The Journey of The Magi T.S. Elliot A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.' And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory, Lying down in the melting snow. There were […]
Blog
Epiphany
Posted on by James Woodward
In western Christian tradition, January 6 is celebrated as Epiphany. It goes by other names in various church traditions. In Hispanic and Latin culture, as well as some places in Europe, it is known as Three Kings’ Day (Span: el Dia de los Tres Reyes, la Fiesta de Reyes, or el Dia de los Reyes […]
not to the play, but to itself
Posted on by James Woodward
The poem of the mind in the act of finding What will suffice. It has to be living, to learn the speech of the place. It has to construct a new stage. It has to be on that stage, And, like an insatiable actor, slowly and With meditation, speak words that in the […]
DON’T BE JUST A VISITOR TO THIS WORLD
Posted on by James Woodward
When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder If I have made of my life something particular, and real I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened, […]
Adoration, Love and Hope
Posted on by James Woodward
Have you ever looked into the face of a tiny baby and wondered what will be in store for that child – how his or her life will unfold across the years? There is an exquisite painting which hangs in the great museum of The Louvre, in Paris. It is called ‘The Adoration of the […]
The Digital Story of the Nativity?
Posted on by James Woodward
Follow this and think on…..!!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkHNNPM7pJA&feature=related
watchful
Posted on by James Woodward
If you value yourself watch that self, carefully the wise should be watchful. Self must govern self Who else would do this work? If the self is well controlled you have found a good master. It is your self that does wrong it is your self that suffers it is your self that purifies; no-one […]
Getting Ready for special time?
Posted on by James Woodward
Special days and auspicious times with implied or explicit religious significance appear to be a universal human phenomenon. This points to a basic human need for a different quality of time from the daily routine of our lives so that we may recognize and live out our full humanity. Life perhaps can be lived for […]
a certain sort of seeing?
Posted on by James Woodward
I take it that contemplation is a certain sort of seeing. I take it from Girard that we always learn to see through the eyes of another. The desire of another directs our seeing and makes available to us what is to be seen. In other words, there is no reality ‘out there’ to be […]
How do we look after the vulnerable in our ‘Big Society’?
Posted on by James Woodward
This isnt going to be the easiest weeks for many people. What a strange and perplexing world we live in – a Big Society accepting the inevitability of cuts. The following research should give us all soem cause for concern. Some councils in England fear budget pressures will hit care services which help elderly and […]
Being transformed in Advent
Posted on by James Woodward
As Christians we are called to enter into and attempt to transform the pain of our fragile world. This subtle transformation is beautifully expressed by Simone Weil. ‘Two prisoners whose cells adjoin communicate with each other by knocking on the wall. The wall is the thing which separates them but is also their means of […]
The Woodward Effect?!
Posted on by James Woodward
The Woodward effect is a hypothesis proposed by James F. Woodward, a physicist at California State University, Fullerton, that energy-storing ions experience transient mass fluctuations when accelerated. While some have expressed doubt about this hypothesis, no respected theoreticians have yet disproved it. If these doubts are unfounded it is conceivable that the Woodward effect could […]
Beware of too much speech!
Posted on by James Woodward
But I wonder too whether the ambivalence about ordained ministry has something to do with the licence that the ordained person has to talk — to instruct, explain, exhort, even control. We have seen how wary the desert teachers could be about professional theologians and thinkers, and there are plenty of stories about the need […]
amazement is the thing
Posted on by James Woodward
The point is the seeing, the grace beyond recognition, the ways of the bird rising, unnamed, unknown, beyond the range of language, beyond its noun. Eyes open on growing, flying, happening, and go on opening. Manifold, the world dawns on unrecognizing, realizing eyes. Amazement is the thing. Not love, but the astonishment of loving. […]
Commission of assisted dying – why I joined.
Posted on by James Woodward
What might it mean this Advent to follow St Benedict’s injuction to keep death daily before our eyes? Perhaps our friends might think us morbid; but we could discover in this embrace a better way to live. Keeping death daily before our eyes means thinking about how our own death could be happy. This […]
compassion
Posted on by James Woodward
Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours, Yours are the eyes through which is to look out Christ’s compassion to the world; Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good; Yours are the hands with which he is to bless […]
who died?
Posted on by James Woodward
When death comes like an iceberg between the shoulder blades, I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness? And therefore I look upon everything as a brotherhood and a sisterhood, and I look upon time as no more than […]
Laughter
Posted on by James Woodward
Laughter is a special sign of play. Laughter can be escapist, con¬trived, or cynical, but not when it is God laughing through us. Then it is simply restful celebration of the life that is. Such laughter is schoolmaster too. It teaches us humility. “It notes how far all earthly and human things fall short of […]
Eutrapelia
Posted on by James Woodward
Eutrapelia is an old, neglected human virtue identified by Aristotle that can lend understanding to the quality of authentic sabbath play. It derives from eutrepo, “to turn well’ It is a virtue reflecting mobility of soul, one that is able to turn to lovely, bright, relaxing things without losing authentic self in them. It is […]