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Theological Education is more than the Diploma or Degree.

The last couple of weeks we have been completing the marking and grading of papers in preparation for the end of the session. Every time I do this I'm aware of the work and worry, the learning and writing, the thinking and re-thinking, that is part of that great humanising process we call education and to which our students commit themselves. Leaving all the usual quips aside, the truth is a theological paper is an attempt by one mind to grasp and understand, then to articulate and communicate, something they have come to know about God, their self or the world, and how to live and grow as the person they are. That's what is meant by learning that is informative, then formative and finally transformative.

For that reason, a theological essay is a statement of what one person believes and tries to argue. Their can be little point in simply writing what they think the marker wants to see, if at the same time they don't affirm the validity of what they write. Authentic learning is where we risk writing, saying, speaking out, what we believe to be the case – how much more then when dealing with those things we say matter to us as ultimate, primary, perennial concerns of our lives, and expressions of our deepest commitments.

So when I read an essay on the Triune relations of Father, Son and Spirit; or a Journal of personal discovery in ministry and responsiveness to others; or a review of a tough book that demands critical thought tempered by intellectual humility; or a sermon written out of a wrestling match with the text when like Jacob the preacher won't let the text go 'except you bless me'. That's when the academic discipline of marking is sanctified by the awareness that these assignments are about more than the grades – and to be sure the process of grading is rigorous, fair and open. But alongside the academic achievement, is a process of shaping and forming a mind, nourishing and nurturing a heart, encouraging the spirit to expansiveness, receptiveness and hospitality to new ideas and experiences.

So when people ask how the marking is going, there are two answers. One is about the process of confirming the achievements in learning; the other is being alert to that deeper process of growth and change towards maturity of theological understanding, enrichment of spiritual life, and development of gifts and skills which become the source and resource of the Church's mission and ministry in the world. That's what makes theological education crucial – and that's what makes being a theological educator a crucial ministry in the life of the Church.

25 May 2011
Bob Dylan – the latter day Ecclesiastes?

One of the signs of age is when you see Bob Dylan and Joan Baez in concert in the 1960's and remember the excitement and passion of discovering they sang about things you cared about as a teenager. Last night on BBC4 I watched the first part of Arena: No Direction Home, a biography of Dylan's early years. The footage of him singing Blowing in the Wind, evoked more than nostalgia – a kind of pride that my generation used music as a medium of political protest, moral exhortation and ethcial censure of cynical power structures. The civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, the Peace movement and CND, the ruthless greed of corporate business, the unequal lives of the powerless poor and the powerful rich – these were issues of critical importance for humanity, and they were being sung with rhetorical power, or iconoclastic sarcasm, or blunt poltical incorrectness long before politcally correct means what it now means.

And Pete Seeger all but in tears remembering how it felt to know a singer as genuinely committed to political protest had taken up his torch, and Joan Baez reminiscing about the discovery of Dylan the soon to be phenomenon and prophet for his generation – these were significant moments of cultural history. Dylan is both perplexing and fascinating, complex and enigmatic, passionately humane and incapable of indifference, deeply religious but despising religiosity.

What was evident in last night's programme is the power of a life story to shape and direct the way others live their lives. It's going too far to talk of Dylan having disciples – but there are millions who now span at least two generations, for whom Bob Dylan has articulated what we want to say about the world, our joys and fears and loves, to tell of the things that outrage us, to sing the causes that matter because they are about human flourishing – both what hinders and helps human beings live in peace and freedom. It takes a troubled soul who looks unflinchingly at trouble to interpret what troubles, or ought to trouble, each generation. In that sense, Dylan is a prophet – flawed, enigmatic, sometimes wrong, quite often right in the diagnosis of the self-inflicted wounds of our humanity.

"Human beings are born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward…" "Vanity, vanity, all is vanity, says the Preacher". "Let justice roll down like waters…." "Now abides faith, hope and love, these three, but the greatest of these…." Job, The Preacher, the Prophet, the Apostle – in secular terms Dylan weaves those strands of human experience (the tragic, the skeptic, the ethical and the romantic), into a corpus of music that is profoundly spiritual, and which for 50 years has resonated with those who question the status quo, who are restless for change, and who are looking for an exegete of their own lives' experience. It's only a thought – but if the preacher of Ecclesiastes had been looking for a way to communicate with the Western World of the 1960's, he could have done worse than being a singer song-writer who composed Blowing in the Wind….

As a coincidence of serendiptious proportions – the picture of the young Dylan above, which I saved to my picture file, is next to a photo of David Cameron used in an earleir post. Now there's a conversation I'd like to overhear – Dylan and Cameron, on the things that matter most!

21 May 2011
Dr Garrett Fitzgerald and the Jigsaw of Peace

The words "rest in peace" (RIP) are part of a familiar tradition of respect and remembrance when someone dies. Few deserve such respect, admiration and remembering as much as Dr Garrett Fitzgerald whose death is announced. Head of the Irish Government for two terms during the 1980's he was a profoundly influential presence in the peace process, a trusted voice on both sides of the divide, and a politician who gives politicians a good name. The current Prime Minister of Ireland, Enda Kenny has expressed very well the moral and political significance of a leader for whom humanity and peaceableness were moral imperatives – and for whom indeed peace is the categorical political imperative.

"Garret FitzGerald was a remarkable man who made a remarkable contribution to Irish life," he said.

"His towering intellect, his enthusiasm for life, his optimism for politics was always balanced by his humility, his warmth, his bringing to public life of a real sense of dignity and integrity, and his interest being focused entirely on his people and on the country."

Mr Kenny also said his former Fine Gael party leader would have been happy to hear the Queen address Ireland on Wednesday night as part of her state visit.

"To see the work that he had done over very many years, and indeed his father (Desmond) before him, have played their part in putting the jigsaw of peace together."

Mr Cameron, who attended the Queen's speech at a state dinner in Dublin Castle, said he watched Dr FitzGerald when he was a student of politics, rather than someone involved in politics.

"He always struck me as someone who was a statesman, as well as a politician, someone who was in politics for all the right reasons and someone who made a huge contribution to the peace process and bringing reconciliation for all that had happened in the past,"

No wonder political friends and foes alike referred to him as Garrett the Good. May his tribe increase, and may this patient peacemaker rest in peace

19 May 2011
Maria Boulding – and the reverse side of the tapestry

Maria Boulding was one of the finest exemplars of the Benedictine monastic life, and a Christian spirit of quite rare depth and insight. I first came across her in the 1980's when I was reading avidly around the Rule of Benedict, and writing a paper on "Baptists, Benedict and the Blessing of Community". Her autobiographical essay in the volume of edited essays, A Touch of God, is a carefully considered and honest estimate of her own formation within monastic community. She writes of the life we live and know as the reverse side of the tapestry, a metaphor I fully understand. My own tapestries are likewise viewed from two sides, and it's a matter of care to keep the reverse side as neat as possible – but it never shows the real beauty, subtlety and definition of the true side. We all have our twisted threads, unintended knots, evidence of short-cuts and partially hidden flaws.

Over the years I've read each of her best known books, all of them more than once. Prayer in the Easter Christ remains one of the clearest explorations of what it means to live an Easter life, and to use the word Easter as a verb that means to look on the world through the lens of the Cross and Resurrection, the realities of Divine Love and the gift of Divine life. The Coming of God is as biblical an account of Advent as there is, and again the book is replete with theological and spiritual thoughtfulness about the kind of God who comes, in Christ. Gateway to Hope is a book about failure which is pastorally sound, sympathetic, but never colludes with self-pity or the paralysis of mind and heart that failure can trigger. Her translation of Augustine'sConfessions has made that masterpiece accessible to generations now impatient with Victorian or highly stylised translations.

Dame maria Boulding died in december 2009, and in her last months wrote her final book, Gateway to Resurrection. In it she takes stock of what remained important and central in her life and faith, and for her it is summed up in her experience of the Risen Christ. I've just bought this book, which will go with me soon on a break when I don't want to do a lot of reading, but need a wise, familiar and understanding conversation partner. The obituary published in The Times is an affectionate and generous account of a remarkable woman who took particular care that the reverse side of the tapestry was as neat as patient skill and constant discipline over detail will make it. Click the link below.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article6938006.ece

17 May 2011
Seasons of the Heart – and the complexities of our emotions

As you'll gather from the earlier post, I am an unashamed fan of John Denver. Frankly I am puzzled by anyone who doesn't at least know or remember several of his best known songs – and those who raise their eyebrows when I wax lyrical about his lyrics, or sing his songs, or enthuse about his earth-loving people-hugging philosophy, I consider with much goodwill and sympathy as misguided souls!

The first album I ever bought was Rhymes and Reasons. The title song is about the loving and valuing of children as the source and focus of our wellbeing and the guarantee of our human future; the royalties were gifted to UNICEF in 1979. Then I bought the double album live concert, An Evening with John Denver, which I played till the vinyl was worn and I bought it again. And when vinyl was replaced by CD I bought it again and regularly play it in the car. Then Windsong was released and he moved to a different level of sound and developed from there material that expressed his deep protective love for the earth's environment, and long before environmental responsibility became politically acceptable or economically thinkable.

I still have a dozen vinyl LPs, a kind of chronology of his career. People differ on which is his best; even fans know that several albums took him as near mediocrity and inferior derivative material as someone of his talent could go. But Seasons of the Heart is the most complete and unified album he ever produced. Written out of his experience in the Far East it contains some of his most reflective, poignant and honest songs about human love and the complexities of human relationships, the mystery of the universe and human existence, and the joy and pain of human togetherness. The combination of emotionally frank lyrics and orchestral musical accompaniment gives it a depth of expression he previously achieved only in Windsong. I've just bought Seasons of the Heart on CD, and listening to it again it still has that emotional complexity, sincerity and inner knowing that gives weight and integrity to the greatest love songs. On one car journey north I listened to this album, then Brahms' violin concerto, some of The Best of James, and Abba Gold. A kind of musical ecumenicity……

16 May 2011
Why the library matters as a humanising refuge for the soul.

Amongst the public services under threat of cuts, and a too easy target for budget trimmers, money squeezers and compulsive cost cutters, are our public libraries. You would expect me to be vocal and verbal about any threat to those opportunities and privileges of knowledge that are essential to the health, life and culturedness of – well, of our culture.

I came across the quotation below (by E B White the novelist) written to the Troy Public Library in the US in the 1960's. One hundred writers were asked to write to the children at the school and tell them what a library is, and what it is for. The library has recently posted all the letters on its website here.

I suggest you click and go read some of them – then email a couple of them to your MP, Councillor, (and the Library staff at your local library – to encourage them).

A library is many things. It's a place to go, to get in out of the rain. It's a place to go if you want to sit and think. But particularly it is a place where books live, and where you can get in touch with other people, and other thoughts, through books. If you want to find out about something, the information is in the reference books — the dictionaries, the encyclopedias, the atlases. If you like to be told a story, the library is the place to go. Books hold most of the secrets of the world, most of the thoughts that men and women have had. And when you are reading a book, you and the author are alone together — just the two of you. A library is a good place to go when you feel unhappy, for there, in a book, you may find encouragement and comfort. A library is a good place to go when you feel bewildered or undecided, for there, in a book, you may have your question answered. Books are good company, in sad times and happy times, for books are people — people who have managed to stay alive by hiding between the covers of a book.

14 May 2011
Rhymes and Reasons – the poetry of John Denver

New makeover on Living Wittily. I stayed with the Art Nouveau red for a while. But sunshine and blue skies lighten it up and I'll stay with it for a while. Speaking of which, right now there isn't a cliud in the Aberdeenshire sky as I look over towards the hill line.

There hasn't been a poem posted for a while – so here's one that happens to be a favourite song by the singer I listen to most – John Denver. It came up recently in conversation, I know it by heart, and it is as ethically and humanly to the point as it was when it was written in the immediate aftermath of Vietnam and in the Cold War.

Given the global climate of conflict, polarised ideologies and danger to our human future, this song still pleads for different priorities.

So you speak to me of sadness
And the coming of the winter;
Fear that is within you now
It seems to never end'
And the dreams that have escaped you,
And the hope that you've forgotten,
You tell me that you need me now,
You want to be my friend.

And you wonder where we're going
Where's the rhyme and where's the reason
And it's you cannot accept
It is here we must begin
To seek the wisdom of the children
And the graceful way of flowers in the wind

For the children and the flowers
Are my sisters and my brothers
Their laughter and their loveliness
Could clear a cloudy day
Like the music of the mountains
And the colours of the rainbow
They're a promise of the future
And a blessing for today

Though the cities start to crumble
And the towers fall around us
The sun is slowly fading
And it's colder than the sea
It is written from the desert
To the mountains they shall lead us
By the hand and by the heart
They will comfort you and me
In their innocence and trusting
They will teach us to be free

For the children and the flowers
Are my sisters and my brothers
Their laughter and their loveliness
Could clear a cloudy day
And the song that I am singing
Is a prayer to non believers
Come and stand beside us
We can find a better way

13 May 2011
Knowing we are understood – those moments when we are least alone.

Elizabeth Goudge is an author whose kind of writing would now be dismissed as old fashioned. Most of her novels were written in the middle of the 20th century and she was classified as a writer of novels for women. Just goes to show – such categories are useless at best and mischievous at worst. I've read a lot of her novels, and remember a conversation with an English teacher who knew her novels, who said The Dean's Watch was the most complete and satisfying novel she had ever read. On her recommendation I read it – and twice again since. I have a lovely first edition hardback with a quaint dustcover that is unmistakably mid twentieth century.

I was thinking about her the other day, and now today came across an epigraph at the start of a chapter in The Disciplined Heart. Love, Destiny and Imagination by Caroline Simon. This is a very fine book, the kind of writing I revel in. A philosophical discussion of key human experience, opening into theological reflection, and laying tribute on literature and bible. At the centre is the meaning of human love in all its diverse and rich expressions, including friendship – an area of human experience coming to the fore in theological consideration today.

And here is the epigraph – taken from Goudge's novel, The Scent of Water:

If you understand people you're of use to them whether you can do anything for them or not. Understanding is a creative act in a dimension we do not see."

There is an entire week's teaching of pastoral theology waiting to be extracted from that. Unfazed empathy, imaginative listening, accessible wisdom, thoughtful compassion, accompanied waiting, patient faithfulness, persistent presence. There are few more therapeutic moments in our lives than when we feel and know ourselves understood. One other person stands alongside us, exactly where we stand, and knows, with that intuitive gift that is kindness and friendship, just knows, how it feels at this precise moment and in this exact place. And we know they know.

12 May 2011
Seve Ballesteros: One of Golf”s Shining Ambassadors

I am not a regular or skilful golfer. I can hit a golf ball, and sometimes a fair distance and occasionally in the right direction. My putting is seriously challenged by the Himalyas putting course at St Andrews and my short game is hit and miss, in about equal proportions.

And I only occasionally watch golf on TV, and even when I do I still puzzle over the camera following a white dot in the sky until it lands in grass some hundred yards away.

But I remember the year Seve Ballesteros won the British Open and that wonderful image of him punching the air, pumping up his adrenaline and grinning with such joy because that small pimpled white sphere had rolled into a metal cup having been tapped with the smooth precision of the practiced genius. The flair and fun and colour he brought to golf made him an exemplar of the entertaining sportsman.

The news that Seve has died leaves the world of sport without one of its courteous enthusiasts and one of the most likeable people who remained unspoilt by fame, celebrity status and sporting success. The word ambassador shouldn't be used indiscriminately, but reserved for those who represent and embody what is best in a sport. Seve was an ambassador for golf, and a fine human being whose struggle these past three years have shown the same qualities of courage, dignity and purposefulness, that made him a great in his sport.

7 May 2011
New book on Julian of Norwich – “And all manner of thing shall be well”

There are now several substantial monographs on Julian of Norwich, indicating a healthy and deserved interest in one of the greatest theologians of the Church. Amongst my favourites are Grace Jantzen's careful and respectful account of Julian: Mystic and Theologian, a book that firmly places Julian within the brightest constellation of contemplative theologians. Kerrie Hide's Gifted Origins to Graced Fulfilment is a beautifully written and lucid account of Julian's doctrine of salvation that shows the nuanced and sophisticated clarity of Julian's thinking, while at the same time giving a sympathetic reflection on the speculative humility of Julian's attempts to articulate the great mystery by which all shall be well. Wisdom's Daughter by Joan Nuth is the best book on her spirituality that I know – and it too is written with considerable scholarship distilled and rendered accessible in a volume that I return to often. And there's more – I have at least four other serious studies of this remarkable woman whose one book gathers so much theological fruit from her own experience long pondered, and brought into conversation with the church tradition, and then written out of a profound and searching contemplative mind in love with the Crucified God. I know the phrase is an anachronism, but The Revelations of Divine Love is the medieval theological precursor to our current fascination with the suffering of God, the suffering of the world and the search for a healed creation through the Crucified Son of God.

The most recent study has just been dispatched to me from Amazon. Denys Turner has written widely and deeply on mysticism, apophatic theology and the often contested relationship between faith and reason. I hope not to be disappointed then, when I read him on Julian the Theologian. I have long been an admiring advocate of Julian's crucicentric vision of the universe and her insistence against all comers that the love of God is the ultimate assurance for the future of all that is. Indeed I'm convinced that the current controversies about divine love and judgement, heaven, hell and universalism, come back to the fundamental question of the God we believe in and the definition of love that colours all our theological assumptions and psychological hesitations. And those who dismiss love as sentimental, and recoil from a "soft" theology, haven't really begun to appreciate a theology that was born out of the black death, in a feudal society, and mediated through the near death experience of a woman who took twenty plus years to guage the depth of that abyss she calls the Divine Love.

Sentimental she is not – compassionate, speculative, a thinker unafraid of the affections, each of these she is. But the theological vision of her book has a rigour and robustness that is rooted in the ultimacy of the Divine Love, and nourished by a faith that takes the cross and the Christ with utmost seriousness – and paradoxically, that seriousness is expressed in the hilarity and joyfulness of one who believes she has discovered the secret of the universe, that elusive formula that Stephen hawking is after, the explanation of all things…."All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well." It isn't a knock-down argument – it's a credal cry of the heart, an adoring reiteration of quiet if mystified confidence in God, both a prayer and a promise, and the final premise on which she rests her hope for God's broken but deep-loved world.

The image above is from the Book of Kells – included here because I like it, and maybe Julian knew of it?

6 May 2011