This is the grass your feet are planted on. You paint it orange or you sing it green, But you have never found A way to make the grass mean what you mean. A cloud can be whatever you intend: Ostrich or leaning tower or staring eye. But you have never found A […]
Seamus Heaney
Posted on by James Woodward
Dennis O’Driscoll Stepping Stones: Interviews with Seamus Heaney (Faber, 2008) Seamus Heaney is regarded as possibly the finest poet of his generation. Although I find some of his writing rather dense and impenetrable, many people have been enriched by the sheer depth and creativity of his clever verse. While his poetry has […]
In Love
Posted on by James Woodward
Give all to love; Obey thy heart; Friends, kindred, days, Estate, good fame, Plans, credit, and the Muse – Nothing refuse. Leave all for love; Yet, hear me, yet… Though thou loved her as thyself, As a self of purer clay, Though her parting dims the day, Stealing grace from all alive; Heartily know, […]
Understanding the Reformation?
Posted on by James Woodward
The Last Office: 1539 and the Dissolution of a Monastery by Geoffrey Moorhouse 283pp, Weidenfeld & Nicolson 2008, £25 St Cuthbert had a lucky start in life; lame at the age of eight, he was cured by an angel who came by on horseback, and who recommended a poultice made of flour and milk. A […]
Valuing Age: Pastoral Ministry with Older People
Posted on by James Woodward
Valuing Age: Review by Arthur F. Moore This book has huge potential for empowering and enhancing the quality and relevance of pastoral ministry with older people. It is not a text book as such but it does offer the reader a richly and widely sourced introduction to the academic discipline social gerontology. I could recommend […]
In Praise of….
Posted on by James Woodward
Just back from a week in mid- Wales sleeping and reading and generally wondering what 2009 might have in store for me and my work. These musings take the form of scribbles and lists … a thinking aloud on paper that increase with coherance after a glass of claret! Where would we be without lists? […]
Is religion marginalised?
Posted on by James Woodward
Religion, spirituality and the social sciences: challenging marginalisation, Editors Basia Spalek and Alia Imtoual, (The Policy Press) 2008 There is no point in looking for a single event or factor that kick-started the revival of public interest in religion towards the end of the 20th century. It was more a question of separate developments […]
Geranium
Posted on by James Woodward
geranium Is there no great love, only tenderness? Does the sea Remember the walker upon it? Meaning leaks from the molecules. The chimneys of the city breathe, the window sweats, The children leap in their cots. The sun blooms, it is a geranium. Sylvia Plath, from Mystic.
What are Sundays for?
Posted on by James Woodward
There is a morning; Time brings it nearer, Brittle with frost And starlight. The owls sing In the parishes. The people rise And walk to the churches’ Stone lanterns, there to kneel And eat the new bread Of love, washing it down With the sharp taste Of blood they will shed R S Thomas
The Christmas message
Posted on by James Woodward
God is wanting to connect with us, reach out to us. That’s the heart of the celebration of Christmas. We respond, hesitatingly, even unknowingly. We come, making our way down to Church and to the door. Why? Nostalgia, distant memories, a hard year perhaps or we may be following an instinct that tells us there […]
Christmas Eve
Posted on by James Woodward
Have you ever looked into the face of a tiny baby and wondered what will be in store for that child – how his or her life will unfold across the years? There is an exquisite painting which hangs in the great museum of The Louvre, in Paris. It is called ‘The Adoration of […]
Approaching Christmas
Posted on by James Woodward
“And they shall name him Emmanuel, which means God is with us’. I confess to enjoying watching completely pointless and mindless television from time to time – not in large amounts but in sufficiently small quantities to keep what’s left of my sanity. You will know that while there are many good things on digital […]
Rothko
Posted on by James Woodward
Mark Rothko (1903 -70) is widely celebrated as one of the greatest painters of the twentieth century. His paintings are famed for their visual intensity. Shortly before his death, Rothko donated nine large-scale works to Tate on the condition that they would always be displayed together, in their own space, separate from the work of […]
The relevance of Christmas?
Posted on by James Woodward
In the spirit of Advent, Theos has published researchrevealing that 52% of Britons believe that the birth of Christ is significant to them personally and 72% of people think that it remains significant culturally. It’s hardly a picture of a determinedly secular society, is it? The question is, what exactly does this snapshot reveal about the […]
Tolerance?
Posted on by James Woodward
Benjamin Kaplan, a professor of Dutch history at University College London and the University of Amsterdam, offers a history focused on the popular culture and every day believers in Divided by Faith, just published by Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. With this perspective, the radical nature of religious tolerance becomes much clearer: Every […]
A Secular Age?
Posted on by James Woodward
Charles Taylor, Board of Trustees Professor of Law and Philosophy at Northwestern University, is causing quite a stir with his new book A Secular Age. Among his more interesting arguments is that Christianity itself is responsible for the rise of secularism. Robert Bellah has written a glowing review: I have long admired Charles Taylor and […]
Temple
Posted on by James Woodward
We, unaccustomed to courage exiles from delight live coiled in shells of loneliness until love leaves its high holy temple and comes into our sight to liberate us into life. We are weaned from our timidity In the flush of love's light we dare be brave And suddenly we see that love costs all we […]