Dear Friends
We’ve certainly had some wintry weather during April. During a slightly milder spell I ventured out into the Rectory garden armed with secateurs and loppers. Attacking the overgrown shrubs is something I find most therapeutic! Not that I’m an expert gardener. Ron, my husband, knows much more about gardening than I do, having been brought up on a small farm and market garden. Perhaps that explains why he avoids gardening like the plague! In fairness, though, he is the one who remembers to water the house plants.
I recall the first time I ever pruned the roses. I cut them back so severely that I thought I’d killed them. I hadn’t. The roses survived and flourished. Jesus often referred to growing things when teaching about the Kingdom of God. He also spoke of God the Father as the gardener. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be a rose tree or a shrub and to come under the pruning knife. I do know what it’s like to receive attention from the divine gardener. There are times in all our lives when God has to do a bit of pruning.
In John chapter 15 Jesus speaks of himself as the vine and Christians as the branches. We are to remain firmly grafted into the vine, attached to Jesus, if we are to grow and bear fruit. Jesus says that the gardener cuts out the dead wood, and cuts back fruit bearing branches so that they will yield yet more fruit. Being pruned can be a painful business, but every gardener knows that it is necessary. When the plant grows and bears fruit we see the purpose of the pruning.
In these days of diminishing numbers of clergy we are having to think and pray about what can and cannot be maintained in the life of our churches. Steve Osman, myself and our lay leaders in the Cluster are committed to doing our very best to provide pastoral care and to arrange for worship in each parish church. Having said that, some changes will be necessary, in order to produce a pattern that can be maintained with a reduced ministry team. To begin with we plan to change certain services around. If the time comes when we need to cut back, the question will be how to do that in a way that will produce more abundant growth.
Of course, much of the life of our churches goes on, led by able and gifted lay people, with support and encouragement from clergy where needed. I wonder, though, how much of what we do is really producing fruit in the lives of our churches and our communities. Is there any dead wood that needs cutting out – activities and groups begun, perhaps, a long time ago, and which have served their purpose or are becoming burdensome for the leaders? Are there other activities that are achieving some results, but which could do better with a bit of pruning? This could be a good time to look at our churches with a gardener’s eye, and decide what needs attention if we want to see growth and fruitfulness.
With my love and prayers
Glynis Hetherington
Thursday, 24 April 2008
Friday, 4 April 2008
April 2008 - Volume 30, Issue No. 4
Dear Friends
If you have been reading recent editions of Compass you will know that closer relationships are being forged between this Benefice and other parishes in the South Notts Cluster. As part of this, the Reverend Steve Osman and I will be taking it in turns to write the letter for our parish magazines. The month Steve writes:
Yet again, the church has hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons. The Archbishop of Canterbury gives a lecture to a bunch of lawyers, mentions Shariah law and British legal system in the same sentence, and for the next few days the media has open season on the church. What worried me was that many, in and out of the media, jumped to conclusions and made harsh judgements without bothering to check the facts.
A similar thing happened to me in my last parish. I wrote an article for the parish magazine about parenting. I mentioned that, in my observation, in the estate where we lived, a lot of parents talked to their kids like I sometimes talked to my dog. The local press got hold of the article and I was headline news for a day. I received 3 or 4 letters of abuse from animal lovers who assumed I was maltreating my dog! What was funny if it wasn’t so sad is that a) they never bothered to check out what I was really saying and b) they were more concerned about animals than the children on our deprived estate.
It is an unwritten rule that you never talk about religion or politics in polite company. I want to challenge that point of view. Our Archbishop will probably be wishing he had kept to that rule – his comments were about both religion and politics – no wonder he stirred such a reaction. But it seems to me that religion and politics are both about real life; both are about ideas; both affect decision making, personally and corporately. They’re simply too important to keep private.
I know why they’re subjects usually avoided – it’s because they stir such deep emotion, they affect the basis of our being. If I hold a deep-seated belief and someone else presents an alternative, I’m going to feel threatened. However, what I would hope I could do was hold a reasonable and reasoned conversation, not scream and shout at them. From the Christian point of view, I believe Christianity holds up to the closest scrutiny and the fiercest criticism, for me it is a reasonable faith. I sometimes think those who scream and shout do so out of insecurity; they’re not sure of their ground so they attack rather than defend.
Over the centuries the church has been guilty of unreasonable attack, using blasphemy laws to stifle opinion. It was Forrest Gump’s mother who said life was like a box of chocolates. So is the church. Some churches are like nougat – hard and unyielding, some are like strawberry creams – soft all through with nothing to get you teeth into. The best church is like the hazelnut caramel – a firm centre, sure of what it believes, but soft on the outside, open and welcoming to all who seek a reasonable faith.
Steve Osman
If you have been reading recent editions of Compass you will know that closer relationships are being forged between this Benefice and other parishes in the South Notts Cluster. As part of this, the Reverend Steve Osman and I will be taking it in turns to write the letter for our parish magazines. The month Steve writes:
Yet again, the church has hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons. The Archbishop of Canterbury gives a lecture to a bunch of lawyers, mentions Shariah law and British legal system in the same sentence, and for the next few days the media has open season on the church. What worried me was that many, in and out of the media, jumped to conclusions and made harsh judgements without bothering to check the facts.
A similar thing happened to me in my last parish. I wrote an article for the parish magazine about parenting. I mentioned that, in my observation, in the estate where we lived, a lot of parents talked to their kids like I sometimes talked to my dog. The local press got hold of the article and I was headline news for a day. I received 3 or 4 letters of abuse from animal lovers who assumed I was maltreating my dog! What was funny if it wasn’t so sad is that a) they never bothered to check out what I was really saying and b) they were more concerned about animals than the children on our deprived estate.
It is an unwritten rule that you never talk about religion or politics in polite company. I want to challenge that point of view. Our Archbishop will probably be wishing he had kept to that rule – his comments were about both religion and politics – no wonder he stirred such a reaction. But it seems to me that religion and politics are both about real life; both are about ideas; both affect decision making, personally and corporately. They’re simply too important to keep private.
I know why they’re subjects usually avoided – it’s because they stir such deep emotion, they affect the basis of our being. If I hold a deep-seated belief and someone else presents an alternative, I’m going to feel threatened. However, what I would hope I could do was hold a reasonable and reasoned conversation, not scream and shout at them. From the Christian point of view, I believe Christianity holds up to the closest scrutiny and the fiercest criticism, for me it is a reasonable faith. I sometimes think those who scream and shout do so out of insecurity; they’re not sure of their ground so they attack rather than defend.
Over the centuries the church has been guilty of unreasonable attack, using blasphemy laws to stifle opinion. It was Forrest Gump’s mother who said life was like a box of chocolates. So is the church. Some churches are like nougat – hard and unyielding, some are like strawberry creams – soft all through with nothing to get you teeth into. The best church is like the hazelnut caramel – a firm centre, sure of what it believes, but soft on the outside, open and welcoming to all who seek a reasonable faith.
Steve Osman
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