which contribute to making life, well, ordinary! 

It didn't happen. Who knows, it might, but it probably won't and even if / when it does, the moment will have passed. 

And so we arrive in Advent... a season for which I have a particular soft spot, perhaps because I feel it gets so squeezed and forgotten as the preparations and pre-emptive celebrations of Christmas. 

I wonder whether there's any chance of somehow "doing it better" this year when so much of the usual December trappings have been stripped away." After all, I / we have had plenty of practice for Advent this year ... a season which is all about waiting and anticipation and looking ahead to something better to come. 

I'm kind of hoping so, but am yet to really figure out how. Ask me in a month.

playing with colour

A couple of weeks ago, in my latest attempt to inject some creativity back into my life, I joined in with a short online art course / challenge / programme. 

I didn't really know what I was expecting, but it was free so I figured if it didn't work for me, it didn't really matter and I could just give up. As it turned out, I really enjoyed it. It's hard to really pinpoint what I appreciated about it. It certainly wasn't a technical course about how to draw or paint: I didn't learn lots of new skills. Instead I guess I'd describe it more as something of a reflective process, about who we are and why we make art, not so much the what and the how. 

Mostly it was about process, not product: but this is what I created on the final day and a couple of things I've done since.

 (you can't tell here because the images are all the same size, but this last is a very large canvas: bought back in March thinking I'd need things to fill all that free time in lockdown. It didn't really work out like that, but now it is finally covered in paint and I quite like it!)

Lorries (and maybe a mention of boats)

I started writing this blogpost about a year ago. I know that, because it was just after 39 people were found, suffocated to death, in the back of a refrigerated lorry in Essex. Despite several attempts, it never got beyond the bullet point stage. As the anniversary and the trial has meant that particular tragedy has hit the headlines again recently, I thought it was time I tried again to extract it from my drafts folder.

One of the things which I intended to include was a link to a short film on Youtube, "Oksijan", about another near-tragedy in the back of a lorry. It is not an easy watch. I highly recommend it. 

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rNnBJRRL5c)

In the early hours of the story breaking, the victims were given the wrong nationality, let alone any hope that their individual names and stories would be known. I think that was one of the first things that really struck me about this story. I thought of families who would perhaps never know the whereabouts of their loved ones who had left so full of hope for a better life. Of stories which would never be known, let alone heard. The names did start to be found, the nationality corrected, the stories uncovered; but between occasional glimpses at their individual humanity, in most of the articles on the subject they are just "39 migrants". 

I know so many people who could have counted among those 39. So many who felt they had no choice but to risk hiding in the back of a lorry. So many who knew they might die but believed the alternative was worse. 

Those 39 people, and countless others who have died en route to and through "Fortress Europe" will never have the chance to tell their story. But some stories, of those who survived, can be told. And they need to be heard. I guess this all links to my deep passion about sharing the stories of my very dear friends who made it out of the back of a lorry (literally, in many cases; or metaphorically). Not just sharing their stories for them, but more importantly, finding ways to give them the space and the opportunity to do so for themselves. 

  

It is about honouring their lives, as individuals, as human beings. Perhaps it is also, in some way, about also honouring those who didn't make it to the end of the journey to find the safety and freedom they dreamed of. 

Trafficking and smuggling (two different, but often confused, things) are complicated evils. I am sure far too much money changes hand from treating people as commodities and from exploiting vulnerability and hope. But, to my mind, there is a far deeper sin which underlies that one. It is the sin which allows countless victims, unnamed and unknown to die on the borders of Europe; it is the sin which leads to building higher walls and more complicated procedures to lock people out and send then searching for more and more desperate routes to safety; it is the sin which allows British politicians to question whether the rule of law needs to be applied to "these people".

It is the sin of believing, explicitly or subconsciously, that some people, by virtue simply of an accident of birth, are somehow more valuable, more worthy than others. It is a sin the outworking of which, as a British citizen, I admit to being sadly complicit but one against which I also seek to strive with every part of my being.

Maybe it's a sin which is so much easier to commit when they are just "39 migrants" or victims of yet another ship wreck of the Libyan coast that barely even hits the headlines anymore, or those whose desperation is dismissed in media headlines and party conference speeches about small boats on the channel. Maybe it is a sin which shifts, almost imperceptibly, when they instead become individuals with stories to tell, when they become those with whom we have shared good food and conversation, those with whom we have shared laughter and tears: those who we encounter, those who are friends.

I will keep helping people to tell stories. Because it matters.

Asylum destitution and a call to action

Last Sunday was homelessness Sunday and I was asked to contribute something to the Carrs Lane Service about homelessness in the asylum system. I said this. 

Homelessness is an immensely complicated reality, and neither the causes nor the solutions are straightforward.

And then there is asylum destitution. What marks it out as distinct from other forms of homelessness is that it is not caused by people falling through the gaps in a system that hasn’t successfully supported them. Asylum destitution is the system. Whatever the government’s rhetoric on wanting to end homelessness, deliberately making people homeless is written into asylum policy.

I have met people who are victims of this system. 

I have had hundreds of conversations with asylum seekers. Some will always stay with me. I want to tell you one such story.

Being an English teacher at St Chad’s Sanctuary was never just about language teaching. I very quickly learned that it was much more about building and holding human relationships. For whatever reasons, some stories always affect you more deeply than others. M, who I first met, I think, in 2016, was one such person. I remember one time him telling me the story of being in Calais, and of “looking at England’s sky”.

I also vividly remember the day he arrived with his eviction letter from his Home Office accommodation, asking for help, believing I would be able to do something. And I remember having to explain to him that no, there was nothing I could do to enable him to stay there. I guess most of what I did at St Chad’s was about helping people. Any time when you had to say sorry, no, I can’t help at all, was always difficult. When the consequence of not being able to help was street homelessness, even more so.

He was luckier than some. He sofa-surfed briefly, and was then offered accommodation and support by Hope Projects. He prepared, with better legal advice, to navigate the notoriously complicated asylum process once more.

At the end of last year, M was finally granted asylum. Recognised by the state to be a genuine refugee. Four years of needless suffering and anxiety came to a close. I remember that conversation too.

Having said that the causes and solutions of homelessness are incredibly complex, that’s not true for this. Asylum destitution does have both a simple cause: government policy; and a simple solution: change it!

After not doing so for several months during the pandemic, as of the 15^th September, the Home Office have once again started sending eviction notices to people who will have nowhere else to turn. Into the second wave of the pandemic, into approaching winter. Into a context where staying with friends is less possible, where charities have reduced capacity, where night shelters remain closed.

There is a long-term demand to stop asylum destitution completely: but there’s also a short term one to say no-one should be left deliberately homeless by our government during a pandemic. If you wish to add your voice to this campaign, you might want to join the NACCOM campaign to draw a house, and on it write a message to send to the Home Secretary asking for an immediate halt to evictions from asylum accommodation.

For the attention of the Home Secretary

Rt Hon Priti Patel
Home Office
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF

www.naccom.org.uk for more information

Twenty Years (Or: How on earth did that happen?!)

Almost exactly twenty years ago I started university.

As I say ... how on earth did that happen?! Not the starting university. That was probably a relatively normal thing to do as a nineteen year old. But that it was twenty years, more than half my life ago, seems hard to believe somehow.

And yet in other ways, life now feels world's away from life then. Of course, I can identify parts of the nineteen year old me in the person I still am ... but I can also look back and recognise how far I have travelled (literally, but mostly metaphorically) since those days. I have, in parts at least, matured in the intervening years. I have been enriched by so many different encounters and experiences. 

I really loved my time at university. I have so many very, very happy memories of those days. Looking back with such fond nostalgia on my own early days in Lancaster; I really feel for those starting out on their higher education journeys in this year's very different, very challenging circumstances.

I met some truly wonderful people, a number of whom I am still privileged to call my friends: I still refer to those I lived with in my first and second year collectively "my housemates" much to the amusement of those around me who know it is a very long time since we lived together. 

Lancaster is a beautiful place (something I possibly didn't appreciate as much as I should have done at the time) and the university campus was a wonderful environment in which to spread my wings as I approached something vaguely resembling adulthood.

So much of what I learned there: both inside the lecture theatres and, undoubtedly more significantly, outside them; has played an important part in creating the person I am today.

And yet, despite the very genuine fondness with which I look back on those highly formative years and the people and experiences there which shaped me ... I wouldn't choose to go back. I know it is a privilege not to hark back to richer, happier times. It is not in any way an indication of anything lacking in those amazing experiences: rather it is a reflection that life has continued to improve, that life now is richer and fuller than ever. 

The last few months aside, which I'm still hoping is a temporary aberration, my life continues to be filled with many amazing people who deeply enrich my life. 

Birmingham, in its own unique way is also a beautiful place and a wonderful environment in which to spread my wings still further. 

So much of what I am still learning continues to help me to grow into the person I am still in the process of becoming.

So this week I am looking back: I am remembering and celebrating four amazing, formative years years and giving thanks for all those I shared them with. But I am doing so in the context of looking forward, trusting that there is much more that is amazing and formative still to come.

Adulthood

Back in 2009 (in my pre-blogging days!) I started a new job as a primary teacher at an international school just outside Paris. It certainly had its challenges, but among the joys was making close, lasting friendships with some of my colleagues. Part way through our time there we were honoured to be asked to become Godparents to the then 8-year-old daughter of one of them. 

We moved on from St Germain en Laye after two years, but the friendships formed there have remained an important part of our life. 

Fast forward to 2017. After plenty of prayer, reflection and conversation led us all to think it was the right thing to do, we welcomed our then 14-year-old Goddaughter to come and live with us. It was always going to be something of an adventure, most of all for her, but for all of us. It was bound to be challenging in parts. But, like many adventures which involve a leap of faith into the unknown, it has proved to be a most beautiful one.

She discovered Birmingham city-centre living. She negotiated starting at a new school and then a new college. She interacted with all sorts of different folks. She made friends. She learned to cope with our somewhat unconventional life. She became part of our family and enriched our lives.

And now, just like that, she's an adult. Legally at least. As much an adult as anyone is at 18.

It is another important milestone on a journey. 

I'm not going to write at length about the journey that has brought her this far, and the journey that lies ahead. That's not really my story to tell. Suffice to say, I am very happy that I get to be a part of it.

Thank you.

A bit of art

Happy New Year!

For me, as for many who work in academic cycles, September is synonymous with new beginnings. This, much more so than January, is when I mark the new year. 

Most of the significant changes: of jobs, of home, of projects, in my life have taken place over the summer. Not all summers, of course, have involved such major changes, but it has always been the time of stopping, taking stock, starting again. This time last year I had just left my role as ESOL co-ordinator, had significantly cut my hours at St Chad's Sanctuary, and was in the process of trying to set-up Stories of Hope and Home. That all feels a very long time ago! 

This year feels somewhat different, unlike any September that has preceded it, possibly ever. 

I've been trying to reflect a little on why. It's not like I had the whole of last summer off: I ran a series of slightly bonkers family days out which were wonderful but certainly involved no small amount of effort. I did lots of paperwork and rounding off tasks to hand over my role in the smoothest possible way (the colleagues I left behind should probably be the judges of how well that worked out) I wrote a constitution, opened a bank account, dreamed dreams about getting a new project off the ground. Its not how hard I am working that feels different this year.

And equally its not like I haven't had opportunities for fun activities over the summer this year: there may not have been any significant travel nor big group events, for obvious reasons, but that hasn't meant I couldn't do anything fun. I have been lucky enough to have several trips away, even if each has only been brief. Lockdown easing definitely allowed a shift from preceding months. Logically, I can point to plenty of things that marks the summer out from the rest of the year.  

And yet, somehow, it just doesn't feel like I've had the same shift in routine. I am aware some very deliberate choices have contributed to that. They are choices I stand by and about which I have no regrets. Every other year, we have taken a summer break from the routine of prayer, whereas this year morning prayer has continued throughout the summer: a reflection of the fact that it has felt an important anchoring point for me during these months, even more so than usual. In other circumstances, Stories of Hope and Home might have taken a summer break but both maintaining the online contact with that group of people, and taking advantage of the opportunity to actually meet each other felt hugely important and valuable (for me as well as them).  

And so, September has somewhat crept up on me. Normally, this is the time for formulating plans, dreaming dreams and making things happen. But the year ahead still feels so full of unknowns, so vague and completely "unplannable" Normally this is also the time for getting back into routines, getting back to normal, but while there are glimmers that some of that is beginning to happen, the idea of returning to "normality" any time soon seems rather unlikely. 

Of course, I can see plenty that will be able to keep me busy in the coming weeks and months: including both returning to routines and building on new possibilities. I can identify exciting potential even in this new strange reality we seem to be stuck with for the foreseeable future. I hope I will be able to grasp some of those opportunities. No doubt you'll hear about them here!

September is a time of new beginnings, and change is always unsettling. I guess I'm acknowledging that this year feels unsettled in very different ways to usual.

Time together and time alone

At some point, perhaps, I'll write a post that has nothing to do with covid-19, or lockdown, or the strangeness of 2020. But not yet. There is still too much to say on the subject, still too much to process and try and make sense of.

Over recent months our experience of human contact and interaction has, for the most part, been completely transformed. Normality, as we once knew it, has been turned on its head. Things we didn't perhaps even realise were part of who we are and how we relate to the world and one another have been stripped away or called into question. 

And in that space, perhaps, some of us, have learned something about what we want and need from ourselves and from those around us. As the months of lockdown have dragged on, I have found myself with contradictory cravings: for more time together and more time alone.

I am an extrovert. There is no question of this and I come out strongly as such on all sorts of personality tests. People who know me will not be surprised. 

I have been exploring and to varying degrees living community life for the last nine years. Our life at Carrs Lane is a highly peopled one with people coming and going and sometimes staying all the time. Almost 600 people have passed through the doors of the flat in the last seven years and, while some have been but fleeting visitors, with many we have built sustained relationships. 

I have always had people-orientated jobs which place human relationship at the very centre of their raison d'etre.

It is, perhaps, unsurprising that since March I have craved  more real human contact. And yet, despite my desire for human relationship I can identify a certain lethargy which has meant the reality of how well I have kept up contact with friends and family may not quite have lived up to my intentions. I am extremely grateful for the technology which has made maintaining relationships possible: but, like many of us I can also acknowledge its limitations. It is also a very long time since I have gone so long without encountering anyone new and while I value the existing relationships I have, this too feels like a gap. 

So yes, I was more than ready for the easing of lockdown which has gradually allowed more real human encounters to become possible. I am very grateful for the ways in which, through the summer, that has been the case. Opportunities to meet up with family and friends; re-establishing face-to-face meetings with the Stories of Hope and Home group: these have been very good things.

What has been, perhaps, more surprising, even to myself is that, in a strange way, through this lockdown time, I have also found myself craving time alone. It has taken more self-reflection to identify and acknowledge this to be the case and think about why. 

I suppose I have come to realise that while human contact has been extremely limited, that which has existed has had a certain intensity to it. Ours won't have been the only household thrown together much more intensely than we are used to. While the blurring of boundaries between work and not-work between home-space and work-space have long been blurred in my life, lockdown has intensified the challenges of delineating both time and space. 'Switching off' (perhaps literally!) and 'getting away' (not literally!) have felt more difficult when the same physical and virtual spaces are places of both work and relaxation. The prevalence of virtual gatherings has also brought an intensity to our human interactions which is very different to "real" face-to-face encounters, as 'host' in many of these spaces, that is perhaps especially so.

Whatever the reasons, I have discovered in myself a need for, and appreciation of time alone, even in the midst of my cravings to return to the days when I can surround myself with friends (and strangers). Through the summer I have also been grateful for opportunities to meet this need. I have recently returned (not quite as recently as when I started writing this post) from a wonderful two days in the peak district entirely on my own and if I didn't entirely manage to switch off from digital communication, I did better than I can usually manage at home.

I have no intention of universalising my experience, although at least one conversation with someone else has suggested I am not alone in living with the paradox of these contradictory feelings. I am sure we will each have experienced the challenges of this time differently, and as we emerge into the so-called "new normal" will be seeking different things in response to the challenges we have experienced and needs we have identified. Perhaps understanding and acknowledging our own needs and responses, and really listening as others do the same will help us all to be kind to one another, and ourselves, as we try to transition towards the months ahead.

Lockdown highlights

OK, I admit ... parts of the last few months have been pretty tough. I know the same is true for many people who have been dealing with both global and personal crises.  

Knowing that there are lots of other people who have it far worse has, at times, helped me to have a sense of perspective. But it isn't always helpful either ... because if you're having a bad day, feeling guilty about it because you "shouldn't be" does not, I can attest, make it any better.

A better strategy, for me at least, has been to focus on and recall the good stuff. The gratitude diary I kept in the early weeks of lockdown certainly helped. 

As we at least partially emerge form lock-down, I thought I'd look back and pick out a few of the positives of this strange and unsettling time we are living through, focusing specifically on those things which have not only been positive during lockdown but which (probably) wouldn't have happened without it. 

In no particular order, here are five which came to mind:

1) Cycling confidence 

I've owned a bike for years. It has cluttered up the hallway in the flat ever since we moved here, but been used very rarely. And then the city closed down around us. Public transport use was banned or at least strongly discouraged. And we were only allowed out for an hour a day. On foot, you can't get very far in that time, so if I wanted to get beyond the city centre I was going to have to get my bike out. That motivation, coupled with empty streets which definitely boosted how safe I felt, was what I needed to get back on my bike. I am so glad I have. I have really enjoyed getting out and about on my bike and, now that my confidence, and the habit, is established, my hope and intention is it is something I will continue with.

2) New ways of praying together

The routine of daily prayer I am committed to at Carrs Lane is of great value to me. I have tried, and often failed, to explain why and how many times. One of the things, though, which at times has been a struggle, is not being able to find ways to really share it with others. There is something very special about committing to a routine of prayer. There is also something very special about knowing you are praying with others. As the decision was made to lock the doors to the building, we needed to find new ways to continue this aspect, the being open to praying with others part which has always mattered to us. Cue live-streamed prayers on facebook and suddenly, a community of people praying together every day. Not being in the same physical space has not detracted from this sense that, in a way we have never known in all our time here, we have found a way to have a sustained community prayer with others. I deeply appreciate it, I hope the others who are part of it do too. 

3) Attentiveness to my locality

In the strict early days of lockdown, options for getting out were, as we know, very restrictive: but, for me at least, certain positives came even from this. Knowing my outdoor time was strictly limited made me prioritise enjoying it. In "normal" life, as was, I generally get out and about, with lots of walking built in to my normal routine: but it took lockdown limits for me to commit to ensuring I went out absolutely everyday, come rain or shine. Walking (and cycling) became less functional, more enjoyable. I learned (albeit imperfectly) to be more fully present in the moment, focused on the activity and the surroundings rather than my brain always whizzing ahead to the next thing. noticed things which I've undoubtedly passed many times without ever seeing. Repeating the same walks and cycle rides regularly meant I watched the seasons change before my eyes: I noticed different flowers bloom and fade along the canals; I saw buds and blossom come and then go, I watched families of ducklings grow up. At the same time, limitations on travel further afield has also meant I have explored parts of Birmingham I've never really visited in my time here. Perhaps none of this should have needed lockdown, but it did. Hopefully, however, they are lessons learned that won't be quickly forgotten.

4) The book of the blog 

It's true that, in theory at least, this project didn't need lockdown to come to fruition. But every other time I've thought about doing it, it has remained just that, a thought. Whereas this time I felt able to carve out the space to actually put the necessary time into the editing to make it happen. I am, as I wrote in a previous post, extremely pleased with the result.   

5) Flowers in the foyer

There is, something deeply satisfying about growing things. We have always had a few houseplants on our windowsills. Early on, we tried to grow things on the roof but the seagulls always had other ideas. But when lockdown arrived, and the building was closed to the public for the foreseeable future, we suddenly had lots more space to play with. The space behind the full-length glass windows in the foyer are, it turns out, perfect for growing things. Admittedly, I probably would have tried to get hold of dwarf sunflower seeds if I'd known just how tall the ones I found in a random packet were going to grow, but I have found it very pleasing to watch seeds germinate, poke up through the compost, and finally flower. I wonder whether, when the building reopens, I'll be allowed to continue my little gardening efforts ...

Life in Lockdown

A few weeks ago, I was interviewed by Nick, the URC synod evangelist, about life at Carrs Lane during lockdown.  In church circles, I guess we are fairly unusual, and because of that, some might even suggest, vaguely interesting. While many people have been discovering how to 'live church' away from their church buildings for perhaps the first time; we have spent even more time 'in church' than usual.

There was, of course, a specific agenda and audience in mind. The context was for it to form part of a series, sharing good news with and from churches about lockdown. A lot of what I said was fairly rambling and incoherent. When talking about the Stories project and the other ways in which I have tried to stand alongside asylum seekers and refugees through this period, I feel like I failed to properly communicate the great joys and benefits ... for them and for me. There is much that is left unsaid.

It is, I suppose I am saying, far from perfect as a reflection of the last few months. But it exists as a record of a conversation (albeit edited) at a particular moment in time and hey, if its out in the big wide world of the internet, I guess it makes sense for it to be shared here too.

Seven Years

It is seven years since we moved to Birmingham. Maybe not exactly today, but this summer marks spending seven years in a place I have come to love as home.

There is particular significance to this for me because it means Birmingham is now the place I have lived longer than anywhere else in my life, overtaking the place in which I spent my distinctly less happy and less fulfilled teenage years. 

If we weren't in the midst of a global pandemic I'd undoubtedly have considered throwing a party to celebrate, sharing the occasion with some of the many who have been part of the journey to making this place home. Hey ho, 'tis not to be this time: a slightly rambling blogpost will have to suffice by way of marking the moment!

It doesn't feel so very long ago that I was accustomed to being told by others that my addresses needed their own page in their address book because there had been so many of them. I have certainly gone through phases of changing location at frequent intervals: following the next opportunity to other parts of the country or in some cases, the world. Some I still return to at intervals, some I guess, there is a strong likelihood I will never even visit again. Many, perhaps all, are rich in the memories who have shaped the me I am today.

But here we are, in Birmingham: seven years and counting, with no plans to move on from this place any time soon. Initially my love for Birmingham took me somewhat by surprise. The sense of connectedness to this place which gradually crept up on me, likewise. But I have discovered a new appreciation for the semi-solid foundations I have built here. In a way that has perhaps never been true before, I have put down roots and built community and connections which tie me to a geographical locality. Where once I feared that these kinds of ties would feel restrictive somehow, here, I have discovered that they don't. 

I could probably write at length about the host of interrelated reasons why Birmingham has held me in a way that nowhere else has: but I suspect most or all have probably made sufficient appearances in a blog post (or several) in the intervening years and don't need to be repeated here. 

This is not a post which intends to pretend that Birmingham is perfect: I would be the first to admit that it isn't. Nor am I declaring that I have found somewhere I will settle for ever: who knows what the future might hold and where it might take me. But it is an acknowledgement, I guess of my sense of connection and attachment to this place. 

One thing is certain, I don't believe that staying here for so long (by my standards) means that life has somehow become static, nor that I have lost my desire for newness and adventure. That which in the past I have found by switching location, I have continued to discover amidst the new opportunities and new encounters which have continued to enrich my life here in this place. 

The adventure continues. Here. For now at least.

The pictures of the words (3)

And just like that, another month draws to a close. 

Here is the third and final instalment of my July artistic challenge, illustrating these texts and following on from this one and this one.

The pictures of the words (2)

This is the second series of pictures illustrating the "thirty words a day" which I wrote during the month of June. I have, as I promised myself, picked up my paintbrushes (almost) every day. So here are the next ten images to follow on from these ones. 

The pictures of the words (1)

As I said, I quite enjoyed June's creative project of writing thirty words every day, so when that ended I wanted to come up with something equivalent for July. For my follow-up challenge I decided that each day this month I would produce a painting to represent the corresponding day's words. I'm being realistic, so they're quite small, who knows, like with the words, maybe some of them will spark something bigger at some point, maybe they won't.   

I think part of this setting of challenges is a bit of a quest to cling on to, or salvage, some creative energy from something of a sense of lethargy I can feel in myself and sense in others. Don't get me wrong: I am still keeping pretty busy, and as lockdown is gradually lifted I am revelling in the possibilities of real human contact it offers. But I am also aware that at times I am struggling to find the energy to do things which either I know need to be done, or know will give me pleasure if I make the effort to. I am sure I am not alone in this. 

Some of this is undoubtedly entirely natural. Behavioural sociologists warned from the start we would only be able to cope with lockdown for 12 weeks. Uncertainty is always tiring and whatever the recent relaxations of the rules, this is still not the normality we are used to. I am a natural extrovert, I draw my energy from being with other people and compared to the heavily peopled existence I am used to, this last few months have been very, very different. And then, this is, in the calendar in which my brain still operates, the end of the year. There is nothing new to me, or anyone else who has ever been involved in education, to a sense of exhaustion creeping in by mid-July. 

But normally, it feels like it makes more sense: though part of my brain is telling me it is fine to acknowledge this spring / summer has been just as tiring as any other, part of me still refuses to admit that sitting at home for four months can possibly be particularly draining. And normally, there's a natural process for overcoming it, a summer break, a shift in routines, ... this year, the exit strategy feels much less clear-cut.

I am not one for being inactive; the need to be busy and to have a sense of purpose is core to my very being ... but even I can sense the creeping risk. Recognising, acknowledging and at least to some extent accepting this has not been easy. I have every sympathy for those who speak of struggling to get up in the morning, for those who have drifted away from online communities even though they know the sort-of-human contact would probably ultimately help, for those who haven't been able to face leaving the house today or even this week. I have less sympathy for the elements of it I see in myself.   

Maintain a routine, getting outside each day even when it is raining, continuing to feel I have a role in offering support to others, keeping in contact with friends ... these are the things that are ensuring I don't spend even more time than I already do scrolling through meaningless social media posts! Forcing myself to pick up my paintbrushes each day this month will be another.

Originally this blog post was only really going to say what it says in the first paragraph. But maybe the rest needed to be said too. Anyway, here are the first ten painted pictures, matching these first ten word pictures: 

Isaac the Beloved

When you can't find the hymn that quite says what you want, clearly the solution is to write one, no? 

This is "Isaac the Beloved", to the well-known tune of Be thou my Vision / Lord of Hopefulness; which mostly wrote itself on a walk around Birmingham's canals. 

Isaac the beloved was Abraham’s dear son

How could God ask him to give up this precious one?

Was there sadness and anger before he said yes?

Did he know God was with him, even in his distress?

They walked to the mountain, they walked side by side

Did he know what was happening as his hands were tied?

But still in that moment, in the depths of the pain

Still daring to listen, so God spoke again

God said to Abraham “do him no harm”

Where bloodshed was threatened, a moment of calm

Where sometimes we falter, unsure what we must give

A promise is whispered your God wants you to live!

But what of that message, had he misunderstood

Or had God changed her mind about what was now good

As we journey to discover what we’re called to do

It’s the daring to listen that allows something new

Sometimes we listen, sometimes struggle to hear

As the voice seems to change with the passing of years

But dare we still listen to what God will say

And dare we still follow when she changes the way?

(Written for the church at Carrs Lane service which I wrote about here)

The book of the blog

Several times in this blog's history, as various milestones in its existence have rolled past, I have considered the possibility of getting a printed version of it. Like with photos, while there are many advantages to digital records, there is something inexplicably different about the tangible 'hold it in your hands' version of things.

The latest milestone was in early May when I published my 300th blog post, and I decided that finally investing some time in editing a printable version of my blog might be a good lockdown project to get my teeth into. Whereas in the past it has never got beyond a vague idea, this time, I committed a bit of time to making it happen.

So I researched blog book websites (realising in the process that I have written A LOT of words in the last 9 years, and some sites are certainly better suited to volumes less substantial than mine was going to be!) These sites do a lot of the work, but I wanted to have some editorial control and chose intorealpages, one that offered that possibility.  

Admittedly, there were some minor formatting frustrations: straight text posts transferred across really easily; poetry, not so much!) but with a little bit of assistance from a very helpful person on the other end of an email address, and quite a number of hours, it was done.

On the whole, it was an amazingly enjoyable process: rereading and reliving adventures from the last nine years has been a really fun way to spend a significant number of hours. I smiled over people and events scarcely thought about for a long time, I recalled much which had long been consigned to the cobwebbed recesses of my memory. In places I could see how my thoughts and reflections have developed over time, in others, the strands of "me" that are still very much the same and run throughout. I watched myself grow.

Individually printed hardback books do not come cheap. And even after all the hours of editing time, when it came to the final moment of pressing the button to order it, I did wonder whether it was really justifiable to spend so much on something which I acknowledge to be be simply an extravagance. But I did it anyway. Yes, it's a luxury, but it is also the product of, over the years, a lot of thought, and time, and effort, and creative energy. It stands as a tangible record of nine years of life hopefully well-lived.

 

From then to now there was an interlude, as I tracked its progress through printing, dispatch and failed delivery. And then, yesterday, it arrived. I don't often await packages with quite so heightened a sense of anticipation ... and I am glad to report it completely lived up to my hopes. The quality is excellent (of the product, others should be left to judge that about the writing I suppose!) and there is something deeply satisfying about seeing this very professional looking version of something that is entirely my own work. Perhaps that's mainly about ego, I don't know, but for now at least, I'm not going to analyse too much, I'm just going to enjoy it.

Thirty words (3)

This is the third and final instalment of my June challenge of writing thirty words every day. So here we are, thirty vignettes: inspired by the last month of my life, by conversations and encounters, and by my imagination.

Part 1 

Part 2

And these: 

21st June

The pain of separation. A deep ache of gnawing uncertainty enveloping the heart. Anxious, disorientated, numb. But fingers curl tight around a sliver of hope, determined not to let go.

22nd June

Disordered words scribbled across a tattered page. Disordered thoughts scattered in a distracted mind. How do we find order in this chaos? How much does it matter if we don’t?

23rd June

Sometimes every inch is an effort, sometimes miles fly past. Sometimes each day seems to last a lifetime, sometimes weeks flash past. But the wheels, and the earth keep turning. 

24th June

Sometimes, you just want to curl up under the covers for a while. That’s ok. Provided you remember the shape you make is always a comma, never a full stop.

25th June

The sun smiles down from bright, cloudless skies, and the earth heats up beneath it. But the best kind of warmth comes from inside, and we usually call it love.

26th June

How often we resist the pull and possibility of newness for fear of wasting what went before. But autumn leaves which fall from trees aren’t wasted, they are making way.

27th June

A simple air, hummed absent-mindedly; a catchy chorus sung out totally un-self-consciously, poetic words, infiltrating the soul. This is music, with the power and beauty to sustain and change us.

28th June

Ethereal early morning light bathing the earth. Cool freshness cradling the promise of heat. Foliage still gently caressed by dew drops. The precious quality of a new day just beginning. 

 

29th June

Lives carefully stitched together from those parts of ourselves lived out loud in vibrant colours, and the deeply hidden secrets traced in fragile silver we scarcely dare whisper to ourselves. 

30th June

The shadows shift, and at times it seems the light fades; but then the clouds crack open, pierced by a shaft of light which reminds us, all will be well.

And so, tomorrow, another month begins. 

A willingness to listen

I lead daily prayer a lot, but it's not often I get to lead a Sunday service at the Church at Carrs Lane. When I do, it usually involves paint ... but that doesn't work so well in online worship, so this time, it didn't.

The Old Testament lectionary reading for today was the story of Abraham's non-sacrifice of Isaac (Genesis 22:1-14), a story I think is particularly rich on all sorts of levels. Too rich, and too deep to address everything in one five minute reflection. Anyway, I thought I'd share my reflection from the service here too.  

At the beginning of this story, Abraham knows what God wants of him. He understands there will be a huge cost: a commitment of time and physical energy, but above all a huge emotional cost. He says yes to this call of God and sets of on this journey.

And then, at a certain point, after much of this emotional and physical energy has already been expended, God says, Stop. I require something different of you now.

We don’t know, the text doesn’t tell us, whether Abraham had completely misunderstood the original call: there is a strong part of me likes to think so, I struggle with the idea of God that God would demand child sacrifice; but perhaps actually God did need Abraham to engage with this, albeit destructive, aspect of the community in which he lived, of the culture which surrounded him.

I wonder whether it matters which is true: either way, what we do know is neither God nor Abraham condemn themselves or each other for the journey, the expenditure of energy and emotional angst which has brought them to this point. All of this is held as part of the story with no value judgment cast.

I wonder whether what really matters, what makes Abraham such an important father of faith for three major world religions is his willingness, both here and in other stories about him, to continue to listen, to be open to changing direction, to setting off on new paths.

This is a story from an ancient culture so far removed from our own and yet I wonder whether, in fact, it speaks more deeply into and about our own experiences than is immediately apparent.

I wonder whether many of us have in fact had, or even perhaps are having, parallel experiences. I hope, I really hope, that no-one listening to this feels God has asked them to sacrifice a child. But I hope, too, many of us feel God has called us down paths which have cost us something: towards things which have demanded our time and energy, demanded our emotional investment. I hope, many of us have been willing to respond to those calls, to set off on those journeys towards those mountains.

I wonder how easily Abraham heard God say stop. From this distance it is easy to think, well of course, any hint that he should not sacrifice his child he was going to leap at. I wonder whether it was  really that simple. I wonder how tempted he was, given all it had already cost him, given the emotional investment in this path he was on, I wonder how tempted he was just to carry on along that path, I wonder how tempted he was to close his ears to whatever other messages God might now speak.

I wonder how tempted we are, sometimes, to do the same. To be so invested in something, to know so definitely that the journey was sanctioned by God that we close our ears to the whispered voice that might say stop. I require something different of you now.

When Abraham heard that voice say stop, I wonder if he felt like it wasted all of that energy, all of that effort, all of that time, all of that emotion. I wonder whether we ever struggle to listen to a God who is asking something new, for fear of wasting all that went before.

But Abraham dared to listen. He dared to respond. He dared to change direction. And in doing so it did, ultimately, offer something infinitely better, infinitely more beautiful. I wonder whether, if we are willing to keep listening, to hear God sometimes ask us to stop and change direction, we too will discover something infinitely better, infinitely more beautiful.

You can watch the whole service, which also includes music and singing from friends with far more talent than me, and contributions from some very cute children, here: