December 2021
My friends,
As I write we are about to enter the season of Advent. And we begin the year by thinking about the end of time as we know it; we begin to prepare for new beginnings by acknowledging that the old must give way; and that we must make ourselves ready by awakening! It is a strange spiritual truth that we prepare for beginnings by considering endings.
Most of us here have seen so many Advents come and go that we risk becoming a little blaze, a little ho- hum, and if we have any reaction it is – how did we get to be back here again so soon? But maybe even the most organised and/or sentimental of us have been shaken by the pandemic and the state of the world and are open to feeling the tremor of change coming. I am certainly not ready for Christmas, for the birth of the baby, and I am most certainly not ready for the end of the world! I am too tired and too busy to be alert and awake.
But Advent asks of us, to voluntarily enter a state of readiness, wakefulness, of preparedness for the coming of the kingdom of God, or the reign of God in our hearts, minds and lives and in our time. Advent we have been told is about waiting but it is not a gently passive waiting. It is longing, a dissatisfaction with the world as it is, an openness to a new order – a restlessness for the ways of God.
The invitation, the commandment is to be alert or the image of being awake which has the potential to alarm. But paradoxically we are told to be alert but also to be on guard so that our hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and the worries of this world. In many ways Advent is an exploration of how to be alert but not anxious, to live in this in betweenness – in between the birth of baby Jesus and the coming of the cosmic Christ, in between the world that is and the world that could be, in between our sleepy desire for a comfortable life and our deep desire for in breaking of the reign of God.
I don’t want to be a pessimist, but we cannot truly long for the kingdom until we acknowledge the darkness, pain and violence and failure of life as it is. Our world needs more than just a bit of tinkering on the edges. Jesus did not come among us so business as usual could go on - although to a large extent that is what we in the church have worked hard to achieve!
The truth is it is hard to desire real change, even good change. And to those of us who are a bit feint hearted let me share some words from Maria Boulding (The Coming of God, 1982):
“If you want God, and long for union with God, yet sometimes wonder what that means or whether it can mean anything at all, you are already walking with the God who comes. If you are at times so weary and involved with the struggle of living that you have no strength even to want God, yet are still dissatisfied that you don’t, you are already keeping Advent in your life. If you have ever had an obscure intuition that the truth of things is somehow better, greater, more wonderful than you deserve or desire, that the touch of God in your life stills you by its gentleness, that there is a mercy beyond anything you could ever suspect, you already drawn into the central mystery of salvation.
Your hope is not a mocking dream; God creates in human hearts a huge desire and a sense of need, because God wants to fill them with the gift of God’s own self. It is because God’s self-sharing love is there first, forestalling any response or prayer from our side, that such hope can be in us. We cannot hope until we know, however obscurely, that there is something to hope for; if we have had no glimpse of a vision, we cannot conduct our lives with vision. And yet we do: there is hope in us, and longing, because grace was there first. God’s longing for us is the spring of our longing for God.”
Even so, come Lord Jesus Christ, come into our broken world with your healing wholeness. Amen!
Advent Carol Service.
It's unbelievable that Advent is here, Advent Sunday being the 28th November. We shall be holding our traditional Advent Carol Service on the 28th at 6:00pm. I think that the Advent Carols are as wonderful as the Christmas Carols. This will last for just over an hour and be followed by seasonal libations! (Just for your diary the Nine Lessons and Carols will be on the 19th December).
Liturgical Gospel for Year C
Each year we change our Gospel readings, this is on a three year cycle and this begins on Advent Sunday , this year's readings come from The Gospel According to St Luke. St Luke, in many respects, shows us the human face of Jesus, with the story of the prodigal son, the good Samaritan and the widow's lost coin. The overriding message of the book of Luke is, that God has acted through Jesus Christ to meet our deepest needs and encourages us to welcome God's actions throughout our lives and, in turn, to go out and offer God's mercy to the world around us.
Junior Church
We have now resumed our Junior Church for children and young people at St Cyprian’s. We will invite those children who wish to attend Junior Church to come down to the crypt with the leaders at the Gloria (about 5 minutes into the service, after the Confession), and then to come back upstairs to rejoin their families around the time the Peace (about two-thirds of the way through the service).We will ensure we always have two adults present for Junior Church. Our volunteers are DBS-checked. We will need to ensure the DBS checks are brought up to date as necessary.
North Paddington Food Bank
We are restarting our collection for the Food Bank. If you are able to donate dried or tinned produce or toiletries that would be greatly appreciated. Please help.
You priest and friend
Fr Michael
Into our busy lives, O God, bring your peace and tranquillity, your love and compassion, so that we, in turn, may bring the joy of the Good News to all and show the caring face of God to others through our actions.
Amen.
My friends,
As I write we are about to enter the season of Advent. And we begin the year by thinking about the end of time as we know it; we begin to prepare for new beginnings by acknowledging that the old must give way; and that we must make ourselves ready by awakening! It is a strange spiritual truth that we prepare for beginnings by considering endings.
Most of us here have seen so many Advents come and go that we risk becoming a little blaze, a little ho- hum, and if we have any reaction it is – how did we get to be back here again so soon? But maybe even the most organised and/or sentimental of us have been shaken by the pandemic and the state of the world and are open to feeling the tremor of change coming. I am certainly not ready for Christmas, for the birth of the baby, and I am most certainly not ready for the end of the world! I am too tired and too busy to be alert and awake.
But Advent asks of us, to voluntarily enter a state of readiness, wakefulness, of preparedness for the coming of the kingdom of God, or the reign of God in our hearts, minds and lives and in our time. Advent we have been told is about waiting but it is not a gently passive waiting. It is longing, a dissatisfaction with the world as it is, an openness to a new order – a restlessness for the ways of God.
The invitation, the commandment is to be alert or the image of being awake which has the potential to alarm. But paradoxically we are told to be alert but also to be on guard so that our hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and the worries of this world. In many ways Advent is an exploration of how to be alert but not anxious, to live in this in betweenness – in between the birth of baby Jesus and the coming of the cosmic Christ, in between the world that is and the world that could be, in between our sleepy desire for a comfortable life and our deep desire for in breaking of the reign of God.
I don’t want to be a pessimist, but we cannot truly long for the kingdom until we acknowledge the darkness, pain and violence and failure of life as it is. Our world needs more than just a bit of tinkering on the edges. Jesus did not come among us so business as usual could go on - although to a large extent that is what we in the church have worked hard to achieve!
The truth is it is hard to desire real change, even good change. And to those of us who are a bit feint hearted let me share some words from Maria Boulding (The Coming of God, 1982):
“If you want God, and long for union with God, yet sometimes wonder what that means or whether it can mean anything at all, you are already walking with the God who comes. If you are at times so weary and involved with the struggle of living that you have no strength even to want God, yet are still dissatisfied that you don’t, you are already keeping Advent in your life. If you have ever had an obscure intuition that the truth of things is somehow better, greater, more wonderful than you deserve or desire, that the touch of God in your life stills you by its gentleness, that there is a mercy beyond anything you could ever suspect, you already drawn into the central mystery of salvation.
Your hope is not a mocking dream; God creates in human hearts a huge desire and a sense of need, because God wants to fill them with the gift of God’s own self. It is because God’s self-sharing love is there first, forestalling any response or prayer from our side, that such hope can be in us. We cannot hope until we know, however obscurely, that there is something to hope for; if we have had no glimpse of a vision, we cannot conduct our lives with vision. And yet we do: there is hope in us, and longing, because grace was there first. God’s longing for us is the spring of our longing for God.”
Even so, come Lord Jesus Christ, come into our broken world with your healing wholeness. Amen!
Advent Carol Service.
It's unbelievable that Advent is here, Advent Sunday being the 28th November. We shall be holding our traditional Advent Carol Service on the 28th at 6:00pm. I think that the Advent Carols are as wonderful as the Christmas Carols. This will last for just over an hour and be followed by seasonal libations! (Just for your diary the Nine Lessons and Carols will be on the 19th December).
Liturgical Gospel for Year C
Each year we change our Gospel readings, this is on a three year cycle and this begins on Advent Sunday , this year's readings come from The Gospel According to St Luke. St Luke, in many respects, shows us the human face of Jesus, with the story of the prodigal son, the good Samaritan and the widow's lost coin. The overriding message of the book of Luke is, that God has acted through Jesus Christ to meet our deepest needs and encourages us to welcome God's actions throughout our lives and, in turn, to go out and offer God's mercy to the world around us.
Junior Church
We have now resumed our Junior Church for children and young people at St Cyprian’s. We will invite those children who wish to attend Junior Church to come down to the crypt with the leaders at the Gloria (about 5 minutes into the service, after the Confession), and then to come back upstairs to rejoin their families around the time the Peace (about two-thirds of the way through the service).We will ensure we always have two adults present for Junior Church. Our volunteers are DBS-checked. We will need to ensure the DBS checks are brought up to date as necessary.
North Paddington Food Bank
We are restarting our collection for the Food Bank. If you are able to donate dried or tinned produce or toiletries that would be greatly appreciated. Please help.
You priest and friend
Fr Michael
Into our busy lives, O God, bring your peace and tranquillity, your love and compassion, so that we, in turn, may bring the joy of the Good News to all and show the caring face of God to others through our actions.
Amen.
