When I read my First Ramble for May (see previous post) to daughter Ashley, she asked what was bothering me, and when I told her, she said that I ought not to put the post in the church newsletter because it represented a scholarship that was outside the experience of most people. But I'm glad I got the Chesterton thing off my chest, because along with watching "Braveheart" and reading Churchill's "The Island Race", it made me feel a lot better about the current status of my beloved Anglican Communion, or at least about my place in it. And so now I offer someting that might be a bit more helpful to a few more people.
Rector’s Rambling- May 2010
At last it rained! I’ve been waiting all week. Watering new plants and seeded beds is incredibly time consuming, and yet is so necessary this time of year if the weather does not cooperate. For a number of years now I have found myself at odds with most of my neighbors and friends when spring and summer roll around. They tend to welcome daylight savings time because it leaves longer evenings and saves energy. I like standard time because it gives me an extra hour in the morning to take care of animals and the garden. They like sunny days and clear days because they allow time for their chosen pursuits. I generally prefer slightly cloudy skies and regular rain because such days make it easier to start plants in the greenhouse or in the garden. Small scale agriculture and agrarian living in general also puts me at odds with most of my neighbors and friends regarding what wild or domestic animals are desirable and which ones ought to be classed as vermin. As a weed is a plant, sometimes a very beautiful plant, in the wrong place. Vermin can be defined as a species of animal, sometimes quite beautiful animals, of which it can be said that three are picturesque on someone else’s property. Thus raccoons are vermin because they spread disease and chew leather. Deer are vermin because they eat corn and beans. Canada Geese are vermin because… well, you know the answer to that one. The list shifts by the season and goes on and on, but I think you get the idea. All of us have our own reasons for determining what is desirable and what is not desirable, and few of our lists agree all of the time.
Thinking about such things led me inevitably today to consider how our lists of behavioral expectations as Christians differ from the lists of society at large. Certainly they coincide at many places with the lists of our neighbors who are not Christian- all of us for example say that murder is a bad thing- but where do the differences lie? The historic position of our Holy Mother the Church is that holy matrimony is a relationship between a man an a woman, contracted for life in the presence of God and witnesses, which is designed to demonstrate to all the world the nature of the relationship between Jesus Christ and His Church; and which is designed to produce and rear children, to provide a buffer and an outlet against illicit carnal behavior, and to provide a man or a woman with “an helpmeet” to meet the ordeals of life. My guess is that a poll of the nation at large would reveal that most people do not define marriage in such a way. Or consider the question of authority in life. Our Anglican faith tells us that the Bible is the ultimate authority in our faith and practice, and that it contains everything we need to know in order to be saved and to lead a “godly, righteous, and sober life.” It also informs us that the Bible (which is the revealed truth of God in written form) when properly understood, will never contradict true science (which is God’s revelation in nature.) Our Anglican faith goes on to say that the Bible is properly understood when we inform our discussions about it with the teachings of the church through the ages (which we call “the holy tradition”) and when we understand it by using reason (which consists of all the ways we know God and his truth, and which is a part of the image of God in which we are created.) The outgrowth of this traditional set of beliefs about the Bible is of course that we ought to do what the Bible says clearly that we should do, and that we ought not to do what the Bible says clearly that we ought not to do. Anglicanism teaches us that when there are serious grey areas, we ought to agree to disagree in love, and that we ought not to try to force our opinions and expectations on others.) In my experience, most people, even most people in the church, do not believe those things about the Bible.
And so I come back to the point that we all have lists by which we live and by which we order our lives. The question is, “Do the lists by which I live identify me as a person of genuine Christian faith?” The question is simple, and I imagine that the answer is sometimes very uncomfortable, even for the best of us. In this month to come, I hope we will all take the time to examine our “faith lists” honestly, and that through such a prayerful examination, God will draw us ever closer to himself.
Sincerely,
Bill+
Friday, April 16, 2010
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Rector's Rambling, May 2010- Alfredus Magnus
Rector’s Rambling- May 2010
Those who know me best say that I am rather predictable. Some of them also know that when I truly believe that my world is passing, I reach for a well thumbed copy of G. K. Chesterton’s “Ballad of the White Horse.” The flurry of Easter activities precluded my reading of the news about our denomination, country, and world. But the passing of that great day led me back to the news servers, and I reached again for my well loved copy of the story of King Alfred and my other beloved friends. Mark, the dutiful Roman, has always called me to what I hope to be, but fear I am not. On the eve of the Battle of Ethandune “His speech was a single one,… Dig for me where I die, he said…Bear not my body home, For all the earth is Roman earth, And I shall die in Rome.” Eldred the Saxon has always been my favorite character. In the midst of battle he thought of beautiful things, and of home. “But while he moved like a massacre, He murmured as in sleep, And his words were all of low hedges, And little fields and sheep. Even as he strode like a pestilence, That strides from Rhine to Rome, He thought how tall his beans might be, If ever he went home.” And then there is “Alfred born in Wantage, who (sic) Rules England till the doom.” Of him our Lady had spoken, “But you and all the kind of Christ, Are ignorant and brave, And you have wars you hardly win, And souls you hardly save. I tell you naught for your comfort, Yea, naught for your desire, Save that the sky grows darker yet, And the sea rises higher.” And yet Alfred did prevail for a time, though his world was changed forever. In his brokenness and humility, he faithfully lifted high the Cross of Christ, knowing full well that every generation of Christians would be called to do the same.
And now is our time, for the vision of Alfred is fulfilled. “I have a vision, and I know, The heathen shall return. They shall not come with warships, They shall not waste with brands, But books be all the eating, And ink be on their hands. Not with the humor of hunters, Or savage skill in war, But ordering all things with dead words, Strings shall they make of beasts and birds, And wheels of wind and star. They shall come mild as monkish clerks, With many a scroll and pen; And backward shall ye turn and gaze, Desiring one of Alfred’s days, when pagans still were men…By this sign you shall know them, The breaking of the sword, And Man no more a free knight, That loves or hates his lord. Yea, this shall be the sign of them, The sign of dying fire; And man made like a half-wit, That knows not of his sire. What though they come with scroll and pen, And grave as a shaven clerk, By this sign you shall know them, That they ruin and make dark. By all men bound to Nothing, Being slaves without a lord, By one blind idiot world obeyed, Too blind to be abhorred; By terror and the cruel tales, Of curse in bone and kin, By weird and weakness winning, Accursed from the beginning, By detail of the sinning, And denial of the sin; By thought a crawling ruin, By life a leaping mire, By a broken heart in the breast of the world, And the end of the world’s desire; By God and man dishonoured, By death and life made vain, Know ye the old barbarian, The barbarian come again- When is great talk of trend and tide, And wisdom and destiny, Hail that undying heathen, That is sadder than the sea. In what wise man shall smite him, Or the Cross stand up again, Or charity or chivalry, My vision saith not; and I see No more; but now ride doubtfully To the battle of the plain.”
And so with Alfredus Magnus, Rex Brittorum, I am called to ride forth this day. How the battle will progress I cannot know, but I know the end. In faithfulness and patience we are called to serve our Lord, and that will be enough. As the good king sang before the Dane, “That though you hunt the Christian man, Like a hare on the hill-side, The hare has still more heart to run, Than you have heart to ride. That though all lances split on you, All swords be heaved in vain, We have more lust again to lose, Than you to win again.” Let us rise above our realities and serve faithfully that greater truth.
To Christ, the True King!
Bill+
Citations are from G.K. Chesterton, The Ballad of the White Horse, SanFrancisco, Ignatius Press, 2001 (A beautiful reprint of the 1928 edition illustrated by Robert Austin)
Those who know me best say that I am rather predictable. Some of them also know that when I truly believe that my world is passing, I reach for a well thumbed copy of G. K. Chesterton’s “Ballad of the White Horse.” The flurry of Easter activities precluded my reading of the news about our denomination, country, and world. But the passing of that great day led me back to the news servers, and I reached again for my well loved copy of the story of King Alfred and my other beloved friends. Mark, the dutiful Roman, has always called me to what I hope to be, but fear I am not. On the eve of the Battle of Ethandune “His speech was a single one,… Dig for me where I die, he said…Bear not my body home, For all the earth is Roman earth, And I shall die in Rome.” Eldred the Saxon has always been my favorite character. In the midst of battle he thought of beautiful things, and of home. “But while he moved like a massacre, He murmured as in sleep, And his words were all of low hedges, And little fields and sheep. Even as he strode like a pestilence, That strides from Rhine to Rome, He thought how tall his beans might be, If ever he went home.” And then there is “Alfred born in Wantage, who (sic) Rules England till the doom.” Of him our Lady had spoken, “But you and all the kind of Christ, Are ignorant and brave, And you have wars you hardly win, And souls you hardly save. I tell you naught for your comfort, Yea, naught for your desire, Save that the sky grows darker yet, And the sea rises higher.” And yet Alfred did prevail for a time, though his world was changed forever. In his brokenness and humility, he faithfully lifted high the Cross of Christ, knowing full well that every generation of Christians would be called to do the same.
And now is our time, for the vision of Alfred is fulfilled. “I have a vision, and I know, The heathen shall return. They shall not come with warships, They shall not waste with brands, But books be all the eating, And ink be on their hands. Not with the humor of hunters, Or savage skill in war, But ordering all things with dead words, Strings shall they make of beasts and birds, And wheels of wind and star. They shall come mild as monkish clerks, With many a scroll and pen; And backward shall ye turn and gaze, Desiring one of Alfred’s days, when pagans still were men…By this sign you shall know them, The breaking of the sword, And Man no more a free knight, That loves or hates his lord. Yea, this shall be the sign of them, The sign of dying fire; And man made like a half-wit, That knows not of his sire. What though they come with scroll and pen, And grave as a shaven clerk, By this sign you shall know them, That they ruin and make dark. By all men bound to Nothing, Being slaves without a lord, By one blind idiot world obeyed, Too blind to be abhorred; By terror and the cruel tales, Of curse in bone and kin, By weird and weakness winning, Accursed from the beginning, By detail of the sinning, And denial of the sin; By thought a crawling ruin, By life a leaping mire, By a broken heart in the breast of the world, And the end of the world’s desire; By God and man dishonoured, By death and life made vain, Know ye the old barbarian, The barbarian come again- When is great talk of trend and tide, And wisdom and destiny, Hail that undying heathen, That is sadder than the sea. In what wise man shall smite him, Or the Cross stand up again, Or charity or chivalry, My vision saith not; and I see No more; but now ride doubtfully To the battle of the plain.”
And so with Alfredus Magnus, Rex Brittorum, I am called to ride forth this day. How the battle will progress I cannot know, but I know the end. In faithfulness and patience we are called to serve our Lord, and that will be enough. As the good king sang before the Dane, “That though you hunt the Christian man, Like a hare on the hill-side, The hare has still more heart to run, Than you have heart to ride. That though all lances split on you, All swords be heaved in vain, We have more lust again to lose, Than you to win again.” Let us rise above our realities and serve faithfully that greater truth.
To Christ, the True King!
Bill+
Citations are from G.K. Chesterton, The Ballad of the White Horse, SanFrancisco, Ignatius Press, 2001 (A beautiful reprint of the 1928 edition illustrated by Robert Austin)
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