Quartz at St Johns Dumfries
As we prepare for our journey through Lent here is some insight from our past
https://aclerkofoxford.blogspot.com/2015/02/now-pure-and-holy-time-draws-near.html?m=1
If you were given the gift of being able to truly see in this life, what impact would that have on your daily living?
In some parts of the world absolute poverty is obvious, you see it on the streets as you walk. In Scotland poverty is a complicated issue, and not always visible.
This organisation lives out it’s faith through helping people overcome poverty related issues. An important first step is to become aware of what is actually happening.
https://capuk.org/news-and-blog/life-on-a-prepayment-meter
Reading from the SEC calendar for Feb the 16th 2023
This picture is one of my early ones. It has been useful a couple of times recently.
This morning I was thinking about peace as I stood in to help out at a commemoration of remembering the day that Bruce killed Comyn in Greyfriars, Dumfries. The opportunity to help arose as a result of connections I made during the “Hidden Histories” project. It is one strand of a complex mesh of connections in developing local community work. Essential work but difficult to classify!
My role was portreying a member of the Grayfriars monastery community. As part of a team from the Bruce Trust to help the general public and a primary school class imagine the significance of the events and access their heritage.
We were hosted in a Church that is still known locally as Grayfriars although there is only a vague connection through the communion of saints living and departed. This helped link the history, with the spirituality, and the whole human experience of time though.
Characters included, King Robert, his sister Lady Christina, Lady Mary (who was imprisoned in a cage for years) and Tom the pilgrim to show that history is not just about kings and warfare.
Hopefully by retelling the stories surrounding the violence of 1306 in their home town, the pupils will be better able to understand peace and practice #SensingMeaningfulness
I draw during the 11 O’clock service. The pencil and paper help me to explore the familiar surroundings and repeated words.
Perhaps this is similar to taking notes in a lecture theatre, even if the text is available online. Writing helps focus the mind and activate more of the brain to aid retention. For me the drawing is not so that I remember though, it helps me contemplate rather than rationalise. Sometimes I’ll draw a design inspired by the feeling of the moment or the archetecture of worship. At others a phrase from a reading will start me exploring the nature of my experience of the Divinity. It is usually a combination of many things!
This Sunday my drawing was most influenced by the reading from 1 Corinthians ch2 (although I later looked up John ch14 when I started putting my thoughts into words).
The flow of the service seemed to follow the theme of questioning the relationship between ritual acts and righteous living. Even kindness and public displays of charity can conceal support for systematic injustice. Whilst all the right words might be said, the balance of power remains with the privileged. An empty ritual of giving reinforces dependency rather than releasing potential, whether this is through fulfilling basic needs or placing abundance at the service of those who need it – both to restore healthy relationships.
Beneath this flow, my mind was occupied with thinking about the passage from Corinthians and the relationship between the presence of Jesus and that of the Holy Spirit. As Christians we look to Jesus for our example. Did Jesus ascend so that we would need to sense more broadly though? Rather than imitating one human being, we now have to be aware of the Spirit in being human. As pervasive as salt, yeast, light and obvious in her absence in tasteless behaviour, the weight of grinding poverty, and piety which blinds us from the minute to minute reality of what needs to be done.
So my drawing starts with a cross. Radiating from the cross are waves of water, transforming into tongues of fire. Perhaps viewers loose sight of the cross as they gaze on the drawing. For me though, I see the fire of the advocate blazing with anger fueled with an experience of ethical indignation that cannot be satisfied within the status quo. I see the healing waters of the comforter refreshing and bringing peace to those who are weary. The art style comes from stone and the metals of the earth, and perhaps by exposing it to the “open air” in this blog post others will find meanings I haven’t seen yet.
And that perspective shift is why the cross gets smaller and smaller as the drawing develops. The cross in it is not something to look at. It is a place to stand and look out from. The invitation is there to centre yourself in Jesus.
Let the fire of the Holy Spirit bathe you and transform darkness into light.
Let the water of the Holy Spirit bathe you and heal your wounds.
And flow through the food you eat, the drink you drink, and the relationships you live your life in.
To what extent is salvation given or worked out through living?
I suspect that the issue of how “Grace” and “Works” relate to one another is an example of #SensingMystery, although like all mysteries it involves a confusion of certainty that keeps us going and awareness of the unknown so we have to keep asking questions.
Particularly in discussions with those interested in ‘Celtic’ spirituality the names Augustine and Pelagius are important. Learning more about the views they expressed is also a good ‘mirror’ within which we can explore our personal beliefs and received teaching about the issue too!
In Scotland most church members who have even heard of Pelagius will remember him as being refuted by Augustine. Augustines understanding of human nature dominates reformed thinking. This article introduces Pelagius and gently encourages us to question our assumptions.
https://newedenministry.com/2020/08/30/hope/
This article explores the subject more closely, from another perspective.
https://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/pelagian-controversy
This is a discussion about the nature of human being. The Augustine position combined with a dualistic understanding of human being leads to problems with pre-destination, and the tendancy to dehumanise such as explored in the book “Scarlet letter”. The Pelagian position is open to the accusation that it puts too much emphasis on the ability of humans to save themselves, rather than rely on Jesus death and resurection.
Where do your beliefs place you, and how does that position influence your understanding of salvation? Is there an integrity of belief when you apply this and think of children, convicts, the unborn in the womb, your neighbour?
It is the eve before the new year starts!
Well, that is, before the calendar year we use in Scotland starts. The financial year, the academic year, and the agricultural years have different starts. As do the multiple liturgical years observed by people living and settled in Scotland. There is also the lunar year which is still used frequently enough by enough people to be available on calendars in high street shops.
There are many possible origins and meanings for the word “Hogmanay”. Most people can agree though that even if they don’t go all out celebrating it, it is a good opportunity to relax a bit and enjoy being alive.
What does it mean to you as you read this? Take some time out to reflect on that. If you have the luxury, perhaps you can use the opportunity to contemplate time itself.
Our lives are made up of many moments, and we have great flexibility in how we as humans string them in to a story which supports our sense of self. We don’t have complete freedom, because that self is also held in the stories others tell about us. The friends and associates we live with are in many ways the mycelium which support the growth of our mushroom like visible selves.
Significant cultural moments like hogmanay provide opportunities for events and the telling of stories in a way that can reset this, and provide a fresh start. As the year unfolds resolutions we make can grow into our new identity – if our relationships confirm any inner change!
So all the best for the new year, and a happy Hogmanay.
The featured photos are of a piece of interactive art in a cafe about five years ago. They have spread though facebook and pop will pop in memories for years to come. Another addition to the colourful expression of life in winter.
But have you ever wondered if Angels are real, and if so what they are like?
What is it about Angels that makes the idea appealing, far beyond the walls of church buildings?
We are choosing to work in relationship with the natural environment when we meet as Forest Church. We are taking a chilled out approach to this though. This means that our midwinter meeting is on a Sunday close to the solstice but not the day of it.
We will meet outside the Crichton chapel as usual. We have started exploring using words from liturgy which draws directly on the earliest church practice in these islands – often called “Celtic Christianity”.
Have you ever taken time to think about the way in which Christianity holds in tension the importance of history down to the details of where a baby is born and the cosmic awesomeness of a God who created and sustains all things in being?
This attention to detail and physical reality emerges time and time again as cultures go through a “Celtic Revival” that delights in locality, a sense of place, and meaningfulness connected with nature. (perhaps seen in books like Carmena Gadelica)
During the Golden age of Celtic Christianity brilliant minds pursued obscure truths and mysteries that academics of all era have struggled to grapple with though. Take for example the poetic work of “The Altus Prosator” where St Columba grapples with the concepts of Trinity and the cosmic order of things.
So on the 18th we will make an effort to become mindful of the moments we live in. We will also remember the connection we have with the creator of the cosmos who calls us out of our present to meet in eternity. Hopefully we will respond to the call of Wisdom as she stands at the highest point along the way where the paths meet.
It makes me smile when I think that one of the things which early Christians in these isles are remembered for is illuminated manuscripts. The grin gets broader when I compare the ready appreciation of this art with the slowness with which “youthwork for adults” has been accepted in many worshiping communities. The Manga gospels seem to be tolerated to try and ‘hook’ the youth and draw them in, but the acceptance of contemporary arts is slow.
Even in those congregations where the arts are an integral part of Sunday worship this tends to gravitate towards a particular congregation and their niche culture. Something has driven a wedge between the Church and the wider community and this has been driven deeper during my lifetime. To some I suspect this feels like the country (or union of countries!) is slipping away from church control into paganism. To many in my generation however we watch as despite our best efforts the institution seems slow to adapt and to cling to the mindset that underlies colonialism as well as economics that de-humanise people and will consume our environment.
Why is this relevant to the arts? Those who positively identify with the term pagan are often the leaders in environmental action. Back in the 80’s and 90’s they were building car henges. Drawing on the deep prehistoric past to express ethical idignation through contemporary art with the prophetic style of an old testament prophet. Not everyone is called to participate in such works of prophetic art, but has innovation been relegated to youthwork with the false expectation that people will grow out of it when they become adults?
Whilst a wild meadow of flourishing spirituality is blooming in many small gestures of artistic expression outside church meetings, inside we have a culture struggling to come to terms with digital projector screens let alone the theological implications of shifting from a clockwork understanding of spacetime to one which involves quantum uncertainty and the ‘spooky effect’.
So, I grin when someone thinks that a manga gospel is a new idea. They were too little, too late, and inexpertly executed, but a valuable attempt. After all, the shape that the light of the gospel took for centuries before printing presses was in the glorious colours of illuminated manuscripts. Experimenting with the best technology available, to variable levels of achievement. The church can provide #SensingSpirituality and #sensingmeaningfulness but it will need to escape the vice of the recent past to inherit awareness of the dynamic eternal truth. Like all living organisms it will need to seek out and undergo change in order to preserve its substance.
If we can do this in our Christian communities, and can embrace creative acts like the fusion of illumination from the late iron age combined with manga, then we make the way smooth and open new paths for exploration. Not using art functionally as a hook to lure the unwashed in, but as a celebration of the Way flourishing in fields we did not sow. Then perhaps the wedge will disappear, although what our gatherings will look like is unknown. In the C8th monasteries what did they imagine worship would look like now?
More of this artists work can be seen on the Scribal Styles website
Those interested in pioneer ministry will hopefully be recognise many common ways of working in this article (and perhaps even identify glimmers of micro-gospels). The article is about creative placemaking, and a phrase which stood out to me is:
“The common thread amongst various definitions, however, is that it is a process that helps to generate places where people want to be.”
You can read the article here:
And it is generously seasoned with links to more examples.
For the established Church in particular, some questions to reflect on could include…
Can we transform the spaces we have into places where people want to be?
If we go out, is it to discover God “in face of friend and stranger” or to convert?
What echoes of the creative placemaking carried out by saints like Ninian, Columba, Adomnan can still be felt in Scotland?
Are some called to gather people round God’s table, and others to feast on hillsides and drink unexpected wine at weddings?
Suggestions in the comments please!