Lesson unlearned - Holy Innocents

After breakfast this morning on Radio 4 this year's four Reith Lecturers discussed the 'Four Freedoms' theme of the series, and were pleased to realise how much their ideas about freedom were shared. Like a choir part-singing in perfect harmony. I wonder if this years innovation of having four lecturers instead of one will catch on and be repeated next year. It introduces an additional dimension of dialogue on top of that provided by the fifteen minutes of Q&A after each lecture.

It rained for much of the night and continued until early afternoon. I ventured out in full rain gear to Saint Catherine's to celebrate the Eucharist of Holy Innocents' Day, reflecting with the congregation on  how child exploitation, abuse and slaughter in warfare has persisted in human history down to our own times, despite vain efforts to prevent and protect. To my surprise, despite the terrible weather, half a dozen regulars came to join me. No veggie bag this week, and no coffee after the service, so I went straight back home.

I cooked lunch, then had a snooze in the chair. Although I coped well with such difficult conditions last night, the effort of  driving it left me feeling pretty tired, and needing to take it easy with all the joints in my hands and fingers painful from the tension of holding on to the steering to wheel without respite for so long. That's what happens when you no longer do much distance driving I guess.

As it had stopped raining, I walked down to Blackweir Bridge and then around Pontcanna Fields. The Taff water level was high, covering the fish ladder completely and about to overspill on to the footpath. I took this little video.

As the sun set, I was walking under the avenue of trees the other side of the Fields when the local flocks of starlings began to convene noisily for the final stage of the journey to roost in trees along the east bank of the river, thousands of them, such a sight as you'll se here.

Before supper I recorded and edited the audio for next Thursday's Morning Prayer and after eating made them into a video slideshow for uploading to YouTube. Then I watched the last of Stanley Tucci's series on the regional food cultures of Italy, about Liguria. Genoa, capital of the region is the home of Pesto making. It was eye-opening to see how the basil leaves used in it were grown high up at 400 metres in an industrial greenhouse above the city, and then how a top expert chef made it by hand using a giant pestle and mortar.

Turning point

It's the shortest day today, I'm pleased to say. Slowly lighter evenings will return. I wake up at first light , switch on the radio to hear the news and then doze, often until eight thirty before getting up, frequently missing Thought for the Day and needing to listen on catch-up. After breakfast the fourth and final Reith Lecture for this year, on  'Freedom from Fear' by Fiona Hill a British born international relations advisor who worked for several US presidents sharing her expertise as a Russian affairs analyst. 

She started with a useful long perspective on geopolitical power struggles and conflicts over the past centuries, observing a tendency for history to repeat itself, and then analysing the war in Ukraine and Putin's strategy of arousing fear as a primary instrument of war. This I thought was a brilliant take on the situation, particularly her idea that the only way to counter the impact of fear was with resolute courage. Nicely timed this week as President Zelenski ventures away from Ukraine for the first time to visit the USA and make a bid to the US Congress for continued support. 

Then a walk in the rain to St Catherine's for the Eucharist. There were a dozen of us present and ten stayed on for coffee chat afterwards. Then I walked in the rain to collect the weeks veggie bag and return to cook lunch. A full stalk of brussels sprouts and huge red cabbage this week. Christmas fare indeed! I cooked a batch of soaked yellow split peas for lunch, but these took far longer than anticipated, so they were added to the vegetables sooner than necessary, and then needed pressure cooking to make them palatable. I was rather disappointed with my effort.

It stopped raining and the sky cleared of cloud after lunch. I started preparing the texts for the next two Thursdays' Morning Prayer, then went out for a walk just as the sun was settiing. By this time clouds were filling the sky and the temperature dropped enough to cloak the Fields with mist, quite beautiful.

After supper, another evening watching the last couple of episodes of Rocco Schiavone. Apart from the interesting story-line there are occasional sympathetic vignettes of characters marginal to the plot, encountered in the course of the investigation. Often old, or poor. There are still a few unresolved threads in the overarching story, maybe to do with high level corruption and vendettas that would benefit from several more episodes. If the sixteen episodes so far fourteen were made between 2016 and 2019, and two more last year, so the series survived the pandemic. I hope there'll be more.

Before turning in for the night, I recorded the audio for next week's Morning Prayer and set up the Video creation app ready to complete the task tomorrow to make ready for a work-free Christmas feast.

Rowan on Religious Freedom in Reith Lectures 2022

A late start to the day which began after breakfast to listening to Archbishop Rowan delivering the second in this year's Reith Lectures in a series entitles 'The Four Freedoms', of which freedom of religion is one. It was a masterpiece in covering a complex subject for a secular pluralist audience. Amazingly, it was also a magisterial account of Christian apologetics for the contemporary world, which to my mind helped to explain a few of the decisions both political and ecclesiastical, which he took while he was still in office, always aiming against the odds to keep everyone in dialogue, even those lapsing into schism, opposing the mainstream liberal agenda. 

The philosophy seems to me to be that no religious conviction or practice should be suppressed, but all should be subject to challenge and scrutiny, so that all sides can start to learn what impact their views and actions have on others. Above all, then the call is 'be reconciled', driven by the question Jesus often posed. What are you afraid of? - and - Why are you afraid? Spot on!

Then I went to St Catherine's to celebrate the Eucharist with eight others and chat afterwards for an hour over coffee before going to collect this week's veggie bag. I was home before Clare and cooked lunch for us, somewhat later than usual. Afterwards, I scanned all the safeguarding identity verification documents required for my Euro diocese PTO and emailed a .pdf file of the documents to HQ. Due diligence done hopefully. I'll hear about my clearance for PTO in a few days I was informed.

After lunch I did the Co-op shopping trip, and then had to go out again to collect a couple of items from Beanfreaks which were ordered but omitted from purchases Clare collected from the shop. The rising full moon was just over the horizon under a clear evening sky as I walked home, and the temperature went down from five to one degree, so we needed central heating while we both sat in the lounge and read. This morning I found another Patricia Cornwell novel from the church second had bookshelf and brought it home to read. It makes a change from binge watching series on catch-up telly.