Month: November 2025

A couple of days ago, I was with a small group of people from neighbouring villages. We were sharing stories of past times, told to us by our parents and grandparents. We were all local; a century ago our grandparents would all have known each other and could well have met in the same way to share stories told to them by their grandparents. In this part of Shropshire, local ties are still very strong; it is not often I go to a church on this side of the Clee Hill and do not have some kind of family connection with it. But I also know that there has always been movement between communities; new faces were always arriving in search of work and sons and daughters moved away to make their own way in life. The arrival of coal miners from East Shropshire, 200 years ago in Highley and Billingsley, would have seemed like a big change, although some at least stayed to enrich the communities. And so to the flags that now proliferate… I am proud of my own local links and have no problem with celebrating this. But I also recognise the value of outsiders, the importance of generosity to newcomers. I am happy to fly a flag, as long as it is to celebrate, not to exclude.

Rev David Poyner

Today has been a frustrating day; tried to do a lot but it feels as though I have done nothing and I am now short of time. The one thing I did do was meet up with Kina, my gaffer as vicar, although I doubt she sees herself like that. We periodically meet to exchange thoughts and report on what we are doing. At the end of the meeting, she told me that, as we prayed, she had a vision of a bumblebee. The bumblebee is small and individually insignificant. It is a fragile insect, but actually part of a much greater whole, the nest. As an individual, it simply does the little it can, oblivious of the greater whole. But without individual bumblebees doing their bit, the nest would fail. And without nests of bumblebees, our crops would fail as they are some of the main pollinators. Kina did not know that one of my sins of omission was that I had not written this article today; I was not sure what to write about. But I do now….

Rev David Poyner

As I write, the rain is incessant and is forecast to continue all day, so perhaps this is not the best time to write about the wonders of nature. However, we have had some very pleasant autumn days and I have really noticed the colours in the leaves. After the  drought in the spring and summer, I did wonder if any leaves would last until autumn, but I need not have worried. The colours seem particularly rich this year. The author of Psalm 8 famously wrote how the heavens proclaim the glory of God. As a scientist, I am often wary of arguments that the natural world somehow proves the existence of God; the world follows physical rules and they, at least at one level, explain how it operates. However, I still think Psalm 8 has a point. I am a scientist because I love the beauty of nature. I seek to understand what I see in terms of biology, chemistry and physics, but when I have seen the autumn colours this year, my response has been emotional. I have simply rejoiced at the beauty and that emotion connects me with what I call God, even though I believe that God works through quantum mechanics and evolution by natural selection. Emotion and intellect are not in conflict; they work together.

Rev David Poyner

When I was at vicar school memories were fresh of the TV comedy series “Rev”, about a hapless vicar trying to run a parish in London. Most people thought this was a comedy; I thought it was a training manual. A decade later, I am still following the instructions I learnt from it.  One episode started with the hapless Rev Adam and his deputy on Remembrance Sunday, standing alone at a war memorial now surrounded by high-rise flats, observing the two minute silence. Nobody else was there; it was just them remembering. And so, this Sunday, a member of the congregation will be in Billingsley Church on Remembrance Sunday. He will ring the bells just before 11am, then pause for 2 minutes and ring the bells again. At Sidbury, a member of the congregation will be at the soldier cut-out, at the head of the drive to the church. He will read the exhortation “At the going down of the sun….”, observe the two minute silence at 11am and then end with the Kohima epitaph, “when you go home…”. I imagine both will be alone; I will be leading remembrance at Glazeley so cannot join them. It really does not matter. On Remembrance Sunday, at 11am, they will be acting on behalf of their communities to remember the sacrifice of past generations. In fact they will not quite be alone; alongside them will be all the company of Heaven.

Rev David Poyner