Brill Home Group

The Wednesday evening home group that meets at the Vicarage, will be looking at the writings of six short Old Testament prophets next term.  Actually, I don't know whether the prophets were short but certainly their wrtings were!  It will be interesting to discover what these men, who lived two and a half thousand years ago, might have to say to us and our society today.  I have a suspicion that, human nature being what it is, there might be some interesting parallels .   You are welcome to join us- 8.00 pm on the first and third Wednesday of each month.  Tina

War and Peace

Well this is definitely the peace bit, sitting on the Smetten's patio, drinking wine and looking at the view. A lovely end to the year at the Ashendon Home Group. We have finished our ethics course, but the last session was very interesting, thinking about the Christian response to War and Peace. Just a little snippet is below:

Principle 1: It is right to fight against injustice (see virtually all the prophets - but is there any hint of 'going to war?')

Principle 2: The kingdom of the Prince of Peace cannot be won with the weapons of this world (Matthew 5:38-48)

Principle 3: It is good to give one's life for others (John 15:13)

Principle 4: God has used war to fight injustice (Ex 15:3, Ps 144:1)

We meet again in September. Please contact Lesley or visit the website if you would like more information.

Salvador Dali, Christ of St John of the Cross

This picture by Salvador Dali aroused gasps of appreciation at the home group in Ludgershall on Thursday, we have been following the ICES material 'Snapshots of the Life of Christ' and this was the final session. I have loved the picture for a long time, and found the background material from ICES interesting and surprising:

This picture by Salvador Dali has aroused strong, even violent, emotions. When it was purchased for Glasgow Art Galleries for £8,200 there was a storm of protest. It was seriously damaged in 1961 by a 'mentally disturbed visitor’, who attacked it with a brick. In 2005 the picture was voted Scotland’s favourite painting in a poll conducted by The Herald newspaper.

It has been regarded as arrogant: ‘only God can look down on the cross’ and even as anti-Christian: no blood, no nails – a crucifixion denuded of its true significance. William Crozier organized a petition against the purchase of the painting. He said in an interview later 'You can’t imagine this man saying, ‘This day you will be with me in paradise’ but rather, ‘This day I will be with you in Hollywood’.

It is clear, however, that Dali himself intended it as an expression of his rediscovered Catholic faith. At the bottom of his studies for the Christ, he wrote: ‘In the first place, in 1950, I had a “cosmic dream” in which I saw this image in colour and which in my dream represented the “nucleus of the atom”. This nucleus later took on a metaphysical sense; I considered it “the very unity of the universe”, the Christ! In the second place, when thanks to the instructions of Father Bruno, a Carmelite, I saw the Christ drawn by Saint John of the Cross, I worked out geometrically a triangle and a circle, which “aesthetically” summarized all my previous experiments, and I inscribed my Christ in this triangle.’

The Archbishop of Glasgow, Mario Conti, speaks of the sense of calm that it engenders: suffering has now been overcome by peace. The victory is achieved.

The members of the home group asked me to find out the size of the painting, and the answer is 205 cm × 116 cm (80.7 in × 45.67 in). The effect the painting has on me is to remember that in my suffering God is there, we see the cross from God's perspective, our eyes travelling through the cross, through Christ's body to earth, the place that we live and work: From the eternal to the here and now. So often, when I am suffering I lose all perspective of God, but in this painting our pain and our lives are all held within the enveloping peace and love of God.

Picture from http:// www.glasgowmuseums.com/venue/page.cfm?venueid=4&itemid=68

A day in the life of a curate 3

I have been asked to explain what priests do on Monday to Saturday, and so I am dipping into random days to answer the question. Yesterday, the main events were a coffee morning, lunch with the pastoral team, a series of phone calls working on a green project I am involved in, and a home group in the evening:

Coffee Morning - this is open to the community every Thursday in the Brill URC. It is run by church volunteers and provides a great opportunity for people to meet and chat. There is a lot of laughter too. It is mainly retired people who come along. From the church's viewpoint it gives us a chance to serve the community and also to get to know people so that if they are unwell we can be aware and call in.

Lunch with the pastoral Team. The people who serve on this team run the coffee mornings in Brill, Ludgershall and Ashendon and visit those in the community who are unwell. They are a group who all have the gift of encouraging, every one of them has shown me immense kindness and support and they would be the first people to drop in on if I was feeling low.

Green Project. I am a great believer in saving the planet and have a few ideas up my sleeve.. more on this at some other time.

Home Group. It was the Ludgershall Home Group last night. I love it. We discussed the Great Commission:

Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

What I love about it is that we are able to discuss things and be very real, it is refreshing to be in a place that  supportive and honest, where everyone's views are respected. I love praying in that group too.

In amongst that was some emailing, and on reflection I realised that the most wonderful part of my job is I regularly see acts of kindness and immense generosity, between others and towards me. Here is a letter I received yesterday:

Dear Lesley

I do hope I can call you that for I feel as if I have known you for a long time.
However, I specially wanted to thank you again for the gentle and lovely way you conducted my daughter's funeral. It was also good to see you later but I was worried about you getting home safely.
I do hope you will find what you are looking for in life and that you will be happy.
Take good care of yourself - I shall remember you fondly.

x x

I often think I have the best job in the world.

Christian Ethics

Have you ever wondered how we make ethical decisions, especially in a Christian context? Do we use the Bible as a rule book, or throw away rules and base it all our decisions on love, or perhaps we are pragmatic and think about results.. How do you make decisions?

Do you use the RULES route

or the MOTIVES route

or the RESULTS route?

From January the Ashendon Home group will be looking at an Introduction to Christian Ethics using material from ICES. These will be the topics:
 14th Jan- Week 1 Introduction to three routes of ethical decision making.
Moral Issue: Euthanasia.
28^th Jan Week 2 – Using the Bible in Moral Decision Making.
Moral Issue: Abortion
11^th Feb Week 3 – Natural Law: Theory and critics
Moral Issue: Birth Enhancement
25^th Feb Week 4 – Human sexuality in God’s scheme
Moral Issue: Sexuality and Censorship
11^th Mar Week 5 – The lesser evil principle
Moral Issue: Divorce and Remarriage
25^th Mar Week 6 – Situation Ethics
Moral Issue: War


Contact Lesley Fellows to find out more.