Filling the void.

I've rediscovered something about my situation, and indeed the situation about the Church. It's clear that the Church is not complete without Christ, so surely the inherent disunity of the Church is the frantic search to find its completion. Perhaps the Catholic Church is united right now as I write these words, but this unity is only something that can be clearly seen from the eschatological point of view.

Are we too close to the problem to see its solution? After all, the solution won't come from us; it will come from God. Being an INTJ, I am designed to seek solutions to problems. Yet the real problem, the ultimate problem is that I am separated from Christ, just like any other Christian.

"For we being many are one bread, and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread."

We pray these words at Mass, so if we believe that what we receive is indeed the Body of Christ, then surely we have some degree of unity whether the altar rails of the Holy See are closed or not. The obstacle of course is the contentious issue of the validity of Anglican Orders to the Holy See, which I have discovered is no longer as clear cut as Leo XIII wanted to make it in Apostolae Curae. If the Continuum can unite sufficiently and say categorically "we believe in the Real Presence of Christ" then there is some chance that the validity issue can be re-examined.

I can't see that happening until the Continuum demonstrates that it has a presence which can be regarded as significant to the Holy See. In Britain, the Continuum is seen as a tiny fragment of "crack-pots and intransigents playing at being church on their own" despite the fact that her priests really are priests &c and that they have a message of great validity and hope.

In a few years the Apostolicity of the Church of England will be actually lost, rather than just spiritually lost when the first female puts on a mitre. What preparations is the Continuum making for this happening? What will they do to attract those who will first try to seek solace in the Holy See? What will they do to entice the disaffected from just becoming "stay at home" Christians? What will they say to those who object but nevertheless will stay within the Church of England and just spiritually moulder away?

With schism will come the void and the Church groans because it is separate from her Master. Will we try to fill the void with intellectualisms and distractions, or will we seek to cross the void on the Pontificate of Christ? Just how do we cut the cackle, roll up our sleeves and get our hands dirty to beckon those for whom the pain of just living is overwhelming? What is our unity worth if the debate it generates prevents us from tackling the disorders of society? Sure, get one's house in order first, but aren't the churches starting to say the same thing to society?

We must pray St John xvii with Our Lord beside us. We have to live out John xvii. Being in the world we are divided, yet being in Christ we are united. How can we make this utterly real and apparent in this wintry world in which the flames of passion are being doused by a false reason?

Only through faith, hope and love.

It's a start, if nothing else.

Reading through the Catechism of the Catholic Church I found paragraph 818.

"However, one cannot charge with the sin of the separation those who at present are born into these communities [that resulted from such separation] and in them are brought up in the faith of Christ, and the Catholic Church accepts them with respect and affection as brothers. . . . All who have been justified by faith in Baptism are incorporated into Christ; they therefore have a right to be called Christians, and with good reason are accepted as brothers in the Lord by the children of the Catholic Church."

I find this somewhat comforting because it does some justice to my view of my separation from the Holy See as being an accident of history. Of course it still denies me the epithet of Catholic in the eyes of Rome; it still denies me access to receiving the Sacrament with those in Communion with the Pope; it still requires me to have my confirmation repeated whether or not it regards it as sub conditione, but there is a start, a point of recognition.

I look at the Benedictine Order both those of the Anglican and Roman Catholic branches and I see the statement of the Catechism lived out. It is in places like Elmore and Prinknash that the schism, although present is thin. I for one pray for more to embrace the monastic orders because through their prayers and through their working of the Opus Dei, they are making some petition towards Unity. These Religious folk like Dom Kenneth Newing and Abbot Christopher Jamison are making a difference.

Please pray with me for more men and women to hear the call of God and take up the cross of Religious Orders.

Another Seriously Confused Anglo-Papalist.

Perhaps it's inevitable that Anglo-Papalists should be confused. Fr. Vervoorst, before he went to Rome was the definitively Seriously Confused Anglo-Papalist.

I've been considering my position in the C of E for a long time, and my intention was to make my final decision as to whether to stay or go when the first woman "bishop" was brought into a very dubious idea of being. My thoughts there were that I would be joining a host of others who would be leaving at the same time. So have I changed my mind?

Well, it's difficult to say because my own position is more murky than ever. In the space of a year or so I have become a part of the Continuum, yet without being part of the Continuum, i.e. remaining as a Reader in a Church of England Parish yet not really regarding myself as a full member of the Church of England. Now quite reasonably my friends in the Continuum are desirous that I shake the dust off of my feet at the Church of England. But I don't just have friends in the Continuum, I also have some very good friends in the Church of England.

So do I move to the Continuum just to appease one bunch of friends, or do I remain where I am to appease the others?

Well, clearly neither. I don't stay or go just to satisfy the concerns of friends but I stay or move according to the will of God and I stay or move to the places where the Truth is being taught and they know and appreciate that fact because they love me unconditionally, a fact that I cherish dearly. Personally I'm amazed at how long I've managed to stick out my present parish.

But you see I'm an Anglo-Papalist.

I'm not a Romanizer, though I do love the Tridentine way of doing things, but the Anglican Tradition, as it has always stood, is rich and deeply spiritual. For me Anglo-Papalism is a refusal to take the idea of the schism of the Church lying down. Yes, there is a schism between Canterbury and Rome, and the Catholicism of the Anglican Church is not complete without communion with the Holy See.

So I watch as the Anglican Church schisms again. The effects of this schism has seen the appearance of the Continuing Anglican Parishes which seek to continue the Anglican Tradition. However many of these are not in Communion with each other which seems to suggest the presence of some schismatic influence which may or may not be a feature of the history of these Parishes. Personally, I feel that if there are schismatic issues here in the Continuum, then they result from the way that the Anglican Communion has moved away from the Anglican Continuum.

As an Anglo-Papalist, schism worries me.

My main worry about the Continuum is a fear that I have that the reasons for the separation are an intellectualisation which covers the and underlying "do it my way or I sha'n't play" attitude. That's quite a horrid thing to say on my part, and I'm sure that it is not the case since there is much integrity within these parishes. However, by and large there is a marked convergence between what the larger of these Jurisdictions teach and believe. The fact that there seems to be little desire for the Continuing Jurisdictions to talk and seek ways of unification, or at least conversation, does seem to lend weight to the argument that my fear could be true.

For me, the attraction of the Continuum is a stability of doctrine. That doesn't mean an atrophy of doctrine, but rather I see in each of my Continuum friends a desire to seek the truth within the confines of a system of dogmas, something that I hold very dear. Unlike mathematics which is based on axioms, our faith is based on dogmas. Mathematics builds on axioms whose truth cannot be disputed and results in theorems. Our faith is built on dogmas whose truth can be disputed and the act of dispute has a hand in unpacking those dogmas and revealing deeper, more intricate and beautiful truths. Thus heresy has a vital role to play in Christianity provided that the heresy is a means of sharpening our picture of the Truth. I wrote recently about the ACC and its guarantees that her priests are priests and that her Sacraments valid. That is something that cannot be said about the C of E.

What I do appreciate about the Church of England has been its historical struggle to hold together opposing viewpoints in some coherent way. Where it has failed has been in revising the Prayerbook in such a way as to diversify Common Prayer to the extent that the different wings of the Church started to pray differently from the others and subsequently lost touch. I blame the issues of condoning abortion, the "priesthood" of women and all the other divergences in doctrine on this revision. But still, in this, the province of my upbringing, there are signs of Christian love and charity, there are still validly ordained clergy who do uphold the Christian Faith, and there are still folk who inspire in me a deep admiration and reverence. In my conscience, the light of the Catholic Faith still burns in the C of E.

I am an Anglo-Papalist.

This means that I have no option but to try to hold the Holy See, the Continuum and the Church of England together in my heart and offer them all my love and support. What do I foresee? The only thing that I can foresee is that I end up ripped to shreds. I think I would rather that happen than for me to accept a quick-fix solution and denying the possibility that there is Truth outside that solution. I will be accused of trying to serve two masters. I don't see how since my only master is Christ. I'm trying to be Catholic, and since Catholic means "according to the whole" I am trying to be just that. I don't see why I should have to choose between Catholic Christians. One day I may take my rear from the fence: it will not be without thought, regret and tears.

Making the Most of Mass

Is there such thing as a perfect Mass? What would it look like? Would it be a Pontifical High Mass with Bishop, Deacon and Subdeacon and a swathe of incense obscuring the altar while the eternal dialogue follows the Tridentine Rite, or the Liturgy of St James? Well, not necessarily. There is no ostensible difference between a Mass that’s acted out on television as part of a play and one that’s done for real. The difference is necessarily that of intention.

Is there such thing as an imperfect Mass? Again, what would constitute such a thing? Clearly the sinfulness of the priest and the congregation don’t play a part, and as long as the priest is validly ordained, the Sacrament is present and thus perfection is literally within our grasp as the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. If there is imperfection at Mass, then surely it’s the imperfection that comes from within us that mars the sacrament. It’s how we receive it that determines what its effect is for us. We are capable of refusing grace! Christ our God to Earth descendeth, will we recognise Him if we don't seek to find Him? Or in the Eastern Orthodox vein, at Mass we are lifted to God, but how will we know if we don't seek to be transported?

So why is it then that we get so uppity about how the Mass is done, which liturgy is used, which songs are sung, if at the end of it all the effect is the same and we are fed with the Body and Blood of Christ? Are we too bound by distractions from the norm? Yet if Mass is deliberately constructed to be precisely the same week after week, what difference would there be from reciting a magic spell, or pressing a button on a vending machine – a Host-O-Matic? Say the right words and ping! out pops God. Now surely that is a blasphemy worthy of Jack Chick! But how much do we treat our Masses like that?

It’s clear then that Mass is done with people as they are at the present time. Thus by embracing the fact that we are not the same people as those who attended Mass last time do we avoid the falseness of the vending machine Mass. Thus a necessary requirement is that we attend Divine Worship in the light of the Truth about who we really are. This truth is borne out in our acceptance of our sinfulness and physical frailty, and yet that, in possessing the image of God Himself, we are permitted to receive into ourselves what is truly the Body and Blood of our God.

Yet in recognising this truth, we come to Mass with another view – to give of our best in worship. The whole point of worship is that we focus on how much worth we put on our relationship with God. The word “worship” does have its roots in the idea of worth-ship. We therefore come to Mass with a view to considering how much value we place on God being present in our lives. I’ve worshipped in a parish in the Church of England where the Ciborium holding the Reserve Sacrament has been carried about like a mug of cocoa – what does that say about the worth of Christ in that parish? Of course, some parishes (probably most, theoretically all) in the C of E don’t hold to Transubstantiation, so one wonders about the level of consistency of belief and the resulting quality of worship. Lex orandi, lex credendi!

I’m struck mainly about the lack of thought that goes into Mass. With a lack of thought comes a deficiency in intention, and thus for many the effects of the Sacrament are compromised. Too many parishes seem to be engaged in an attempt to lure people into church with the right “ethos”, with the right music, or liturgy that explains everything, or a brilliant preacher. In so doing they have changed the object of worth into a bottom on a pew. The only way that the Church will grow is if people engage in a relationship with Christ that demonstrates the reverence and love we have for Him.

The Mass is the centre of our worship. It is where we encounter God physically. If we allow ourselves to be distracted from this central fact, if we allow dumbing-down of our admittedly and necessarily limited understanding of the Sacrament by the winds of false teaching, or by the insipid babble of prattled pious platitudes, if we do nothing to make some kind of preparation to come before God, then what’s the point of Mass, what’s the point of grace and what’s the point of faith?

Making a Sincere Apology

Services at Swanscombe were rather sparsely populated this Paschal-tide, leading me to question the commitment that people have to the faith. With this in mind, I wrote the following article for the Church magazine.

Did I come on too strong?

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Making a Sincere Apology

Reading the Ecumenical Research Committee’s report on how people from all denominations (and none) view their local Church, there is an interesting statement from someone in the Midlands: “It is a myth to say that the people of this country have rejected Christianity, they simply haven’t been told enough about it to either accept it or reject it.”

If this is the case then it is a sad indictment about the missions of Christians in this country. If you think that it is just the job of the Rector to call people into church, then, quite frankly, it is that attitude as to why there are fewer people in church today and why the understanding of the Christian Faith is so poor. It is not the job of the priest to go around preaching the good news about Christ Jesus – it is the job of each and every Christian to go out and help the world see the truth of the Light of Jesus Christ. We have to become apologists – people who can say what they believe and why, and live that Faith responsibly and truly.

It is the job of the priest to serve those who are “called out of darkness into [God’s] marvellous light”. The Greek word for “called out” is “ekklesia” from which we get the word ecclesiastical. We are the ones who are served by the deacons, priests, bishops, and ultimately the Pope (who is titled “the servant of the servants of God”), and their service is so that we, the ones who are to go out, are well equipped to work at the coal-face of life bringing our Christian Faith with us. While it is good that our ministers go into schools and hospitals, these are not the only opportunities for getting people into church. In fact, the best way of getting people into church is for us to invite them!

What is not being suggested here is that we all go out and become soap-box preachers shouting “Repent for the End of the World is Nigh”. That approach in fact drives more people away. The best way for us to bear witness to our Christian faith is to live it, and live it well. This means a lot of discipline on our part and requires us to develop a growing and healthy relationship with Christ.

The Benedictine Rule has three aspects to it – commitment, obedience and self-examination, and it is these three aspects that can help us develop as good and fruitful Christians. It isn’t just for Benedictines!

First we need to make a firm commitment to the Church, both financially (since the Church is a non-profit organisation) and corporately. We do need to attend Church regularly. We cannot be armchair Christians. We cannot be those selfish folk who say “I’m spiritual but not religious”. If we’re expecting the priest to serve us on a Sunday Morning and are prepared to do nothing with the benefits from that service, then what is to stop God at the Day of Judgment saying “in truth, I never knew you”? Our relationship with Christ can only develop if we’re willing to help it develop. We’re not “once saved, always saved”, i.e., believing in God at one point in our lives and living terribly for the rest of it. We may be in the process of salvation by Faith, but that means co-operating with God. The Church needs members who are willing to help it in its mission to bring the light of Christ to a darkened world. This can only happen if its members are committed to the Church and engaged in praying to God with that Church.

This leads into obedience. We serve one God, and if we are to serve Him then we must hear His word through prayer and reading. The Holy Scripture is indeed the word of God, and it needs to be read frequently by every Christian – no exceptions. It needs to be read prayerfully and under the authority of the Church. Too many people (some important clergymen) have read their own interpretations into the Bible and have fallen into disobedience. In so doing, they have clouded the minds of their parishioners. It is important therefore to become obedient to the teachings of the Church. It is not a democracy, but governed by people who have been entrusted to work faithfully with the Sacred Tradition and who are themselves obedient to the Church. This puts a great deal of responsibility on our priests, that they should carefully and sincerely follow the Traditions of the Church so that they teach only what the Church has always taught.

Third, we need to examine ourselves carefully to make sure that we are doing everything in our power to serve God in the examples of Christ Jesus and our Holy Mother Mary. We need to work at finding out how we are sinning, ridding our lives of that sin, confessing it and receiving absolution. We need to examine our commitments to the Church and we need to examine how obedient we are.

A lot of work! Indeed, a lifetime’s work! But this is work that we do out of nothing but love for Christ. In doing His work we find out who He is and we find out more and more just how deeply we are loved by him. This is a job that we should find utterly fulfilling, though it will be tough. It is by living out our Faith that we will draw people to Christ. When people see the kindness that we show to each other, the love that we have for one another, the sincerity of our belief and the joy that we have from serving God, then they’ll want it too. But before we can go out and make a difference to people’s lives, we need to look and see what God needs to do with us.

Think about your faith and what it needs to grow and work for you. How might you go about deepening your understanding of the Christian Faith? How might you find out about what God is asking you to do for Him? How might you make yourself different from a person who comes to Church on Sunday but doesn’t really believe in everything that’s being said?

Lo, the full final sacrifice

Due to computer troubles, I've not been able to post any reflections on the Great Triduum of the Christian year. However, I did have the privilege of singing Finzi's setting of Lo, the Full Final Sacrifice. The words I found terribly rousing before I realised (happily) that they are a translation of words of St Thomas Aquinas by Richard Crashaw. No wonder I was encouraged.

Lo, the full, final, Sacrifice
On which all figures fix’t their eyes.
The ransomed Isaac, and his ram;
The Manna, and the Paschal Lamb.

Jesu Master, just and true!
Our Food, and faithful Shepherd too!
O let that love which thus makes thee
Mix with our low Mortality,
Lift our lean Souls, and set us up
Convictors of thine own full cup,
Coheirs of Saints.

That so all may
Drink the same wine;
and the same way.
Nor change the Pasture, but the Place
To feed of Thee in thine own Face.

O dear Memorial of that Death
Which lives still, and allows us breath!
Rich, Royal food! Bountiful Bread!
Whose use denies us to the dead!
Live ever Bread of loves, and be
My life, my soul, my surer self to me.

Help Lord, my Faith, my Hope increase;
And fill my portion in thy peace.
Give love for life; nor let my days
Grow, but in new powers to thy name and praise.

Rise, Royal Sion! rise and sing
Thy soul’s kind shepherd, thy heart’s King.
Stretch all thy powers; call if you can
Harps of heaven to hands of man.
This sovereign subject sits above
The best ambition of thy love.

Lo the Bread of Life, this day’s
Triumphant Text provokes thy praise.
The living and life-giving bread,
To the great twelve distributed
When Life, himself, at point to die
Of love, was his own Legacy.

O soft self-wounding Pelican!
Whose breast weeps Balm for wounded man.
All this way bend thy benign flood
To’a bleeding Heart that gasps for blood.
That blood, whose least drops sovereign be
To wash my worlds of sins from me.

Come love! Come Lord! and that long day
For which I languish, come away.
When this dry soul those eyes shall see,
And drink the unseal’d source of thee.
When Glory’s sun faith’s shades shall chase,
And for thy veil give me thy Face.
Amen.

Carnis resurrectiónem, vitam ætérnam

Sermon preached at St Peter and St Paul’s Church Swanscombe based on Ezechiel xxxvii.1-10, I John v.4-12, John xx.19-23

Gus struggles to his foot
as the rest of the congregation begins
to recite the Apostles’ Creed.

He lost his foot at Dunkirk
and the rest of that leg is still suffering
the effects of shrapnel.

These 60 years of wandering around
on crutches have given him
terrible arthritis in one hip and knee
as well as various aches and pains
in his shoulders.

It pains him to stand.
It pains him to sit.
It pains him to lie down.

So how do you think he feels
when he reaches in the Creed
the words
“the Resurrection of the Body
and the Life Everlasting”?


The Church says that on the Last Day
we will all be raised,
like the Lord Jesus,
from the dead not as disembodied souls,
but as human beings with physical bodies
able to see, hear, smell,
feel and taste.


Do you think Gus wants to believe that?

Do you think he would want
to spend the Life Everlasting
with the body that he has now?


[PAUSE]

The next day,
Monday,
Gus visits the doctor.

“Gus, we’ve got a new painkiller here.

It’s called Disagonyzin
and it should ease that pain you’re suffering.

Take one three times a day.”

Gus readily receives
the prescription
and makes his way to the Chemist.


It’s really effective.

Gus has the best night’s sleep he’s had in ages.

He’s out of bed easily,
and it’s a good thing.

He’s wanted to be ready
to see his new granddaughter,
Erica, for the first time.

Erica is just five days old
and apparently is a real cutie,
with beautiful pink skin and lots of hair.

He washes and shaves with ease.

He’s especially pleased
because the Disagonyzin
has taken the edge off of shaving.

It isn’t half as uncomfortable
as it was before.


He’s smartens himself up
and gets ready for the bus ride to the hospital.

On the bus,
Mrs Mills’ shopping trolley
runs over Gus’s foot.

It hurts,
but it isn’t the agony that Gus
would have expected.

“This pain-killer is really wonderful,”
thinks Gus,
“even Mrs Mills’ bumper packets of Daz
don’t hurt me that much!”

At the bus stop,
he’s off and away like a three-legged whippet.

He wouldn’t normally be able
to do that without severe pain,
and Gus is glad because
he is really excited about seeing
his little Erica.

Soon he is beside Julie’s bed
gazing at Erica lying across
her mum’s chest.

“Why don’t you hold her, Dad?” asks Julie.

Gus gently picks up the little one
from her mother and cradles her.

“She’s lovely,” he says beaming.

“Isn’t she?” says Julie,
“she’s got the softest skin,
and her hair is so thick and silky,
don’t you think?”

Gus strokes Erica’s hair and cheek, and frowns.

“I don’t know how soft her skin is.
I don’t know how silky her hair is.
I can’t feel them.”

[PAUSE]

Do you believe in the Resurrection of the Body
and the Life Everlasting?

After all, if there is no body,
then there is certainly no pain.

There are no nerves to feel
the aches of the human condition:
arthritis,
rheumatism,
stubbed toes,
indigestion
and the more severe pains
are all meaningless
either in a body that is numbed to pain,
or for a soul without a body.

But, as Gus realises,
the soul without a body
is also numbed to
the more wonderful sensations of life,
the warmth of the sun,
the nursing of a baby,
the taste of home-made chocolate cake.


If there is no Resurrection of the Body,
then our destiny is to become disembodied souls,
clinging onto vague memories
of what it was like
to be given a peck on the cheek
or to drink a cup of tea.

Is that Heaven?


What is the point of God giving us bodies
if we are only destined to lose them,
and all the joys that go with them?

[PAUSE]

Human beings are unique among God’s creation.

Animals are just bodies without souls;
angels are just souls without bodies;
human beings have both.

We are a unique fusion of body and soul.

This is how we are meant to be.

We’re not supposed to be split into two things
– a body and a soul –
but rather we are incomplete
if we are one without the other.

We are neither animal, nor angel.


Look at Ezechiel standing amongst the dry bones.



Watch as, with a rattling louder than
Patrick Moore’s xylophone
after he’s downed a gallon of Red Bull,
they are put back together
and given flesh,
but they are not human until God
breaths their spirits into them.

See that God raises the dead,
body and soul together.

If we cannot accept this,
then we deny the Resurrection of Christ in the flesh,
and if we deny the Resurrection of Christ
then we cannot be Christian,
and if we are not Christian
then we cannot be saved.

[PAUSE]

“Behold, I make all things new,” says God.

The body we have at the last day
will be able to experience
all the wonderful things we can feel now
but not pain.

St John tells us:
“there shall be no more death,
neither sorrow,
nor crying,
neither shall there be any more pain:
for the former things
are passed away.”

It won’t be that we are numbed to pain,
but rather there will be nothing in Heaven to hurt us.

As Sam Tyler is told in “Life on Mars”,
it is only when we feel nothing
that we know we are truly dead.

If there is no Resurrection of the Body,
then the pain we suffer now
is meaningless.

We simply will not feel the love of God,
we will not live
– there will have been no Resurrection.

Would you honestly choose
an Eternity of numbness
over all those wonderful sensations
God really does have planned for you?

The Church believes in
the Resurrection of the Body.
Do you?

The shape of things to come?

Sometimes the Internet seems such an impersonal thing - indeed one could easily come to the conclusion that the people who email and comment on message boards are figments of the imagination and/or programmed responses given by the computer like a chinese box.

However, today I can refute this technological solipsism in the shape of Albion Land and the various members of the Anglican Catholic Church with whom I received communion with their gracious permission today. Albion, as you may know runs The Continuum blog and is striving to hear God's vocation for him realised as a priest in the ACC. Certainly my prayers go with him.

Today has been very special as I have witnessed my first ordination, and received the Sacrament with people who actually agree with me (more or less) with what is happening in the Eucharist. I also heard Fr Damien Mead's sermon based upon the sermon of a previous bishop (now at peace) written for ordinations. What struck me was that for once I was receiving a guarantee - a guaranteed Sacrament administered by a guaranteed bishop (The Rt Rev'd Rommie Starks) in a church which has orders guaranteed by the Grace of God. The Church of England cannot guarantee that her own priests believe the orthodox faith judging from the recent comments by Dr Jeffrey John.

While I am, like Fr. Vervoorst was, confused about my role in a confused church, I am beginning to see some where that I may be calling home. Pray for me please that I may hear God's will in this matter.

Roman Reflections III: The Biggie

So far I've made two reflections on the Romans. The previous reflection was somewhat illicit in that I seemed to have got hooked up on one word in amid the bustle of Holy Week. I hope that's forgivable.

Howver, I suppose the big issue that results from Romans is the whole idea of Justification and the ructions that it brings out in Protestants. However I don't seem to be able to find this issue at all in the Epistle to the Romans.

What I principally see is St Paul making a very important observation. As human beings we are bean counters: we count every bean that comes in, and every bean that comes out. Following Newton's third law, every action has an equal and opposite reaction. If we do work, then we expect a reward, after all Holy Scripture does say that the worker deserves his wages.

So here then is St Paul's beef against the materialistic bean counters. We cannot go through life with the attitude that God owes us something. We cannot assume that we in any way deserve a reward for what we do for the simple reason that we are comparing the finite and coarse effects of our actions against the infinite and exacting specifics of our Divine Master.

Ours is not a worker-employer relationship with God, we cannot talk about earnings and wages. It is a slave-master relationship in which we realise that somehow we've ended up with a master who actually wishes us a great deal of love and respect. We cannot any longer talk of justification in terms of debt or reward or of rights, but only as a grace of God. If we live measuring everything in terms of credit-debit, loss-gain, earnings-owings, then that is precisely how we will be judged. The relationship with God, and with each other, has to be one of love, respect and acceptance.

This means that our justification does not come without our cooperation otherwise there is no such thing as free will and subsequently no love. We are slaves with the interesting position in that we choose our master. This position comes entirely from the desire of God for us to love Him as He is. Our chief sin is putting ourselves in the master position - self-worship. To whomsoever we give our allegience as master, we will be with that master for Eternity - where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

We do have to cooperate for our justification. Romans viii. 1 says "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." We need to be walking, exercising ourselves into the ways and means of Christ, finding Him out for ourselves, seeing Him in the others around us, fixing our heart on Him and allowing them to be opened. If we want to be saved, then we need to know the Saviour. This requires research and effort. In order to receive the Sacrament we need to find out where it is and walk to it, our hands outstretched, our mouths open in the full hope of the love of God. Are we going to be, as it says in Proverbs, so lazy that we do not put the food into our own mouths?

Roman Reflections II: the Ark of the New Covenant

As we approach the awful and yet wonderful Triduum, we recollect the first Eucharist and the Lord proclaiming the New Covenant in His blood. The next day He bleeds on the Cross, and dies, His lifeblood spent.

Catholic Piety places Our Lady cradling the dead Christ in her arms. No doubt His blood smears upon her as she struggles with His limp, lifeless frame. The Litany of Loreto gives one of Our Lady's epithets as "the Ark of the Covenant" and I think that Paul's epistle to the Romans gives us a glimpse of why.

In the twenty-fifth verse of the third chapter, the Lord is described as being the hilasterion. The word does indeed mean the "propitiation" of our sins, but it also refers to the lid, the mercy seat, of the Ark of the Covenant on which the blood of a sacrifice was dripped after being sacrificed on the altar.

Clearly this word hilasterion points us towards the sacrifice of the Mass, in which the Lord's New Covenant in His blood poured for us upon the Ark of His mother after the sacrifice upon Christ as altar. In this horrible scene of a devastated mother holding the body of her son, which only thirty years early she cradled as a baby, do we see this propitiation effected.

Whether or not you believe Our Lady to be Immaculately Conceived, her example is very clear to us. If we are truly going to be justified in the eyes of God then we must allow ourselves to have His lifeblood poured out upon us which effects our reconciliation. In so doing, our hearts will be broken in order to be a part of His life, just as Our Lady's heart was pierced by the lances of men in the body of Our Lord. She is part of His life, and now she has her position as Queen of Heaven.

Roman Reflections I: eritheia - the greatest sin of them all

I've been trying to understand the Letter to the Romans which hitherto I've always found difficult, so I've made a point to study the Greek a little over Holy Week. So far I've finished the first three chapters which are proving amazingly rich. I'm not surprised why this letter has been the inspiration for many.

So far I see very much the heart of our sinfulness is the word eritheia meaning "electioneering or intriguing for office". It conjures up images of those who constantly put themselves first, and in the process making light of God.

It is in making light of God in which we ruin our chances of repentance. By ignoring His kindnesses, we find ourselves unable to return to Him, but if we don't think much of God, what incentive do we have to amend our sinful lives? The whole basis of our Salvation is in the honesty in which we regard God as our ruler and Father. Refusal to see ourselves as His children seems to be one of the driving forces behind eritheia, that we look always to increase our standing, our independence, we look to define ourselves in the way that we want to be defined.

However, if we truly seek God, then we should first seek Him as our Father. Do we really expect to know who we are if we are still children? We only think we know who we are because we try to take control of this knowledge in our sin. It is when we submit to God, our Creator that we find definition. It is in hoping in God that we are purified.

Does this mean that we are justified by faith alone? No. I don't believe it, and perhaps my further readings of Romans will help me to clarify my statements. From what I'm getting at the moment, we are justified by the grace of God that is channeled by Faith, purifies us by Hope and brings us to Him in Love, the three things that will remain. It seems quite reasonable to me that if we are to gain eternal life, then we must become comprised of these three things which remain. We must devote ourselves to building our Faith and Hope and Love, and this does mean work. We are not justified by Faith alone, I think this much seems clear.

And then there was one fewer...

For those of you who move in Anglo-Papalist circles online, you will surely have come across the Confused Anglo-Papalist which subsequently became the Seriously Confused Anglo-Papalist. Well, the prefix Anglo has disappeared (as well as the serious confusion), a sure sign that Fr. Marco Vervoorst has made the decision to swim the Tiber. Certainly I wish him well, and pray that he may be happy in his new Catholic family.

So how do I react to a rare breed becoming one fewer? Well, I have no condemnation for Fr. Vervoorst at all; he will always be one of ours just as Cardinal Newman was always one of ours. There is sadness yes, but there is no real problem with what he's done.

It does make me think about my own position. I am on my own in my physical community, and I find myself surrounded by larger animals telling me which is the correct doctrine. As an individual I have a choice, but with my choice comes the responsibilities of living up to the consequences of that choice. I no longer belong to a church whose teaching is consistent with the Catholic Faith.

So what will it take for me to finally shake the dust of the C of E from my feet?

First: a home to go to. I do not want to run away from the C of E, I want to run to an established home which will receive me in love and keep me in the Catholic Faith.

Second: that I am assured of a smooth period of transition so that I may in some sense get my affairs in order before I make the break. Considering that I have a family and a considerable number of friends whom I only really see in a church context as a member of a choir and a Bible Study group, this will be where the pain of the transition lies.

Third: if there were a definite split in the C of E along the Catholic fault lines then I would move with that split on the proviso that the resulting denomination is perfectly consonant with the Catholic Faith.

These are the big three that readily spring to mind. There may be others.

God bless Fr. Vervoorst!

Suffer the little children...

Sermon preached at St Peter and St Paul’s Church, Swanscombe on the fourth Sunday in Lent (Mothering Sunday), 18th March 2007 based on I Samuel i.20-28 and St John xix.25-27.

In a little house sits a mother,
her little boy at her breast
content and happy.

To him,
her thoughts are irrelevant.

All he seeks is warmth
and love
and milk,
items his mother supplies
as abundantly as she possibly can.

As he sleeps,
he is comforted
by the steady beat of her heart.

Not for him is it to know that
despite all this tranquillity,
his mother is wracked
with pain and worry.


The child does not know
of the preparation that his mother is making,
for when he has stopped needing
the milk and the cuddles,
when he has teeth and is on solid food,
when he is just about to walk,
his mother,
the one who has prayed fervently
for his birth,
will give him to the priests
and walk away.

[PAUSE]

Before Samuel’s birth,
Hannah,
his mother was declared to be barren.

Peninnah,
her husband’s other wife,
has children.

At that time Hannah didn’t,
and she was mocked for it.

Hannah has prayed
to the God she has always prayed to
and Samuel is the result
- a happy and fine baby boy
with fat legs and thick black hair.

So why on earth did she want him born
if she is only going to give him up
while he is still small?


Has Hannah been selfish?

Has she only prayed for Samuel’s birth
just to save face
in the light of mockery from Peninnah
and social disgrace?

Is Samuel just a trophy baby
so that Hannah can say
“see, I can have children”?

Is Hannah like some women of today
whose only thought is to have children
so that she can claim benefits?

[PAUSE]

Samuel stretches a little
in Hannah’s arms and
as she wipes his little mouth,
her heart is heavy
because she loves him
and she must give him up.
Is there anything more difficult
than for a mother
to give away her child?

[PAUSE]

Having to let go of a child
is an inevitable part of motherhood.

There are many tragedies in life
which see a mother having to say goodbye
to her baby prematurely.

Isn’t “goodbye” something
that all mothers have to say at some point?



Is there a mother
who hasn’t shed a quiet tear because
Her baby has left her because
it’s their first day at school,
the first time they sleep
over at someone else’s house,
go on holiday on their own,
go to university,
get married and leave home.

A mother’s heart is filled with worry.

Will they be alright?

Will they get there safely?

Will they eat well?

Have they packed enough clean underwear?

Motherhood is tough, no two ways about it.

[PAUSE]

When Our Lady, Mary,
presents the infant Jesus, Our Lord
at the temple,
the priest Simeon tells her that
because she is the Mother of God,
a sword will pierce her own soul,
just as the Lord’s body
will be pierced
on Good Friday.

Isn’t this a sensation with which
mothers are all too familiar?

Suffer the little children…
and, boy, do we have to suffer them!

[PAUSE]

In presenting Jesus in the temple,
Lady Mary is fulfilling the requirements
of the Jewish law.

Every first-born male must
be presented to the Lord for His possession.

Thankfully for the parents,
God usually charges them
to look after the child for Him.

It’s also a bit of a relief for the priests too.

Just think – wouldn’t the Rectory
be a little inundated with nappies?

But in giving the child back to the parents,
God is telling them that the child
must be brought up in His ways.

[PAUSE]

Hannah is serious in what she wants to do.

She loves God,
and wants a chance to worship Him fully.

This is why she is determined
to offer up Samuel in worship of God.

She’s not saving face
by praying for a baby to be born
and then foisting him on the priests
just because he’s inconvenient.

She’s asking God for a way to worship God
through the hard sacrifice of being a mother
- a sacrifice made harder
by giving Samuel up when he’s still very little.

Samuel will turn out to be a very fine priest.

What does this say about Hannah’s sacrifice?

[PAUSE]

Being a mother is a priesthood unique to women.

It involves a sacrifice of love
to bring a child into the world,
to nourish it,
to love it,
to teach it,
to give it every opportunity
to become the person that it is going to be.

This can only happen
if the mother decreases
so that the child increases.



As a church we all,
men and women,
have a duty in mothering.

When a child is baptised,
the Church becomes a spiritual mother
and has a duty to make sacrifices
in order for that child to grow up in the faith.

We, the Church, have a duty in our mothering
to decrease so that our little ones can increase
knowing the love of God,
and how He provides for them.



In giving us His son,
God also gives us the example
of the Blessed Virgin Mary,
the Mother of God,
to show us how seriously
we must all take our
mothering duties.

Like any Jewish Mother,
Mary is the one who teaches the Jesus the Faith,
so must we teach our children
the same Faith built
on the same precepts.

Mary is the one who has
to accept the person that her son is,
so must we accept the people
who our children are,
and let them have every opportunity
to serve God.

Mary is the one
whose heart is broken
when she sees her son
bleeding on the cross.

So too must we have our hearts broken
in letting our children go
to do what they must do.

Mary— Mother of God.

The Church— mother of Christians.

Have you made your sacrifice of motherhood yet?

The most obscene VIth form assembly ever

I was asked to give my first talk to the assembled sixth form today. I chose to elaborate on a theme I've already covered in "An Obscene Posting" and from the comments made. A little near the knuckle I thought!

Address given at the VIth form assembly at Eltham College on 15th March 2007

Cricket commentators
Don Mosey and Brian Johnston
are in the commentating box
for the BBC World Service
in a test match between
West Indies and England at the Oval.

Batsman Peter Willey is at the stumps,
bowler Michael Holding is at the crease.

As the On Air sign comes on,
Johnston begins his commentary:
We welcome World Service listeners to the Oval,
where the bowler's Holding,
the batsman's Willey.

[PAUSE]

Yes, there's always some laughter about that,
and I suspect that some of you who didn't laugh
are feeling uncomfortable
that one of your teachers
has just mentioned the word "willy"
in assembly.

But have you ever wondered
why we find words like "bum" or "willy" funny?

Still further,
our lexicon of rude words and phrases
is populated solely with
so-called unmentionable parts of the human body,
functions of the human body,
things that one human body
does to another human body,
and suggestions about
what one human body can do to itself.

Why is that?

We all have to use the bathroom,
be we a sixth former, the Queen,
or even Michael Jackson!

Why is the lavatory funny?

Our parents have all engaged
in a certain activity
which has resulted in us being here,
so why does that produce nervous giggles,
and even more horrible thoughts?

[PAUSE]

Well, using the bathroom is a fact of life
- the end process of a complicated
and indeed remarkable
chemical decomposition of food
and the rejection of that
which is unnecessary or harmful.

It's funny because it's unpleasant,
especially after some school dinners,
but it’s something we all have in common.

Sex is an action
which should take place
between married couples
in order to bring forth human life.

That's what it's for!

Sex is traditionally funny
because the Church gets
rather hot under the dog-collar about it
- in more ways than one.

Among others,
we have to thank St Augustine of Hippo for that.

St Augustine is a notorious womaniser
who famously prayed
"Lord make me chaste,
but not yet."

When the Lord eventually made him chaste,
he turned on sex with such a vengeance
that there is still an attitude (a minority)
in the Church today
which hold Augustine’s view
that sex is sinful
and to be ashamed of.

However, the truth is that
the Church properly believes that sex is far
from disgusting.

Indeed sex is held in such a high regard
that Christians believe that it belongs
to the sanctity
- and privacy -
of the marriage bed.

It is not to be shared with anyone else
other than the person to whom you are married.
The pendulum has swung a long way
from St Augustine,
and many people these days,
old and young alike,
tend to be praying
"Lord make me chaste,
and quite easily caught".

The media have blown sex out of proportion.

No longer is it that something people do,
it's something that everyone has to do
everywhere
at anytime
and in any place
as long as you are under 30.

At least that's what our television programmes,
papers and the cult of celebrity tell us.

If sex is so out in the open,
then why do we use sexually explicit language
to swear or curse at someone?

Why tell someone to F-off if,
in telling him so,
you are wishing him a pleasurable experience
with his lover?
Why tell someone to P-off if,
in telling him so, you are wishing him
that unique sense of relief
that comes from getting rid
of three cans of cola?

Does this really make sense to you?

[PAUSE]

If we use sex as the barrel
from which we draw our insults,
then doesn't this say something about
our respect, or lack of it,
for the way in which our species
regenerates itself.

We're not amoebas who go off
and quietly divide
in order to replenish our population.

We are beings who forge
complex and meaningful relationships
which colour our lives.

Our friends and our families are important to us,
but even more so the person
with whom we fall in love
to the extent that we wish to marry
and populate our lives with children.
How can that be a curse
if we find our love?

How can we look at the newborn baby
in its mother's arms and say to it
"your conception was disgusting"?

How can sex be this obscene?

Surely there are greater obscenities in life
than the toilet or the bedroom?

Isn't beating someone up in a pub an obscenity?

Isn't kicking a dog to death
more disgusting to us than bringing a baby
into the world?

Why isn't the greatest obscenity
of them all "I hate you?"

At least our biological waste products
have the potential
for creating and sustaining
the beauty of creation.

[PAUSE]

The human condition is wonderful.

Our bodies are the product
of complex and delicate
mechanical,
hydraulic,
biological
and chemical engineering.

How will you stop yourself
from treating your own humanity
and the humanity of others with anything
less than the greatest respect?

Aren’t you worth it?

Realigning wobblebottoms

Homily Preached at Eltham College Chapel on 26th and 27th of Febrary 2007

So what have you given up for Lent?

Sweets?
Chocolate?
Rollerblading?
Homework?

"Please Sir, I haven't done my homework
because I've given it up for Lent."

"Hmm, that's interesting Eric, because, for Lent,
I've given up not putting people into detention
for failing to do their homework."

Perhaps you're like many people and find Lent rather passes you by.

You don't give up anything for Lent,
yet you still enjoy the overdone and rather greasy pancakes
that slop onto your plate on Shrove Tuesday.

Others of you may like the discipline
of giving something up,
something which, perhaps, you've been too fond of doing,
such as eating too much,
or playing too much
on the Nintendo DS,
and Lent seems the perfect opportunity
to make a step towards becoming healthier in body and/or mind.

Sometimes giving up something for Lent seems more trouble than its worth.

It would not be advisable to insist that a confirmed carnivore give up meat for Lent.

That could result in less physical health, namely a spell in A&E for anyone who suggests it.

Like New Years' Resolutions,
we give up giving up for Lent after two weeks
when the withdrawal symptoms kick in
- the shakes,
the sweats,
depression,
sleeplessness,
and listlessness during the day.

It seems going without a chocolate hob-nob
is too much for some of us to bear.

So why give anything up in the first place?

Why not carry on life as usual
without all this abstinence?

After all,
we have all these wonderful things around us,
why not use them
and enjoy them all year round?

[PAUSE]

We have only to look at
the environment around us
to see the effects of this attitude.

Our constant demands
for what we want
are damaging this planet,
perhaps irreparably,
all for the sake of satisfying our wants
- not our needs,
our wants.




Our planet,
our society and our own selves
are put at risk
all because we refuse
to give up something that we enjoy
just to restore a balance.

It is a fact of life that,
in order to make a positive impact
on the world around us,
we need to make an effort.

Effort requires sacrifice
- you don't get something for nothing.

To win at rugby,
you cannot have a team of wobblebottoms
lumbering across the field
like a heard of soporific hippopotami.

You need trained athletes
who have given up sitting on their backsides
playing Grand Theft Auto
to bring themselves to a peak condition.

The school captain would not have been picked
for the rugby team if simply walking onto the pitch
made him wheeze like a hyena with laryngitis.


To be a successful academic,
you need a mind that has often gone
without a good night's sleep to solve a problem
or gather information.

To be a great moral leader
like Archbishop Tutu,
or Pope Benedict,
you have to give up
thoughts about yourself
and what you need
in order to see the needs
of those around you.

To be successful at anything,
you cannot be a stranger to sacrifice.

"Giving up" and "sacrifice"
both involve restoring a balance,
whether that be environmental,
social or personal.

They are also seen as dirty words in our culture.

By sacrificing aspects of our way of life now,
we can go some way to restoring
the delicate balances of the environment.



But the act of sacrifice has to be
meaningful for the people we are.

Our drama teachers have made sacrifices
of time and patience,
to ensure that the latest production
went with a bang
- literally.

And one wonders how many cast members sacrificed their
eyebrows,
fingers and toes as a result.

Knowing what to give up for Lent
requires knowledge of what we need to balance.

For the Christian,
Lent is about trying to restore
the balance in our relationship with God.

We examine our lives
and strip away the spiritual fat
that has grown as a result of our selfishness.



It does hurt to sacrifice
- it wouldn't be sacrifice if it didn't hurt -
but the benefits of doing so
are incredibly rewarding.

So what’s stopping you from looking
at the way you live your life,
and thinking about the impact
you are personally having
on the world around?

Is there some imbalance
that needs to be re-dressed?

Are you man enough
(or woman enough)
to make a sacrifice this Lent?

Black Shuck rides again.

Depression seems very rife at the moment. Several of my close friends, and I also, have been feeling low. Whether this is a seasonal thing or a product of the circumstances in which we find ourselves, I'm not sure. I certainly find myself feeling for two friends who are at present suffering gross injustices, and having to live with the results and implications. Their problems put my self-pity in the shade, and yet when the black dog comes -even for no apparent reason - there seems to be little that can be done.

No platitude will bring us out, or free us from the pad, pad, pad of Black Shuck dogging our steps, and yet our darkness is not all self-pity. There are many troubles that are in the world at the moment - troubles that have always been there and will continue to be ,and other troubles that come out of the darkness periodically. Whatever the magnitude of these troubles, they burden us, and not even the thought of what Our Lord went through on our behalf seems to lift our spirits. Indeed, I've found that can make things worse.

I find myself turning to Psalm xxxix, and find that the psalmist too gets overburdened with the cares of this life.

Psalm xxxix. Dixi, Custodiam
I SAID, I will take heed to my ways : that I offend not in my tongue.
2. I will keep my mouth as it were with a bridle : while the ungodly is in my sight.
3. I held my tongue, and spake nothing : I kept silence, yea, even from good words; but it was pain and grief to me.
4. My heart was hot within me, and while I was thus musing the fire kindled : and at the last I spake with my tongue;
5. Lord, let me know mine end, and the number of my days : that I may be certified how long I have to live.
6. Behold, thou hast made my days as it were a span long : and mine age is even as nothing in respect of thee; and verily every man living is altogether vanity.
7. For man walketh in a vain shadow, and disquieteth himself in vain : he heapeth up riches, and cannot tell who shall gather them.
8. And now, Lord, what is my hope : truly my hope is even in thee.
9. Deliver me from all mine offences : and make me not a rebuke unto the foolish.
10. I became dumb, and opened not my mouth : for it was thy doing.
11. Take thy plague away from me : I am even consumed by the means of thy heavy hand.
12. When thou with rebukes dost chasten man for sin, thou makest his beauty to consume away, like as it were a moth fretting a garment : every man therefore is but vanity.
13. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with thine ears consider my calling : hold not thy peace at my tears.
14. For I am a stranger with thee : and a sojourner, as all my fathers were.
15. O spare me a little, that I may recover my strength : before I go hence, and be no more seen.

When depressed, I think that we're often tempted to say, "Snap out of it! Stop moaning or being self-pitying. Don't wallow!" Sometimes we're told to do this by a loved-one who can't quite see the situation. We hold our tongues before God, trying not to express the depths of inexplicable misery that has suddenly come upon us in the midst of our lives and in the midst of the loveliness of God's Creation in the hope that it will pass. But the darkness descends and we sit there stewing like a plum pudding trying to keep it all in.

When at last we can find our voices, we cry out to God to let it end somehow. "How long have I got to put up with this lousy life? I can't do anything right. All that mankind can do is at least empty and at worst destructive. What on Earth is the point of it all, that men should rise up and fall down and disappear?"

Is there any point to life? If we exist to glorify God and enjoy life, then why is one day much like another? Why is there so much to worry about, so much that crushes our spirits?

Once we have vented our spleen, then comes the silence, that unfair silence of God. A silence that is even more crushing that the darkness that has already befallen us. All we want is that glimmer of light to just allow us to get up and walk into oblivion where even we forget who we are.

And why is God silent?

Well, what words would He use to comfort us? There aren't words in the English language - or in any language for that matter - that can rouse someone from depression. That is why there is silence. It is said that Mother Theresa of Calcutta ended her life in the silence of God, just a darkness. St John of the Cross spoke of the Dark Night, and countless saints suffered the same complaint. Is it then the case that they couldn't see the wood for the trees, that these folk had passed into the cloud that surrounds God? From far away we hear the voice of God, but close up to Him we find ourselves in the Cloud of Unknowing, the cloud through which God speaks to us in words that our ears cannot hear; indeed, all we hear is silence. But these are words of healing. Mother Theresa's healing was her passing from this life into the bosom of God.

Our duty to God is to offer Him the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. If it's a sacrifice then it is something that we can expect to hurt us at times. We're still expected to offer Him thanks and praise when life is miserable, pointless, difficult, and it does hurt us to do so. But if it hurts us then we can be sure that we are actually offering God something worthwhile, something that He won't ignore because it is offered out of love.

We are built to love, to care, and there is much to care about - the sick, the homeless, the poor, destitute, starving, naked, orphaned and oppressed... whether physically so, mentally so, or spiritually so. So if we are truly built to care and love, then depression is part of the course when our poor finite little selves get overwhelmed with a greater quantity of misery.

We must wait for God silently to break our silence. The Dayspring from on High will break upon us, but not until our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving is complete in His eyes.

Somnambulism in the City

Sermon preached at St Peter and St Paul’s Church Swanscombe on 18th February 2006, based on Exodus xxxiv.29-end, II Corinthians iii.12-iv:2 and St Luke ix:28-43.

Al reaches for the snooze button again
as, for the second time,
the alarm stridently cuts through
a lovely dream about Keira Knightly.

He switches the light on,
wincing as the neon bulb dazzles him,
hurting his eyes.

Slowly he rouses himself,
trying to focus on the day ahead of him.

Eventually,
he summons up all his strength
to poke a warm toe out into the cold room.

Yawning and scratching his head,
he stumbles through to the bathroom,
walking straight past God’s holy angel standing
by the doorway.


Al gets dressed,
and wanders downstairs
for his bowl of Crunchy Nut Cornflakes.

He switches on the Radio,
and the sound of Chris Moyles
playing “Hotel California”
drowns out the Eternal song o
f the two seraphim in the kitchen
singing “Holy, Holy, Holy.”


After cleaning his teeth and brushing his hair,
Al grabs his briefcase from by the door
and gets into his car.

As he drives to work,
he passes three angels
playing lute, trumpet and shawm,
a crowd of martyrs praising God,
Moses and Elijah calling out to the world,
and Our Lady in a shop window
pointing towards
the Divine person of Christ
in the world.

[PAUSE]

Al’s working day is uneventful.

He photocopies papers
unaware of a couple of cherubim
sitting on the copy tray.

He grabs a cup from the water-cooler
on which St Simon Stylites
stands motionless.

He sends countless emails to his colleagues,
missing the email sent to him
by St Isidore of Seville,
patron saint of the Internet.

On his way home from work,
the Glory of God shines all around Al,
radiant and pure light from an Eternal source.

He dines,
watches a bit of telly
and goes to bed unaware of the multitude
of the heavenly host moving around him.


All of these things have happened in plain sight.

One woman saw the angel
hovering above Al’s car as he drove by.

But Al has not seen them.

As far as he is concerned,
all he sees is the greyness of the pavement,
the fumes coming
from the exhaust of the car in front,
the irritated look on the face of his boss
when Al tells him that
the figures will be late
this month.

None of these wonders
have been hidden from Al,
but he does not see them.


You see, when the alarm clock rang,
Al did not wake up.

[PAUSE]

Oh yes,
he got out of bed all right,
and he was conscious
when he drove to work.

He was certainly conscious
of the idiot who cut him up
at the Walthamstow roundabout.

He was conscious of
the choice words and phrases
that he used to describe that idiot.

He’s conscious of the staple
that he nearly put through his thumb at work.

But Al isn’t conscious
of the angel standing
next to the homeless woman
to whom he throws a £2 coin.


Al is a somnambulist, a sleep-walker.

He wanders through his day
oblivious to the truth of the world around him,
concentrating on his life and how it works.

For Al, every day is much the same,
the alarm goes off every morning;
he has Crunchy Nut Cornflakes for breakfast;
his daughter always manages
to beat him to the bathroom
when he’s desperate;
Wednesday night is always casserole night.

That’s his life.

When the alarm rings and the lamp comes on,
Al shuts his eyes again
because he is dazzled by the light.

[PAUSE]

It’s easy to shut our eyes when they are dazzled.

It’s a reflex.

Indeed it hurts if we try to look at something
which is too powerful.

When we sleep,
we become used to the darkness
which hides our world.

In the dark,
we see only the shadows of the way things are,
and we make up our own ideas
of what the truth is.

But if we try to open our eyes to the light,
it hurts
so we shut them again.

How can we get used to the light
if we keep shutting our eyes to it?

How can we see the Truth
if our eyes are closed?

[PAUSE]

Peter, James and John
get to see Jesus as God on the mountainside
because they’ve been having their eyes opened,
little by little,
through devoting themselves to the Lord.

Day by day,
they sit with Him,
eat breakfast with Him,
walk with Him,
go out onto the lake with Him,
study the Scriptures with Him.

Jesus is there with them
in the intimacy
and day-by-day routine of their lives
and they are part of the intimacy
and day-by-day routine of His life.

Yet all the while, the Lord has been preparing them
for a deeper intimacy,
the intimacy of His Godhead which bursts into their hum-drum reality
quietly
on a mountainside in a blaze of Titanic Glory.


Yet, the Transfiguration is an intimate event.

It’s an event as deeply personal
as going to sleep with your spouse next to you,
yet it comes only as a result of getting used to Christ in your life,
of opening our eyes
to the brilliance of God who wants
to show Himself to us as He really is.

It is only by opening the eyes slowly to Christ that we see the wonders of God around us in a world that is darkened by much sadness,
selfishness and sin.


The season of Lent gives us
the opportunity for us to see
how much of our lives we spend asleep
to God’s Presence.

We could spend Lent
just giving something up
sweets,
chocolate,
television,
coffee
like we always do,
but what’s the point if,
at the end of it,
we are just as unaware of God in our lives
as we were
when we started?

How do you propose to seek
the light of God this Lent?

Catechetical catastrophe!

You are a 100% traditional Catholic!

Congratulations! You are more knowlegeable than most modern theologians! You have achieved mastery over the most important doctrines of the Catholic Faith! You should share your incredible understanding with others!

Do You Know Your Baltimore Catechism?
Make Your Own Quiz

Well, I'm sorry, I'm just showing off now. It's a just a fun test and nothing serious, but it does raise a serious issue. If that jocular little blurb beneath the score bar is true, then I truly fear for the preservation of the Doctrine of the Church.

Why is it that I should do well in this and not even know of the existence of the Baltimore Catechism, (though I do know the Tridentine Catechism with a certain degree of familiarity) and yet would have not performed half as well in my knowledge of the Anglican Catechism?

The 1662 BCP Catechism is so seldom used now. Indeed, when I was Confirmed, my Confirmation classes were so vague, all I can remember is something distant issue about a chalice! I don't mind so much about this with my somewhat mottled relationship with the CofE, but there are so many Anglicans in the Church of England who leave Confirmation Classes without understanding any of the Faith and what it means. These days Confirmation classes seem to involve sitting down and watching an Alpha Course Video. This is all very well an introduction to the Faith, but surely this introduction isn't necessary if the Confirmands are already established members of the Church. They will surely have shown some commitment, and the natural teaching office of the Church would surely help them to know the basics, wouldn't it?

The Teaching Office of the Church ought to be drawing attention to concrete issues of Faith, not allow people to be obfuscated with theological dithering over weighty issues, or get away with believing what they want to believe. There is an objective Truth, and it needs to be sought.

For example: it may not be particularly Anglican practice to discuss these days, but aren't the spiritual and corporate works of mercy actually important to being a Christian?

[For those who aren't aware, the spiritual works of mercy are:

• To instruct the ignorant;
• To counsel the doubtful;
• To admonish sinners;
• To bear wrongs patiently;
• To forgive offences willingly;
• To comfort the afflicted;
• To pray for the living and the dead.

and the corporal works of mercy are

• To feed the hungry;
• To give drink to the thirsty;
• To clothe the naked;
• To harbour the harbourless;
• To visit the sick;
• To ransom the captive;
• To bury the dead. ]

Even people who believe in Salvation through Faith alone should at least be aware of the things that their neighbours need and look out for opportunities to practise them. There isn't an excuse for a Protestant not to know these because, quite frankly, they are a mark of the Christian Faith and part of the priesthood of the Laity of any denomination. I acknowledge that a Protestant would balk at praying for the dead (can't think why...) but to know that these works are part of our duty is surely of vast importance.

There are other issues:- how many members of the Anglican laity know what a sacrament is? How many care what a sacrament is? They don't care because they haven't been taught the fundamental relevance of Sacraments to the Church. Result: indifference to the Divine Grace of God. And I shudder.

If the Church doesn't teach the Truth, how will people know Him?

Aren't labels sticky?

So what are you?

Dare I make the assumption that you are a human being reading this?
Dare I make the assumption that you understand English?

If I may, then I can reasonably conclude that you are an English-understanding human being. Already I've managed to label you, a noun qualified by an adjective.

We seem to get ourselves in a tizzy about just what we mean by the various labels we use to describe ourselves, or others, or organisations. The adjectives and nouns give us a set of conditions that we have satisfied in order to bear those very adjectives and nouns. In order to be described as red, you have to reflect a certain wavelength of light. In order to be described as soft, you have to have a yielding quality either physically or emotionally.

Clearly concrete labels such as "red" or "soft" can be verified via direct experience (except if you are colour-blind or eating school mashed potato). It's when we come to attribute abstract labels to things, organisations or people that the most disagreement occurs.

In the circles in which I find myself (and I make it clear that I am not a philosopher, nor a student of philosophy), the word "Anglican" appears to cause a lot of bitter dispute among those who would call themselves such. Smiliarly the words "Catholic" and "Orthodox".

It is the connotations that these epithets carry with them that cause the most distress. These days I feel increasingly reluctant to call myself Anglican, and this is due to the circumstances in which I live. To be called an Anglican by my friends who know me is fine: they understand that I have some affinity with the Historical Ecclesia Anglicana, that my genealogy is deeply English, though I am sure that I have some Viking or Norman blood from centuries past. However, ask anyone in the street what Anglican means and they will say "Church of England", and there begins my objection. I no longer consider myself a member of the Church of England as it is now, but as of one who rests in it with a deep affection. I believe myself to still be Anglican in the same way that Albion and Ed and Frs. Kirby and Hart do on the Continuum blog, but I do not adhere to the practices nor the doctrine of the Church of England where they diverge from the Catholic Faith. (If I get kicked out of the CofE as a result of saying this, then actually this will make my life easier!)

Now, we could all get bogged down in semantics and historical pedantries as to what Anglicanism actually is. Was Anglicanism invented at the Reformation, at the Synod of Witby, or when the first Christian set foot on the British Isles, or was it with the first Christianised Angle in Germany? There seems to be some consensus that it is something to do with Blighty and her rather convoluted history. However, as soon as we get into the idea of what it is to be British, then we find ourselves "us"ing and "them"ing. Are Americans Anglicans? Can there truly be an Anglican Centre in Rome? In trying to define ourselves we start to try and split ourselves off from other people, and that is something which is easy to do, but utterly against the Will of God. Labels applied too rigidly afford us only the selfishness of ever-approaching solitude

Well then, perhaps Anglicanism is something to do with the Office, or Anglican Use Liturgies? Wouldn't that depend on your opinion of what the Anglican Church is, and when it started? The BCP was a product of the Reformation; priot that it was all Roman Catholic, and yet even that had an English twist to it with the Sarum Liturgies, prior even to that the Celtic Use. So we're back to comparing genealogies and who is or isn't Anglican - practices that St Paul condemened to his disciples Timothy and Titus (I Timothy i.14 and Titus iii.9).

In short there are always senses in which the word "Anglicanism" does and doesn't apply. So Perhaps for Anglicanism its a case of Louis Armstrong's maxim: "if you gotta ask, you'll never know." Could we really get away with "If it doesn't feel English, then it isn't Anglican"?

I think if we quibble about what Anglicanism is, then we miss a very big point. Surely it is better to be a Christian rather than have our exact identity pinned down according to the way we conduct our Divine Liturgy and Divine Office. Even then we quibble about who is a Christian and who isn't . There are many who call themselves Christians who say and do things that are manifestly not Christian ideals - that in itself doesn't stop a person from being a Christian since we all sin and fall short of the glory of God. It's what we believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths that is important. Jesus is Lord. If we cannot say that and mean it then there is a doubt on our Christianity.

Perhaps the only True Christians are the saints.

What do I mean by that? Well perhaps True Christianity is something to which we aspire, we may call ourselves Christians, but if at the end we are not recognised by Christ, then how can we have truly been Christians?

There will be a schism in the Anglican Communion over the issue of homosexuality, and there will be a schism in the Church of England over trying to get women into the Episcopacy. Who will be allowed to keep the title Anglican? To be honest, I don't care. I am an Anglo-Papalist: by that I mean I am a Roman Catholic barred from Communion with the Holy See by an accident of History finding a dwelling place within the Anglican Church. Both the Holy See and the Church of England mean a great deal to me, even if one of them is going off the rails into darkness and the other is fighting an encroaching plague of relativism and modernism.

That is what I believe myself to be, but until God tells me who I am, then I shall just have to labour under this misapprehension. However, I earnestly pray that one day I may be honoured by God with the title "Christian".

Head versus heart: No contest!

My latest parish magazine article which I publish here, unabridged.

“Have a heart,” is what we say to the traffic warden as he, with malicious grin and calculated manner, slaps a ticket on our windscreen despite the fact that we’ve only parked on a double yellow line for five seconds to pick up an elderly aunt. It’s an interesting expression by which we mean that the grinning embodiment of evil clad in yellow peaked cap ought to display some human emotion. But why the heart?

It was the Greeks who believed that the heart was the house of our emotions. After all, when we fall in love, get involved in a heated argument, face our fear, or cry our eyes out, that rather large muscle in our chest starts beating like a woodpecker after 100 cups of Nescafé. No wonder the Greeks thought that this is where our feelings are kept. The brain, however, the Greeks didn’t understand at all, and so put its presence down as something to do with temperature regulation. In this age of MRI-scans and other electro-magnetic imaging techniques, we can see emotions flash across the surface of the brain, so we can be sure that our hearts are doing a perfectly good job of pushing blood around the body and not pushing out waves of sadness just because the goldfish has passed away.

We might say that our tormenting traffic-warden was ruled by his head rather than by his heart, mechanically doing an unpopular but necessary job in an age when people’s selfishness have made it necessary for double yellow lines to be painted to indicate that stopping would inconvenience many others. Others are said to be ruled by their hearts and guided by where their thoughts and feelings take them, like environmental protesters marching to make a faceless organisation hear their cry of anger at the pollution they are causing. Yet some are ruled too far by their hearts and become effective terrorists, endangering the lives of scientists testing drugs on animals.

Action based on feelings without thinking can be very destructive. In this day and age where many of us are tempted to indulge ourselves with all kinds of luxury kitchens, holidays, sofas, toilet-paper to make ourselves feel more comfortable, we think not of the consequences of the effects on others around us. If scientists are right about global warming being cause by human beings (and there still is some doubt) then it is mainly through the lack of consideration on our part to consider the impact of our wants on the environment. Our prisons are over-crowded because the Government feels that it has to make laws in order to force people into being less anti-social, but who is telling us what it means to be social?

Actions based on thought without feeling produce similarly destructive results. Communism was, and in fact is, a perfectly respectable idea but which has effectively been proven not to work in practice. This did not stop Stalin from enforcing his understanding of Communism on Eastern Europe, and many still bear the scars of that today. Oliver Cromwell forced his own ideas of Christianity on the people of mid 17th Century for what he believed to be the common good. He went so far as to abolish Christmas and other festivities because they did not fit in with his system of beliefs. We may believe whole-heartedly in a theory but if we want to try and implement it, then we have to take into account people as they are: neither Stalinist-Communism nor Cromwellian Puritanism did so.

It is clear that love truly requires the use of head and heart, of thought and emotion. Think on I Corinthians xiii. The loveless know-it-all is nothing because he fails to see the import of human beings for what they truly are in the sight of God. Without love, there suddenly appears something which the loveless know-it-all does not know, and so he ceases to be what he believes himself to be. A loveless know-it-all submits himself to nothing rather than the cage of his own reason, and as a result destroys himself utterly.

So how should we use our heads and our hearts? Well, in his letter to the Roman Christians, St Paul tells us:

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. (Romans xii)

By not being conformed to the world, we should refuse to separate the rule of our lives into thoughts and feelings which lead to pride and over-indulgence in this rather individualistic and liberal society in which we find ourselves, but sacrifice their use to God and let Him rule us rather than hearts and minds.

We are to transform ourselves by the renewing of our minds. Now this does not mean that we should be dropping everything for the latest fashion like women priests and bongo drums. St James reminds us that we are not to be blown about by the latest theological theory. But St Paul means that in order to be renewed, we need to go back to the Source – to God Himself, so that what He created He can also renew in His ways. We need renewing because we continue to stray, but the Lord Jesus spoke about the Living Water that will spring up from within us. This Living Water is again from the One True God who is humble and loving enough to make His dwelling within each of us. It is He who will help our hearts and minds work in harmony to worship Him, and love those around us.