Easter poem

This poem by Evangeline Paterson simply takes my breath away.  The gaps are as the poet wrote them.  I suggest you read it aloud observing them.   The effect is astonishing.   And that will be heaven And that will be heaven at last   the first unclouded seeing   to stand like the sunflower turned full […]

Diocesan conference – David Runcorn presenter

We’re delighted that Rev David Runcorn, author of ‘The Road to Growth Less Travelled’  is coming from Bristol to work with us next week.  Our conference on Tuesday 10th (the day before our diocesan synod)  is entitled ‘Singing in a Strange Land.’  The morning session is for clergy only; the afternoon session for everyone will […]

Dignity

I can do no better than to recommend you listen to Sunday Worship of Feb 22nd.   The Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lent book is Rev Desmond Tutu’s ‘In God’s Hands’ and Radio 4 is following that for its Lent theme on Sunday mornings at 8.10.  This week the service from St Martin-in-the Fields focussed on the […]

Healing – restoration or transformation?

For today’s blog, I’m indebted to the Revd Lisa Eunson who shared with me a thought from a recent sermon.  The question is hers – the rest is my take on it! Is healing about more than the resumption of ‘normal service’?   When we suffer in any way -physically, mentally, emotionally, spirituality – it’s human […]

Rural ministry

Rural ministry applies to most charges in this diocese – and indeed to many in the SEC.  Even those in towns like Oban, Dunoon or Campbeltown have rural dimensions.   The Church Times has a telling piece summarising a report  ‘Released for Mission: Growing the rural Church’  from the Rural Affairs Group of the C of […]

My rash promise

Last week, I said I would offer my answer to ‘what keeps you following Jesus?’  That was rash!   (I notice nobody else has taken up the challenge!) The first rather simplistic answer is ‘because I promised to follow’.  This might not seem very informed; after all just because I undertake to do something doesn’t in […]

‘The Gospel – take it or leave it’

Marion Mackay from St Peter’s Stornoway shared a link this morning which provides considerable food for thought.   Diocesan ‘Facebookers’ will have come across it but it’s worth relaying here. The historian A.N. Wilson writes in the Telegraph about the state of Christianity in the world today.   He asks how we can interpret phenomena such as […]

Mary Slessor

The blog returns after rather a lengthy seasonal break! Mary Slessor’s name is familiar to me, brought up as I was in the Church of Scotland.   We heard about her in Sunday School and I think she was one of the ‘heroines’ featured on the back page of the girls’ comic I read.  ‘Girl’ was […]

The wind and the waves

Well I’m sure I’m among many whose plans have ‘gang agley’ this week.  As I write this we are being battered by the wind and, in the outer isles, experiencing power cuts.  When you live on an island as I do, you have to be prepared to make contingency plans or just hunker down, philosophically […]

How to do Advent?

So many experiences come together at this season.  The  light decreases as we descend towards the year’s midwinter turning point.  The increasing frenzy of the retail season is hard to avoid as it seeks to draw us ever earlier into the whirl.   The church’s calendar invites us to prepare for the coming of God in […]