Reflections

Glimpses of Gold This article does not try to pretend that COVID was anything less than abhorrent. People got sick and died. There are those whose health (physical and mental) can never be the same again. People are still being diagnosed and finishing up in ICU to say nothing of the scars of our healthcare...Continue reading→

Bishop Stephen writes This is how he had come to see it –. That God had spent everything to try and create community with his beloved; with us; – through covenants, through prophets – everything except himself. And now, when all was exhausted except for the love from which this world was made there was...

He carried his followers’ disappointments. They thought he was going to be a different sort of king. Heaven knows, he had tried. He had tried to etch eternity into the stubborn humanity of those who followed him, but now nearly all of them have abandoned him. Through eyes smarting with grief and narrowed by pain,...Continue reading→

 Of lawns and edges. I’ve just been out to admire my handiwork. The lawns are all neatly mown and the edges crisply trimmed. It’s a great look and a smug feeling. I feel virtuous and maybe even a little proud, for to do both of these jobs properly takes me about 2 hours. Of course,...Continue reading→

During January we gather up last year's palm crosses and we torch them. The result of this safely contained mini fire is the ashes for the Ash Wednesday services. You know the little black smudge on the forehead business. So the folk had kindly returned their faded 2022 palm crosses with the aid of an...Continue reading→

He carried a seamless robe. It was a thing of delicate beauty and of great craftsmanship, robust and at the same time light, woven in one piece from top to bottom; like the robe, a high priest would wear as he went about his duties. Like everything else, it would be taken from him. Freshly...Continue reading→

All those things we never said. There is a book called “All those things we never said.” The basic plot is this Days before her wedding, Julia Walsh is blindsided twice: once by the sudden death of her estranged father…and again when he appears on her doorstep after his funeral, ready to make amends, right...Continue reading→

Bishop Stephen Cotterell The soldiers’ logic had a brutal simplicity. A cruel, schoolboy logic. He said he was a king, so dress him up as one. A purple robe. Some twisted thorn. A makeshift crown. The barbed wire of the bush. Harvest it gingerly. Put that in your pipe and smoke it. Stack him up....Continue reading→

The things he carried Lent 1 - the cross  26/2/23 They handed it to him like it was nothing. Like it could be thrown away; like they were going to throw him away, this thing of terrible beauty. He held the rough wood in his hands; gripped it, felt its shape, tested its weight, imagined the...Continue reading→

I get to hear a lot of eulogies. Long ones, short ones, poorly worded but effective ones, and even sometimes, ones that go on for far too long. The record is forty-five minutes. Perhaps the most potent are those who say what they miss. Anything from a cuddle to chocolate cake, to the whiff of...Continue reading→

A reflection for Sunday 19th of February. I began writing this on Tuesday 24th of January. The news was not good that morning. It was especially grim for the people of Los Angeles in general and the people of Monterey Park in particular. A man allegedly shot 11 people in a dance club. He then...Continue reading→

I gleefully reached two separate milestones at the end of 2022. First, I accomplished 50 ‘park runs’ which entitles me to a swanky red T-shirt telling the world that I have in fact accomplished 50 park runs. The other milestone was that the Christmass of 2022 was my fourth with you in this parish. It...Continue reading→

The work of the table. They come every so often and together we sat at a table. We have swapped stories, shed tears and laughed raucously. The wine like the conversation has flowed, been consumed and enjoyed. The bread was broken and the food was passed around. But there are other tables I go to...Continue reading→

Get right with God a reflection for the 12th of February Well! Today’s Gospel is a bit different from last week’s. Last Sunday Jesus was calling us the salt of the earth, and the light on a hill and it was all very gooey and wonderful. The week before that he was dolling out blessings...Continue reading→

Our choices always matter. Apparently, those who are about to be executed are given a choice for their last meal. I’m sure it's an interesting array of selections. I imagine some would choose a lobster, some steak, some a meal from a Scottish-sounding fast food outlet. Hopefully, none of us will finish up on death...Continue reading→

A reflection for Sunday 5th of February. He was born Robert Stockdale Lawson on the 10th of February 1934. He was professed a monk on the 11th of July 1967 and entered eternal life 31st of December 2022. Dom Placid was a monk at our monastery at Camperdown. I’m not sure when he came to...Continue reading→

A reflection for January 29th. Matthew’s beatitudes are a well-known classic. Luke also has a shorter version of the Beatitudes. The beatitudes have rightly been called “God’s blueprint for living” and each of Matthews 8 is a sermon in and of itself. So today I thought I would just focus on this one. “Blessed are...Continue reading→

Christmass is Evolving At Christmas, I usually just collapse into a crumpled little heap and have a scrumptious meal in the rectory later on. But not this year. This year we did something radical. This year we were daring, brave and courageous. After the last amen and everything was tidied away, we got into the...Continue reading→

Of potential and possibilities. On Sundays this year we will be reading through the gospel of Matthew. It was written to encourage the small and fragile community of converted Jews who lived in the region of Galilee and Syria. They suffered persecution and threats from their Jewish brothers because they had accepted Jesus as the...Continue reading→

Of an empty crib The empty crib in the nativity scene in our Church caught my eye the other day. It was just there, in the middle of the straw with some animals and Mary and Joseph looking on expectantly. It had been a long day with much to ponder and process and I thought...Continue reading→