Unless we change

The feast of St Paul's Conversion today. As a fan of his teaching and often contentious passionate  evangelism. "Woe is me if I do not proclaim the Gospel" and "By the grace of God I am what I am." are two of my favourite phrases of his. I felt sad not to be able to be at the Eucharist on his fiesta, but I did remember him anyway.

Overnight and all day the temperature has hovered around zero, with sunshine and some cloud, and little wind. Another good day to be outdoors enjoying fresh air and exercise. After breakfast this morning, as happens several times a week, a scam call from someone claiming to represent Microsoft, who knew my name, to inform me of an internet security compromise. It's tiresome, and predictable. Often we pick up and listen without responding, so the scanner thinks the line is open to an answering machine without a message. Fifteen seconds and the call is cut. Today, I was in a good mood and felt like trying out a new scam baiting response.

"Hello Mr Kimber, I'm calling from Microsoft about your account."

"Ah, you work for Microsoft too!" 

A hesitant silence and then again 

"Er - I'm calling about your Microsoft account."

"Yes, but which department department are you, what's your identity code? I'm with cyber fraud."

Click.

I rang my sister June to share the joke with her. 

"When I realise it's a scam call, I say 'This is Balham police station.'" she said. On the ball at 86.

Just after lunch we commonly get robo calls about Amazon Prime accounts. No interaction so we just let the call continue until it times out. I feel sorry for the poor people who deceive themselves into thinking they are working for a legitimate enterprise when they are cold calling using stolen data.

I went to the Co-op for a few grocery items later on. I queued a short while to get in, and several people came out empty handed. I picked up what I needed and when I reached the till was told "Cash payments only the payment network's down nationally." I stopped carrying cash many months ago, and we've been discouraged from using it because of covid contamination. And this happens, showing how vulnerable we are when our super snazzy technology doesn't work. I went back home and got some cash from Clare then returned for my shopping. 

Funny, in the old days a grocer would write a bill, and you'd be trusted to return later and pay, but very few stores will offer that kind of account rendering any more. The admin is too complex and inefficient in our cost conscious modern world. We appreciate our convenient cashless transactions, but have lost a fall-back alternative. Society today doesn't run on personal trust in the way it used to, and we're so much poorer for that. After lunch I went and drew some cash from the bank. Who knows when electronic pay systems will fall over again?

The government enthuses daily about the vaccination rate, while expressing concern about the numbers being infected and warning that lockdown will need to go on longer than promised. Boris' lightweight cheerleader optimism is being gradually supplanted by a healthier realism. Measures are being mooted about far stricter quarantine for people travelling into Britain from countries where new covid variants are spreading like wildfire. Border control, it seems to me has all along been more aspirational than rigorous, like track and trace, not to mention ubiquitous virus testing. 

Interesting, now that the rigour of post brexit trade border control is becoming evident, the greater is the price UK businesses have to pay. The cost of living will rise, as a result of reclaiming freedom from EU 'control' in the name of old fashioned libertarian ideals, the same ideals that presumed all Brits would behave decently, common sense and courtesy and abide by anti covid restrictions. The price paid is seen in the highest excess death rate in the world. 

The more that's understood about the covid virus, and how to master it, the more it seems to me that scientific confidence is being moderated by scientific caution. Victory is far from assured, as a result of the scale of human poverty and the impoverishment of the planet due to pollution, global warming and bio-diversity loss - factors working in favour of the virus adapting and becoming even more persistent. If nature continues to turn against humankind as a species, we're headed towards extinction. Maybe only when the global population is decimated will the impact of humans on the biosphere will be reduced enough to enable the biosphere to recover its stability and health. A terrible thought. Nevertheless, I am still in a good mood, not despairing, because we are such a creative and adaptive species. But it really is a matter of 'change or die' now as it was for the Hebrew poets and prophets two and a half millennia ago. I think St Paul would agree.

Disembodied, and grief observed

Finally this morning, we woke up to a light sprinkling of snow, not much more than a centimetre. After breakfast an extended time of Sunday Prayer. I read through the Eucharist of the day, rather than watch on-line, as Clare did. That is, until the live feed transmission broke down, thanks to the introduction of a different piece of kit to the St John's chapel cum studio where the service takes place.

I can't quite put my finger on it yet but didn't have the heart to join her today. I feel fine at watching a broadcast Eucharist in any form with a live congregation. It's easy to join in. I've attended a couple of Euro diocesan services on Zoom, with eighty others in their little on-screen boxes, No sound of the group responding, or singing together. Not knowing anyone apart from the Bishops leading didn't help. I found it a bit strange, even though it was well thought out.  

I think Zoom could be tolerable at a Benefice or congregational level, because I would recognise faces in the little on-screen boxes. Our Benefice streams one service on-line via Facebook. The camera operator says the responses, and recorded hymns are played with the text displayed. I've watched Parish services with Clare before the Eucharist in church resumed, but today, I reverted to what I did in Ibiza, and read through Matins and the Eucharist. I miss receiving Communion but equally miss being in a group and responding to the priest together. 'We who are many are one bread, one body' is what we all say and that is what makes liturgy alive and life giving to me.

Watching passively even with Clare still feels disembodied - that's the word. Prayer for me is never just in the mind and on the tongue, but a physical and social action in which we carry each other. The truth of this came home to me after five months of social isolation, then returning to public worship, and then being separated from it again. In a crisis we have to do our best and make the best we can of our situation, and our clergy have certainly made an immense effort to make the on-line offering an enriching alternative. It's the passivity that leaves me feeling out on a limb, I guess.

For centuries before my time, clergy recited the liturgy at the altar and an assistant answered and maybe a choir sang, depending on the occasion. The laity were entirely observers, and the highlight for them was to watch the elevation of the Host and Chalice during the Words of Institution. But they were there together, and that mattered. Looking down the narrow channel of the video screen is not the same. In fact, I feel more involved if I just listen to a service on the radio, or recite a service aloud myself. Somehow it offers room for the imagination to work, not least in feeling connected to others who listen actively. Or am still missing something, or finding my own spiritual poverty exposed from a new angle? Time will tell I guess.

I went for a long walk in the park before lunch and a shorter one after. All morning despite clouds, the sun shone through. It was cold enough for the snow not to melt immediately. Children with their parents were having a lot of fun together while it lasted. It became overcast in the afternoon, but the snow by then had nearly all melted and the temperature stayed around zero and felt even colder. Very refreshing!

In the evening I watched the second episode of Finding Alice, in which the newly widowed quirky heroine organises a funeral at home and buries her husband in the garden without planning permission. I foresee trouble ahead. A DIY secular funeral ceremony echoed church liturgy, without text or context, featuring without explanation a cleric as mistress of ceremonies, claiming to be OK about doing humanist funerals as religious ones. No so far fetched in real clerical life. Was she a hospital chaplain running a bereavement group in the hospital mortuary suite featured earlier in the episode? I wasn't sure. All a bit odd, though not totally odd. It's been quite real in its representation of grief and grieving so far, but where next, I wonder? 

Series end, no plot spoiler yet!

A frosty sunny morning with clear blue skies to stat with. Pancakes for breakfast after a lie-in, then a walk around the Fields. There was a police car stationed at the entrance to the sports changing room car park. Masked officers were stopping and questioning drivers entering to see if they had sufficient reason not to be arriving on foot. They were also helpful to walkers as the road was covered with black ice but thanks to last night's frost still affecting in the shaded area and making it tricky to negotiate. 

Park footpaths were well populated with people walking, riding or standing chatting, not alway socially distanced, so we kept our distance by walking on the grass. Although the soil remains waterlogged, the grass and surface layer were frozen and enjoyably crisp to walk on, at least in the shade. Getting out in the morning recently when it's been sunny has been a treat as the light is different from the afternoon. I tend to go out again for a shorter walk in the afternoon, perhaps to the shops. The more sunlight I can absorb the better. The day is already three quarters of an hour longer than it was at winter solstice, and as I don't have any pressing commitments, it does me good to get out as much as is practicable.

In the evening I watched the final episode of the eighth and last series of 'Spiral / Engrenages' on iPlayer, wondering with some apprehension what kind of conclusion there would be to a story of crime fighting in Paris that's been running for fifteen years, and has always been relevant and disturbingly through changing times in the social issues it has touched upon. Apprehension is very much an indicator of how much I've come to care about the main characters Laure and Gilou, the team they lead and the lawyers they have to deal with. It's an indication of how well written it has been. It would be unfair to say anything about the way it ended until it's been broadcast on BBC Four and my sister June has watched it and we've discussed it, as we often do. 

 

On the record

Another sunny start to the day, with a layer of frost on cars in the street. By half past ten, while Clare was having her on-line jazz piano lesson, I went for a refreshing walk, first around Thompson's Park, then to Llandaff Village, then down to Blackweir and back home in time to make lunch.

In the early news it was reported from health authorities in Yorkshire that they were ahead of schedule with their covid vaccinations and had run out of supplies. It's being said that there are enough supplies in the country to meet the target of inoculating the top four categories of vulnerable people by mid February, but it's a matter of scheduling and delivery logistics. This is much the same as what's been reported here in Wales, except that the Welsh Government and Health Boards have stuck to their measured delivery plan and not run out for racing too fast, to avoid having the vaccination teams idling or stood down. First Minister Mark Drakeford is being harrassed by the BBC for giving honest answers to vaccination questions. It's not the first time he has been targeted for criticism for getting things right, acting in advance of English government moves and publicity.

A letter arrived for me in today's post from CofE's Archbishop's Council, inviting me to register my basic clerical identity details on an English church national database, for public reference. Hitherto, the world has relied on Crockford's Clerical Directory, a respected independent publication which has been around since 1858, and whatever information is made publicly available by each diocese. It's possible for clerics to get left out of either, and be difficult to trace, a concern when it comes to safeguarding issues. The new database will also cover lay church office holders and workers. I'm asked, as I hold a Europe diocese PTO and worked for half my ministry in the Church of England. Church in Wales, as disestablished Province of the Anglican Communion will already have its own database on which I appear as a retired licensed cleric with a PTO. Anyway registration on the CofE database only took a few minutes, then I received a confirmatory email.

By the time I went out for a load of bread after lunch the sky had clouded over and the pavement was wet. I thought the shower was just ending, but as I walked it really began in earnest, and I got quite wet. Not long after I got back, the rain stopped, the sky cleared and the temperature dropped. Another frosty night to come, and no sign of the promised snow down here on the coast.

The wound pain was quite acute for a while this evening. I don't know what to do about it. No chance of getting a wound specialist to look at it without going through the rigmarole of a GP or hospital visit. I'm not sure if a district nurse could do anything other than look at it and recommend a specialist looks at it. They're all so very busy with far worse medical crises to manage, and it's not exactly life threatening. No sign of infection, just sharp excruciating pain sometimes, which takes a while to recover from, the sort of pain that analgesics can't deaden, as it stimulates the vagus nerve, like hitting a panic button. Walking is the only thing that helps. I've done 13km instead of 10 today.

I watched this week' episode of 'Rebecka Martenson Arctic Murders' this evening. I love to see the snow covered terrain and the way it slows life down naturally. Sara observed that Swedes in the north naturally speak slowly, and take time taking with each other, yet when something goes amiss they have very fiery tempers.

The evening news told of a troubling early statistical report on the impact of the new coronvirus variant, and intimations that lock-down measures will stay in place until April. The government has talked about 'following the science', but it's been noticeable how slow the reaction has been to new data, as if needing to soften the impact and avoid inevitable economic impact. It's not worked. Despite vaccination roll-out happening at a remarkable pace, infections and deaths still rise. The situation is not under control, and the tone is more serious and less upbeat than it was (apart from vaccination news), as if the government now using anxiety to motivate non compliant people. I believe that from the outset, measure should have been imposed more strictly so that people would get used to how it inevitably has to be in order to bring the pandemic to an end. 

Normality returns, step by step

How cheering to wake up with sun shining through the window this morning! It clouded over again later but stayed dry. Despite overnight rain, the Taff water level was lower by half a metre, so no flooded fields When I was walking in Pontcanna Fields in the hour before sunset, the temperature dropped sharply. There was no wind at ground level, but the sky cleared from the north east, a high altitude weather front driving clouds to the southwest as the sun's rays dappled them with an orange hue - half the sky was bright blue, the other half what they call a 'mackerel sky'. Unusual and spectacular to see! 

Last week we both received, a few days apart, our driving license renewal letters. I  first had to renew after an eyesight test at seventy, and now again. My! Those five years passed quickly! Clare filled in the paper form. I did mine on-line, and the new license arrived in today's post. I have to cut it up and mail the pieces back to the DVLA. It doesn't say in the instructions if the address is freepist, but it doesn't mention the customary stamped addressed envelope either. Odd 

President Joe Biden has been busy since his inauguration yesterday rescinding many of the executive orders issued by Trump, who took America out of WHO membership, out of the Paris climate accord, and approved a major Arctic oil exploration project in Alaska. It has frightening potential to cause environmental damage while continuing to produce fossil fuel while the race is on globally to achieve zero carbon energy production to mitigate global warming. It's such a relief that a leader with global standing and credibility is now in charge. 

Top of his priority list is an activating a plan to get American vaccinated and controlling the pandemic. It was great to hear America's top public health spokesman, Dr Anthony Faucci on the news this morning, celebrating the country's return to WHO membership, and praising its many achievements in relation to global health. He was often under fire during the Trump regime for insisting on the seriousness of the pandemic while Trump tried to play it down, repeating all sorts of spurious 'facts' unsupported by science. Truth will out. He stood his ground and been vindicated.

There's no doubt that Biden's aim to reconcile the factions into which the country is now polarised. Hearing and understanding what disaffected people want and acting on this in response to their real needs is going to be a real challenge.

This evening, Clare wanted to watch Biden's inauguration on iPlayer catch-up. Having hear the speech, I opted to watch a couple of episodes of 'Spiral / Engrenages' instead, and then 'New Amsterdam'. I didn't have much energy for doing anything more creative. The Seton's suture is giving me pain in the wound at the moment but the wound looks healthy. The pain may be a consequence of wound closure, so the suture's not as loose as it was, and its free end sticks into me, like a needle or a thorn. I need to exercise a lot and be careful how I sit or lie, and never for too long.

Inaugural honesty in a pandemic of swindling as well as covid

A lot of rain overnight. Clare walked down to the Taff before I got up this morning, and remarked how high the water was, I went down to the river before lunch. The water had risen even further, overflowing on to the footpath by the bridge. It's as bad as it was last February, although I think there may have been an overflow a few weeks ago. We've never seen such extreme weather.

I went to our local HSBC branch to bank a cheque after lunch, wondering if it's one of 82 local branches set to close in the latest cost saving round of reduction of local services. It's disturbing to think banking bosses are willing to disregard the needs of people who cannot travel to larger branches and queue to be seen because they don't want to bank on-line or by telephone. The idea is that such clients can use services provided instead by their local Post Office, to bank cheques, make payments, deposit or withdraw cash. 

It seems some sort of deal has been done with the Bank of Ireland which I believe operates a franchise to offer financial services to the Post Office. I wonder if this will lead to clients deciding to transfer accounts to the Bank of Ireland via the Post Office? Certainly in Switzerland and EU countries Post Offices offer a range of banking services including debit and credit cards. Maybe it'll develop like that here too.  

Earlier in the week I received a text message purporting to be from HSBC recognisably a phishing scam. I enquired of the bank if any agency within the HSBC security network was keeping a record of fake phone numbers used for phishing scams. Apparently not. Only if emails purporting to come from HSBC can be forwarded to them, so they their provenance can be tracked. Voice calls and text messages are too many to be logged, and fake identities change very rapidly, so it's impossible to retrieve useful information that enables the source to be tracked. Bank staff have to deal with a growing number of client subjected to fraudulentl solicitations. Some people suspect and need reassurance, others are duped. We get half a dozen spam calls a week at least, sometimes twice a day. A swindling epidemic.

This afternoon, an hour of sheer delight listening on BBC Sounds catch-up to Choral Vespers in Latin from the London Oratory. A lovely gift for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. By the time it was over the US Presidential inauguration ceremony had started, so I switched channels and listened to Joe Biden's speech on catch-up. It was a moving powerful appeal for American unity in facing the challenge posed by the pandemic and its economic impact. He was open in declaring himself to be a man of faith, appealing to the heart of faith in others. It was a powerful secular sermon, delivered by an active Catholic. No religious piety displayed, but a deep commitment to truth, justice, equality and reconciliation. 

He was an inspiring contrast to the divisive self centred rhetoric of Trump. His parting speech wasn't inflammatory, simply a rehearsal of what he considered to be his achievements, couched in vague references to the improvement in 'numbers' on his watch. Now Trump has gone to Florida, with no intention of retiring or staying out of public life, who knows what will happen next?

This evening, Clare and I watched 'Staged', the entire first series of comedy shorts about rehearsing a play via Zoom under lock-down, starring David Tennant and Michael Sheen, with a cameo appearance in the sixth episode of Dame Judi Dench, sending herself up, as did David and Michael throughout. We laughed out loud throughout  from start to finish. A refreshing inspired contemporary on-line drama production. 

A friend in deed

Another damp day, but ten degrees centigrade all day from before dawn until well after sunset, as if the clouds were trapping a large mass of warm air, and there was no wind to shift it. Curious.

I set out in good time to drive to Thornhill for this morning's funeral, but found the car wouldn't start. We have used it so little recently, and simply not left it running outside the house long enough keep the charge level up and prevent the battery from draining. It could have been bump started, but with nobody around and the contagion risk entailed in asking anyone to help, not enough time to connect the battery charger and top it up just enough to get it started, and not enough time to be certain a taxi could come soon enough to get me there on time, and the possible risk of taking a taxi anyway, I started to panic.

I called Pidgeons and explained what had happened, and bless 'em, an empty stretch limo pulled into the street ten minutes later, kitted out with anti-covid screens (a thousand quid a go, said Paul my chauffeur), so I travelled in style and peace to Thornhill and arrived with twenty minutes to spare. Paul is one of Pidgeon's long standing drivers. He used to be an emergency recovery vehicle driver, and sometimes now has to go to crash sites and recover bodies. Unflappable, good humoured, always willing to help. After the service, with his boss's permission, he drove back to Pidgeon's garage, collected his jump leads, drove me home and got the car started in just a few minutes! I hope he enjoyed the thank ou pot of home made marmalade I gave him.

I did most of my walk before lunch, then went out again down to Blackweir later in the afternoon, to see if the onset of rain in the Brecon Beacons, as warned by my weather app, was reaching us yet. It was much the same as normal, but with a rainy night ahead who knows about tomorrow?

I had a long chat on the phone with Ashley in the evening and during our talk, signed off the penultimate set of audited accounts for 2019, the last trading year for CBS. In 2020, the year of covid, there's been almost no account activity. Auditing these accounts will be very simple and the next task will to audit them and wind up the company. Thanks to some very careful stewardship the company will be wound up owing nothing, all bills paid, electronic and other physical assets properly disposed of, if not written off, nothing left in the bank, no directors' payoffs. We always believed this is how a voluntary not-for-profit business should conduct its affairs - honourably.

I said we signed off the audited accounts. In former years each of us signed the paper version, but on this occasion Ashley received an email from our accountants which contained a link to access an online document service where an applet allowed us to append a signature to the correct place in the document and then submit it for printing. A jpeg of Ashley's signature was accepted by the document portal, but not mine. This was one of three options available. If I'd been viewing on a tablet I could have used a pen and given a live signature, but as this wasn't possible, a third option, was to type in the constituents of the forename and surname I use in signing. It shows on the document in a quaint cursive copperplate script! If ever interrogated, about this I can say 'Yes I did this, and it was a surprise to me how it came out! 

All this was done standing up with my Chromebook on a chest of drawers while we talked on the phone. I never had to do anything like that before! Electronic submission to Companies House had already happened by the due date, as law requires if you're registered for Corporation Tax. We didn't owe any as our turnover was well below the threshold. 

Trump had announced his farewell ceremony, boycotting Joe Biden's Presidential inauguration, will take place at Andrews Airbase when he leaves office tomorrow. A twenty one gun salute and a final speech and then off to Florida to live. I guess the world is wondering whether he'll have anything else contentious or inflammatory to say.  

Church lock-out again regrettably

It's my sister June's 86th birthday today. I sung her an audio 'Happy Birthday to you' greeting, but it wasn't to successful as I couldn't get the sound levels right. Later in the day, I did the same on video and emailed it and that was more successful. I was delighted to hear from her that her GP surgery outreach team is visiting her tomorrow to administer her Oxford/AZ anti covid job. 

Sending the video wasn't straightforward. I recorded it on my Blackberry, but the file size was too large to email, so I transferred it to my Samsung phone where I have Whatsapp, sent the video to Clare (June doesn't use Whatsapp). The Whatsapp software is very good at compressing video to a tenth of its size for onward transmission, so it's possible to email the compressed version using Gmail to anyone, as it's not prohibitively large. it worked just fine.

There was a Whatsapp message from Mthr Frances to say that the PCC had decided to close churches for public worship for the next five weeks. I'm not surprised, but I am profoundly disappointed. There was something very special about returning to church for services, and discovering that despite mask wearing, no physical contact and social distancing the spiritual sense of being The Body of Christ was as profound as ever. As sacramental as hearing the Word proclaimed and receiving Holy Communion. Being reduced to being passive liturgical voyeurs by on-line liturgy yet again is a real deprivation, and I'm surprised to say, leaves me feeling very upset.

As a youthful Anglo-Catholic liberal zealot, it was not unusual for me to celebrate a house Mass for small parish groups, or Mass in a lecture room with students, or even on occasions to say Mass privately at home, but as the years passed I stopped doing this. My sense of value in public gatherings of Christians in a sacred space, its open sacramental quality took on a deeper significance than the rather existential small group encounters I'd enjoyed before. 

I came to understand what it must mean for people to attend worship just to listen and pray in their own way, whether they were going to receive Communion or not. There's more to the 'Fellowship of the Holy Spirit' than we may be aware of. The testimony of some adult converts to the part played in their spiritual journey by sitting in an open church, or attending worship and slowly learning how to participate and feel at home there, is well recognised. Those closed doors and gates are somehow an offence against the Gospel, light going out as the clouds of fear circulate. Spiritually loyal and hungry people will return in due course. God won't lost track of any of them, from the divine perspective clergy, church and liturgy are all ephemeral efforts to reach out, always at risk of failure. I'll get over this eventually. Famine or fast help remind us ... Somos todos mortales.

I watched David Attenboroughr's 'Perfect Planet' documentary on seasonal weather tonight, so very beautifully shot and highly informative, gently raising concerns about the impact of climate change on all life on earth. Then, Saturday's seventh episode of Spiral/Engrenages. There are several new series on at the moment, but I don't fancy any of them. This I looked forward to.

Church on hold again?

There were twenty of us for the Eucharist at St Catherine's this morning. The new covid variant scare is having hitting people's confidence. It seems tonight's PCC is set to discuss whether or not to continue to offer public worship, as some attendees are slower to disperse from the churchyard than is considered to be desirable. 

Clergy are being enjoined not to stand outside to greet people from a suitable distance as they leave, as this leads to people hanging around outdoors. Outside the church gates on the street, in the shops, the risks will be high because the public realm isn't as well controlled. It doesn't take much to ask people not to take off their masks while they are within the gates. They'll understand why. Outside, it's up to each person to assess risk for themselves.

It troubles me that if clergy can't see and hail worshippers from afar and ask how they are, offer a word of support and encouragement, what will it do to pastoral relationships? On-line isn't enough, a face on a screen doesn't allow a pastor to notice the true colour of someone's complexion, their tone of voice, their movement when they walk, all of which inform the relationship the shepherd has with the flock. I found it in Ibiza - seeing only half a dozen people over a three month period, face to face, very occasionally. It was impossible to establish meaningful pastoral relationships with people I was there to serve. That was the worst thing, not being able to assess from personal contact what was really happening to people. Social media can't be trusted when it comes to baring one's soul. 

And all this happens on a day when the key Gospel phrase is 'Come and see ...' 

It comes in a week when a contagion expert said on the news that the risk is far less outdoors, with or without a mask, although research into this is still on-going and not yet peer reviewed and published. The most serious risk is in uncontrolled indoor settings, like supermarkets, on which new health and safety requirements have been imposed of necessity this weekend. If data on supermarket based contagion is available, why not data on contagion in compliant churches? Without proper information, judgements are likely to be made on the basis of anxious hearsay - as if we needed that!

In church, we pray in a highly controlled environment, sitting in well spaced out pews, wearing obligatory masks. Those who attend behave considerately of others, and don;t hang about indoors longer than they need to. We're told there's a hugely increased risk, but without a shred of data to show how many Anglican congregations worshipping together compliantly are known to have been involved in transmitting infection. Sure, a few churches have blatantly ignored the risk from the outset, carried on as normal and become 'superspreaders', but does that mean the rest of us can't be trusted to behave compliantly?  Caution, self-discipline, good information are always essential in Christian conduct, even more so in such dangerous days. Timidity is understandable and inevitable, recklessness is folly, but giving in to the tide of fear - how does that witness to the Gospel?

On my walk in the park after lunch, the Taff water level was down again and the resident Merganser was back on the rock slabs where family can be seen. On the same outcrop stood a cormorant as I was passing and I got a nice photo of the two of them in each other's space. The merganser moved ,then fluffed up its feathers as it turned its back on the cormorant. The cormorant then plopped into the water and took off.

Afterwards, I decided to have a go at reclaiming space in my Gmail accounts now 85% full. If storage fills up completely I'll be required to rent extra space, but why bother if most of the data stored is redundant or irrelevant? Last year I deleted emails from 2007 when I registered the accounts, up to 2010 when I retired. Since then, a great number of emails were CBS correspondence, not necessary to keep as they are copied on the CBS Gmail account. 

Over the past ten years, the size of photo attachments has risen tenfold, as many senders don't bother to downsize them before sending. Also thousands of notifications that should have been deleted weren't. Google's fast search options mask the accumulation of redundant files and big attachments. After an hour's work, I got rid of ten gigabytes of data on one account and seven on another. One thing which I discovered on other file storage systems too. The deleted content of the account trash can must also be deleted before file space is reclaimed. Sneaky that one! A worthwhile effort, I think.

I had an email after lunch from Emma in the Euro-diocesan office about the new requirement for holders of PTO doing locum duty that they now need to do a further on-line Safeguarding training, before their PTO is renewed. The five year renewal cycle has been reduced to three years, the accent on training is welcome in a fast changing environment, especially regarding the rise of on-line forms of abuse. Emma works from home in deepest rural Essex where, like here they've had phenomenal amounts of rain. There was a tiny video clip of the little stream at the bottom of her garden, swollen and spilling over its banks. It's the same in many parts of Britain.

Much to my surprise, I had an email from Bishop June while I was out walking, noting with appreciation my small effort to support the Parish ministry team these past few months. How could I do anything else as an elderly churchgoer who happens to be ordained and still fit enough to function from time to time. In present circumstances ministry is extra difficult and demanding of new skills, stamina and patience. It's a relief to me that I no longer have responsibility for holding everything together and giving a lead. Acting on orders, as long as I can do that well and correctly is all I can hope to do nowadays. It's not a bad thing at all. President to be Joe Biden is my age. I'm glad not to be in his shoes! 

ON telly tonight, we watched the first of a six part drama about a woman whose property developer husband dies mysteriously at 48 while he's showing them around the high tech new home he's just had built for them to move into. It's a sort of black comedy, that may turn into a comedy crimmie, I suppose. In my Geneva days I was summoned urgently to offer pastoral support to the traumatized wife and daughter of a member of the congregation who was a banker. He dropped dead in the middle of a working day, and I was asked to accompany them to the chapel of rest where his body had just been laid out. He was still in his work suit, looking smart, eerie and unreal. 'That's not my Daddy!' exclaimed his 13 year old daughter, and they both wept. 

Watching this brought it all back to me, whether it was really true to life or not. That made it uncomfortable to watch, not entertaining at all. I am interested in how it plays out, however, given the problems which arise when someone dies intestate or mired in debt or cash-flow issues, especially as bank accounts are automatically frozen when someone dies. It's understandable that some elderly people are still in the habit of keeping a stash of cash under the bed, reluctant to entrust all their wordly goods to the self serving paranoia of a modern banking system.

Time of trial - no let-up

As soon as I woke up I uploaded today's Morning Prayer, then an hour's Saturday lie-in with Clare followed by pancakes for breakfast. It was eight degrees and the sun shone through the clouds, so we went out for a walk around the Fields before lunch, just in case the rain returned later. Although we weren't aware of it, there must have been a lot of rain  overnight as there were huge pools of water on the saturated grass. The river Taff was running half a metre higher than yesterday afternoon.

Stricter controls are being introduced on supermarkets in Wales, imposing mask wearing and hand sanitization on entry. Many stores already did this before, when it was a highly recommended option, but things have got lax recently, and discipline needed tightening up. Takeaway orders have to be collected by appointment and delivered through a hatch at the door so people don't congregate indoors while waiting. 

Flights from Portugal and Brazil have been banned, due to another fast spreading covid variant in South America. Incoming passengers from other countries must have had a negative covid test three days before travelling, and quarantine for ten days on arrival. It's unfortunate that quarantining isn't strictly enforced in this country as it is in others. Needless to say, the infection and death rates continue to rise, although there are patchy indications around the country that rates are levelling off, including here in our locality, as a result of restrictions immediately after Christmas.

Listening to 'Any Answers' on the Radio after lunch, it was remarkable the number of callers responding to exchanges on last night's edition of 'Any Questions' expressed the view that the government pandemic responses had come too slowly and weren't strict enough, or you could just say - over cautious and not bold enough given the gravity of the situation. It's clear that a majority of people make an effort to stick within the guidelines, but there's also an awareness that some don't, either rebelling against restriction of any kind, or remaining wilfully ignorant and careless, taking unnecessary risks. 

Supermarket staff are facing abuse for stopping people on entry and asking them to wear masks. Police face resistance when intervening to break up illegal gatherings. Everyone is tired and demoralised by the continuing need to be vigilant and restrict their activities, and some people are getting sick or being made sicker because their lives, their jobs, their hopes for the future have come to a standstill. This is a 'time of trial' in the biblical sense that exposes our weaknesses as well as our strengths, acknowledged and hidden. I believe the Gospel of Jesus speaks to this condition and enables us to find inner strength to endure. What more, I wonder, can the church do to help people rediscover this vital truth?

The emptiness of Sophia Gardens

I had a very lazy morning, falling asleep after saying morning prayer again, nine hours altogether! But it seems to do me good. It's not not to be under pressure, and have nothing to worry about, but rather let the natural rhythm of my physical need for rest and exercise take priority.

Yesterday, the daytime temperature was around nine degrees. It went down to zero overnight, what you'd expect consistently for this time of year. Warm damp air from the west meeting much colder air from the East and mixing in our corner of the continent. Sara, near coastal Gothenburg in Sweden sent me photos of their garden with twenty centimetres of snow, and Roy in Madrid has sent photos of Spain's capital city with thirty centimeters of snow. It's 667m above sea level there, about the same as the Black Mountains, often the furthest south winter snow settles in Wales nowadays. We both miss walking in the snow, and the lovely silence it brings. We have to be grateful for frost anyway, as it plays a part in balancing populations of insects that's vital to our ecosystem.

My afternoon walk took me to around Pontcanna Fields down to Sophia Gardens and back. The cricket stadium and National Sports Centre are closed, and the coach station deserted, as no National Express coach services are operating around the country now. Just a few joggers and dog walkers are about. The main road is fairly busy, and some local buses run, but are virtually empty. It's so strange, other worldly. There was a solitary merganser duck perched on small rock in the river, in the same position as I've seen the creature several times lately. There's a few flat stones nearer the shore where in previous years a family of mergansers has been raised before moving downstream. Is this one waiting for a breeding partner to turn up? I guess they must make a nest there on the river bank, although it won't be so congenial this year with so much of the riverbank undergrowth cut down and not yet started to grow back. I hope that poor patient duck isn't waiting in vain.

The emptiness of Sophia Gardens, looking so smart since the recent upgrading of paths and parking places, reminded me of the first few days of lock-down in Ibiza when I walked to the empty beach resorts and found everything closed with very few people out and about. March is the season when many holiday places are closed to guests or undergoing maintenance, but there are still apartments occupied by people who either work locally or stay off-season because they enjoy it when it's quieter, except that Spain's lock-down obliged people to return to or remain in their primary place of residence, so travel by land and sea without a stated legitimate purpose was impossible. Stronger enforcement measures didn't stop the virus from spreading, however, in poor deprived working class communities. It didn't stop people from socializing and spreading the virus, however heavily punished were those caught offending.

After my walk, I worked on preparing next Tuesday's funeral service, and then recorded tomorrow's Morning Prayer in the attic. After supper an episode of 'Spiral' on catch-up and 'Rebecka Martinson' live on More Four. Another routine sort of week under lock-down grateful to be alive, safe, free to go out and enjoy nature in the heart of the city, and not alone. Even so, I feel a little restless sometimes, and miss being able to go somewhere different for a change.

Thinking together

I celebrated the Eucharist at St John's this morning with nine others. The church was open when I arrived, but nobody had a safe key, by Fr Benedict rang the caretaker, and we were able to open the safe at the last minute. Mthr Emma came as well. I appreciated being able to minister to the Parish clergy for a change. 

The Gospel of the day struck a chord with me, Jesus healing a leper whose appeal to him begins; "If you want, you can heal me and make me clean" (Matt 8.2). Jesus says "Of course ..." It's like the man is trying to make Jesus feel guilty, rather than saying outright "Have mercy on me, and heal me" Jesus doesn't try to teaching him a lesson, or play his game, he just heals him, and sends him off to register his healing with the local priest and make a thank offering, and say nothing about how he has been healed. The man can't resist being indiscreet and tells everyone he meets about who healed him. 

Yes, he's got a great story to tell after goodness knows how long living in social isolation, but he ignores the only thing Jesus asked of him in return. There's no comeback, no sanction for disobeying Jesus. He's already on his way, someone else is begging him to heal them. The story begs the question why Jesus seeks to avoid publicising his ministry. It's what biblical scholars call 'The messianic secret'.

It struck me, perhaps for the first time, that Jesus doesn't look for approval or support. He asks those he helps to be discreet about his ministry. He gives to each person individually. Contrary to popular ideas about what a Messiah should be or do, His aim isn't to start a new religious or political movement, but to offer a no strings attached experience of God's unconditional free grace to anyone open to receive it, no matter what their status, motive or attitude. He's not out to change anyone he helps. They must find in themselves the need to change in response to grace they have freely received. This was hard to grasp in His own time, and it still is nowadays. 

Yesterday Clare started talking about making face masks, as both of us find the designs of those we find in the shops are never quite satisfactory in use. She found a sewing pattern to work with on the internet and then produced a trial version which fitted me better than her. I have a larger head and a long jaw. A mask that I wear correctly always feels as if it will slip off when I talk, as I have a big jaw and long chin. It's good to have a mask that gives me more confidence to wear when I'm ministering to others.

I had a walk around Pontcanna Fields after lunch, and was surprised to find, later in the day, that I walked further in total today than at any time since the first week I was in Ibiza, without feeling tired. It's good that my energy levels are still improving - well, maybe not every day. I'm just glad that improvement is still possible at all.

By chance this evening I discovered Series Two of the New York City hospital drama 'New Amsterdam' started last Thursday on the More Four Channel. I was much taken with series one, both the story-lines and the characters, and the first couple of episodes of series two which I watched this evening didn't disappoint. 

It was amazing tonight to see a hospital's medical director portrayed as making a effort to learn what was possible to do to improve the general health and well-being of staff complaining that they never had enough time for themselves and their families and always felt tired. He figures out that most of them are taking four hours a day to commute to work, on public transport if not driving across a congested city, exhausting in its own right. He proposes that staff pool their commuting expenditure and hire a coach that will pick them up from home to take them to the hospital, saving a couple of hours a day to be that much longer at home, and give them quiet time on the bus, enabling them to plan their day, and get extra rest. It just works. 

So often in life complex problems can be addressed in a simple creative way, once a right understanding of surrounding issues has been reached. John Bell's 'Thought for the Day' on Tuesday spoke of Jesus, not as one who handed out edicts from on high, but as one who sat down and discussed essential matters with people at grass roots level. It's something the church needs to pay more attention to in its 'strategic' planning, rather than do surveys and bring in experts to forge policies everyone can follow,

Trumpism confronted at last?

Another damp drizzly day, but the temperature is nine degrees, unusually mild for January. There were eleven of us for this morning's Eucharist at St Catherine's. It's our regular day for home deliveries of food ordered on line or over the phone. Something went wrong with the Co-op delivery. All the groceries Clare ordered turned up, but in addition a couple of bags of someone else's order. It's happened before, and when it does we don't get charged for the excess, but they won't take back the mistaken goods, as a precaution against covid. 

The small amount of fresh food we eat and the canned food we give to the food bank, as there's no way of tracing who the spare bags were intended for. When they discover the shortfall however, they can call the Co-op and get a replacement delivery. It's happened to us in the past, and the staff in out local branch are very good about it. It's a huge task for any store, for which few were structurally equipped to do from the outset. I guess they are still learning by doing. 

I suspect that home food deliveries will remain commonplace for much of the rest of this year, as it'll be summer before the whole population is vaccinated, and longer still before the vestiges of covid contagion are eliminated from the population. I just hope food stores don't lose too much money in the process and end up going out of business, as is happening with so many high street retailers.

Our organic veggie bag delivery resumed today, so I walked around to collect ours after lunch and went for a damp walk after making a bereavement call in preparation for next Tuesday's funeral. Pidgeon's called me about a service for the still-born child of a Romanian couple. They seemed OK with having an Anglican priest. I'm willing to help, but I asked if a Romanian priest had been approached. The person who called me didn't know about the Romanian Orthodox church community in Cardiff, or of services that take place regularly in St Dyfrig and St Samson's church. It seemed to me that pastoral care and support from a Romanian speaking person was important in such a tragic situation. I couldn't offer any contact details, but directed the enquirer to the Area Dean, who should have that information. I do hope he is successful finding a Romanian pastor, for the couple's sake. 

Sunset is now at four thirty, and that little extra time seems to make a difference, even if the skies are grey, as they often are. I recorded tomorrow's morning prayer video before supper, the relaxed in front of the telly and caught up with the day's news.

Talk of impeaching Trump for a second time while still in office turned into a reality this evening with a vote in the US Congress House of Representatives, in which the slim Democrat majority was reinforced by the votes of ten Republicans, A trial will take place in the Senate, though it's unlikely to happen until after he leaves office. The point of the exercise then will be to complete a process which will prevent him from standing for office again in 2024. 

With credible threats of more orchestrated violence from extremist groups in all fifty states, Washington is already in lock-down a week early. Hotels are shutting for the next week, and AirBnB reservations have been cancelled across the board to prevent an influx of demonstrators accumulating in advance. A security operation of this scale surrounding Inauguration Day has never been seen before, and shows how determined the political and governmental leaders are to protect American democracy and the Constitution from subversion and insurrection. There's no knowing in reality how far right wing populist sentiment has been stoked up by agents of foreign powers, but it is clear that the Alt-Right movement in American public discourse over the past decade has been driven by patriotic resentments and fears of change, coupled with the persistence of the rich-poor divide. 

The right to free speech is widely accepted, social media has evolved and given a platform to people of all kinds of persuasion, promoting ideas and values from the highest to the most debased imaginable. In the absence of shared moral consensus, racist and sexist hate speech flourish on-line, and conspiracy theorists strive to persuade people that the brand of falsehood is true but all others are liars. A place of nightmares as well as dreams and visions. Will it be possible for Joe Biden's administration to reset the nation's moral compass, and do enough justice to those voicing real grievances to ensure healthy debate and reconcile a country now do locked in confrontation and conflict? 

Trump saw the way things were and exploited them to gain support on his pathway to power. His effort to do things his way has unleashed pent-up forces of division he was incapable of channelling for the common good, and this has only made things worse. A great deal of soul searching and repentance is necessary when the drama of coming weeks dies down and the pandemic is brought under control. By the time Joe Biden's Inaguration takes place, over 400,000 Americans will have died of covid and 24 million been infected, with immense collateral damage done to the world's biggest economy. Biden is an active practicing Catholic. He needs all our prayers to become the blessing America needs right now, to curb the curse of Trumpism.

Better safe than sorry

I woke up just the second time last night at half past six, and couldn't get off to sleep properly again afterwards. After Thought for the Day, I uploaded today's Morning Prayer without a hitch, then got up for breakfast, conscious of not having enough sleep. Often I doze off after praying, but not today. I've had an email from Emma at Eurodiocese HQ asking me to do the on-line stage two Safeguarding course, now a requirement for clergy with PTOs. I'm happy to do this, whether or not it ever becomes possible to do another spell of locum duty abroad. 

I'm conscious there are all sorts of low level abusive habits or tolerated practices persisting in the life of the church, some of them to do with bizarre kinds of piety, but others to do with changes in governance and management styles under the guise of coping with crisis. Clergy and lay leaders can be victims as well as perpetrators. I'll be interested to see if any of this is reflected in the stage two course.

This afternoon I walked up to Llandaff Weir for the first time since 22nd November. There's been so much rain over the past couple of months that the footpath and surroundings stayed waterlogged and muddy, treacherous to walk on. A photo I took that day shows a huge tree stump, roots trunk and remains of branches, lodged at the top of weir in the same position as it had been since last February's floods. I think it must have washed out of the river bank nearby, eroded by the storm water surge. I was curious to see if it was still stuck there after the more recent spell of heavy rain, and it wasn't. 

There was no sign of it among the entangled remnants of trees and bushes trapped by island reefs of pebbles that build up in the river bed. Could something that heavy, perhaps half a ton of wet wood, have been carried further down the river out of sight? Or was it necessary for the river management team finally to remove it, as even more wood washed downstream built up and impeded the water flow? I'll never know the answer, but it's clear that work has been done along the banks of the Taff to improve the outflow of flood water.

On the walk back I was pleased to find the Cathedral open to visitors. A dozen English Cathedrals are now closed to visitors and offering only on-line services, because of soaring infection rates. In Wales the rate of increase is showing signs of slowing, but numbers of infections are still high and rising. First Minister Mark Drakeford instigated partial lock-down in Wales before England did, and the measures have been tightened since. Shopper behaviour in supermarkets is being identified as a source of contagion, as well as indoor meetings of households, are now to be restricted. Wales was first then England followed, again.

In the evening I watched the fifth episode of 'Spiral' on iPlayer, having discovered that all ten episodes of this final series are already available to watch. It means I'm not tied to watching later on Saturday evening and ending up not having an early night before church.

Clare's recently been learning to play a 1950s jazz ballad 'Cry me a river'. Julie London's recording with the legendary electric jazz guitarist Barney Kessel and bassist Ray Leatherwood made it into the hit parade after it was performed in the epic Lil' Richard rock 'n roll movie 'The Girl can't help it' in 1956, the year I started grammar school. The song was written for Ella Fitzgerald to sing in a movie, but it was dropped from the story-line, and she sang it in an album of her own 1961. By that time it was a cover version of London's hit. I still remember the words off by heart. I found it on YouTube and played it to Clare this evening. She remembers them too. 

Timely words about bogus Messiahs

Before uploading today's Morning Prayer video I listened to John Bell's 'Thought for the Day' on Radio 4 reflecting with some perspective on last week's events in Washington. It was a superb concise analysis of how and why certain strands of religious people have rallied behind Donald Trump, despite his appalling behaviour before and during his years of office. Part of the problem he said, is the false separation of the political and spiritual dimensions of life, as if political ethics and values were nothing to do with God - a totally un-biblical and heretical notion. 

It's a tribal way of avoiding having to think deeply about what religious faith and practice mean for the entire way in which we live and serve God. In a changing world, having to understand and be concerned about events is avoided by hiding behind a tribal banner. Trump gives the illusion of caring about what they believe and promising to defend them, in exchange for their unquestioning loyalty. He becomes regarded as a divinely appointed champion of their religion and liberty so that challenging Trump is perceived as an assault on God, so believers are prepared to fight and die for him.

"For many other Christians" says John Bell, "Trump has been a bogus Messiah, his photo shoot holding a bible outside a church during a Black Lives Matter protest was not, in my view, an endorsement of faith, but an attempt to convince the faithful that he was on their side. His ability to stand on a podium, manipulate emotions, pontificate and defy contradiction is in complete distinction to the great religious leaders. They, like Jesus, sat at ground level, even among those who disagreed with him, to discuss thorny issues, make themselves vulnerable and affirm the humanity of all."

I felt that I should quote him verbatim as it's the first time I have heard any Christian leader or teacher openly so what I have been thinking since Trump was elected. He sees himself uniquely as one who can save America from all its misfortunes - a bogus Messiah indeed. If any American religious leaders have said this openly I've not heard it, likewise as for European religious leaders. Is it considered unseemly to engage in openly criticising a head of state for dangerous messianic behaviour? Is this the price of unity? 

Unless, of course, news reports have been suppressed or not syndicated so that they don't become part of the public debate. It seems that only comedians and satirists have stood up and dared to mock Trump. On Wednesday, the retiring Archbishop of Wales came out openly in criticism. Sorry, too little too late. And what abut the rest of the establishment of church hierarchies? Simply to have stated, time and time again in public that the true Messiah Jesus didn't behave like Trump would surely have been a start in witnessing to the truth, rather than being so reticent for so long. 

Every Advent the church reads prophetic words about the Messiah from Old and New Testaments. early Christians in a turbulent changing were very conscious that life as they knew it could come to end both violently and abruptly. In this context the Messiah would appear, but nobody knew when or how. It was a mystery. Jesus and the Apostles urged people not to second guess how things would work out according to God's will and warned against preacher and leaders promising to rescue them and claiming to be sent on this mission by God. No matter how good or well meaning they seemed to be any claims to be godlike or superheroes shouldn't be trusted, they were manifestations of the anti-Christ - fake Messiahs. Nobody these 'enlightened' days dares to go against the flow and call a populist leader, religious or secular an anti-Christ. The use of such words has lost its force by being part of the rhetoric of sectarian protestant preachers, usually with the Pope as their target. So it was good to hear John Bell coming at the current American political crisis from a mainstream biblical perspective today.

When I stepped out of the house to walk after lunch I thought it was drizzling and about to stop. I didn't realise it had only just started and over two hours the fine mist turned into rain and soaked my ski jacket. Curiously, the temperature went back up to nine degrees at night, after hovering around zero yesterday. Apart from the grass today, gaunt dark trees against a uniform grey sky, with hundreds of crows wheeling above the trees on both sides of the Taff, made for an ominous and dramatic landscape to walk through rather than photograph, simply too wet to get a camera out.

The Welsh government has banned indoor mixing and outdoor socialising while walking now. You wouldn't think so, to judge by groups of teenagers and adults standing or walking along in groups of four if not more. I know it takes time for new instructions to sink in, but I see no sign of police officers out on patrol. The city centre has CCTV. Apart from traffic crossings there's no surveillance in the park, so patrolling is all the more needed to remind people of what's expected of them to stay safe.

No telly this evening. I spent my time trying to resurrect an old Acer laptop with a new linux install. It used to work except that the trackpad didn't function. I got the hardware to work perfectly and reinstalled Mint 19, but after the first successful reboot, the existence of the hard-disk was not recognised. There's something amiss in the set up of the UEFI secure boot firmware that I cannot figure out how to change. It's so frustrating! 

More covid worry and frustration

Waking up again to more bad news of covid infections continuing to rise out of control, and calls for a stricter lock-down. We were twenty adults and three children for the St Catherine's Eucharist, but for how much longer, amidst calls for even tighter restrictions, heaven only knows. Our church warden fell at home broke her leg and needed a few days in hospital after surgery. Then someone on her ward was tested positively for covid, so now she's stuck there in quarantine for ten days, and we're hoping and praying that the rest of the ward doesn't get infected.

When I walked in the park after lunch, I noticed that Coffee #1 and Cafe Castan were open for takeaways. Outside Cafe Castan, despite distancing measures, and a line of people queuing properly to be served, small groups of people stood un-distanced, un-masked, chatting nearby. And no sign of law enforcement. 

The BBC seems to be interviewing an 'disproportionate' number of elderly people expressing the opinion that the country should go back to a much stricter lock-down asap. Maybe they can't get anyone who doesn't care a toss about others to stand in front of a camera and be counted, unless they are in some kind of anarchic demonstration in defence of their civil liberty right to be careless and selfish. 

Calls for Trump to be removed from office before his term finishes continue to grow in the USA, as public outrage against him and congressional supporters continues to grow. He's been banned from both Twitter and Facebook, and the alternative far right free speech extremist social network is being removed from app stores and deprived of its web server space, as the big companies are recognising how damaging the persistence of their paranoid hateful messaging has turned out to be. The control of both national and international security rests ultimately with a President who increasingly behaves like a mad dictator, to the point of talking about a counter demonstration on the day of Joe Biden's inauguration.                                 

After my walk and before supper, I caught up the third and fourth episodes of 'Spiral / Engrenages', it is turning into a tragically powerful story of undocumented child migrants from North Africa in Paris, and how they subsist by mugging people and stealing phones or wallets. A phone shop dealer not only acts as a 'fence' for stolen phones, but is trusted to perform a social service for them, by electronically transferring ill-gotten euros to family accounts back home. 

One child gets murdered having stolen a batch of cocaine from a dealer who has collected it from drug 'mules' bringing it into the country in their digestive systems. It was shocking to hear an airport customs officer stating that they could only catch a fraction of travellers transporting drugs daily in the way. An dramatic exaggeration or not? Maybe recreational cocaine users will watch this series for entertainment, and realise how their demand makes them complicit in such an evil form of exploitation of poor people.

It was Anto's birthday today, and various family members Whatsapped him their greetings and talked on line. No family get-together in this year of covid for any of us.

After supper I worked on this week's batch of recordings of morning prayer, this time in the attic bedroom. At the moment the parish intercession list for the sick and departed needs regular updating. Unfortunately this can happen after I've made a recording, and then it needs doing again, since it's impossible to edit the video and get it to render correctly on Whatapp, the chosen platform for prayer group use. With a four year old phone, uploading the video file is problematic as the phone doesn't have enough memory and the process stalls. I've had to strip all but essential apps from it to free space. Recording ahead is necessary in case I hit unforeseen problems. Doing it on the day carries too much of a risk of failure. Doing it the day before risks not having an up to date intercession list. I wish there was a better way of doing this that'd justify scores of users making the change, but there isn't. It's been hard enough to develop the circle of users to may who have never used Whatsapp before. If only I could figure out what stops edited videos from rendering correctly on a smartphone ...

Winter watch

Finally, reading from a teleprompter, Trump video broadcasted a condemnation of Tuesday's mayhem on Capitol Hill - it's being likened to a hostage video by the media commentariat. Half a dozen members of his cabinet have resigned, dissociating themselves from his actions. Open discussion in Congress about removing him from office before the due date. Whether it will happen or not on such a short timescale is doubtful. 

Trump also stated that he won't attend Biden's presidential inauguration, the first time this has happened since 1860. Whatever he does on that day (and nobody knows what), will draw attention away from the President. A calculated move to undermine a celebration of national unity. A refusal to be reconciled. As long as he's in office he can still wield executive power to do dangerous things, The worry is that he'll declare war on Iran, and leave others to sort out the chaos generated.

Meanwhile rates of covid infections and deaths continue to climb in America and in Britain. A third new vaccine has been authorised for UK use, and there are reports of two new effective treatments that can be used on seriously ill covid victims, shortening their stay under an intensive care regime. Both assist in dampening over-reaction by the inflammatory mechanism of the immune system and reduce the chance of a fatal outcome to the infection. One drug costs a thousand pounds per treatment. A lot of money, but set against the cost of two thousand pounds a day per intensive care patient, its cost effectiveness is evident. The rate of advance in some areas of medical science this past year has been as amazing as the spread of the virus has been terrifying.

My crisp cold afternoon walk in the park was blessed by the sight of a family of long tailed tits foraging in the trees leading down to Blackweir Bridge. I also caught sight of a tree creeper in the same vicinity. They occupy same habitat year after year. Unlike the last time I saw them when I had a camera with me, this time I didn't. But never mind. It's a comfort to know that nature continues as best it can despite global warming and  other man made environmental damage projects.

This evening heralded the start of a new series of Rebecka Martenson - Arctic murders, set in the far north of Sweden. The first episode portrays the life of a community of Sami reindeer herders, with some wonderful photography and explanatory detail about their way of life today, with a family drama and a fatality at the heart of it. A must-watch series now for the next seven weeks of winter in the warm.

Better winter days

Throughout the day, condemnation of the violent invasion of the congressional confirmation proceedings has been drawing comment from leaders all over the world, with Trump coming in for severe criticism. Americans are still reeling from the shock, and Trump himself has been silent. Uncharacteristically, the Archbishop of Wales, John Davies, has spoken out. I can't find any statement from other Archbishops in Britain so far, but Boris Johnston among other UK political leaders has spoken out. About time. What took them so long? 

Admittedly Trump has given voice to dispossessed, frustrated and marginalised Americans, whose lives have been impoverished by social and industrial change, plus globalisation of trade, but he has encouraged them to see him as their saviour. Hopes have been nourished by his inflammatory rhetoric and his selfish ego has fed off their idolisation of his personality. It's a short path from being a charismatic strong leader to being an authoritarian dictator. It was interesting to hear what authoritarian heads of state had to say of events on Capitol Hill, quick to point out the flaws and weaknesses of democracy from their perspective.

Yesterday the forces of law and order were weakened to breaking point by the unexpected onslaught, and took time to recover, but after the disruption Congress continued with its duty and ratified Jo Biden as President. Then Trump conceded with a statement which didn't acknowledge his electoral loss, but stated there would be an orderly handover of power. But he still has a fortnight in office in which he has authority to put measures in place to impede progress for the new administration. It'll be a nervous wait until Inauguration Day.

I had lunch early and drove up to Thornhill for a funeral in the big Wenallt Chapel. Seven family members and two former neighbours of the deceased. Most of the extended family live around Nottingham, so the service was live streamed for their benefit. I needed to be on the alert, as I discovered at the last moment that the deceased was known by her second name, not her first, for which I had prepared. A daughter gave the eulogy, and somehow the hymn to be played after this got lost, but it didn't seem to matter as we were carried forward by the warmth of the tribute she made.

When I got home, a quick excursion to the bank and the shops, then marmalade making. It was my turn to today, the third and final batch, about seven kilos' worth in two dozen jars. Very satisfying. Now, we're out of jars and hunting for an extra place to store them! 

The temperature has hovered around zero, but as it's less humid, I don't feel so chilled to the bone indoors and outdoors, so walking in the cold is pleasantly stimulating. I was out at sunset on Pontcanna Fields. The temperature drop was quite sudden and the air was still. Low lying mist gathered over the grass as I walked shrouding solitary walkers and their dogs momentarily. It was magical! And one time when I didn't have a decent camera to hand, so I had to use my Blackberry phone camera. It's a nice photo but not nearly as sharp as it could have been, but never mind. Owain and Kath both posted rural walk photos of vegetation covered with frosty rime. In our neighbourhood, starlings roost in the terrace eaves and garden trees, but I've also heard a great tit calling recently, a sound that evokes memories of skiing with Valdo in Jura forests.

Uproar on Three Kings Day

There were twelve of us at St Catherine's this morning for the Eucharist of Epiphany day. So glad we were able to keep the feast in church. I understand some parishes have returned to on-line only services in the light of heightened risk, but we haven't been ordered to close churches so far. We just have to be extra careful about everything we can do when we're out of the house. 

Journalists are getting fidgety, asking questions about the pace of delivering doses of the new Oxford /AZ covid vaccine, so we are hearing more about the procedure of manufacture, batch production of the vaccine in individual vials, and quality testing rather than the logistics of delivery. 

It's hard to understand what editors and reporters are up to. All this information has been publicly available for weeks, and since last week, concern about global shortages of manufactured vials - billions extra are needed urgently. It was in the best interests of the public to have an explanation of the total procedure entailed in manufacture and distribution of the vaccine very early on, not just the distribution. It takes longer to ramp up production than it does distribution. The mechanisms for the latter are well known and efficient, and with military aid, capable of rapid expansion. 

It would have been better for people to know more about the pace of production, to forestall anxiety about delays which aren't delays, except in the minds of magical thinking people. The oft maligned pharma industry is working with scientific care and precision at an astonishing pace for the common good, in a way which would have been unthinkable forty years ago, thanks to technological innovation. In the end, the pace is set by natural growth processes which are at the heart of making any vaccine.

I received an amazing short video from my sister June this morning of virtual flash mob of a choir, soloists and a baroque orchestra singing the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah. It's set in the fourteenth century Basilica of Nuestra Senora del Mar in Barcelona. Individual singers, then orchestra members pop up as projections inside the nave, and as numbers grow the images develop into a tiled mosaic of video images of singers decorating the walls, vaults and pillars. It's a kind of video art installation which really exploits what can be done to widely available editing tools today - just like the carols Clare was involved in singing with the Carnival Band, just before Christmas. A great way to lift the spirits and a challenging piece of work to keep creative minds active.

In the United States, the formal congressional confirmation of Joe Biden's election as president has been violently disrupted by an invasion of the building and even the debating chamber by hundreds of Trump supporters aiming to stop and overturn the process. All this incited by Donald Trump, whose illusions and lies peddled to the masses led to a huge rally of supporters in Washington during the confirmation session. Nothing like this has ever happened in America before. Charismatic dictators all over the world must be rubbing their hands with glee. 

Surely now the Republican party must turn against him and say with one voice 'Enough is enough' and kick him out regardless of the consequences? Or are too many of them in his thrall if not indebted to him for the privilege and status. The way this has played out over the past four years makes me think of the story-line of a Marvel comic book or movie, with a super-villain, oppressing the world but without an obvious superhero to combat and defeat him. Joe Biden will steer America back to sanity with quiet unspectacular reconciling guidance, and be the voice of all people who want to reclaim their country from the clutches of dictatorial populist fanatics. Let's hope that Britain, muddling along behind as ever, will find inspiration and follow this wholesome example.

I watched the fifth episode of the German crimmie I prefer to call Baltic Murders on More Four catchup. I'm not sure if it's the last episode or not. It may not been broadcasted yet as the remaining perpetrator still evades justice, so it's a matter of wait and see. Like with Biden's confirmation, still in process with a likley all night sitting to get it done, now that law and order is restored after such a disgraceful lapse.

Twelfth night lockdown

A cold clear bright day. Clare was out for her daily walk  this morning while I stayed in bed, listening to the news and dozing, as I do habitually before getting up for breakfast. 

Today's news centres on the impact of school closures on children and families under new restrictions announced yesterday. Less prominent in the headlines are changes being implemented as a result of brexit. Lorry delays get publicised, but less so expats not allowed to return to their homes abroad because they haven't got documents updating their status as non-EU citizens. 

Some mail order companies in the EU, and other importers are stopping trade with the UK because they're obliged to register for UK VAT - time and money consuming procedures leading to the conclusion it's not worth bothering to trade with Britain. Announcements on line to this effect have attracted nasty comments from sleepwalking brexiteers, waking up to the reality of what they've been shouting for and blaming all others but themselves. We starting to pay the price paid for the fantasy of complete sovereign autonomy, and it well get worse as more unforeseen consequences emerge. As ever, poorer people will suffer most.

This morning I prepared the order of service for Thursday's funeral and accepted to do another one in two weeks time. Elderly covid patient deaths. Canton ward still has the second highest number of infections. A high proportion of elderly people in the population, several care homes, but also an area with a significant number of BAME households, and a densely populated area. So it's only to be expected, I guess.

When I went out for my walk around the Fields, neighbourhood pavements were strewn with discarded Christmas trees awaiting collection by the Council, a reminder that already it's Twelfth night. Clare stripped our little tree this morning, ready to go back into the garden, as it has live roots. I felt sad not to have a last burn of the candle stubs this evening before dismantling, but never mind. How quickly the festive season has slipped behind the cloud of covid angst. 

Nevertheless started by visiting the local greengrocer to see if he'd yet taken his delivery of this year's organic Seville oranges. Last time I called before Christmas, he though the consignment had been held up at the Channel crossing. I had to queue in the cold on the pavement for five minutes to enter but endurance was rewarded by the sight of a large box of naranjas sevillanas, by the counter. I bought three kilos worth for just under six quid, took them home, and left them for Clare, who was still having a siesta. When I got back the exquisite aroma of bitter oranges cooking greeted me and transported me to Andalusia despite lockdown. A wonderful Epiphany gift.

On the tree lined avenue through the park, I spotted the first daffodil shoots with buds about to burst and the first snowdrops fully formed and ready to open. That's five days earlier than when I noticed the earliest new year winter flowerings I'd ever seen five years ago, and posted them on Instagram, not long after I opened my account.

This evening, I caught up with another episode of the latest German crimmie in the oddly English titled in the Channel Four Walter Presents 'Nordic Murders', when it's set on the North German Baltic coast. The German heading for the series mentions the Nordsee Usedom archipelago as the story line setting. Not so difficult for foreigners, unless you're not so keen to advertise your location to movie buffs! Seven hours away by ferry is the town of Ystad, the setting for the Wallander stories, is now much visited by movie tourists. There's a price to be paid for becoming a real-life film-set, and it's not paid by the producers but by the locals. The well acted series continues to retain interest, containing a strong element of family and community relationships, sensitively portrayed, reaching back over decades. I have another episode in reserve, for the next uninteresting evening of telly viewing.

Pandemic concerns and hopes

The national news this morning showcased the start of the Oxford/AZ mass vaccination programme to reach 31 million people in total before Easter. Schools are about to start back in many parts of Britain, but mainly for an INSET day, Some schools remain closed for shortage of staff, sick or staying away. The government is under mounting pressure to keep all schools closed and revert to on-line learning for at least the rest of the month, but clarity is still lacking lobbying goes on behind the scenes and more criticism of government prevarication and mixed messages is drawing a lot of hostile criticism. So the shambles of feeble immature leadership continues.

I went to the Post Office to send a parcel mid-morning, and then to the phone shop on Severn Road to get the phone number Clare wanted to call and enquire about a case for her new phone. Mission accomplished. She rang up and then made an appointment to pop into the shop to get what she needed. She was shocked that nobody working in the store was masked. 

I thought I'd return to the park and search again in the small area where I must have dropped the lens cap I dropped yesterday evening. This time I was lucky and found the cap right in the middle of a flat sunken stone next to the 'no parking' double yellow lines. It didn't land where it could be obscured by vegetation, but in plain sight, black on a pennant grey sandstone kerb.

Coincidentally, the last photo I took with the Olympus last night was of a Redwing on the ground close to the double yellow line in question. It must have been at that point that I began to feel the cold and fished a pair of gloves from the pocket in which the lens cap had been buried, and out came the cap. I didn't piece together the memory fragments with the photo that would have narrowed the search locus. I'm glad I had the impulse to return and take another look!

After lunch I went out and walked again down to Blackweir. Although the temperature was five degrees, there was a strong easterly wind and the humidity made it bone chillingly cold. At one moment there was a small flurry of rain driven by the wind, so stingingly cold I thought it was hail. Despite impressions it's not yet cold enough to snow, and not yet cold enough to drive all the under fives from the playground whingeing with freezing cheeks and fingers. 

A quiet uneventful evening, whiled away idly watching ancient episodes of NCIS on the telly, and then the news of further lock-down measures in England and Scotland, and schools closed for the rest of this month officially, at last, though not everyone is happy about this. It's a measure of the seriousness of the escalating health crisis. Wales's tighter restrictions started straight after Christmas day with shops being shut down instead of open for the sales. I suspect there'll be more restrictions announced by First Minister Mark Drakeford very soon given the continuing rise in numbers of infected people.

Redwings return

Clare and I were on duty at church this morning, welcoming people and checking them in. I took names and contact details as we're required to do for track and trace purposes. Clare read the OT lesson and Psalm. It was so good to have Emma back celebrating the morning, and Fr Rhys in support, preaching. Altogether, there were twenty adults, three children plus the two clergy.

On my walk after lunch I spotted a family of redwings foraging in the field below the stables and on the grass verge of the road nearby. They were in exactly the same place as I last spotted them in Mark 2016. Whatever there is for them to feed on at this time of day and year must have been there. I've not seen them that often around here. I believe they are winter visitors, possibly from Eastern Europe, or at least Eastern Britain driven further west by extreme cold weather. In the course of taking photos, I lost the lens cap from my Olympus. Although I knew roughly where it happened, I was unable to retrieve it and was most annoyed with myself for not putting it safely in a trouser pocket. Serves me right.

As I arrived home feeling chilled, Clare was taking a fresh batch of mince pies out of the oven. Still lots of vegetarian mincemeat left over from Christmas and it's only the tenth day of Christmastide, so no better reason to bake some more, and eat them with a glass of red wine to warm up.

I listened on BBC iPlayer to Choral Evensong recorded in Canterbury Cathedral last week for the feast of Saint Thomas a Becket, with all the Psalms for the last day of the month  sung delightfully to familiar traditional chants. After supper I didn't feel like watching telly, as my neck and shoulders were giving me trouble. I don't find our front lounge sofas comfortable and supportive enough of good posture. It's something I need to consider often, as postural problems are collateral damage arising from the need to protect the wound. Sometimes I just need to lie flat on my back with a book under my head to straighten my spine and pelvis to prevent neck vertebrate going out of alignment, other times lying on the bed to read or write helps. We've only had the sofas five and a half years and they've turned out to be something of a disappointment. I need something more substantial to support my big boned frame, even though I'm a dozen kilos lighter than when we bought them.

Saralee called us from Seattle this evening to wish us a happy new year, and see how we are health-wise. It was quite a surprise. She and Mark are I think cautiously optimistic that Trump will not succeed in disrupting, let alone overturning Biden's presidential election victory. The common view seems to be that he is scamming loyal supporters for funds to make spurious legal challenges and start a re-election campaign for 2024 ahead of the 2020 inauguration. Although Biden indisputably and legally won the election, America is riven apart almost equally between Trump idolaters and the the rest. It remains to be seen whether or not criminal indictments against him land him in prison, but there are others willing to take up his crazy crown and campaign as inheritors of his legacy. Can sane, decent, trustworthy governance be restored to America? Or Britain for that matter? We need this more than ever right now.

Farewell series

The temperature has hovered just above zero all day after a proper frosty night. A cold wind is blowing the cloud from east to west, opposite to the most common tendency along the Bristol Channel - the Beast from the East is arriving, and maybe there'll be snow in Cardiff this week, as there is already in mid and north Wales. After a morning of digital tidying in my office, Clare's Christmas present, a new Samsung A21e smartphone arrived just before lunch, both of us received email notifications to say where the parcel was on its way to us. The last popped up to say it had arrived just as the postie knocked the door!

Transferring the old SIM and SD card to the new phone was less fraught with difficulty than I imagine. The Smart data transfer app on the old LG phone to automatically transport it to the new one was a total failure. Fortunately our Google accounts keep a copy of most of the data, and photos live on the SD card. Samsung has its own competing cloud ecosystem which wants to back up all your data and get you to use their apps, and dealing with his is an un-necessary annoying intrusion at set up. 

The phone's instruction manual leaflet came with text exclusively in Hungarian (I think), with a slip of paper containing a QR code linking to the download of the English version. This tells a story of its own. The Curry's European distribution centre is located in a country where I guess the net cost of the imported goods is low enough to provide a margin of profit in moving them on to the UK and EU. Clare was most annoyed. She like an instruction manual to read, whereas for me that's a last resort. I like to see how easy it is to figure out the operating system, how user friendly it is in reality, as opposed to the marketing hype.

My walk after lunch and phone set up took me over the the east bank of the Taff through Bute Park for a change. This too was busy, as can be expected when pandemic restrictions discourage people from going further afield. 

British teachers' Unions are advising members not to return to work, on Health and Safety grounds, unless all necessary covid testing provisions are in place and working, as opposed to promised. The government is facing a legal challenge to produce expert evidence that schools are safe enough as a workplace, and some English local educations authorities are going ahead and delaying the re-opening of schools, as the local health situation is serious enough to justify this. The government is not backing down on its insistence that schools re-open, despite mounting criticism. Nobody wants to see kids deprived of education and the pastoral support schooling provides. Everybody wants to get back to normal as soon as possible, but this is still a worsening situation, and the best everyone can do is hunker down and take no risks of making things worse for others.

Tonight, the first episode of the eighth and final series of the Parisian flic saga. Engrenages in French or 'Spiral' in English. It's been running over the past fifteen years and offers a grimly vivid view of crime in the French capital. Most of the perpetrators of vicious and brutal crimes of every kind over the years come from foreign migrants, refugees or asylum seekers 'sans papiers'. Or so it seems. The entangled worlds of corrupt cops, politicians, lawyers, financiers and indigenous organised criminals, is exposed from every angle, and involves a core cast of about eight characters who have been with the series for most if not all of the past fifteen years. 

Unlike the various iterations of American NCIS crime dramas, and the Italian Inspector Montalbano stories which have elements of family comedy about them sometimes, this has a sober serious dramatic long narrative and offers space for reflection both social and moral, on our flawed humanity, observing that the even the most brave, compassionate people have flaws when revealed under pressure, and are tempted to cut corners to achieve what they regard as justice. It's been interesting to see key characters age and gain seniority, and relationships in the brigade criminelle team develop at work and personal life. It can be tough to watch on times, chastening perhaps, but always worthwhile. There's not many TV series you can say that about.

Viennese New Year, despite everything

After a late night, a frosty start to the New Year. The news is preoccupied with still rising covid infections and deaths, plus the challenges of vaccine distribution. We got up late and ate pancakes for breakfast, but didn't go out for a walk until after lunch. The park was busy with holidaymakers, unable to go elsewhere, as traveling to the beach at Penarth or Barry is banned for Cardiffians, being in a different local authority area.. The rules say that you must start and end your exercise period at home, and only travel within your local authority area by car if you have no alternative means to exercise.

Experts are alarmed to find that the new virus variant is far more contagious, spreading faster than other mutations. It's becoming more efficient at transmitting itself, so its impact is more more widespread at a faster pace. We can look forward to stricter lock-downs in an attempt to contain the spread until the vaccination campaign takes effect. Is the diligent observation of the existing precautions - 'hands, face, space' - all that's possible, all that's needed? 

There's no research published yet on whether mechanisms of virus transmission are being subverted to aid this virulent strain. apart from the inevitability of human carelessness and accident. It seems that more infected people without symptoms may be a factor. Does it stay alive longer on some surfaces than earlier versions did, or need stronger disinfectant action than was originally the case. There's no news on this yet. In my opinion, it's bound to be crucial, as is antisocial behaviour by people socialising irresponsibly

A wonderful New Year's Day treat this evening with a recording of the morning's Vienna Philharmonic orchestral concert, played for the first time ever in the Musikverein concert hall, emptied by pandemic restrictions. All the orchestra's musicians were covid tested daily during the rehearsal period and before the performance, and so seating arrangements for the 145 players didn't need to be socially distanced. I make a point of listening to any concert by the Vienna philharmonic. Their musical repertoire contains a great deal that has been familiar with me since childhood, as weekend orchestral concert broadcasts were something listened to in our house, even after we had a telly.

It was lovely to see looks of pleasure on the face of the conductor and musicians as they played under the direction of 79 year old Ricardo Mutti, who has been with the orchestra on occasions over the past fifty years. Playing in the absence of a live audience must have been tough, but there was a live internet audience of thousands by means of an interactive web-link which fed back their applause into the hall at the end of both halves of the concert. Bravo techies for making this happen with people from seventy countries all over the world watching and clapping, though sadly not during the traditional final encore, the Radetsky March. Music to console offered by those whose livelihoods and sense of vocation depend on it. A memorable expression of global solidarity. A great start to 2021.