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I’ve just ordered my copy of That was The Church That Was - How the Church of England Lost the English People by Andrew Brown and Linda Woodhead. It has been described as a ‘devastating critique’ on the decline of the C of E and has caused quite a stir even before publication. Bloomsbury recalled their initial copies because of legal complaints and many readers have found the brutal honesty of the authors deeply painful; they've hit back with acerbic reviews. Others have welcomed the book with open arms. I’m looking forward to reading it and forming my own opinion.
We desperately need prophets who dig for truth, not just bland commentary, despite how difficult it might be to hear. And we need different types of prophets working together. It’s important for the church to reflect, critique and debate in verbal and written form. But we also need more Irom Sharmilas who speak with their body or counter-cultural lifestyle. On Tuesday, the human rights campaigner ended her 16-year hunger strike in Manipur as a protest against state violence. In 2000 she vowed to continue a fast until the Armed Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which grants the military immunity from judicial scrutiny in so-called disturbed areas, was repealed.
Now after years of being force-fed via a drip she is opting for a different route to justice by attempting to become chief minister despite her lack of education and inexperience in politics. Whatever we might think of Sharmila’s form of campaigning up until now, her strike has made her a household name. She has been compared to Nelson Mandela and Aung San Suu Kyi and her actions have reduced the level of military violence in the region.
I find it heartening that there are always those who push and prod more than most, who dare to do things with their books or bodies that make people sit up. Isaiah stripped off his clothes, Jeremiah fastened a cattle yoke to his shoulders and Ezekiel burned, chopped and scattered his hair. Today’s truth-tellers might command attention through different means but their bold prophecies shape the future nonetheless.
The Revd Alan Ramsey Acting Priest-in-charge
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| | Services
—Tuesdays & Thursdays at 12.15pm
Lunchtime Eucharists —
Sunday 14th August Trinity 12 10.30am - Sung Eucharist
Preacher - Claire Browes, Lay Assistant
5pm - Choral Evensong
Preacher - Revd Alan Ramsey Music: Responses: Reading
Canticles: Howells, Gloucester Service
Anthem: Britten, Hymn to St. Cecilia
Hymn: 384, 414
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| | Forthcoming Concerts & Other Events— Thistledown Theatre: Emma: Tuesday 2nd August - Saturday 6th August & Tuesday 9th August - Saturday 13th August
From the novel by Jane Austen, adapted by Michael Bloom
Wednesday 17th August: Christ Church Summer Lecture On Wednesday (17th), Sarah Mortimer is giving one of the Christ Church summer lectures. It's about Henry Hammond, a Royalist in the Civil War who led the Anglican resistance to Cromwell's regime. Not only did he help to keep the Church of England going, he also engineered some radical shifts in its thinking which are still influential today - like the Holy Living movement which focused much more on everyday Christian ethics. The talk will discuss how he did this, and uncover some of the surprising and unorthodox sources behind Hammond's new and lasting style of Anglicanism.
4.30pm in the Frideswide room; tea from 4.15. Enter through Tom Quad and head for the cloisters.
Check out our website and Facebook pages.
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| Poetry Corner
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Common Names
Somewhere, there is a spider called Harrison Ford,
another genus known as Orson Welles. The ocean’s full
of seahorses who take their names from racing champs.
Above our heads, a solitary Greta Garbo wasp takes flight.
Each day, someone adopts a killer whale or buys
a patch of moon only to call it Bob and last night,
watching meteors sail drunk across the Grasmere sky,
you told me there are minor planets christened
Elvis, Nietzsche, Mr Spock. So forgive me if I looked up
past your face, to see those nearly-silver drops
make rivers in the dark, and, for a moment,
almost thought there might be stars named after us.
Helen Mort
This week sees the height of Perseid season: expect them at their peak tomorrow evening and into the small hours of the 12th. Stars have long proved rich ground for poets and philosophers alike; the celure in the University Church is a feature which most visitors – particularly children – notice and want to know more about. Many assume the celure is medieval, and are surprised at how recently it was installed. Having a small-scale star system at our disposal makes them seem friendly and accessible – something of which WH Auden, as suggested in his poem ‘The More Loving One’, would approve (‘How should we like it were stars to burn / With a passion for us we could not return? / If equal affection cannot be, / Let the more loving one be me.’). Mort’s poem, too, serves to humanise these most beguiling, inhuman of fascinations.
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