Reflection for Sunday after The Ascension: Elvis has left the building?????

When Jesus had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. While he was going and they were gazing up towards heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. 11They said, ‘Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up towards heaven?  (Acts 1:9-10)

Last Thursday, we celebrated Ascension Day, and I’ve often wondered why we celebrate the risen Christ returning to the Father. It’s a bit of a sad scene, imagining the disciples watching their beloved Messiah leaving! I’ve also winced at the depiction in art of Christ’s feet dangling from a cloud!!!! But as I was reminded this week, the Ascension means we have Christ interceding on ALL of humanity’s behalf to God, not just the group who followed him most closely on earth. And in ascending, Christ – both human and divine - has also taken our humanity to the Father. There’s a part of us that is already with the Father and Jesus in heaven! And also the promise of the gift of the Holy Spirit and the presence of God dwelling within all of Christ’s followers here on earth. As the light of the world returns to God, and we cease lighting the pascal candle this Sunday, a light remains within us, and asks us to share the joy of this gift with others. Our ‘Elvis’ has not left the building, or us!

Thank you, Jesus, for bringing me this far.

In your light, I see the light of my life.

Your teaching is brief and to the point;

you persuade us to trust in God;

you command us to love one another.

You promise everything to those who obey your teaching;

you ask nothing too hard for a believer,

nothing a lover can refuse,

Your promises to your disciples are true,

nothing but the truth.

Even more, you promise us yourself,

the perfection of all that can be made perfect.

 Nicholas of Cusa

It’s a total eclipse of the heart

Reflection for Third Sunday after Easter 2023 – It’s a total eclipse of the heart

The writer Annie Dillard writes of her experience of a total solar eclipse in 1979:

“From all the hills came screams. A piece of the sky beside the crescent sun was detaching. It was a loosened circle of evening sky, suddenly lighted from the back. It was an abrupt black body out of nowhere; it was a flat disk; it was almost over the sun. That is when there were screams…Abruptly it was dark night…In the black sky was a ring of light…It was an old wedding band in the sky, or a morsel of bone. There were stars. It was all over”1

When people were interviewed on Thursday after experiencing the total eclipse in Western Australia, there were screams recorded and the excitement, fascination and awe was palpable in those gathered to watch.

Annie Dillard writes further of leaving after the eclipse and breakfasting in a local diner where other eclipse-watchers were present and almost shouting and saying “Did you see….? Did you see….? The experience too fantastic to quash the urge to share with others afterwards.

32They said to each other, ‘Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?’ 33That same hour they got up and returned to Jerusalem (Luke 24:32-33a)

We hear of the experience of the couple on the road to Emmaus in our gospel reading this Sunday. And I imagine the couple reacting as though they have seen a total eclipse – this time the realisation that they have just spent several hours in the presence of the risen Christ. Chatting on the road, listening to an explanation of the meaning of the scriptures, inviting Christ to share and meal and then, wham! The breaking of the bread and their eyes finally open!

And like the eclipse-watchers, unable to keep the experience to themselves - as they return immediately (at night) to Jerusalem to speak to the other disciples.

A total eclipse of their hearts, indeed (apologies Bonnie Tyler)!

I give thanks for the disciples and their experience – and may we all be blessed by even a sliver of that experience in our own faith journeys!

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for Second Sunday after Easter - Have you seen Christ?

“Although you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, for you are receiving the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.…” (1 Peter 1:8-9)

The faithful Christ followers who received the writing from 1 Peter may not have visibly seen the risen Christ, but it appears they showed every evidence of faithful living and loving Christ. So they had experienced the risen Christ!

Thomas Merton, a 20th century mystic and Trappist monk, entered a monastery in his thirties and spent the next two decades writing and studying, achieving much fame for his spiritual writings. He was also quite open about his struggles with a deep sense of both feeling unworthy of love and a diminished capacity to show love.

In his 52nd year he fell deeply in love with a nurse who was caring for him in hospital. Much of the time they corresponded by telephone or letters, with some brief visits, before the relationship ended. 

Even though their parting brought great grief, his love for another human being changed everything. Transformed and healed, this love taught him that his tremendous need for love was not an impediment to faith, but as a key to his salvation. Reflecting on it, Merton felt that his pursuit of a ‘spiritual, detached love’ in his ordained life had actually prevented him from loving fully – and thus prevented him from entering into a deeper connection with the great sweep of God’s saving work.

In his experiencing of a deeply human love, Merton felt more able to rejoice fully in receiving God’s love and responding to God in love.

The faithful Christ followers in Peter’s church may not have visibly seen Christ, but as I said above, they surely must have experienced the love of Christ in order to respond to God’s love.

From Thomas Merton:

“It is for this that we came into the world—this communion and self-transcendence. We do not become fully human until we give ourselves to each other in love ... we will never be fully real until we let ourselves fall in love”.

May we all experience the love of Christ in this Easter season and learn to fall in love again.

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for 6th Sunday after Epiphany - Let's be honest???

“Let your word be ‘Yes, Yes’ or ‘No, No’ anything more than this comes from the evil one.” Matthew 5:37

It’s tempting to think that Jesus is the inspiration for ‘honesty is the best policy’ and all the other quotes such as ‘honesty is the first book in the book of wisdom’, ‘a half-truth is a full lie’…etc.

But is that what Jesus is really on about in Matthew’s gospel?

The Matthean Jesus is using an extreme form of hyperbole in teaching about the imperative to follow the commandments of God – the Law. Along with the extreme ‘anyone who thinks murder/hatred in their heart against someone HAS committed murder’, the hyperbole is stretched – it’s preferable to enter heaven maimed from self-mutilation by cutting off a hand, or plucking out an eye if either cause you to ‘sin’!

Matthew’s Jesus goes on to describe the ‘ancient’ belief that swearing an oath on the Lord’s name is the be and end all of oaths- that ‘noone was to swear falsely’ on the Lord’s name. Jesus wants his followers to abolish this practice by not even countenancing the idea that they might intentionally swear an oath that they don’t intend to keep! And to certainly not use the name of the Lord as a shield to hide behind!

I think this is deeper than honesty – it is about integrity – the wholeness of our being. About what is in your heart and mind being what comes out of your mouth and what action you do.

Sounds easy, but of course so much of what we think/believe may be unknown to even ourselves. So, as we approach the season of Lent once more, it might be a good time to pray and prepare for God’s loving honesty to show where our wholeness is fractured and ask for God’s healing.

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for 5th Sunday after Epiphany - What does God want?

Reflection and Sermon prep for 5th Sunday after Epiphany – What God wants

“Is this not the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your hose; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?” (Isaiah 58:6-7)

“It goes well with those who act generously and lend: who guide their affairs with justice.” (Psalm 112:5)

Paraphrasing the words of one biblical scholar during my formal theological training:

There are about half a dozen or so pieces of biblical text that might be a critique of sexual behaviour (and that might be stretching the context of the texts), but well over six hundred pieces of biblical text about how to share our wealth and possessions.

So for every text on sexuality (1), there are a hundred (100) on sharing resources with those who have little. So I guess it is pretty clear from our biblical record what God is truly interested in and how God would choose for us as far as behaviour!

This Sunday in our lectionary we have two pretty direct statements on what the people of God should do (see above from Isaiah and the psalmist). And in our preparations for the coming season of Lent, it seems that we might have a new lens to look through in terms of what ‘fast’ we might be contemplating as our Lenten practice.

Rather than planning to abstain from food/drink/watching TV/social media etc etc we might start by God to show us where there is need that we have not noticed before. And not just human need – but for all who live with us.

I think the possibilities are many, both locally and globally: caring for our green spaces where we live; being conscious of our purchases and the possible impact on the environment (manufacture, use and disposal); supporting a group working for peace overseas; donating at local foodbanks or volunteering. Listening/reading to someone who comes from a completely different background. I’m sure that many of you know of other avenues of acting generously and lending…..and I’d love to hear about them!

Because, at the heart of it, is that God urges us to do this not just during Lent – but for all our lives.

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for Fourth Sunday after Epiphany - are we as good as we could be?

“O mortal, what is good;
   and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
   and to walk humbly with your God?” Micah 6:8

On Australia Day 2023, Wiradjuri man Stan Grant writes as an aboriginal person and a person of God. And reminds all God’s people of the profound call from the prophet Micah above – which is also in our lectionary to be read this coming Sunday.

Grant writes: “As an Aboriginal person and a person of God, I know politics alone can't save us….God did not arrive on the First Fleet. God was here with us. We are a people of God on the land God gave us. According to my faith God lives in us as God lives in all.”

And as Amos reminds us: “Do justice….Love kindness…walk humbly with your God…”

Such a simple and such a powerful message calling down through the centuries. And from indigenous poet Jonathan Hill a beautiful acknowledgment that God was and is in all throughout time:

Today we stand in footsteps millennia old. We acknowledge the traditional custodians whose cultures and customs have nurtured, and continue to nurture, this land, since men and women awoke from the great dream. We honour the presence of our ancestors who reside in the imagination of this land and whose irrepressible spirituality flows through all creation.

To read Stan Grant’s article: Are we all we should be as a nation?

Blessings

Ceri

Third Sunday after Epiphany - The power of symbols

Reflection for 3rd Sunday after Epiphany

“For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” (1 Cor 1:17-18.

On the 23 May 1945, Colonel Gonin penned a special order of the day.

It was a thank you letter to all the ranks of the particular medical corps who had tirelessly worked with the American troops for the last 3 months in Germany.

The letter went on to describe their further ‘thankless and unspectacular task of clearing Belsen Concentration Camp’.

Over 11,000 sick were freed from the camp – most of them suffering from the ‘most virulent diseases known to man’. In the first 10 days working in the camp, the medical corps had distributed 4,000 meals twice daily from whatever they could scrounge.  Collecting medical equipment from all over Germany they had supplied drugs for 15,000 patients a day. Without hesitation they acted as undertakers collecting over 2,000 corpses from the wards and moving them to the mortuary. Some of the workers caught Typhus.

Some time later, the Colonel noted in his diary that a case of lipstick had been misdelivered to the camp, despite the camp still being so very desperate for necessities. Rather than send it back, they distributed it to women remaining in the camp.

Which the colonel noted was ‘genius’ as the freed women clung to them, even in their misery. He tells of a woman who, laying dead, still clutched a lipstick in her hand.

“At last someone had done something to make them individuals again, they were someone, no longer merely the number tattooed on the arm.”

Why did these women cling to this ‘foolish’ piece of make-up? For these human beings who had gone through hell, maybe the lipstick reminded them of happier, normal times? Maybe it was a powerful symbol and concrete sign that life might be worth living for, that there might be a future as they held that tube of make-up?

I don’t presume to know; this tale is so disturbing and sorrowful; it cuts to the heart and defies easy answers. But it may show how important and life-giving symbols can be – even in the darkest of times.

In the Roman empire, crucifixion was the most shameful of deaths. To follow and praise one who was crucified was mostly likely a completely foolish and lunatic act. But for Paul, apostle of Christ, it is the most powerful, concrete sign of the power of God to nullify death. In Christ’s life, death and resurrection was the proof that in the empire of God, no matter what happens to us, we are seen, welcomed and loved.

May we be blessed with just a smidgeon of the power of God that the cross points to!

Blessings

Ceri

Second Sunday after Epiphany - Listen to me O coastlands.....

“Listen to me, O coastlands, pay attention, you people from far away!” Isaiah 49:1-7

“And he has put a new song in my mouth..” Psalm 40:3a

During my adolescent years we lived by the West Tamar riverbank in Northern Tasmania. A tidal river, the bank at low tide stretched for a hundred metres or so. Walking on the dark grey mud with each step potentially sinking up to mid-calf required adequate footwear if you didn’t want to shred your feet from oyster shells hiding below the surface.

I’d wander/squelch through the tidal flats, smell the mud-tinged brine in the air, listen to circling seagulls and feel the wind, and work out whether I could get to the larger of the two small islands and back before the incoming tide surrounded them.

And I’d sing as I looked out over this coastland – my coastland.

Not a recognisable song – just a rambling narrative set to a rambling made-up melody. As it was just us Clark girls on that stretch of the river I felt no embarrassment, but just let it rip. Whatever was going through my mind at the time; pre-teen angst, family issues, whatever - they were worked out as I sang to my ‘coastlands’ at the top of my voice.

Walking one morning this week we came upon a young boy on the path with his mother. They were stopped to one side as he did up his laces. And he was chatting non-stop to his mum all the while with his head bent to his task. As we passed I mimicked the chatter with one hand to the mother with a big smile on my face. She nodded her head, as if to say ‘yeah, it’s great, isn’t it!’

Now neither my younger self or the chatting boy, as we voiced out loud our particular stream of consciousness, would qualify as prophets-in-waiting like the great Isaiah from our Old Testament reading this week,. The birds in the air in my case and the mother for the young boy were the only obvious recipients of the river of our thoughts in words/sounds.

But, oh what might happen if we who follow Christ, sang/spoke with the same child-like assurance and volubility to the One who is always listening? Our grief, our frustrations, our joys, our anger, our questions, our love, our thankfulness – everything that we are. And what joy might be felt when Christ calls and sings back to us!

In this season of Epiphany, may you be blessed with the presence of the One who always listens, and is always calling us to share the joy of this presence – God is with us – Emmanuel!

Peace

Ceri

Baptism of Jesus

Reflection for the baptism of Jesus – Epiphany season 2023 – the God who shows no partiality

“Then Peter began to speak to them: ‘I truly understand that God shows no partiality…’” (Acts 10:34)

Peter’s world-view and his understanding of God’s love went through a paradigm shift while praying on a roof-top one noon at his fellow disciple Simon’s house. What we would call an epiphany – sent to him by God.

 The epiphany for Peter was that all people, regardless of ethnicity, are regarded by God as worthy. Even those considered unclean by Jewish law – the gentiles.

When Peter talks to a household of gentiles about the work of God through Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit falls on all those gathered there and they are subsequently baptised in the name of Jesus Christ, because as Peter exclaims:

‘Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?’

Jesus’ baptism by John in Matthew’s gospel, despite John’s feelings of inadequacy, is another sign of the Epiphany – God is truly with us. No matter who we are, what we have done, the invitation to respond to God’s love is given equally and abundantly to all.

In the family of God, baptised in the name of Jesus Christ, we ARE brothers and sisters of Christ. That is the promise of the ‘the God who shows no partiality’. Not one of us is regarded as less or more favoured.

A sobering but also quite wonderful message!

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for Epiphany 2023 - Love....or fear

A reflection from Michael Leunig in his “When I talk to you: A Cartoonist talks to God” (HarperCollins) ruminates on the poetic truth that there are only two feelings, only two languages, only two activities, two motive, two frameworks and two results in the world that humanity occupies – Love and fear.

We see both in our reading about the Magi following a star and finding the child Jesus in Bethlehem.

Love and joy drove the Magi on a presumably long and hazardous journey from Persia to where the star finally stopped in the tiny town of Bethlehem. As did love and joy cause the shepherds in a nearby field to run in haste to see the child whose birth was announced by an angelic choir.

Love ….. and fear.

When Herod and the elite in Jerusalem were told by the Magi of the birth of Jesus, they could also have travelled with the Magi to pay homage to the Christ child. That, according to Matthew, they did not choose to do so is a consequence of fear ruling their lives. And the result was the ultimate act of evil in the shedding of the innocent blood of two year-old babes.

The recognition that God is with us – what we call the Epiphany (manifestation) - brings with it the invitation to react with love…or panic and fear.

As the Magi found God-with-us in the most unlikely of places, after much searching (and wrong turns), so too do we travel. We all carry love and fear in the deepest parts of ourselves. We pray for the Christ light to shine on those dark places with the forgiveness and love that only God can offer so that when we meet Christ we are filled with the same love and joy as the Magi and the shepherds.

May the blessing of the Epiphany reach you all at this time.

Ceri

Reflection for Christmas 2022 - Prayers for a hope-filled Christmas and beyond??

When a veteran human rights activist is working with people fleeing their homes, including many Ukrainians this year, he never offers hope:

"[For] people in desperate circumstances, 'hope' is not the word….

You can't say to them; my prayers are with you and my hope is with you. I mean, they just want to know how to get out of the place." (hope and desperate circumstances)

Instead, when people were asked what IS needed, one reply was:

‘We want you to say 'I am fighting with you and alongside you to find a way for us to get out of this horror'.

These strong words are a reminder that as people of God, each year we start our Advent journey with the theme of hope. But this hope is not an empty platitude, a belief that God will sort of everything in the end. Our Advent journey starts with a recognition and penitence that our world is broken.

As Christmas approaches, we remember and celebrate that God-is-with-us, in the Hebrew language - “Emmanuel”. The hope that Christ gives is the strength to carry on, walking and fighting alongside those who know first-hand what the world’s brokenness looks like every single day.

So may God’s hope for the world which was enfleshed in the body of a child be borne again in us at this holy time and beyond, and may we be a true blessing to this beautiful, fragile and broken world.

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for Fourth Sunday in Advent - The Three Wise Men; the back story.

“In our preparations for Christmas Day, perhaps it is timely to think of the other characters in the biblical account of the birth of Jesus.”

After Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, during the time of King Herod, Wise Men from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, 'Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.' Matthew 2: 1-2

 Later writers identified the Magi by name and their lands of origin: Melchior hailed from Persia, Gaspar (also called "Caspar" or "Jaspar") from India, and Balthazar from Arabia.

 So, during Advent we are, like them, making our own pilgrimage to Christmas Day. And, as we journey like them, we might take time to ponder over the following:

·      What was their journey like? Most likely very long and very arduous.

Ø So what efforts might we also make to meet the Christ child? The Christ child in the most vulnerable in our communities?

·      The gifts the Magi brought were opulent and generous – even by today’s standards -  gold, frankincense and myrrh. And they left them with the young family.

Ø What gifts that we have might we bring to leave with the Christ child today?

Blessings from Milton Anglican as you journey to Christmass.

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Reflection for Third Sunday in Advent - Hear her roar

Reflection for Third Sunday in Advent – Hear Her Roar

“My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour, who has looked with favour on his lowly servant: from this day all generations will call me blessed;” (The Song of Mary)

The news this week included the information that out of Melbourne’s 580 statues depicting historical female figures, only 9 depict historical female figures. To add grist to an advocacy group’s push for more female statues to be erected, is that the only statue of an indigenous woman, Lady Gladys Nicholls, has her staringly adoringly at the larger statue of her husband!

No-one knows exactly how many statues of Mary, God-bearer, exist in the world at the moment, but I’m sure it runs in the order of many millions (if you count the ones in homes)! I’m also pretty certain that statues existing of Christ would outnumber Mary.

However, I reflect this week on the image of Mary as warrior – voicing her victory song in line with her female ancestors – Miriam at God defeating of the pursuing Egyptians in the Red Sea and Hannah who raised her voice in victory as she left her longed-for son, Samuel to be brought up by Eli the priest, honouring her promise to God.

For all three women, their victory came at great price.

For Mary, God-bearer, the price started from the very beginning, in her ‘yes’ to God. As one scholar notes, God cannot do what God intends to do alone. God needs us, and for some it is a very steep price.

So, in honour of Mary, God-bearer, maybe take some time this week to hear other warrior voices from women existing today: please listen to them carefully

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for 22nd Sunday after Pentecost - the laughter of resurrection

Reflection for 22nd Sunday after Pentecost – The laughter of resurrection

‘I am the resurrection and the life,’ says the Lord. ‘Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.’ John 11: 25 - 26.

This Sunday we hear from Luke’s gospel the somewhat snide questioning of ‘some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection’. The Irish poet Patrick Kavanagh once alluded to the resurrection as a laugh freed for ever and for ever.

The questioning of the Sadducees leads to Jesus assertion that God is the God of the living not the dead. Resurrection is God’s big YES to the world’s NO and the loss of hope – so yes to laughter!

And from Joy Mead and the Iona Community (Wild Goose big book of worship resources 2, 2019) comes a meditation on laughter. The laughter of resurrection, the laugh freed for ever and for ever does not gloss over pain or suffering. It is to stand with those who have nothing to laugh at, says Mead. And she continues…

To laugh

is to celebrate the gift of life,

enjoy it and thumb our noses

at those who would destroy

beauty and goodness.

To laugh

is to break the bonds

of evil and oppression.

We laugh, and the words

of the tyrant, the bigot, the bully

no longer threatened us.

Laughter is the sound of joy

heard through a breaking heart

To laugh

is to light the candle at both ends.

In the darkest night

laughter is prayer.

It's music in the air

and water over stones.

It lifts our human tragedy

into the joy of heaven.

We laugh and we are free

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for 21st Sunday after Pentecost - All Souls (including goats!)

I particularly like this photograph – it tickles my funny bone!  By the 1860’s the Paddington Cemetery (adjacent to Christ Church Milton) was in disrepair which only got worse as time rolled  – as is evidenced by the hirsine habitation caught on camera around 1910, where it was noted that both ‘kids and goats gambolled over the last resting place of the dead’ (qld govt archives)

I rather like the idea of children (which I assume were the kids), playing over graves – most likely blissfully unaware of the disapproval of their elders (the goats most certainly were!). Their ‘gambolling’ speaks of life being lived in the present, which we as adults find so hard to do!

We are remembering the passing of our loved ones this coming week with All Saints (November 1st) and All Souls (November 2nd). For some of us the grief of a loved one dying is still sharp, for others it may be a dull throb or a tender twinge of loss. But we do honour their memory, their lives and their part in bringing us to the present day.

In Luke’s gospel Jesus calls to the derided and short-statured Zacchaeus from his perch in a tree and insists that Zacchaeus welcome him– ‘I must stay at your house today!’.

In Christian faith we live in the hope that our loved ones who have died are in the house that Jesus went to prepare for all and that Christ’s presence is with us always – to the end of time.

Time – past, present and future – held secure in God’s hands.

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for 20th Sunday after Pentecost - Welcome simply everyone!

“But Jesus called for the disciples and said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it.’” Luke 18:16-17

Welcome to all, especially those who are seen as not of worth, is the hallmark of God and the reign of God.

Beatitudes for kids

Blessed are those who ask questions

for they are God’s imagination.

Blessed are those who hug outsiders,

for they are God’s hands.

Blessed are those who comfort scared little kids,

for their fears will disappear.

Blessed are those who stand up to bullies,

for they are God’s hope.

Blessed are those who eat lunch with the lonely,

for they will be fed with grace.

Blessed are those who care for the homeless,

for they are God’s welcome.

Blessed are those called every name possible,

for God knows your heart.

Blessed are the atheist and the believer,

the Buddhist and the Hindu, the Jew and the Muslim,

the wonderer and the wanderer,

for you are God’s children, all of you, each of you.

From Wild Goose big book of worship resources 2 (2019, Wild Goose Publications: UK), p 59:

Reflection for 19th Sunday after Pentecost - Oh Lord hear our prayer: Nag us to life

Reflection for 19th Sunday after Pentecost – O Lord hear our prayer – nag us to life.

The gospel from Luke contains the parable of the ‘nagging widow’ who wears down the resistance of the uncaring judge so much he gives her the justice she asks for. Luke specifically says it was told by Jesus to his followers to stress their need to pray always and not to lose heart.

So how do we keep believing when our prayers for justice are unanswered?

The Collect – the prayer of the church – for this coming Sunday might contain some clues:

“O Lord,

tireless guardian of your people,

teach us to rely, day and night, on your care.

Drive us to seek your justice and your help,

and support our prayer lest we grow weary,

for in you alone is our strength.”

God is tireless, a nagging guardian that is never worn out in the care of people. Night and day, seamless time.

It is only God through Christ who can teach us how to rely on our guardian God’s timeless, ceaseless care.

With the nagging God driving us we are spurred on in bringing God’s justice to this world, with God’s help.

And we can learn to rest in the nagging widow’s godly arms when we run out of puff.

Now I’m off to ask some of our wise elders how they go on believing.

Blessings

Ceri

Reflection for 18th Sunday after Pentecost - Profound healing and gratitude

Reflection for 18th Sunday after Pentecost – Profound healing and Gratitude

The gospel story for this coming Sunday is the healing of ten lepers by Jesus, who are sent on their way, and the return of only one, a foreigner, to offer praise to God and thanks to Jesus.

Jesus asks what happened to the other nine – where are they? It is a sad question from the divine healer that the other nine, presumably of the same ethnicity as Jesus, did not return to praise God (Jesus does not appear to be asking for personal thanks).

All ten are offered and given profound healing from their disease, a disease which meant they could not approach anyone not similarly affected. This was not only a cure, but re-acceptance into their family and society.

A profound healing.

This week, the sad news about some very young children, who have died under the medical care in Australian hospitals. The grieving parents asking how could this have happened in an affluent country with arguably the best medical care in the world? And who are wanting their cries to be heard so that it never happens to another young child.

This same week, the news that our medical staff – doctors and nurses in particular – are so burnt out from their work that they are leaving their profession in droves. They are not leaving to find ‘easier’ professions, they are leaving for their own need for healing.

The example of the ‘foreigner’ returning to praise God makes me wonder how often we return to the healers in our own society to give them thanks?

What if a simple act of gratitude – such as ringing my GP’s clinic to say thank you for the recent care I received when suffering from mild bronchitis – makes just a little bit of difference to those who offer us, in their own way, divine healing?

Blessings

Ceri

St Francis Day 2022: We Must See The World Differently

Reflection for St Francis Day: We Must See The World Differently

A quote from St Francis of Assisi: “If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men.”

A meeting of Anglican bishops from all over the globe in 2022, came up with the following calls with regard to Creation:

1.1  We have been gifted a world of breath-taking beauty, astounding abundance and intricate interconnection. It is a world God declared good and loves.

Our earth, and all that it contains and nourishes, is in trouble.

1.2  Yet, this is still God’s world and God calls us to respond as Easter people: bearers of hope

2.4 …. With crisis comes opportunity: for the Church to listen to God’s voice, to imagine how the world could be different, and to help build towards God’s Kingdom.

2.6 ... Member churches of the Anglican Communion are involved in every part of the environmental emergency. We are the people facing devastation in disaster-stricken communities. We are all the polluters, especially in wealthy countries. We are people living in poverty and on the margins. We wield power and political influence. We are experiencing loss and damage of our land, homes and livelihoods. We are investors with financial capital. We are first-responders to disasters and those who accompany communities on the journey of recovery and resilience

3.1 For ourselves and for future generations we need to act now, urgently and at scale.

3.2 However, actions are difficult to sustain unless there is also the transformation of hearts and minds from which such action flows. The climate emergency is not just a physical crisis – it is also a spiritual one.

3.3 Humanity needs a spiritual and cultural transformation. We must see the world differently: repenting of and rejecting an extractive world view, which regards the earth and all nature as something to be exploited, and embracing a relational worldview, espoused especially by indigenous peoples, which sees the profound interdependence of all creation.

Blessings

Ceri

Season of Creation Week 4 -

Reflection for Week 4 – Season of Creation

“Abraham said to the rich man: ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’” (Luke 16:31)

The parable of the rich man and Lazarus the poor man ends with the death of both. Lazarus, so poor and alone in life, is comforted by food and friendship in the afterlife. The rich man is condemned to eternity in Hades, tormented by flames. In Hades, the rich man asks that Lazarus be sent to his five brothers to warn them to change from their hedonistic lifestyles and look after the poor around them – which is what Moses and the prophets have been saying is God’s will for centuries.

The problem in the parable is that some people just don’t listen. Some people, the parable tells us today, will never listen to what God truly desires from us about how to live as human beings – no matter who is sent with the message! Even in the parable, the rich man, suffering in Hades, is concerned only with saving his immediate family, and not the many people who were living in poverty and suffering on earth.

The Season of Creation in 2022 calls the body of Christ to listen in a new way. To listen to the Voice of Creation and to act. The voice which has been calling and warning us for decades, maybe even centuries, about the effect our conspicuous consumption of the planet’s resources has on Creation. The Voice which has been pleading for a change.

Apart from a small, loud minority, it appears that most Australians are listening, and that is something to be thankful for and generates hope. Now, of course, as well as listening we are called to act – immediately – both on a local and global level.

The UN’s COP 27 climate negotiations will be happening in November, and on the agenda is the call for a Fossil Fuel Non Proliferation Treaty – if signed it would be the first time governments agree to not only stop burning coal and gas but to phase out the mining for these resources.

A full list of faith communities in Australia gathering and praying for such an agreement is here.

For those in Brisbane, join with your own voice on October 13th:

St John’s Anglican Cathedral
8am
Thursday October 13th

Blessings

Ceri