Prayer - Who needs it?

Two dear friends of mine recently gave me very challenging food for thought regarding religious beliefs; one asked me how a Christian knows when God is talking to them and the other told me of their struggle to understand why it is necessary for prayer groups when surely a solitary prayer would suffice to gain the ear of God.
I tried to offer reasoned responses to both these questions but the truth is I haven’t a clue!
How do I for instance know when God is telling me something – if indeed He ever has?
I have never certainly heard the voice of God in thunderous rapture or quiet repose but every fibre of my body tells me that God has often ‘spoken’ to me during prayer, whilst asleep, sometimes before the contemplation of sin and sometimes after contrition. To the non-Christian mind I suppose I am describing conscience but quite often our consciences whilst having the facility to be pricked are rarely pierced in the same way as the overwhelming certainty felt when we listen, and follow, a course of action that continues to nag away at us and almost always causes us to sacrifice in some way. Conscience is a powerful thing but it can often bring remorse and misgiving as to whether our chosen course was ultimately the correct one – a directive from God will always bring forth fruit.
So how do we know the difference?
Well there are clues and sometimes even clear signs but at the end of the day there must always be an uncertainty – it is the nature of faith I’m afraid – but what is absolutely certain beyond question is that any course of action in defiance of what an individual believes to be a directive from God will ultimately cause misery and pain. This is not to say that those with mental health issues are right in killing a fellow human being in the name of the voice of God. The good Lord, the God of love, would never ask any of us to kill another human being and that in essence should serve in itself as a clue that all such messages are from the devil.
Many Christians experience deep spiritual revelations which stay with them continuously and they do not waiver from their path when the new day dawns – this is a massive clue.
Some Christians try an alternative course of action from that which their spiritual core is screaming at them. Often this course bears no fruit, and quite often pain and guilt, and the righteous path when ultimately followed might soon bring forth surprising feelings of wellbeing and satisfaction – this too is a massive clue.
For myself I tend to listen to my hidden voice during prayer and quiet contemplation and I will try and analyse the ramifications of any actions I might want to take. When I follow the wrong path I ALWAYS turn off this mechanism and simply follow my human gut instinct and it inevitably leads to pain and misery. When human beings make decisions to glorify themselves then the outcome of these decisions will be measured in human terms – a transient feeling of accomplishment or high but with the inevitable down following at some point.
The simple truth is that humans often ‘know’ right from wrong but choose the safe option, the short term fix. They feel their bodies and souls are fragile and cannot cope with sacrifice – they crave spiritual chocolate and very often know that it is not a remedy and they will soon crash to earth but they have no mechanism, no support facility – prayer, Christian fellowship, church, Bible.
I’ve often heard the question why do we need to pray in groups, indeed I am quite sure I have asked the question at various times in my life. The local priest will ask his congregation to pray for the sick and the recently departed. Of course we don’t know for sure why this might be more powerful than a solitary prayer but we do know that the Bible tells us to pray regularly and this act of faith surely goes some way to building a relationship with our maker.
I have always thought that a truly righteous person (yes I know there is no such thing) will almost certainly have the ear of God over and above the pious hypocrite and so the law of large numbers is a factor in the power of prayer. This is a personal opinion and not part of Christian doctrine but I strongly also believe that whilst we pray for each other we also experience a sense of satisfaction that perhaps OUR prayers will be the ones that save the day and this feeling is an essential part of spiritual growth. Community prayer is an overwhelming energy force and this alone should answer the question – haven’t scientists proven that collective thought can almost work miracles?

Prince of Wales Reith Lecture - my favourite programme of the year

I watched spellbound at the heartfelt pearls of wisdom that so eloquently rattled off the tongue of our future King during his Reith Lecture last May.

“Respect for the Earth, Can Sustainable Development be Made to Work in the Real World?” was his subject and what a controversial one it turned out to be.

For myself I was enthralled by his passion, commonsense and informed knowledge gleaned by talking with many of the world’s leading experts in the field of climate change – a unique position that only someone of Prince Charles’ ilk could indulge.

Of course we had the usual detractors such as the ubiquitous Richard Dawkins who tends to get wheeled out at the first sign of religious or spiritual utterings, but on the whole the world sat up and took notice of this quite brilliant heartfelt speech.

In today’s Telegraph I read that 500 leading companies have backed the Prince of Wales’ campaign for concerted action on climate change. The likes of Shell, BP, EDF and Virgin have all signed a communiqué calling on world leaders to commit to cutting emissions by at least 50 per cent by 2050.

It may be too little too late and Charles did not sugar the pill during his speech but at least we have hope if we act now.

I don’t pretend to know all the ins and outs of the extent of the problem but the stats the prince quoted seemed pretty damning to me and put the fear of God in me as to what the likely scenario will be if nothing is done NOW.

Yes many Christians feel these uncertain times are the type described in the Bible as the precursor of the ‘end’ and indeed many of us might actually pray for deliverance from the evil of this world, however I feel sure that we are meant to repent the sins against our planet in the same way as those against God and it is not good enough to sit back and do nothing in the vain hope that all will be well.

I cannot believe the changes in technology I have witnessed in my lifetime and to me it only shows to prove how organisms can develop exponentially in the same way as the advances in computer science.

I hope we listen to the man and do something. The clues are all there for us to see!!

You can fool most of the people...............

I know it is stating the obvious and I know the only people who really believe that illusionist Derren Brown correctly predicted the National Lottery numbers are those that also believe that the Rovers is a real pub and that WWF wrestling is for real. However, an audience of more than 2.7 million suggests that a high percentage of the viewing public were either fascinated at the prospect of some true divine intervention or were merely curious as to Mr Brown’s modus operandi!!

I actually fall within the second group as I like to think I can work out most illusions and this particular one is a bog standard variance on the old tried and trusted ‘prediction’ trick that Derren himself often ends his shows with whereby a box hanging precariously and quite transparently above the stage throughout his act is opened to reveal an accurate account of all that has gone before………..Magic!

Derren Brown has quite a good patter, although not all magicians find it ethical that he often ‘lies’ to his audience rather than merely leaving them spellbound. I find him very clumsy sometimes when he is studying hidden set pieces and forgets to concentrate on the continuity of the act - and as for that mannerism whereby he appears to have just been injected with botox – well what’s that all about? Is this meant to denote his mystical qualities or perhaps the tic is his way of adjusting his collar as he really does have some neck!

Why I mention all this is because I was flabbergasted that the Daily Telegraph actually gave almost half a page to the Lottery phenomena with a header ‘Mystery remains as Derren Brown tries to explain lottery prediction’. Well Derren didn’t try too hard and in fact ended up saying how he didn’t do it!

I will not spoil the act by telling you how the trick was done but all I will say is that it is easier to perform such a feat in a studio than in someone’s living room.

Oh and sorry to disillusion all those avid fans of the psychic mediums such as Colin Fry and Derek Acorah – these people too are just performing an act, only sometimes they themselves do not even know it. It is very skilful and is as equally enthralling as watching the Undertaker or his ‘brother’ Kane but it ain’t real folks.

So why is my God so real to me when I cannot show you any more proof of Him than Derren Brown or Colin Fry can show proof of supernatural ability?

Because I want Him to be real! because the alternative is unthinkable! – oh yes this is undoubtedly true but it goes a little deeper than that I’m afraid – If I am deluding myself also then what is the downside of this? God doesn’t expect us to live our lives without joy and character so it is wrong to assume that we must automatically become pious - although some Christians do – and this is not necessarily a negative thing. The simple truth is that humans have a great propensity to cock up their lives if left to their own devices. Greed takes over, lust becomes addicted, alcohol, drugs, selfishness, jealousy all become the norm and then depression and anxiety takes hold – the good might feel guilt but without some constraints the evil that men do will always prevail as an acceptable barrier to love and respect and honesty. Not a single man alive or dead has managed to live a sinless life without God’s help. All have died with hope, some more than others, but the Christian ones have died with a faith and trust that they will be held accountable for their actions on earth and that this judgement might be favourable if they are truly reborn. You see there is no downside. People’s opinions mean nothing – Vanity Vanity Vanity – the cool factor is the biggest delusion of all. Who is cool? NO ONE – it is an illusion – in reality we are all lost souls trying to impress each other, trying not to show each other our weaknesses, scared of the judgements we will undoubtedly receive if our fellow man knew how uncool we really were. It is all just VANITY.

It is not that I don’t believe in the supernatural – I certainly do – and I have had many personal instances of the paranormal in my life, but I just KNOW that all those people I mention above are mere purveyors of an art form – all just Uri Gellers – the master of illusion who fooled entire nations with his trickery and earnt lots of money doing so.
If my God does not exist either then what have I lost? You see it is all about the journey and not about the arrival – that will always disappoint the lowly human being!
I know these words should remain unwritten and unsaid because some will automatically think my faith must be weak as I dare question the possibility of there not being a God but these are the same people who think I have a bad opinion of my own Catholic Church because I openly talk about all those wretched homosexual priests that have infiltrated the church and have subsequently been defrocked for their evil ways. To me it is a perfectly natural thing for someone with confused sexuality becoming a priest in the hope that they might lead a celibate life. Some will truly believe they can pull it off and others will not be true believers at all and will merely use the church for their own ends. This is the way of the world and does not make my church evil nor does it make organised religion evil. It is a proof of how low we can stoop without God in our hearts. Here again I must point out that I am not accusing homosexuals of anything and I love them as much as I love heterosexuals – I was once called homophobic by a member of my local Labour Party and it hurt like hell and is just not true – but in the Catholic faith priests are vetted as to suitability for the life of a priest and these people have subsequently shown themselves to be charlatans in the same way as homosexuals who give blood when they know they shouldn’t are charlatans. Yes it is discrimination but we are all discriminated against every day of our lives, especially the youth, but it is for the good of the majority most of the time and not a personal thing.

Enough said

Sisters are not doing it for themselves

I feel the need to comment briefly on Libby Purves’ column in this morning’s Sunday Telegraph.

The picture of a nurse with thermometer in hand below a caption reading ‘Clean up your act, sisters’ caught my eye as I was browsing the comment and analysis pages towards the back, and usually less interesting, section of the paper.

Libby suggests that the nursing profession’s once-spotless image has been tainted by recent revelations of neglect. She tells the story of one dignified old man who constantly fell out of bed because the nurses wouldn't put safety sides on: they quite erroneously and lazily said it would impair his "human rights". He died, in the end, by slipping down the bed one night and choking because they weren't watching, preoccupied with gossip at the nursing station. Apparently another woman was left bare-bottomed in a mixed ward because the nurses couldn't be bothered to draw the curtain!

Last week's report from the Patients Association – coming after the dreadful evidence earlier this year about the failings of Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust – shows that, despite the majority of good nurses, there is a growing rottenness, a seed of disregard and inhumanity within the profession.

Why I feel the need to comment is because my mother was a nurse all her working life and even when she became a ward sister for the last 15 years of her stint her attitude never changed. She was very much a hands-on carer, often shopping for her patients, but always washing them, lifting them, joking with them and certainly changing beds when accidents occurred beneath the sheets and mopping floors when they occurred on the ward.

Today the domestic staff can be counted on to do many of the jobs previously performed by nursing staff but the truth is you rarely see a ward sister outside the safety of her office and nurses often ignore the ‘beckon buzzers’ if something else takes priority – like a tea break, crossword puzzle, sudoku!!

Yes I am being slightly facetious and making sweeping generalisations against the main body of excellent staff but as Libby states ‘It may represent only 2 per cent. But it's there. And once disregard, inhumanity and carelessness take root, they grow at frightening speed’.

The Government's chief nursing officer, Dame Christine Beasley, said recently on Radio 4 that nurses had a clear duty to report poor practice by their fellows – if they don't, "in my book they're as culpable as the person who did it". Dame Christine admitted that reporting colleagues is hard, "especially more senior ones – but that's no excuse".

So that’s the answer then – please please please report bad practice if you are among the 98 per cent of nursing staff who believe nursing to be a vocation. If you are a victim of bad practice then complain to the trust or health authority. If you are an auxiliary worker on a ward then report bad practice to your superior. You owe it to all those people like my mother who gave their life to a profession that made a difference to people’s lives and gave the nation as a whole a great boost and sense of pride.

I can tell you this – In many countries (and some that we might call third world) they are appalled at our lack of patient care in our hospitals and if you were to be sick in an Indian hospital for instance then you would be attended constantly by various medics until you feel becalmed and relatively happy. Dignity is the most valuable of commodities and the elderly, who are often held in reverence in some countries, are clearly being let down in the original home of democracy and freedom.

In memory of Eric Carden

As i cycle around the Sussex streets passing pub after pub i am reminded of my dear friend Eric, sadly no longer with us.

Eric was that rare animal capable of charming all and sundry with his giving personality, modesty and wit. It is true to say that in all the years i knew him i never heard anyone say a bad word against him. There are few people i can say that about.

I first met Eric in the Half Moon public house in Crawley in early 1987. I was playing the quiz machine with very little success and Eric came up and introduced himself and invited me to a quiz there that evening. Martin, the landlord subsequently told me that the reason why i was having little success was that Eric had already taken the machine for a considerable amount and it was now in defence mode. Eric you see was a professional quiz machine player.

We soon became great friends and would have a day out together every week travelling around our pub circuit which included every establishment with a machine south of the Watford Gap. I was a non-drinker and would order a half of something and pour it into the nearest plant pot to deter landlords from barring my entry. We had some great laughs. As time went on, between us we learnt every answer on Crosswords, Give Us A Clue (Genus 1), Treble Top, A Question of Sport, Quiz Vaders, Every Second Counts, Inquisitor, Turnover, Wise Moves, Bar Quest and Give Us A Break, which meant we had all bases covered. We also both knew all the answers of a machine called Concentration whereby you scored points and then had to remember where pairs of cards were that flashed up on the screen. Together we were invincible on this machine as we would merely remember the top and bottom half individually and then pool our answers. On one occasion we found a box in the Romford Odeon (Eric was a past master at seeking out machines in the unlikeliest of places). We had clocked the machine up to £99 (we never went above £100 as we were always afraid it might reset itself as they only had a double-digit display) and were now very nervous at pressing 'collect' as these machines were notoriously noisy and we liked to keep a low profile as we were unsure we should really be walking in off the street and playing the machine without purchasing a ticket. As we pressed the button £80 in pound coins (that was all that was in the tubes) rifled out in quick succession, some initially shooting across the floor. The cinema staff rushed over and Eric as quick as a flash in order to allay attention uttered "we just won the jackpot but it has paid out in ten pences" to which the cashier replied equally as quickly "well done, i'll change them into notes for you". All seemed lost until Eric responded "no that's ok i actually collect ten pence pieces in a jar" - all the while i was surreptitiously stuffing the pound coins into my pockets.

The truth is Eric was never motivated by greed and he would invariably spend his profits in the pub he won them. He might spend an hour or two talking with the bar staff and quite often would either get roped into participating in their quiz nights or asked to host their quiz. This was the measure of the man that despite having a great talent for looting the pub quiz machine he was often the most popular person in the pub with both customers and bar staff.

Eric was a gentleman and a gentle man. He taught me a lot about people and how to interact with them in this alien environment to me, I initially did not buy a drink and wondered why i was constantly banned from pub after pub!

Eric was a great friend. He helped me prepare for my Mastermind efforts by asking me hundreds of questions about Elizabeth I and Mary of Scots. He also often helped out by setting questions for my fledgling British Quiz Championships. Eric was a considerable talent himself and is one of few people to have ever beaten the mighty Kevin Ashman on a television quiz show (Winner Takes All). More than his great brain and his gentleness and even his friendliness and accommodating manner was his humanity. Eric was a human being who had no side, no hidden agendas, no hatred, no vanity. You could rely on him - trust him implicitly. He was a good friend to me and i have many friends locally who miss him as much as i do. He was one of the good guys and i just wanted to remember him today and i wish he were still here. He inspired me to take part in quizzes. He had an over-inflated opinion of my ability but instilled great confidence in me and i almost wanted to be a good player in order not to let him down. He had an infectious laugh and humour played a big part in his life. He was brought up in the Liverpool of the Beatles era and knew them second hand from his older brother who played with a famous Merseyside band.

Eric was knowledgeable, interesting, funny, loveable, vulnerable and always capable of surprising you with a story or snippet of factual information. He was a class act.

Eric was my friend and i pray that he will live again

Shush - there's a Christian about!

Worried Christians worship in secret. This was the headlines of an article in The Daily Telegraph today.

The Very Rev John Hall, the Dean of Westminster, said believers were increasingly keeping their faith to themselves. He went on to criticise the decision to suspend a nurse, Caroline Petrie, who offered to pray for an elderly patient.

On the same page was another headline – Prayers got me fired, says GP. This was the case of a Muslim doctor, Musarrat Syed-Shah, who says she was sacked because she wanted to attend a mosque for prayers every Friday.

Both these stories highlight the growing religious intolerance prevailing in every aspect of human life.

I think I mentioned in a previous blog how I became persona non grata after visiting a children’s home in my locality and made the mistake of handing out Bibles to the kids and was subsequently refused entry. At the time I merely thought the home had something to hide but in hindsight it has become very clear that the chap in charge probably felt I was recruiting for my Christian army – God forbid!

Tony Blair has publicly stated that he hid his Christian beliefs while running the country and of course his master of spin Alistair Campbell once interrupted a question about the prime minister’s faith with 'I'm sorry, we don't do God.'

Broadcaster Jeremy Vine has also publicly declared that he daren’t mention his Christian faith on the radio for fear of reprisals.

What can we glean from these examples and would it be a good thing to abolish religion completely?

Of course there is no easy answer. Spiritual matters tend to be made very complicated by fickle human analysis and arguments for and against the worship of the God of love are fundamental to the ongoing ‘war’.

Take the John Lennon classic song Imagine as an example – One of my favourite songs begins:
Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

John asks us to imagine a world where there is no fear of repercussions for what we do. A worthy sentiment, if only the human spirit lent itself to always doing the right thing!

The song goes on
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

I love this idea of a global village with no boundaries of race, creed, or culture. Sounds like Heaven to me! Unfortunately John was blissfully unaware that was what he was describing so beautifully. Yes it is true that people kill each other in the name of patriotism and religion but the perpetrators of such crimes would operate within any context. To kill in the name of patriotism is only a very small leap from the mentality that prevails among football hooligans. Those that kill in the name of religion are not doing God’s work – He is more than capable of defending himself. To suggest that the world would be safer or more peaceful without religion is naïve bordering on delusion. Humans lie and cheat so naturally, even the best of them practice nepotism and a state of chaos would soon persist if human life was left to its own devices and God abandoned us.

The song finally describes Heaven on Earth – A way of life alien to so many people but those truly touched by the Holy Spirit. Of course John wrote these words in his disillusionment with human beings and the mechanisms by which they choose to remain disparate from each other – patriotism, religion and greed.

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

Far from being the atheists’ anthem that it would appear to be this song is every Christian’s dream for their fellow man. Yes we would love to live as one, live in peace, live in equality – often this is the initial appeal of converting to Christianity (or any religious denomination I should add) but since man’s first disobedience he has shown himself to be untrustworthy, fickle, irrational, moody, inconstant and several other adjectives of the same ilk which all add up to the same thing – man will ultimately cock up – every single time, without fail.

There is no such thing as a good person – we are all tainted – but we place an acceptable level of behaviour in the category of being good despite our shortcomings which without guidelines will eventually supersede the good. These guidelines are necessary, essential even, they are part of what we call religion.

Take the example of MPs’ expenses. Virtually every MP has been found guilty of abusing the system. Irrespective of what the fees office might allow all MPs should have enough foresight to know that they are going to be judged harshly by making speculative claims and I for one could not trust any public figure who blatantly milks the system for all its worth and then expects me to believe they have the necessary integrity to make important decisions in the public interest. Inevitably these people are tarnished in the same way as the bejewelled evangelists and defrocked priests. Guilty of bringing their profession into disrepute but not devaluing the message in any way, in fact the message is enhanced rather than diluted. We need good candidates.

Things are never quite what they seem in this world. On the whole people are greedy and self-serving. Those that become financially successful often throw a few crumbs about to ease their conscience and inflate their ego, those that become financially very successful tend to become megalomaniacs – true philanthropists are a rare breed indeed and all the ones I know are touched by the Holy Spirit.

I suppose Richard Dawkins is the most famous atheist in the UK. His method of rationalising religious beliefs is to concentrate on all the negative aspects of faith without ever giving a balanced view of the positive aspects. They do not exist to him!
I could write an A to Z of the negative aspects of Religions and it would be a far larger tome than his, larger than my A to Z of Everything – by far. I would though feel compelled to write about the positive aspects too and fear my life span is too short to complete such a book.

Holy Thursday

On this day, almost 2,000 years ago, Christ shared His last supper with His disciples and when He broke the bread and shared it with them He said six words which became the foundation of the daily Catholic Mass ‘Do This In Memory Of Me’ (Luke 22: 19).
The Eucharist (Christian sacrament commemorating the Last Supper) in its various forms of Holy Communion is celebrated daily, and often several times a day, in all Catholic churches and so every day this request is carried out, but today the anniversary becomes more poignant as we focus on the events that followed this meal.

My local Catholic Church, the Friary, reopened this evening after six months of much-needed refurbishments and but for it being Holy Thursday, commemorating the Lord’s Last Supper, one feels laudatory speeches would not have been out of place.
The building, recesses, wall icons, lighting and acoustics are all magnificent and to have all these elements coming together at the beginning of the always emotive Easter Vigil, with a congregation of hundreds, made for a very special evening.

I know some folk will think that it is obscene to spend huge sums of money on church decoration but isn’t it our duty to make the best possible use of our resources on earth and surely the spiritual home of our Lord should be the first charge on our income.
Remember that rare occasion when Jesus showed temper in the Jewish temple in Jerusalem when He witnessed it being used as a market-place (John 2:14-15).
Remember too when Mary, sister of Lazarus anointed the feet of Jesus with a pound of luxurious spikenard and Judas Iscariot, the keeper of the money-bag no less, asked why the ointment wasn't sold for three hundred denarii instead (about a years wages) and given to the poor. Jesus answered this accusation with ‘The poor you will always have but me you will not always have’. (John 12:3-8)

Doesn’t this give us an insight into how the Lord is a God of truth. Doesn’t this give us an insight into the Lord’s perfect reasoning skills and also how this God of love implies that we should budget responsibly, make honest assessments, not be judgmental of each other and above all –have a relationship with Him. Doesn’t this also tell us the way He would like us to feel about our blessed and holy places designed for His worship. For this is what a church is, make no mistake – a place of worship.

So although I believe the most modest of churches is of equal importance to the greatest of cathedrals in God’s eyes (as any church is only as good as the Christianity of its congregation) it is the Christian’s duty to strive to maintain or improve that household.

The Friary was crumbling, paintwork was peeling, and the PA system intermittently failing to the detriment of the service. All this created an air of despondency and uncertainty within the congregation as it became difficult to pay homage to the Lord with feedback ringing in one’s ears.

Yes, we are in a global recession and there is much wrong with the world, but we need to change the minds of man, not make false economies.

Praise the Lord for our churches – those hallowed havens of hope for all Christians

Suffer Little Children

Today, as with so many recent days, it rained, and this, coupled with various email received from friends, cycling team-mates and loved ones, led me to reflect on the problem of suffering.

In his poem ‘The Rainy Day’ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-82) concluded Into each life a little rain must fall, Some days must be dark and dreary.

These words were possibly inspired by the premature death, in childbirth, of his first wife, Mary Potter, but in any case later proved to be prophetic for the great man as he lost his second wife, Frances Appleton, in even more tragic circumstances when she accidentally set herself alight. Longfellow never really recovered from this second tragedy and took to his bed for long periods, too scared to sleep in case of not waking.

I've been very lucky with my health generally but I have always felt that when these human indignities are thrust upon us it tends to steel our spirits in a necessary way. Each time we suffer makes the next time just a little easier and we become more aware but more tolerant of our mortality. I remember when my dad sat me down a few years ago to discuss the merits of whether he should bother having surgery for cancer as he didn’t much fancy the treatment and knew that his restricted oesophagus and reduced stomach capacity would mean the loss of his gourmet lifestyle. To me he seemed to be taking an almost business-like approach to his life but I now know it was just the wisdom of advanced age and the human mechanism to rationalise and come to terms with the finite term we experience on Earth.

My dad is still going strong in his 88th year having made the right decision.

Coincidentally I have today received updates about several friends who are struggling through that despicable burden of ill-health. Mark and John have cancers, Sue is in a hospital bed not responding to any stimuli, Mario is worried that his wife Suzanne’s cancer has returned and Luke has had to have his right arm amputated after a mystery virus created complications.

May I ask anyone who reads this blog to pray earnestly for all of the above, with a repentant heart, as I believe the repentant heart has great power. In Luke 13 Jesus talks of the certainty of death of unrepentant sinners. You see it is all just a timing difference. We may die today or tomorrow but we shall hardly ever die when we, or our loved ones, are ready. The repentant sinner shall never die according to Jesus.

An earlier line in Longfellow’s ‘The Rainy Day’ goes Be still, sad heart! and cease repining; Behind the clouds is the sun still shining. The man truly knew the nature of suffering. All things must pass and indeed some tragedies are played out with joyous endings.

I have a friend who broke his back falling out of a tree. He is in constant pain and his paralysis has worsened over the years to the extent that he now requires 24-hour care and is confined to bed for long periods. Despite this Brian always has a joke to brighten your day and is an inspiration to all and sundry. He would actually tell you it was the best thing that ever happened to him as he didn’t really like the path his life was taking before that fateful day.

My brother Kevin had a similar accident to Longfellow’s second wife Frances, last year. He survived and visited me from his home in Ibiza this last Christmas.

It rained and then the sun shone.

Soap Opera Continuity

Having always been a fan of kitchen-sink drama I do occasionally dip into the nation’s favourite soaps Eastenders and Coronation Street. In recent years my enthusiasm has been tempered somewhat by a mixture of unbelievable storylines and little or no continuity. To me it shows scant disrespect for the viewing public.

To give recent examples of each of these misdemeanours might serve to highlight the waywardness of the respective writing teams.

Jack Branning and ‘tough guy’ Phil Mitchell had an altercation two years ago resulting in Phil duping his mother into signing over the car lot to Jack. This in itself was totally unbelievable as Phil had already ‘sorted out’ Jack in the past and is hardly the sort of bloke to roll over and play pussy. The premise was meant to be that Phil ‘got lucky’ the first time around but now Jack was ready for him………………… I ask you!

All was not lost I thought as Phil vowed vengeance on this dastardly lowlife former bent copper who had dishonoured him and, worst of all, his family. The retribution was going to be swift and bloody as everyone in the world knows “you do not mess with the Mitchells!”

Almost two years on and Jack and Phil have become almost bosom pals, teaming up in their fight against the even more dastardly Psycho Sean. Even when Jack’s brother Max solicited Phil’s help to make Jack ‘disappear’ Phil did not rise to this obvious opportunity to settle old scores.

Yes I know Jack Branning is a good character and the writers are loathe to kill him off but they should have thought of that before jeopardising his character’s existence.

A good example of an unbelievable storyline is the present Carla/Tony/Liam ménage à trois. Of course the viewer is privy to the information that Tony had Liam bumped off (literally), but when Maria tells all and sundry that Tony confessed to her is there no one with the nous to give her the benefit of the doubt as she is hardly a straitjacket case and the clues are there as Sir David Frost might say. Surely Carla would have a long meaningful chat with Maria in order to make sense of the death of the love of her life. What sort of friend is Fizz to simply dismiss her mate’s earnest pleas. Even normally supportive brother Kirk is seen constantly kowtowing to Saint Tony by apologising for his errant sister’s foolhardiness. And as for Norris…….well he has been a victim of Tony’s menacing threats first hand so you’d think he’d put two and two together and come up with four, especially in light of the disappearance of Jed Stone.
Perhaps Kevin might even suspect that the man who sabotaged his business is not likely to gain imminent beatification.

Again, I know Tony is a strong character and the writers are trying to prolong his soap life but please can we have just a hint of reality in our storylines.

Don't be Surprised by Joy

Sometimes in the bleak mid-winter months my mind turns to contemplation of shoes and ships and sealing wax and cabbages and kings.

As a new year starts and the stark waves of mortality wash through my brain I appraise what’s gone before, what is now and what is to come – for me - and for you.

For myself – at this moment in time - I feel that incredible emotion that CS Lewis described so beautifully in several of his works – Joy. Those three simple letters, which score so well at Scrabble (in almost any company) can be a Christian’s most potent defence against the vicissitudes of life. God in his wisdom withholds it from his children at some moments, and in his mercy pours it out on them at others.

Joy is at the heart of Christianity – it is that blessed gift that compels men and women into the fellowship of the Cross and transforms a wide, diverse throng of sad, lonely pilgrims into a community full of faith, hope and charity. In John 15: 11-12 Jesus says to His disciples “These things have I spoken unto you, that My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full. This is My commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you”. These words ultimately brought a motley gang of proud and competing sinners together into a fellowship of joy.

To understand Joy further I must hark back to the celebrated Clive Staples Lewis (Jack to his friends).
He distinguished joy from both happiness and pleasure. “Joy (in my sense) has indeed one characteristic, and one only, in common with them; the fact that anyone who has experienced it will want it again. Apart from that, and considered only in its quality, it might almost equally well be called a particular kind of unhappiness or grief. But it is a kind we want. I doubt whether anyone who has tasted it would ever, if both were in his power, exchange it for all the pleasures in the world. But then Joy is never in our power and pleasure often is”.

Jack Lewis gave many examples of joy and almost all contained a defining characteristic of longing—a deep yearning or poignant desire for something agonizingly elusive. Just as one’s pleasure in spring contains a memory of winter longings, joy for Jack Lewis always contained "the stab, the pang, the inconsolable longing". This underlying quality of joy was "that of an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction."

The German language has a word for this emotion - sehnsucht. This is the haunting longing that full, heavy, enveloping nostalgia for a fulfillment that awaits.

I have experienced this feeling many times in my life. At church mainly but in everyday life it might even be a smell – of leather as a reminder of my first day at school and my sparkling new satchel, or of something I know not what. Yes I have a smell from time to time that I have never been able to work out what it actually is, but whatever it is that I smell I am transported back to my childhood and an attic room in Limerick with a treasure chest moneybox and key in my hand, whereupon I first wondered what that magnificent odour was.

The really merciful times I have experienced this wonderful feeling of joy is when everything seems to be dark and gloomy and I am either feeling sorry for myself or for someone else.
I am immediately reminded of King Solomon’s words in Ecclesiastes 1 and how he came to realise that although he had experienced every pleasure available to mortal man it was all just vanity and man’s propensity to strive after wind. The end of this verse goes like this “For in the abundance of wisdom there is an abundance of vexation, so that he that increases knowledge increases pain”. This applies to many bright people I know but only the Christian ones are shielded from their pain by this gift of joy. It is this gift that allows someone who has suffered great human tragedy, perhaps the loss of a loved one, to come to terms with their suffering.

I have lost several friends this past year. It began with Jeremy and then Francis, and then John and then Audrey. The year before a great Christian man died. I had read his book which was a testimony of a Christian pastor. I had only met the man once, at the Whyteleafe Pentecostal Church, and he had given me a great laugh with his dancing and hopping about while still managing to say goodbye to a friend of his. He was full of joy you see.
After he died I visited his widow, Joan, and although not surprised at her reaction to her husband’s death, I was heartened by her faith that he was now with other saints who had slipped from this mortal coil. Joan showed me old photos and spoke with such joy that he was now fulfilled. But as I left she explained that although she felt joy at this particular moment she had also shed tears for her beloved husband. You see that is how joy is given to us by God.
It can be a respite from pain and grief.

Jack Lewis was even blessed enough to have married his joy, Joy Gresham to be precise – now how cool is that!

At the funeral of all four of those I mention above I felt an overwhelming joy at the celebration of life. At Jeremy’s humanist funeral I looked around at others I knew and I shared their grief for a personality which was simply irreplaceable. For Francis it was the same solidarity and love for someone we knew was a gentle man in every sense of the word.

John Piper was my old headmaster and I felt real grief to begin with that this great man went largely unheralded. But then the joy cut in. I remembered how I had knocked the top of my finger off playing football and how he had driven me to the hospital after his secretary had fainted at the sight of the bone sticking up. John waited with me all evening and right through the operation. Apparently he had always had a soft spot for me since my first year when I was awarded a 5/- book token for coming top in Maths, English and French but he had refused to hand out my selected choice of book, the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (my affinity with CS Lewis was already apparent it seems), as it was far too childish for a 12-year-old young man!

Audrey was a tough one on the surface. She had always treated me like a son and I was invariably invited to all the family bashes. I was also friends with all her four sons, Wayne my ex-hurdles training partner and golfing buddy had tragically taken his own life a few years earlier, Mark had become business man extraordinaire, Tony was now a successful Manchester poet and Dave was/is and always will be one of the most special guys in the whole world. Audrey had suffered from mental health problems in recent years and this illness had alienated her from many old friends but magically everyone remembered the kind and loving Audrey we all knew for so long. I was touched by joy that day too.

This Christmas my brother Kevin came home from Ibiza for the first time in many years. It was an exhilarating time for me but tinged with great sadness as unlike him I was unable to enjoy the company of others in my family at this time. I initially felt pangs of grief but this was taken away and replaced by joy. Joy for everyone’s happiness and delight – mine too. You see, I know everyone is fit and well and happy and so all is right with the world.

Now all we need to do is experience joy through this latest credit-crunch. Read more books instead of clubbing it – not mine necessarily – give up the booze, stop smoking, cycle perhaps instead of using the car. Forget the rat race for a while. Try praying some time, read the Bible, give church a go. All these things are economically viable and can be very joyful.