Month: October 2020

Poem: One and Many

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This week, as the darkness and the weather continue to close in, and the news is full of sadness and anger, I’ve been doing something I have never done before – as so many of us are.

I’ve been participating in an online retreat, by zoom, with the Community of Aiden and Hilda, which should have been at Lindisfarne – Holy Island. I’ve never been to such a retreat before, and had not planned to go, but I was encouraged by a friend to try, and dip my toes into those North Sea waters from further south. The week’s subject is The Way of Three, exploring the Celtic love of Trinity.

Celtic prayers and blessings are full of references to this threefold presence of God – not as inscrutable doctrine, but as a deep way of experiencing God, and indeed, all things. Its participatory, and dwells in the dance of interconnection. I have had a growing awareness of this other way of seeing, and just begin to explore it in the chapter on the True Vine in my book, Jesus said “I Am” – finding life in the everyday. You can read a little from that chapter here.

It’s a beautiful and wise retreat, full of welcome and love. I am so glad I joined. On the morning of the second day, I woke with a really strong sense of how everything is bound together, held together in love, and how our new understandings of interconnectedness in ecology and physics and computing and economics are opening our eyes to a new way of seeing and being in the word. As we see reality as interconnected, it gives us a picture, a frame, to help us see God as participating in a dance of love. We find it hard to open up our understanding of God, and these new ways of looking at the world can work as metaphors, helping us picture what is hard to comprehend. What was, at least to me, a doctrinal puzzle, from a perspective of separateness, is now something liveable, relevant, and joyful. It’s taking me a while to find a way of articulating and knowing more deeply this sense, but in the meantime, here is a poem, which I wrote that morning – the day before yesterday. I hope it helps.

One and many

In my garden, I greet the birds
as they slow to land, and hop amongst
the plants, and the feeders.

I greet too the plants,
arriving more slowly still.
I work with what is.
I seek to welcome what grows,
and as things come to the end,
I thank them for their presence,
their work in the garden.

This space is encircled with green,
protected,
so the sharing and flourishing
is open, free.
And within, and without,
all is joined together
in the air, the light, the
rain, and the soil,
the pale threads, deep, deep
in the dark earth that join
under fences and hedges.

Sometimes, I look and see
this bird, this tree,
and flower, and butterfly.
And then my eyes widen,
my focus shifts
and I see the whole,
bound together
in all that is.
I see one loud
singing green,
and that glorious,
and that, welcoming me.

Be the eye of God dwelling with you,
The foot of Christ in guidance with you,
The shower of the Spirit pouring on you,
Richly and generously.

Taken from Wise Sayings of the Celts

This morning, I watched and listened to this beautiful piece by David Whyte – another blessing.

And a quote from today’s notes….

Maximus the Confessor (6th century theologian):
“To contemplate the smallest object is to experience the Trinity:
the very being of the object takes us back to the Father;
the meaning it expresses, its logos, speaks to us of Logos;
its growth to fulness and beauty reveals the Breath, the Life-giver.”

Melton Little Free Pantry – Half Term update

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Apologies for the blur – my mask was steaming up my glasses!

It’s half term here in the UK, and there’s a huge row going on about how to provide for those children and young people who are entitled to free school meals – will they go hungry this week? It breaks my heart that there are so many children who are at risk of hunger in our country, and that we don’t seem to be able to get our response together in time for this short holiday – after all, we knew it was coming. One of the things this crisis continues to do is to reveal things that may have been hidden, or we may have overlooked. Child poverty is one of these, and it’s an affront to us all that we aren’t, as a society, doing better to look after our kids and their families.

Of course, we need to look at long term, systemic solutions which genuinely help families to live good lives, but that long term thinking doesn’t help much if you or your child can’t sleep for hunger, or the fear of hunger. And so, we see once again the kindness and generosity of so many individuals and businesses – many themselves close to the edge – doing all they can to make sure children in their area have enough to eat.

In the light of this national effort, St Andrews Little Free Pantry is a small offering of love and care for and by the community in Melton, Suffolk. It may be just what someone needs, though, to help them through this time. Small, local things can make such a difference. Anyone can come along and take what they need, no questions. So, although I’ve been writing about the free school meals situation, I do want to emphasise that the pantry is available for all, whatever your reasons for visiting. You can just come along, and take what you need.

It’s stocked by donations, and anyone can bring food or toiletries along. Just leave them in the lobby of the church rooms, or by the rectory door.

It’s a little tucked away, so I took some photos so you can see where to go beforehand, that might help.

St Andrew’s Church, Melton, Suffolk.

To the right of the church is this little lane. Follow the sign to the Rectory, which has a paper sign directing you to the pantry.

When you get to the Rectory drive, turn sharp left – it’s fine to cut across the end of the drive – and you’ll see a little path leading down the side of the church rooms.

The door is to your left, and the pantry shelves are just inside.

You will see it’s open every day this half term week, 9-5. Normal social distancing applies. Just come along, and take what you need, leave what you can.

You can read more about the Little Free Pantry here.

Other local organisations which will help:

Woodbridge Salvation Army

The Teapot Project

Plant Hope #PlantHope

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Over the summer, I had some dreams of what I might do come the autumn. I wasn’t too foolhardy in my dreaming, I knew that the pandemic was likely to bite back by winter, but I wasn’t anticipating it being quite so soon, or feel so much like tipping into darkness and confusion.

One of my dreams was to “do something” by way of creative protest in support of the environment, something small and local that would perhaps offer hope, and a touch of beauty. I had dreamed of a creative, peaceful presence in my town’s shopping street, giving out bookmarks and daffodil bulbs, encouraging people to #PlantHope. Somehow, I never quite got to the place where I felt brave enough to do it on my own, and I miss the collective gatherings where we can encourage and support each other to do things together. I miss church community, I miss other communities too of friends and likeminded people.

But I am thinking, it’s not too late to start something. And, as local people, and people far away, join me on this blog, I thought I’d share the idea with you, and see what happens. Release it, or plant it, and see what grows.

As the seasons are turning, I’m suprised to find how urgently I’m seeking to prepare for winter, and plant for spring. As news from the pandemic, the economy, the natural world feels grim, I am looking to the natural world to help me through this coming time, as it helped in the spring with the Lockdown Poems. And so the idea of #PlantHope began to grow in my mind. Maybe some would like to pick up the idea of giving out bulbs, observing social distancing. Maybe we can also all do some hopeplanting, or planthoping, in our gardens or windowsills, seeking to nurture and care for something green and growing over the winter, and into the spring.

A reminder not to give up. A reminder that nature is resillent, relentless in its capactity to grow and flourish in even the most difficult situations. It only needs a little light, a little water, and some hope.

Shall we give this a go? Shall we plant hope?

I made my bookmark with a stamp by the lovely Noolibird.

The plastic free bulbs are from Farmer Gracy

And the table is from Hannah Dowding Furniture

Part of my intent to Plant Hope is to try to support independent traders and businesses doing their best to be sustainable, where that’s possible.