NUDGINGS: a journey into the unknown

A brave soul asked me a few months ago to post regularly on the church’s website. He was the administrator of the website, and the only one posting at that time although there were plenty of readers  He hoped that by encouraging me to post, others might also jump in. As I agreed to his request, I made the comment that he really didn’t know the risk he was taking by encouraging me. His response was, “ Anything is fine, as long as it is Christian!” I laughed and didn’t think anymore about it. Only that comment keeps popping up from my subconscious mind.  My problem with it is ‘What isn’t Christian?’ Of course there is more than one way to interpret that. Not knowing this individual at all well, I’m still not sure just what was meant by that remark. Does he see as Christian anything that has to do with the Anglican church, or is it organized religion as a whole? What boundaries does he put on ’Christian‘ in his mind? I’m still not sure four months later. I do know however ...

BRRRRR! Was it  ever cold! So cold, in fact, that my cell phone turned itself off after just a minute or two outside even though it was in my coat pocket! I HAD NO IDEA THAT IT WOULD DO THAT! It never had before. Not only did it turn itself off out in the cold, it also did it a couple of times when it was back inside. WHAT?? But was it, the technological wonder that a smart phone is, just mimicking human reaction?  I know I have shut down at times when the stress of what is going on around me, becomes too much to deal with. And that it has taken time, with many false attempts,  for me to regain my equilibrium again. So, one might say I am no smarter than a phone! Just as my cell phone needed help to turn on again, so too do humans. It is much more difficult on our own. In society today there is help available to us, if we look for it and are willing to do the work involved. There are therapists of many kinds, self-help books, and if we are lucky, supportive fam...

"Tradition is the illusion of permanence.”  ~Woody Allen Winter came early to Ontario this year. Things on the calendar were being shifted until less inclement weather or being cancelled altogether. So when I heard the weather report for heavy snow with streamers starting in the mid-afternoon and lasting overnight, I was not happy. We had been planning to meet an old friend for dinner, something we had been doing for at least 6 years, ever since we no longer saw them on a regular basis during the normal course of our week.  The next few weeks were busy for our friend, and in any case Christmas was closing in. What to do? Cancel until the new year? That seemed a long way away. Then I had an epiphany! Why not see if our friend was available for lunch instead of supper? Just because we had always HAD supper didn’t mean we couldn’t change. After all we were all retired…. Sounds simple, right? Even obvious.  What this exercise did was point out to me though was just...

“And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they [the Magi] left for their own country by another road.” Matthew 2:12  NRSV Just the other day I was out with a friend. As we were leaving to go home we decided ‘go by another road’ and the comment was made about how biblical that was. But as I heard the preacher’s opening to their sermon this past week, suddenly I had a very different understanding of just what those words meant in the context of the story of the magi. One might say I had an epiphany! We don’t know anything about who wrote the gospels or even when or why the gospels were written. We can surmise that the authors were writing down these stories in an attempt to pass on the transformative effect the life and teachings of Jesus had had on their lives and perhaps the lives of others around them. So I have come to understand the two birth narratives to be an attempt to rewrite his birth showing this importance. As angels sang, he was revered by t...

There is a time for everything a season for every purpose under heaven a season to be born and a season to die, a season to plant and a season to harvest; And God’s gift to us is to eat and drink and find fulfillment in our work. Ecclesiastes 3:1, 2, 13 At the beginning of each new year, we look ahead. With the writer of Ecclesiastes, we query what lies ahead for us: promise or pain; fulfillment or frustration, life or death. And where, we wonder, where will God be in all of this? Will we find the fulfillment  promised in our daily lives? Our lives are full of many births and many deaths, each one as miraculous or difficult as the last.  This coming year will be no different.  The important thing for me in these words is that there is no dying without rebirth, no planting without harvesting, no tearing without mending, no hurting without dancing. No matter what the coming year holds for us, we will experience joy with our sorrow, faith in our doubting,...