August 2009 – For the fainthearted . . .

Unless anyone has any objections

‘Torpor’ is defined as “a state of mental and motor inactivity with partial or total insensibility”.

‘Torpor’ was painted in large black letters in the stairwell of the flats on the edge of Manchester’s Moss Side. The area had exploded into rioting in the spring of 1981, but by the winter, with its cold Lancashire drizzle, there was an air of resignation and hopelessness.

The stairwell stank constantly of urine; the lifts did not work for much of the time, and, when they did, smelt even worse. The occupied flats …

East Coast Thoughts

Five posts from this blog were recycled to provide five ‘thoughts for the day’ for the Sundays during August for East Coast Radio – this is the fifth

Do you remember the days when you would cut figures out of cardboard, and hang accessories on them with tabs, and think that this was something great to have?

Perhaps it was much more a girl’s thing, cutting out models from comics and dressing them in different outfits, but there must, at one time, have been a market amongst boys.

The makers …

Coping with the puddles

Memories of the puddle return at the end of each August.

The puddle was across the road from our house at the edge of a little Somerset village. Cars and tractors would swing wide to turn into or out of the lane that ran beside our garden and as they did so would cut into the verge opposite the house. The big agricultural tyres would cut deep into the soil, leaving a hard packed rut. When heavy rain came, as it always did, there would be a deep puddle, the …

The days are drawing in

The car thermometer said that it was 13 degrees outside; the rain was coming in sideways and the wind was biting. It was hard to imagine that it was lunchtime on an August day in Dublin. BBC warnings about traffic came as a reminder that it was not only still August, but that not so far away it was a summer bank holiday weekend.

The August bank holiday weekend marked the end of the summer holidays during childhood days; a harbinger of doom, it announced the imminent onset of a …

Rich white bringer of good things

A friend working for an Irish mission agency based in Belfast phoned: our paths had crossed briefly in Rwanda when we had shared our unease at some of our experiences. The small group of Europeans was being feted in the district as the bringers of all good things. At every village there was something to be opened or dedicated and there were speeches and food. Africans would stand back until the white people had been served; they would never be at the table first, never be the first in the …

Sermon for Sunday, 30th August 2009 (12th after Trinity/Pentecost 13/Proper 17)

“You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men.” Mark 7:8

Sometimes, I’m not sure why I attend church services when I go on holiday. At the first church I attended, the clergyman stood up and said, “Good morning everyone. Because of the swine flu the archbishops have announced that wine at Holy Communion will be received by intinction (this means dipping wafers into the chalice, he didn’t explain what it was, though) and that there should be no sharing of …