21 January: Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, IV.

Photo: Mazur/cbcew.org.uk

As we join with other Christians around the world for the Week of Prayer we pray that our hearts will be open to see and hear the many ways in which racism continues to destroy lives, and to discern the steps we can take as individuals and communities to heal the hurts and build a better future for everyone.

Day 4 Lament

Psalm 22:1-5 
Matthew 27:45-50

Commentary

Lament requires us to really look and see. A young woman looked and saw the tears of the oppressed. The video she shot on her phone of the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 was seen all around the world and unleashed a holy rage as people witnessed, and finally acknowledged, what African Americans have experienced for centuries: subjugation by oppressive systems in the midst of privileged blind bystanders.In the UK, black men between 18 and 25 years are five times more likely to be stopped and searched by the police and black women are four times more likely to die during childbirth. We have much to lament.

The two passages today speak of lament. Jesus, and David, the brutally honest psalmist, set this example for us of what to do when we’re in pain.

“My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” is a pain-filled cry at the very beginning of Psalm 22 that is mirrored by Jesus himself on the cross in Matthew 27.

The pain is not sanitised and polished for us. It is raw and honest.

Lament is a hard practice to embrace. Our society wants us to rush towards positivity and victory. What does it mean to truly lament? To sit with the pain. Lament demands that we open ourselves, it demands from all of us, that we no longer ignore the pain.

Reflection

“Lament is a protest so deep that it must become a prayer, for only God can provide needed hope that justice will prevail and that the future will be different.”

Rachel’s Cry: Prayer of Lament and Rebirth of Hope, Kathleen D Bilman and Daniel L Migliore, The Pilgrim Press 1999

Prayer

God of justice and of grace, 
remove the scales from my eyes 
so I can truly see the oppression around me, 
and give me courage not only to name it, but to fight it 
while providing authentic presence, witness, and compassion to the oppressed.

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6 November: reasonable to refuse?

Fisherman and child, Mallaig, Scotland.

When Doctor Johnson travelled to Scotland in 1773, the 1745 campaign of Bonnie Prince Charlie to regain the throne and the subsequent reprisals from George II were still remembered by those who had been affected. Here is some of what Johnson found.

There was perhaps never any change of national manners so quick, so great, and so general, as that which has operated in the Highlands, by the last conquest, and the subsequent laws.  We came thither too late to see what we expected, a people of peculiar appearance, and a system of antiquated life.  The clans retain little now of their original character, their ferocity of temper is softened, their military ardour is extinguished, their dignity of independence is depressed, their contempt of government subdued, and the reverence for their chiefs abated.  Of what they had before the late conquest of their country, there remain only their language and their poverty. 

Their language is attacked on every side.  Schools are erected, in which English only is taught, and there were lately some who thought it reasonable to refuse them a version of the holy scriptures, that they might have no monument of their mother-tongue. That their poverty is gradually abated, cannot be mentioned among the unpleasing consequences of subjection. 

Johnson had given his support to those working for a full Scots Gaelic translation of Scripture; the Gospels and Psalms had come first, used in public and private worship every day.

Nineteenth and Twentieth Century foreign missionaries made sure to translate the Bible as soon as they could, but imagine learning to render Latin, Hebrew and Greek into a language not previously written down! It is not just word for word, but idea for idea, a different way of thinking. Not respecting those differences would have been unacceptable bullying. The same is even more true of trying to attack a mother-tongue and deprive people of the Bible in their own language. Whatever mistakes those early missionaries made, they were made in good faith and in service of the local people, to whom they were happy to hand over responsibility as soon as possible.

from “Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland” by Samuel Johnson)

Thoughts on St Oscar Romero by Canon Anthony Charlton of Canterbury

Saint Oscar Romero
Image open access via Wikipedia

Another of Fr Anthony’s thoughts, this time about our unofficial second patron saint, Oscar Romero.

On 24th March 1980 Saint Oscar Romero Archbishop of San Salvador was shot and killed while celebrating Mass. In his sermon the day before, Romero ordered the army to stop killing people: “In the name of God, and in the name of this suffering people whose cries rise to heaven more loudly each day, I beg you, I implore you, I order you, in the name of God, stop the repression!” We are very privileged to have some of his vestments here at St Thomas’s in the Martyr’s chapel.

Here are some words from a sermon he gave in November 1977

Do you want to know if your Christianity is genuine?
Here is the touchstone:
Whom do you get along with?
Who are those who criticise you?
Who are those who do not accept you? Who are those who flatter you?
Know from that what Christ said once:
“I have come not to bring peace, but division.” There will be division even in the same family, because some want to live more comfortably
by the world’s principles,
those of power and money.
But others have embraced the call of Christ
and must reject all that cannot be just in the world.

We give thanks for the witness of his life and death and ask that through his intercession we may also be a powerful witness to Jesus and his Gospel in our lives today..

If you want to know more about his life and message click here.

Going Viral, International Women’s Day and Eco tip XVII (All in one post!)

Saints Mildred and Ethelbert at Saint Mildred’s, Canterbury

Good morning to you all on a rather cold and frosty morning; and I hope this finds you all well, as we are here. Yesterday I headed over to Ramsgate for my vaccination –  what a well organised and slick operation it was- hats off to all those who organised it – arm feeling achy though which is to be expected! It was strange driving to Ramsgate as I realised it was the furthest I have been in the car for about six months!

Today, 8th March 2021 is International Women’s Day, and the Mother’s Union has asked that we pray for women around the world between today and Mothering Sunday (14th March), we remember today that around the world there are women who are marginalised and oppressed or abused for just being female. who don’t have the access to opportunities for education, a safe place to live, clean water,  or some days don’t have enough food to feed their children. We give thanks for organisations such as the Mothers Union who support and encourage women both nationally and internationally. 

Morning Prayer: https://youtu.be/ATUIE7sODHk
God Bless you all and have a good day
Jo
Rev Jo Richards, Rector of the Benefice of St Dunstan, St Mildred and St Peter, Canterbury

Another chance to feel smug and virtuous: both of us gardeners at St Mildred’s Glebe this morning were using metal flasks for our breaktime drinks, and no worries about water quality or quantity. Polish that halo before the cobwebs take over again!

19 August: Gilbert White VI, trouble in the forest.

It seems that Gilbert White had some sympathy with the poor of his district, who had free spirits among them who were prepared to stand up to the nobility.

At present the deer of the Holt are much thinned and reduced by the night hunters, who perpetually harass them in spite of the efforts of numerous keepers, and the severe penalties that have been put in force against them as often as they have been detected, and rendered liable to the lash of the law.  Neither fines nor imprisonments can deter them, so impossible is it to extinguish the spirit of sporting which seems to be inherent in human nature.

General Howe turned out some German wild boars and sows in his forests, to the great terror of the neighbourhood, and, at one time, a wild bull or buffalo; but the country rose upon them and destroyed them.

A very large fall of timber, consisting of about one thousand oaks, has been cut this spring (viz., 1784) in the Holt forest: one fifth of which, it is said, belongs to the grantee, Lord Stawell.  He lays claim also to the lop and top; but the poor of the parishes of Binsted and Frinsham, Bentley and Kingsley, assert that it belongs to them, and assembling in a riotous manner, have actually taken it all away.  One man, who keeps a team, has carried home for his share forty stacks of wood.  Forty-five of these people his lordship has served with actions.  These trees, which were very sound and in high perfection, were winter-cut, viz., in February and March, before the bark would run.  In old times the Holt was estimated to be eighteen miles, computed measure from water-carriage, viz., from the town of Chertsey, on the Thames; but now it is not half that distance, since the Wey is made navigable up to the town of Godalming, in the county of Surrey.

The Wey joins the Thames, so timber could be sent there, and on to dockyards along the Estuary and into Kent. Winter-cut trees were easier to transport, as the sap was not running beneath the bark, and the wood was appreciably lighter in weight.

October 15, Month of Mission: A Workers’ Champion II.

 

Fr Neil Magill is a Columban Missionary. In his office in Taiwan he placed posters on the wall with quotations from Pope John Paul II’s Encyclical: On Human Work. The police demanded that they be removed as “subversive and leading to communism”.  (Try telling that to John Paul II, the champion against Communism!)

For one anxious year he received many anonymous phone calls, often in the middle of the night, telling him to leave Taiwan. On St Patrick’s Day 1989, Neil was lured to the local police station on the assurance that his new visa was ready for collection. On arrival there he was grabbed by a number of policemen who rushed him to the airport and bundled him on to a commercial flight for Hong Kong. All he had with him at the time were the clothes he was wearing. The Church authorities were shocked, angry and embarrassed because they were being publicly attacked by politicians as news of Neil’s expulsion was being broadcast all over the world.

Two days later, at the first news conference ever held by the Catholic hierarchy in Taiwan, five of the island’s bishops defended Neil’s apostolate. “Jesus responded to social problems”, they said, “and the Church must do what he did”. In an open letter 67 eminent scholars claimed that the government had abused its authority. For the first time ever workers demonstrated on the streets against the government. Meanwhile, Neil was welcomed back to Ireland by his aged parents, and over the following ten years he became the Justice and Peace coordinator of the Irish Region, the Vice-Director and the Director. Then at the Columban Chapter of the year 2000, he was elected Vicar-General of the Society.

Welcome Back

In the national elections of the year 2000 in Taiwan, the Democratic Progressive Party took power from the Kuomintang for the first time in fifty years. The new President Chen Shui-bian, a lawyer by profession, who had also been imprisoned by the previous government, talked of his vision for greater democracy and better conditions for workers in Taiwan. He invited Neil to return to Taiwan, paid all his expenses and twice apologised for the treatment Neil had received from the previous government. He also gave Neil £1,000 spending money while he was in the country. This money Neil donated to voluntary groups working with the poor.

The Columban commitment to migrant workers has continued in Taiwan. Meanwhile, Neil has found a new mission in Myanmar where he runs courses in Justice and Peace for lay leaders.

From an article in Far East magazine by Fr Cyril Lovett, September-October 2018.

Please use link below and scroll down to ‘Past Issues’ where you can download the September/ October 2018 edition of the Far East:

https://columbans.co.uk/publications/far-east

15 March: How Many out of Ten?

Members of different L’Arche communities processing into Canterbury Cathedral to celebrate 50 years of L’Arche and 40 years of L’Arche in the UK.

Tony Gibbings  was a founder member of L’Arche Kent and is now leader of L’Arche in Ipswich. He has shared with us his reflection on L’Arche as seen by an Irish comedian, Tommy Tiernan. 

As Tony says, the writer speaks to the Irish context. So he has a few things wrong for the rest of us. In most of the world L’Arche is not just a “Catholic community”… and there is not “a chapel in every house”. We can pray around the shared table, or in the sitting room.

Tony writes:

This column (see link below) was handed to me by a friend. Apparently Tommy Tiernan is an Irish comedian and as foul-mouthed as they come these days. I, for one, do not find it easy that all real political resistance in our Western culture seems to only reside in the entertainment industry, rather than politicians or journalists. Recent news reports that some 30 0r 40 journalists have died in 2017 while reporting in war zones or because they exposed corruption or anti-government views shows the danger of challenging oppressive aspects of our world. Comedians sometimes seem to be the only remaining pockets of resistance, limited by being mere entertainers, but perhaps protected from being targeted themselves.

L’Arche was founded as a resistance and alternative to a society based on power-play. In this article Tommy Tiernan brings that dynamic vision to life and up-to-date for 2018. He has said in one of his other regular columns that “I like going to Mass – it’s all about the losers”. Touché. L’Arche’s prophetic message for the church is just that. We are not made more human by our strength or our success: We are made human by acknowledging our vulnerability and failures. We all need a bit of strength and success, but that is not what brings us into true relationship with ourselves, each other, or God. Community helps us to re-connect with our whole self – this is why those who taste L’Arche and the people at the heart of it cannot get away from the promise of authenticity that it holds out to us.

My prayer for 2018 is that all those with responsibility in the Church will grow in their understanding that what we need to see reflected in the Mass is the compassion of God, not what we have had in recent years – a distasteful attempt by the power-players in the Church to use the Mass to attempt to “correct” those who recognise that God is a God of relationship, not of power-play.

My other prayer is, ironically, for personal strength for each of us, in whatever form it is needed!
Best wishes for 2018.

Tony Gibbings,

Director/Community Leader
L’Arche Ipswich, 3 Warrington Road, Ipswich IP1 3QU
Tommy Tiernan 4 out of 10

11 August: Saint Clare.

Women may have been seen as second-class humans in past ages, yet there have always been saints who stood aside from  what society and family expected of them to live as God called them to.

While aristocratic women may have had more resources to be able to arrange this, they would have been lined up for profitable marriages arranged by others. Not necessarily a doorway to happiness or fulfilment at any level. We have already met the Saxon princesses Eanswythe and Mildred who were given the grace to hear the call and to convince others that they were doing God’s will by entering religious life. Clare was another such aristocrat, and an influence still felt today.

Let us pray to God our Father:

• for all Franciscan sisters especially those at the Franciscan International Study Centre;
• for all women and girls whose lives are limited by other people’s expectations and prejudices, whether in education, employment, life choices or female genital mutilation;
• for those men and women perpetuating the oppression of girls and women;
• for the Franciscan family around the world.

Saint Clare, Pray for us.

 

.Picture by Simone Martini