Still Church Still here

If you were to ask me what my favourite passage in the Bible is, I would struggle.  Not because I don't know any to choose, but because there are so many that I find special in so many ways.  From John's Gospel, through the psalms, and into Isaiah I could name you any number of passages that speak to me.  But one of my favourites is from Paul in the letter to the Romans where he writes that 'all things work together for good for those who love God'.  I'm not only profoundly glad of that, given all the things that have got messed up in my life, but also very aware of the truth of it when I see what God has brought about through the events that have shaped me.  While I may not have seen God's working in my life at the time, when I look back I can often see his presence - if only in the fact I made it through.  And if I am changed or altered by the things that batter me around a bit, then I am no less loved by God, and of no less worth because I am a little chipped

I have commented to several people in the last week that it is all too easy at the moment to lose track of days. The regular structure of my week is gone, and days can easily slide into one another. It matters more to me that the weather enables me to get into the garden for part of a day, that what the name of that day actually is!  Except for Sunday.  Somehow, Sunday still stands out. Despite not being able to go to church, or meet people, Sunday is still the day when I feel closest to you all.  Each Saturday evening I become aware of the fact that I’m not getting ready for the next day in the way I usually would - making sure my robes are ready, checking my sermon, saying the prayers and reading the Psalms that prepare me for leading worship. Gradually though, I have rebuilt my structures; the prayers and the Psalms came back in, though altered slightly to reflect the different way we ‘meet’ now, and I mark Sundays at home in small ways that keep you all especially in my prayers.

Last week myself and the wardens of our churches went round and locked our buildings. It was so hard to do, and I can’t think of a time when our congregations - and clergy - were unable to enter these holy spaces.  It hits harder in communities like ours where we are blessed to be able to leave our churches open each day. As I was about to lock St Mary’s church in Wroxham, I stopped and ran back in and took these photographs with my phone.  This is the sanctuary light, showing the real presence of Christ in our building. I could have turned it off; maybe I should have; but I left it lit - a symbol of our faith and our continuing worship and prayer. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not, and will not overcome it.

Fresh air is a wonderful thing! I love paths stretching ahead of me. Maybe it's the sense of the unknown? Like most of us my son Chris and I are practising our social distancing.  Which is fine, and we are very happy to do it.  But today we decided to take advantage of the advice to get some exercise in the open, while keeping a distance from others. We put a highly excited dog in the car (he really doesn't seem to understand what is going on lately, can't think why) and set off for a walk on Mousehold Heath. It's a place we've driven past many times, but never stopped at.  And we had a fabulous hour. There were more people than we expected, and we found ourselves stepping off the path on several occasions to give people their space, and others did the same for us. There were many smiles and friendly greetings, but a sense of the strangeness of all this really did hang over everything.  I have to admit that my dog George, along with all othe

Welcome to my new online presence! I can’t promise to have something interesting to say every day, but I thought it would be good to expand my Bridge magazine Rector’s letter writing over the next few weeks.  If you’d like to follow along, just bookmark this page in your browser. Earlier this morning I sent the following to everyone on our email list - if I missed you, just send me an email - rector@wroxhambenefice.org - and I’ll add you to future mailings. Please feel free to ring, email, comment on here or send smoke signals. It’s a couple of years since I blogged, but I’ll get up to speed again quickly 😁 Above all, remember we are still church, and still here. Love and prayers, Liz   Dear All, Life has changed rather dramatically in the last few days, and I wanted to write and assure you all that even though public worship has been suspended in our churches we are still church, and still here.  Our churches are places of prayer, and we are peop