Musings

You are currently browsing the archive for the Musings category.

Life after life after death

February 21, 2009 in Musings | 1 comment

As so often happens on a long country walk, we began to talk theology. What, my son mused, would heaven be like? A number of options were presented. Perhaps it would mean sitting on a fluffy cloud, playing a harp? My dad thought that sounded unrelentingly dull. Or maybe heaven would come to earth when justice and peace are restored to all. Not likely to happen this side of the parousia, said my punning sister!

Tom Wright’s book on heaven, Surprised by Hope, makes fascinating reading. Those who long for their very own cloud will be disappointed. Working for global justice and world peace will not bring about salvation, but is ‘anticipating in the present’ what we hope for in the future. At the end of time, all our work today will be transformed, with all time, space and matter. And +Tom is sure that our salvation will be bodily – we will rise with Jesus in a physical sense. Wow. It’s hard not be be facetious, and hope that God will redeem my eyesight and big bum.

This then is our impetuous to continue to look, work, pray and act to bring the kingdom on earth. We do it knowing that God has begun to bring in the new heaven and new earth (because Jesus’ resurrection is the first fruit of the new creation), and in anticipation of time when that kingdom will be fully revealed. It’s all very encouraging to a workaholic like me, who really does hope that my labour is not in vain.

Best of all, my favourite passage in the book suggests that, not just our skills and talents but our likes, loves and interests will be enhanced, ennobled, in fact rescued in an ultimate act of salvation, to be used to God’s glory. YES! I will be able to sing, drive fast and read scary books in the new creation – Adrian will be able to fly, garden and wear cruddy shoes (well, maybe not that) – and my dad won’t have to learn to play the harp. Hallelujah! A heaven like that is worth waiting for, and maybe even believing in.

Tags: , ,

What is literate?

January 27, 2009 in Musings | No comments

I overheard a wonderful exchange at work today, in the education department:

“What are you doing?’

“Reading a book”

“Why?’

“Because I’m not illiterate, like you!”

“Ugh.  I don’t understand…”

What more can I say?  Except perhaps that the book was Shakespeare, and the woman reading was looking for his swear words.  Never doubt that my work is seriously surreal :-)

Tags: ,

Say that again

January 26, 2009 in Musings | No comments

Isn’t communication an interesting thing.  Today our 6 year old had a friend come to play – this classmate is deaf, and the two children communicated well, with improvised sign language, nods, pushes and shoves, a certain amount of lip reading etc.  I remember communicating in the same way with my German cousin at the same kind of age.  Words become more important as I get older, and I pride myself on crafting them well.  So it’s curious to be thrown back onto improvisation and enunciation.

Funny how words like ice-cream can be communicated to children of any age or ability, whereas ’sit down and eat your tea’ takes a little longer.  For me, words like ‘would you like a glass of….’ and ‘have some chocolate’ have a similar effect.  Maybe Jesus was right, and listening is mostly about hearing.

I’ve just joined Facebook, which was sold to me as a way of communicating, which it is, but only after a fashion.  Conversations over the last two days have centred around marmalade and the making thereof, the problem of parents and associated teenage frustrations, and the ability of those who have not been together for as long as Adrian and I have to snuggle down together for the evening, without interruption from children.

Hardly high level communication.  However, so far FB has either been communication with people who live at the other end of the country, so I almost never see let alone talk to them (some form of communication is better than none) or with teenagers, who communicate best without needing to look me in the eye.

Communication on a higher level is probably overrated.  Perhaps the minutiae of life is all we really need to make community and communication happen.  A friend recently asked, “who is my FB neighbour?’  Perhaps in cyberspace, it’s whoever has time to listen.

Oh, and do feel free to sign me up as a friend!

Tags: ,

Joyfully Yours…

December 20, 2008 in General Synod, Musings | 1 comment

… or, life’s too short to stuff a turkey!  I’ve put a blank poster on the wall entitled “This is what makes me joyful at Christmas!”  It is my attempt to fight back against the seasonal pressure that I feel is upon me to cook the ‘right’ dinner, buy the ‘right’ presents, create the ‘right’ atmosphere, so that we have a ‘perfect’ Christmas.  I’ve invited everyone who comes to the house to add something, to join our own contributions.

So far, Christmas is made joyful by

  • Christmas lunch at school with Miles (they put the sprouts on to boil last week, I believe)
  • smoked salmon
  • opening presents in front of the fire
  • lie-ins (guess which teenager wrote that!)
  • getting up early on a frosty morning to walk the dog
  • decorating the tree
  • 9 Lessons and Carols
  • and Miles coming home (despite the school report that they give us at 5pm on Christmas day!)

Food is obviously very important, because of the number of contributions in that area, but the hopes are as much to do with the joy of eating simple things as to do with recipes for perfection – mince pies and brandy butter, chocolate, fishcakes (wierd – don’t know who put that on :-) and champagne.

Lots of people like the atmosphere – opening presents around the fire, wishing it would snow and then it snowing, Midnight Mass and candlelight.  Or relationships - seeing friends, opening presents in front of the fire, grandchildren, ‘the love in the air’.  And one thought that made my day (yes, I’m a sucker for such things!) – mum’s smile.

I love Christmas.  And I love that my family don’t mind (very much) about perfect presents, perfect menus and an unrealistic perfect atmosphere.  So I’m off to decorate the tree.

Very joyfully yours… Dx

Tags:

No-one understands…

November 12, 2008 in Musings | No comments

There is an unhealthy arrogance to the statement ‘no-one understands what I’m going through’!  Rarely can it truly be said.  And yet, there are occasions when it is true.  And perhaps it is true of a Chorister.  Miles began boarding when he was 7, and at 12 is now in his final year.  His day starts at 7am with music practice, because he can’t fit it in later.  He (and up to 20 other boys, some as young as 6) go to song school in the Cathedral from 8-9am.  Then they start school.

Usually they have the same commitments to extra curricular activities as other kids in the lunch hour, and the same homework.  Except on Friday when they have to go to song school in the lunch hour.  They finish school at 4pm and go straight over to the Cathedral for song school and Evensong, 3 days a week.  Many have extra commitments after school on the two week days they have off, including music theory and confirmation classes.  Tea is at 6.30 followed by prep, music practice for second instruments, and showers.

Are you feeling tired yet?  I haven’t even begun to describe the weekends – song school, at least 4 services, and the deep need for some fun, and some recuperation.  So why does no-one understand?  Because no-one lives in their shoes.  Who follows them from the boarding house to the Cathedral?  Who follows them from the Cathedral straight into school?  Every community they are part of, school, boarding house and Cathedral, cares deeply for their welfare, and does a great job protecting their time from unfair demands.  But no-one actually follows them from one place to another, putting energy and commitment into learning new music, leading worship, doing school work, and growing up.

No-one understands, because I don’t think many grown ups could stand the pace.  It is simply too demanding. No wonder the Choristers stick together and have such loyalty to one another.  They do something amazing, and probably will never do anything like it again.  Teachers, Cathedral clergy and musicians, house-carers in the boarding house, even parents, don’t understand.  But we do stand in awe and admiration for what the Choristers do.

Choristers - Christmas Day 2007

Choristers - Christmas Day 2007

Tags:

Rest and be Thankful

October 26, 2008 in Musings | 1 comment

The vocational journey of Dana Delap has been a saga of epic proportions, spanning decades (really, honestly!).  Now the end inches into sight, at least in epic terms, and I’m struck by the number of clergy who are keen to put me off.  I spoke to one of the collared ones this week – I had left an answer phone message for her on Monday.  She was getting back to me on Friday.  This was, she said, the first time she had had a moment to ring in a frantic week.  Did I really want to take on this job?

My first answer to that is ‘no’.  All of us have the occasional work crisis, when there is no choice but to pull a late, if not all, night shift.  But the implication from many clergy is that this is something they live every week.  Is that commendable?  I would say that it is a very poor example to those around them, who have to manage their time better or collapse.  Sadly many clergy do!

My other immediate thought – if Adrian were asked by a would-be fundraiser whether fund-raising is a good job, Adrian would beam, jump up and down, and cry, ‘Yes!’.  He loves what he does and loves others to discover what a fantastic job it can be.  I know because I’ve seen him in full ‘jumping up and down’ enthusiasm.  Ask a priest, and they will ask if you really, really want to be ordained, because you’d be mad to want to… Obviously, not all clergy, but enough to make me very sad.

Call me naive and unrealistic, but I have always found serving God and God’s people to be the best job in the world.  And taking enough time off to remember that is obviously something only lay chaplains are allowed to do!

By the way, we spent the second night of our honeymoon near the ‘Rest and be Thankful’ pass in a cold, isolated and miserable inn.  We moved the next night to something much more luxurious.  Remember to choose carefully where you rest and are thankful!

Tags: ,

Maths for Dunces

October 10, 2008 in Musings | 1 comment

I’ve always been hopeless at maths.  I don’t know why – I think it is because my brain is wired that way.  Maths just doesn’t make sense to me.  When I passed my O level (yes, I really did), my teacher came to find me and tell me what a surprise this was to her (me too) and how it was not my hard work but a fluke.  Rude but accurate I’m afraid.

However, even the most incompetent sometimes have to rise to the challenge, and mine came in September, when I ran an event in Durham Cathedral.  What with speakers coming from the south coast, advertising, caterers and sound systems, there was quite a bit of money to find.  And the punters were charged a pittance for attending.  The organising agency is a charity which runs on a near zero account, so almost no float, and no cushion of its own if it all went horribly wrong.

Of course it didn’t go wrong – quite the reverse; it was very good.  However, even at £15 clergy and others complained about the charge.  I know my maths is bad, but even I can see that if there are out-goings, there need to be in-comings.  Three walked out (after coffee and biscuits) saying that this should be put on for free.  Bizarre!

You will be glad to know that we have covered our costs.  Even I can manage that much maths.  But there are obviously some whose maths is worse that mine, and haven’t figured out that if you put nothing in, nothing comes out.

Tags: ,

Healing, Chickens and New Wine

September 21, 2008 in Musings | No comments

My youngest son offered to pray for my oldest son in the swimming pool today - he prayed that he would no longer be a chicken but would become a boy!  Yup.  Very, very surreal.  However, he has grasped the nature of healing as something that God has fun with, that it can be blessed and therefore encouraged by us, and that it effects change.

There were some fantastic healings at New Wine this year (ask my daughter about it!).  I have no idea why some people are healed and and others are not, even after specific words of knowledge.  But I do know that God is active and works miracles in people’s lives.  Healing doesn’t seem to be related to faith, prayer of determination – God’s Spirit blows where it will…  We are called to bless what we see.

When I asked a woman detoxing at work if she would like me to pray she got down on her knees before her mouth even began to say yes.  I would love to say that she was healed, but she got up again still desperate for sugar and shaking with withdrawl.  It doesn’t stop either her or me praying though.

Tags: ,

Jack Wills

September 21, 2008 in And some more blogs, Musings | No comments

Those of you without teenage daughters may not have come across Jack Wills.  With superb marketing, it sells casual clothing at non-casual prices to those who want to look cool.  Even the knickers are cool, and cost £16 this season.  I say no more.

After some considerable persuasion, and exemplary exam results, I bought my very own teenager a grey hoodie.  She promptly asked if she could take it on the school outward bound weekend.  A very expensive, very cool, and very casual hoodie in lakeland mud!  But it came home without a mark on it.  Very impressive.  So when she asked if it could come to New Wine, of course I said yes…

All went well until a child staying with us came off his bike, swallowed by the mud monster of Shepton Mallet.  My teenager was first on scene, knelt in the mud and prayed for him.  She then helped him up, and got him to the medical centre, all the time supporting him, while offering prayer and encouragement, wiping away the mud.  Well done BK.  EXCEPT, she was wering the Jack Wills hoodie.

Enter the mother with the dilemma.  ”Good job with hurt child; how could you wear that very, very expensive hoodie; but good job; but how am I every going to clean it; but you did just the right thing; but I’ll never get it dry…”  Five days later it was still dripping, since at New Wine this year nothing dried.  And I had just about come down from the tent roof.

The experience of loosing my cool at New Wine is always salutary, since every tent on site can hear the row.  How some of those other parents of a teenager must have laughed.  Still, bouncing off tent walls is quite a soft experience compared to brick.  And the hoodie looks ok – just appropriately aged.

Tags:

Unbelievably – statistics!

September 12, 2008 in Musings | No comments

What do you do when you get bored?  I day dream, or fiddle with something.  If I’ve got a pen, I doodle.  One of the best meeting I ever went to happened over 3 days in Belfast, and the American animator provided clever magnet plastic shape things, which stuck together in fantastical and absurd patterns.  I concentrate better and work harder if I’ve got something to fiddle with!  Having only just passed my maths O level, I’ve never been drawn to a mathematical doodle, but Adrian does.

While he is listening to the sermon (yes, even mine!) Adrian creates statistics about our church.  Apparently, a few weeks ago, 18% of the congregation in the nave were men, average age 48, and 82% were women, average age 62.  In the sanctuary 41% of the leadership (including choir) were men, averaging 61, and 59% women, average age 69.  Therefore, apparently, the average age of the congregation was 63.  Not sure what all that means, except I was in Junior Church.  I guess I could have radically altered the statistical shape of the church, if I had been there!

Heaven fore-fend that I should suggest that church is ever boring, especially when I have a vested interest in the splendour of Church of England liturgy.  But I am allowing myself to acknowledge that there can be meeting-boredom, even when I am chairing.  So I have a very useful tool in my dairy that I bring out at ‘those’ moments.  It gets me through…

THINK EVIL THOUGHTS!

Tags: ,

« Older entries § Newer entries »