A bit of History

A bit of History - This poem about Kilmaveonaig comes from ‘Facts and Fancies and Folklore about Kilmaveonaig’ by one of my predecessors Christopher I. K. Bowstead, M.A. Priest-in-Charge 1891 – 1898, Canon of St Ninian’s Cathedral, Rector of Holy Trinity, Pitlochrie A.D. 1891 – 1898

The name Kilmaveonaig is from the Gaelic ' cille mo Eonaig' translated as Cell of St Eonan
(English name St Adamnan)

Below a picture of Kilmaveonaig in autumn

Lament - The Song between pain and promise

Reflections on our need to lament, to accept the pain Covis 19  has caused in our lives and to our institutions and to acknowledge it before we move forward.

I think we all realise in  one way or another that nothing will ever be quite the same as it was, we also know that all things change and that the situations we deal with have an impact upon us, sometimes for good, sometimes not. But what of the things we inevitably will leave behind, what of the losses, what of the breaking down of some of those seemingly immovable  structures in our churches, in our  face to face interactions with each other, that perhaps we all thought would last in the same way, if not forever, at least for us.

And yet in the blink of an eye all that has gone and all it has taken to break down our illusions  of  a secure and certain world and our place in it was COVID 19.

We have to accept that things have changed, that what was, will  probably never fully return, and that we  need to help and support each other to acknowledge this, to mourn  and give voice to what is passing, before we go forward.

That is where the idea of Lament comes to our aid. Lament, the  prayer song we can sing between the pain of loss and the promise of what is to come. The prayer song we can sing to help ourselves and others come to terms with and process the sorrow, boredom, frustration and pain we feel.

Here are some thoughts from the book ‘Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy – Discovering the Grace of Lament’ by Mark Vroegop. Crossway 2019.The books purpose  is to encourage the reader to find deep mercy in dark clouds  and the title  is taken from these  two verses in Lamentations

“How the Lord in his anger has set the daughter of Zion under a cloud”  2:1

“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end” 3:22

 And Vroegop tells us that:

“Lament is how we bring our sorrow to God. Without lament we won’t know how to process pain. Silence bitterness and even anger can dominate our spiritual  lives instead ……

So Lament  is how we bring before God, our sorrow, our pain, our trauma, and our emotions, how we express our feelings of helplessness,  hopelessness, tiredness and disbelief. How in fact we deal the cloud that  is COVID 19, and  indeed with all the clouds that life throws at us. We do this by understanding that to lament in the biblical sense is to directly address our cries of pain and grief to God  as the Psalmist does in Psalm 22

“Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help’ Psalm 22:11

To make Lament is to release our pain and to tunnel our way to truth, because once we can mourn what is lost, and recognise and name the hurt and pain by taking our distress before the throne of God, and in trusting in God’s response, we can once more embrace the challenge and change of the future and whatever  may become our new normal.

“For we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Rom 8:28)

I have been thinking about this very carefully and I love the idea of Lament being the song we sing between the pain and the promise.  It is a song of belief that we can sing in times of trouble. Lament is how we experience grace, no matter what we are called to face. So I want to make a suggestion for you to think about: We may wonder what we as a small church can do for our communities and friends, well perhaps, one of the most precious things what we have to offer a hurting people and a hurting world, is the healing song of Lament.

Turning the World Upside Down

Turning the World Upside Down

Easter Day 2020

Friends this is the strangest  of Easter Day’s of any I remember, instead of a church full of candles and flowers, hymns and rejoicing here we are, it almost feels like we are in that Holy Saturday suspension, waiting, waiting for that first day of the week when we can burst from our confinement , and yet Today is Sunday and Christ is Risen.

So, it seems ironic that we should be celebrating in the midst of sorrow pain and death.

But you know last year I wrote these words in the April edition of our magazine and I quote:

There is a profound irony in the story of Holy Week and Good Friday which tell us that it is the perpetrators of violence against the man who takes up his cross to Calvary, who claim to be agents of light: the keepers of the peace, the protectors of the faith and the saviours of the nation. And the irony continues as on any human calculation these claims are reasonable:  for the Chief Priest and Elders, to wish to protect the nation from further violence or from the wrath of the Roman occupiers is humanly commendable.  But in the end it is Christ who, in the darkness of agony and crucifixion discovers the hope for the world as he takes its darkness into his being and transforms it, bring new life and hope into the world on Easter Morning.

Irony indeed but  truly the message of Easters is that Jesus by taking the darkness of the World into his being and by rising again transforms it, forever offering through selfless love life and hope into our world.

But the nature of the story doesn’t promise eternal sunshine and green pastures what it does is offer the promise that the day of resurrection has transformed all days forever, this is most beautifully expressed in  poem  Easter by George Herbert

Rise heart; thy Lord is risen. Sing his praise

Without delays,

Who takes thee by the hand, that thou likewise

With him mayst rise.

That, as his death calcined1 thee to dust,

His life may make thee gold, and much more just.

Awake, my lute, and struggle for thy part

With all thy art.

The cross taught all wood to resound his name,

Who bore the same.

His stretched sinews taught all strings, what key

Is best to celebrate this most high day.

Consort both heart and lute, and twist a song

Pleasant and long:

Or since all music is but three parts vied

And multiplied;

O let thy blessed Spirit bear a part,

And make up our defects with his sweet art.

I got me flowers to straw thy way:

I got me boughs off many a tree:

But thou wast up by break of day,

And brought’st thy sweets along with thee.

The Sun arising in the East,

Though he give light, and th’East perfume;

If they should offer to contest

With thy arising, they presume.

Can there be any day but this,

Though many suns to shine endeavour?

We count three hundred, but we miss:

There is but one, and that one ever.

In the poem  Herbert askes ‘ can there be any day but this’ showing that from the darkness of the cross and the tomb the day of resurrection bring us back to the cradle of new birth and turns us and our world upside down. For Jesus was dead, now he is alive, from now on there is but one day the single, eternal day of resurrection and in its light nothing will ever be the same again.

Alleluia Christ is Risen

He is Risen indeed Alleluia. Amen