Category: Thought for the Week

It is often easy to feel sympathy for someone, to recognise that they are in distress and feel sorry for them. Empathy goes beyond this; it is an attempt to (mentally) enter into their world and to share in their pain. It is a relatively recent word, first found in English in 1908 and being a translation of a technical term being used by German psychologists. However the deep sharing of another’s feelings is surely much older. It is perhaps something we need to be careful with; I try to avoid telling people I know how they feel, as it is unlikely that I fully know all the nuances of their feelings. I sometimes worry that it is used as a form of virtue signalling; the person declaring themselves as empathetic really just wants those around them to know what a considerate person they are. But those reservations aside, the ability to use our imagination to try and enter into another person’s broken life can help us understand their situation, even if all we can do is to sit in silence with them. At the heart of the Christian message is that God not only has sympathy, he/she has (uniquely?) real empathy through coming into our world through Jesus, both fully God and fully human. The carol, Once in Royal David’s City, written in 1848, has the lines “And He feeleth for our sadness, And He shareth in our gladness”. Perhaps had it been written a century later, the words would have been slightly different, to make it clear God completely feels and shares both in our sadness and our gladness. There are times when I think I can only worship a God who is truly empathetic with us.

Rev David Poyner

The summer solstice, the longest day, is upon us.  Midsummer Day has always been celebrated; we are holding a concert in Glazeley Church as well a local history exhibition, as part of our festivities to mark 150 years since the church was rebuilt. In pagan times, Midsummer Day had particular significance for those who worshiped a sky or an earth god. Memories of the pagan significance were probably long lost following the conversion of this country to Christianity, but what was remembered was that the day was one to mark with a celebration. 

As far as I know, the Christian calendar is silent about Midsummer’s day; we have no special service. But, by coincidence, the New Testament reading appointed for it is Jesus’s teaching on worry and in this he uses a very appropriate nature image; “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these”. Perhaps that is a sufficient thought for the day.

Rev David Poyner

On Thursday, just as I was on the point of giving up, I went out into my garden at 11pm and there I saw it; the “strawberry moon”, which I had read about on the BBC news website. It is full moon that stays very low in the sky; as such it appears larger than usual and also has a red/orange glow. It is rare, the next time it will happen will be in 20 years time. It was spectacular; when I first glanced it, obscured by a tree, I thought it was an orange street light. Of course, being a vicar, I thought not of strawberries but of the Bible verses which speak of the moon being turned to blood, a sign of coming judgement from God. Now, I know that is not the explanation; the event is a consequence of the orbit of the moon and earth and way reflected light behaves when it is scattered by dust in the earth’s atmosphere. It is not a sign sent by God. And yet, there was something spiritual about the sight; it was beautiful and it was moving. I am tempted to say that where there is beauty, there is also God but God is present alongside us everywhere, including what is dark and ugly. Perhaps it is better to say that beauty, natural or manmade, can point us to God, who is ultimate beauty, the joy of our desiring.

Rev David Poyner

This Sunday, 8^th June, the church celebrates Pentecost, or Whit Sunday to give it its traditional name. It celebrates the coming of the Holy Spirit. In Christian belief, Jesus warned his disciples that he would be leaving them as he returned to Heaven, but he would send his spirit/the Holy Spirit/the comforter/advocate, depending on which passage from the Bible you read and how you translate the Greek. And again, depending on which account you read, he himself breathed the spirit on them, or it came as tongues of fire when the disciples were alone in a room in Jerusalem. Either way, the results were dramatic; eleven confused and timorous disciples and accompanying women became inspired witnesses to the teaching of Jesus, accepting persecution and even death for the cause of their risen Lord.

The marks of the Holy Spirit in Christians today are as varied as the New Testament accounts of him/her. Some claim supernatural powers in the name of the Spirit. I do not deny the reality of any persons experience but that is not what I know. Instead I have a different story, one I share with John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, but also a Church of England vicar like myself. He spoke of how he flet his heart “strangely warmed within him”. And, in my better moments, at prayer, in or out of church,  simply living my life, I also know that feeling. That is what I call the Holy Spirit.

Rev David Poyner

A couple of weeks ago, I was at a service in one of the smallest of our local churches. Given the size of the village, I thought the congregation of five was quite respectable. Interestingly, it turned out that only two of us were actually Anglicans; one was from another denomination, two followed another faith. The Church of England is the established church of England. This means that, through the parish system, it is present in every community. The vicar is there for all in the community, the parish church is open to all regardless of their faith, or lack of it. It seems to me that one mark of a vibrant local church is that they provide a space and a service where those who are not members of the Church of England find it worth their while to come and simply be, in the presence of the God who they may call by many different names. We are open to all.

Rev David Poyner

This coming Sunday, 25^th May, is Rogation Sunday. Historically this was a very popular festival. It probably has its origins in a Roman fertility festival, when the fields were blessed for a good harvest. This continued in the Christian version, where there would be a procession from the church, stopping to bless the fields in the parish as well as to ensure that all boundaries were in their right place. Alas, the popularity of the festival was less due to the pious prayers of  the parishioners and more to the amount of alcohol that was consumed; walking the bounds is thirsty work. Factor in the excitement when it was suspected that the neighbouring parish had pinched some land, which needed to be settled with fists, and perhaps it is not surprising that the church and civil authorities supressed the festival where they could. There has been something of a revival and some parishes now observe a more sober version of the custom.

Whilst I have never done a rogation walk from church, I like the idea of taking worshippers out of the church building into the outside world. At its best, the rogation walk is a symbol of how the parish church is there for the whole community, whatever their faith. The walking of the bounds shows that we pray and care for all who live or work within them. It is real expression of the claim of the Church of England, that we have a presence, through the parish, in every community in the country. I pray this may continue to be the case.

Rev David Poyner

Gregory Dix was a priest, a monk and a historian, remembered by the Church of England. His particular passion was the development of the service of Holy Communion, the Eucharist, where the church gathers together to take consecrated bread and wine as instructed by Jesus, in remembrance of him and because they represent his body and blood. Although he died in 1951 and modern scholars might take issue with some of his views, he is justly famous for his reflection on Jesus’s command to his disciples, spoken the evening before Good Friday. I first came across his words in 1979; they continue to move me.

“[Jesus told his disciples to celebrate Holy Communion]. Was ever another command so obeyed? For century after century, spreading slowly to every continent and country and among every race on earth, this action has been done, in every conceivable human circumstance, for every conceivable human need from infancy and before it to extreme old age and after it, from the pinnacle of earthly greatness to the refuge of fugitives in the caves and dens of the earth. Men have found no better thing than this to do for kings at their crowning and for criminals going to the scaffold; for armies in triumph or for a bride and bridegroom in a little country church; …. for the wisdom of the Parliament of a mighty nation or for a sick old woman afraid to die; ….  while the lions roared in the nearby amphitheatre; on the beach at Dunkirk; while the hiss of scythes in the thick June grass came faintly through the windows of the church; tremulously, by an old monk on the fiftieth anniversary of his vows; furtively, by an exiled bishop who had hewn timber all day in a prison camp near Murmansk… —one could fill many pages with the reasons why men have done this, and not tell a hundredth part of them. And best of all, week by week and month by month, on a hundred thousand successive Sundays, faithfully, unfailingly, across all the parishes of Christendom, the pastors have done this just to make the plebs sancta Dei—the holy common people of God.”

Rev David Poyner

My sisters and brothers in Christ in the Roman Catholic Church know how to put on a spectacle. Pope-making shows this in all its splendour. The cardinals are locked into the Sistine Chapel, the decision is conveyed by a plume of white smoke and the first words that are spoken are in Latin, by a man dressed as a Roman senator. Contrast that with the committee which has been meeting since the start of the year to appoint a new Archbishop of Canterbury.  The cardinals were locked in the Sistine Chapel so that they could better discern the will of God. I’m never quite sure how that works; I am always aware that the Divine will has first to penetrate my own flawed mind. But there is a wonderful line on the BBC website about the process; how  the cardinals were to consider “not just what the institution and Catholic believers needed, but also what humanity needed at a difficult juncture, with war and division the backdrop”. I love the breath of that vision. The Church of God is for all people, believers and non-believers. I know nothing about Pope Leo, Robert Prevost, beyond what I have read this morning but my own prayer is that he, like Francis, will speak truth and hope to all.

Rev David Poyner

Thought for the week is currently on holiday in the Outer Hebides. It is a wild landscape: rough moorland, rugged coasts, sweeping beaches. A few years ago, on a similar trip when I was feeling especially pious  I recall staring at the rock forms as I walked over a beach between two islands  wondering what God was saying to me. Perhaps it would be a profound message about Exodus, crossing the waters of life? On retrospect, I think what God was actually saying to me was that I was on holiday and to lighten up a bit. So I have no profound meditations to offer, just a feeling that the next time I have to deal with an irritating memo from a senior member of clergy, I will be better able to do this because of a week away not doing anything. God moves in a mysterious way.

Rev David Poyner

Give thanks for the life of Pope Francis, for his humility and leadership. Pray for all who mourn him as friend.

Pray for all those who seek to reform the church, to make it more truly Christ-like. Remember the cardinals who are meeting to select a successor for Francis; pray also for the committee who are working to appoint the next Archbishop of Canterbury. 

Pray for peace in the world, especially the negotiations about Ukraine; ask that there may be a just settlement.

Pray for the Christians of Sri Lanka, ranked 61st in the list of countries where Christians suffer persecution and discrimination. Give thanks for the work of Open Doors as it supports the persecuted church.