St Lukes Church

head space....

THIS SUNDAY 7pm....
HEAD SPACE
'AS WE FORGIVE THOSE...'

A discussion about forgiveness in the light of Julie Nicholson, a Bristol vicar giving up her parish because she cannot forgive the July 7th bombers who killed her daughter.

“When we forgive evil we do not excuse it, we do not tolerate it, we do not smother it. We look evil full in the face, call it what it is, let its horror shock and stun and enrage us. and only then do we forgive it.”
Lewis B Smedes

Head Space offers an opportunity, over a glass or wine, a beer or a coffee, to think and rethink things that really matter...to discuss, query and explore...to listen...to be listened to.

brokeback pondering...

Pat and I finally went to see Brokeback Mountain with our friends Dave and Hilary last week. I can't exactly say that I enjoyed it - I noticed that everyone left the studio in silence - though it's a great film.

I'd realised after the first ten minutes that I should have gone to the loo before getting trapped in a long row of seats. So I shot right out to the toilets when the film finished. And a guy hit on me - not the first time it's happened, I confess!

Chatting afterwards, we discovered that all four of us had empathised with the women in the story more than the men. Don't get me wrong, I liked the two guys and certainly felt something of the pain of being a gay man during the 1960s in Wyoming. Maybe the original story being written by a woman has something to do with it - or maybe it was just us?

Scotland on Sunday has an interesting story on the back of the film entitled 'Brokeback wives find solace in cowboy tearjerker', which reckons that an estimated 1.7 million to 3.4 million US women once were, or are now, married to men who have sex with men. Apparently, 10,000 to 20,000 such wives have contacted online support groups, and increasing numbers of them are women in their 20s or 30s.

I'm personally aware of many couples in churches where one partner is gay but hasn't come out to the wider church community. Often the gay partner has entered the marriage in the belief that gay relationships are out of the question, and in the hope that God will 'heal' them of their sexual orientation.

Brokeback may help to lift the lid on mixed-orientation marriages, and I think that has to be a good thing. But what do you think - about the film, or the article?

pie and liquor....

I've just finished writin the talk/tribute I will be giving at Terry's funeral tomorrow. Terry was just 38. He'd suffered from schizophrenia for much of his adult life. His family don't know how he died - or even when. There will be an inquest, but this probably won't occur for a couple of months yet. Meanwhile, his family have to get on with the business of grieving and saying goodbye.

Over the past seven years, funerals have become a significant bit of my life - I take, on average, one a week, though I'm taking four in the next few days. It's an education to see how different people deal with the death of a loved one, and what vastly different degrees of languange people have to talk about that person. Sometimes people gush with stories, anecdotes an insights about the departed one - which is a gift to me. Other times they give me nothing more than a few cliched comments, and I feel I know almost nothing about the person I am commending into the arms of a loving God.

Yet, regardless of the ability or inability of people to voice their true feelings and thoughts about a departed loved one, I never cease to be moved by the pain I feel in their words or their silence.

Unlike many of those whose funerals I take, I actually knew Terry, and I will share personally in the grief of his family. But we will laugh as well as weep tomorrow, because there were many bright sides to Terry's life, despite his illness.

I have only learned since his death that Terry apparently gave me a reputation in the parish (or in the 'manor' as he said) as 'Dave the Pie'. 'That's how you're known around here, Dave', his brother Garry told me, 'Dave the pie.'

I don't know if you've noticed, but people who use cockney slang tend only to use the first part of the expression - 'Dave the pie' instead of 'pie and liquor'. I recently heard a guy telling his son to put on his 'rhythms' - 'rhythm and blues'. I suppose it's about keeping us outsiders on the outside.

Anyway there it is. I'd like you to call me 'Dave the pie' from now on.

'nothingness that is filled with eternity....'

'Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall eturn. Turn away from sin and be faithful to Christ.' These are the words I uttered mantra-like over the people who gathered for the Ash Wednesday service this week as I smudged the ashy mark of the cross on each forehead.

The first time I ashed a congregation I found the whole experience unnerving - trying not to forget the words whilst concentrating on making a recognisable cross on someone's head with a black gungy substance. And feeling overawed by the privilege of what I was doing at the same time.

A friend (who shall remain nameless) who was administering his first ashing this week, found himself stirring at a woman for what felt like an age whilst he tried to recall the words. Further along the line he pronounced over a shocked man, 'Remember you are sin...!'

My talk on Wednesday was inspired by a marvellous essay on Ash Wednesday by Karl Rahner, the great twentieth century Catholic theologian. He says that when we hear the words 'Remember you are dust' we should note that we are also being told that we are brothers and sisters of the incarnate Lord - for he also became dust.

'In these words we are told everything that we are: nothingness that is filled with eternity; death that teems with life; futility that redeems; dust that is God’s life forever....In the boredom of everyday routine, in the disappointments that we experience in everything - in ourselves, in our neighbours, in the Church - in the brutal harshness of universal history. Again and again we shall lie in the dust of our weakness, humiliated and weeping...We shal experience again and again that we are dust. We shall not only be told this in a ceremony; but we shall experience it in life, and throughout life.’

To download my talk just click Download ash_wednesday_talk.pdf

soul space...detox for the soul...

Soul Space

DETOX FOR THE SOUL
A lenten Meditation

This Sunday 5th March 7pm
St Luke's, Hillmarton Road, London N7

Don't miss it!

greetings from the windy city...

The reason for my silence over the past week is that I have been working like crazy to prepare for a trip to Chicago. And here we are here in the ‘windy city’, where I’m giving a series of talks at North Park University, a Christian-based set up, but which offers a full syllabus of study opportunities and draws a student base of both Christians and non-Christians. It’s a pretty cool place.

It’s been a busy schedule, but today I give my last main talk. So far everything has gone really well. The talks are based in the chapel which has been packed with several hundred students. The theme of the week is ‘stories’, a very loose theme that gives me a carte blanche to do whatever I want. On Monday I got to address the faculty – a great honour, I’m told; apparently no one normally gets to do this. They were a pretty scary looking bunch but I think I pitched it right.

They organisers put Pat and I in a hotel right here in downtown Chicago – fantastic. Our hotel window gives a view of the lake, which is frozen for some way out. It was 16 below at the start of the week! We walked to the lakeside at 9.30am on Sunday. It was about as cold as I have ever experienced. Within half an hour we were heading for the hotel as fast as possible.

Later today we’ll be on a jet heading home, and look forward to being with everyone at St Luke’s on Sunday, when Geoff Crawford will be showing us slides of his exhibition on Fair Trade in preparation for Fair Trade Fortnight.

See ya soon.

the 10 most redeeming films of 2005?

The American magazine Christianity Today, have published their top ten list of the most redeeming films. By 'redeeming' they mean films that have stories of redemption - sometimes blatantly, sometimes less so. "And with some of them, the redemption thread is buried beneath the surface; you might have to look a bit harder for it, but it's most certainly there. Some of them are "feel-good" movies that leave a smile on your face; some might leave you with more of a contemplative frown, asking, 'How should I process that?'"

Take a look at christianity today.com and let us know what you think. I haven't seen 'Millions' - have you? Pat was watching 'Crash' on the plane when we were returning from Oz but after a short time, I switched to something else because I thought it was too violent. But Pat loved it - and I obviously made a big mistake!

Bono's best sermon yet....

Sojourners recently published Bono's speech to the American National Prayer Breakfast, attended by President Bush. It's probably Bono's most explicitly Christian speech to date, in which he clearly roots his notion of social justice in the teachings of the Bible. It's well worth a read. You'll find it at sojomail, the Sojourners e-newsletter, which you may also like to subscribe to.

soul space...feast of candles

SOUL SPACE....SUNDAY 5th FEBRUARY 7PM
A CELEBRATION OF CANDLEMASS
followed by a glass of wine
You are very welcome

old joanna gets a new lease of life....

Click on picture for a larger image.
The old Joanna sitting outside the Penn Road entrance to St Lukes may look a sorry sight - an undignified reminder that loyal servants of the church have their day, and then end up being discarded for newer models. But no. It is in fact a shining example of how much beauty a beholding eye can see - especially when the eye belongs to Meg Wroe! The decomposing piano is actually a part of Meg's work for her art degree course. And despite a calamity at her college involving an unspeakable spillage from the upstairs gents toilets (don't ask!), Meg's reframing of old Joanna's bits and pieces should earn her a degree of recognition. Hopefully, the final exhibition will find its way back into the church for us all to see.