Month: May 2020

Many threads

Day 55 of the End to End in 2019 continued along the Lancaster Canal. This canal provided the longest canal side route of the whole LEJOG. As I look back at it this was a day with many threads, but actually they all are. I am continually surprised by how things I wrote about a year ago on a long walk pop up one year on in lock down. I’m grateful to those people who read it for the comments they send.

There’s an odd thread in a field alongside the canal just as we turn towards the coast. On the map there’s mention of St Patrick’s Well. So I looked over the hedge. There were cattle and hedges. Then a moving slinky shape emerged from the hedge and lopped across the field: it was a fox. Like many encounters of LEJOG it was very brief and I’ve none of the photographic evidence you get on Springwatch, but it was a lovely moment.

St Patrick’s well remained covered in brambles, if it is still there at all. Tradition has it that Patrick was British and originated around Banna on Hadrian’s Wall. Perhaps his father was a Christian in the Roman Army. I like this story and use it in my still unfinished novel which threads its way through the origins of early Northern British Christianity. Here my path crossed with Patrick’s again.

The day’s walk finished early at Carnforth Station, made over to the film set, lasting memory to a short clip, but warm and dry on a grey day. Trains till stop there, however briefly.

A version of ‘St Patrick’s Breastplate‘ from my as yet uncompleted novel ‘Surplus to Requirements‘.

The One I follow is always with me:

In front, behind, underneath and above me.

The One I follow is in me,

At my left and right side, lying down or sitting up.

When I’m standing here,

The One I follow is inside everyone else who is thinking of me,

Everyone who is talking about me.

That’s the one I follow: the Always-Everywhere-One’.

JAL: 31.05.2020

Up in the air

Day 54 of the End to End in 2019 I crossed the Lune Aqueduct on the Lancaster Canal and I was quite literally up in the air as it’s graceful stone arches transported me across the River Lune at a height of 19 metres.  It was completed in 1797 and is now Grade 1 listed. The Lune Aqueduct is one of the jewels of our canal system and definitely worth a visit. When you can look down on the birds in flight then things are looking up.

Due to the patterns of the Christian Year, this day in 2019 was Ascension Day so being up in the air was fitting in that way too. I was doing a bit of RB in my head as I walked along. Those who followed Jesus all that way wanted to know ‘Is it time yet?’ much like small children on a long car journey.

We all want an answer to the unanswerable question: ‘Is it time yet?’. As a response to the uncertainty of the times they were living with, they went on to elect someone else to the group of 12: Matthias. Not all that revolutionary as he was a bloke, if a fairly ordinary one, but they were just getting on with getting on, building up a team, being God’s people on the ground.

Back in 2019 I was getting on with walking LEJOG. I still had 63 days to go and was not yet half way. Forward to 2020 and we’ve been in lock down 10 weeks, which is already 10 weeks too many for some, and the country is even more divided than it was when all this started. Not just Brexit, as if that weren’t enough, but now all sorts of anger about the pandemic and whose lives matter most. So things are still up in the air and the question ‘Is it time yet?’ is still timely.

When Matthias was elected to the 12, Justus wasn’t (in fact this chap seems to have had 3 names: Joseph, who was called Barsabbas, also known as Justus). I wonder what happened to Justus? Did he breathe a sigh of relief and get on with his life, go off in a sulk or start a Fresh Expression?

Most things have a sell by date these days. But some thing don’t. Following the Way has no ‘to do by’ date. Things may be up in the air, but our feet are on the ground and here we stay. It is time for us to be God’s people today.

From the remembered bible in Acts 1
Is it time yet?

This prayer is from LEJOG 2019:
Timeless God, we who are obsessed with time need your calm reassurance.
Help us to wait expectantly,
Neither anxious or too laid back.
Your promises are reliable
And you will not restrict the potential of the Holy Spirit in our lives.

JAL: 30.05.2020 in Longdendale.

 

 

Bridges that count

Day 53 of the End to End in 2019 was on the Lancaster Canal from Garstang to Gallgate which was bridge 62 to bridge 88. Canals in England most often have numbered bridges (although the Bridgewater Canal has named bridges). Bob and I found the bridge numbering system quite useful as we could text each other to say which bridge we were at. This would help us to know roughly how far apart we were if he was walking towards me, for example. Of course the bridges aren’t equally spaced but it was helpful.

Sometimes an aquaduct would also be numbered as a bridge. The Lancaster Canal has few locks, except the Glasson branch which goes down to Glasson docks.  An early end to the walking day left time for a visit to Knott End, opposite Fleetwood where we found a welcoming cafe. There’s a ferry at Knott End and the cafe is by the slipway, so no bridge there then.

Bridges are mostly noted for being crossed rather than counted. Maybe we might count bridges we’ve yet to cross. Coming out of lock down from COVID19 is about crossing a lot of bridges in due course, some of which may seem bigger than others depending on the people preparing to do the crossing. Different vulnerabilities and anxieties may contribute to how it feels to prepare to cross the bridge.

There were a great many bridges on LEJOG overall, some big, some bigger. They were crossed in various types of weather, some sunny, some downpours. A bridge is also used as a metaphor for reconciliation: coming together in the middle of a bridge seen as a way of bringing different people together. Whether we are bridge counters, crossers or reconcilers, may the way continue for us, safely and peacefully.

From the remembered gospel: Jesus said ‘I am the true and living way leading to the Father’. I think of Jesus as a sort of bridge in this saying, linking us with the Eternal God.

Bridge builder, may we learn to be reconcilers,
counting the bridges that bring us together,
helping each other to cross over,
not at any price, but mindful of what it cost you
to be a true and living way.

JAL: 29.05.2020 in Longdendale.

Fair enough?

Day 52 of the End to End in 2019 finished in Garstang, the first Fair Trade Town in England. The Fair Trade Town Movement began in Garstang in 2001 and in under 20 years it has been embraced by 20 countries. I’d certainly like to see it become one of the New Normal things about our society post COVID19. There is an initiative called Fair Trade Nation and Wales became the first in 2008. In order to be a Fair Trade Nation we need to

  • 75% of the population should purchase a Fair Trade product every year.

  • 40% of people regularly buy Fair Trade products.

  • All local authorities have active Fair Trade groups working towards Fair Trade status.

  • 55% local authority areas with Fair Trade status with 10% annual increase in following years

Learn more about it all here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairtrade_Town

Fair Trade is important to us. In our village we try to buy Fair Trade but it is not so readily stocked in the small shops. We try to buy locally produced items too, and have some delivered from the nearby town as one delivery a week is ‘greener’ than a car drive to a large supermarket.

Being fair is important, in all aspects of life. People should be treated fairly whoever they are. There’s no point in having empty phrases to unite people if they are not lived out in practice.

My reflection on Day 52 last year was based on Psalm 1: Happy are those who reject bad advice, who do not follow the wrong way or join those who say they have no use for God. Instead, they find joy in obedience of God, and they study God’s Way day and night. They are like trees that grow beside a stream, that bear fruit at the right time, and whose leaves do not dry up.
As with a lot of what I wrote then, it seems just as relevant now.

Like well-watered trees, may we thrive in God’s commonwealth,
where trade is fair and equal treatment is the norm for everyone.
Then obedience would come naturally as we’d turn our faces to the sun
and bear fruits in our lives of joy and peace.
May it be so.

JAL: 28.05.2020 in Longdendale.

Another canal and 500 miles

Day 51 of the End to End in 2019 saw me clock over 500 miles altogether. There was still some way to go but it was a celebration so we had a doughnut. After wandering through Preston I got onto the Lancaster Canal. I’d be walking on it for several days and it was the last canal this side of the England/Scotland border.

Meanwhile in 2020, today was the longest walk for me since lock down started. It was a 10 mile walk in the Longdendale Valley on a beautiful, and not very busy day. Most days I walk nearer 2 miles but we’ve been trying to stretch our legs a bit more recently, locally of course. There’s a great network of paths in this valley so we are fortunate.

Bob’s butterfly counting app is really good. Last year I was noting them all down one at a time, now I can do it with one click on my phone (and yes I do know that Butterfly Conservation has one but it takes up more space and longer to record). Today I was able to identify 26 butterflies and 1 moth.

Once back home it was time to dream. The Bedford Enthusiasts club drew my attention to a 1971 Bedford Ice Cream van for sale on e-bay at £2,000 of so. What a wonderful addition it would make to the Mobile Chapel of St Scholastica. It could be the Refectory.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1971-Bedford-CF-Classic-Ice-Cream-Van-Scott-of-Bellshill-Food-Truck/283891025347?hash=item42193945c3:g:0WEAAOSwdCVey9sA

That’s only a dream, but walking the End to End was one dream that came true (and I ate a lot of ice cream).

From the remembered bible
There’s a lot of dreaming goes on. Jacob dreamt of a staircase at a time when there weren’t all that many. The safety of the baby Jesus when Herod set out to have him killed relied on dreaming. Then at the end of the Bible, John has a massive dream that goes on and on and includes quite a lot of weird stuff.

God of dreams and visions,
may we hold onto the good possibilities that our dreams suggest:
a place of safety for the refugee,
a time when crying and pain will be done.
Fire us up again, that we may move forward
towards safety, peace and justice.

JAL: 27.05.2020 in Longdendale.

A random car park

Day 50 of the End to End 2019 finished in a random supermarket car park on the edge of Preston. That was because I’d got lost (see earlier blogs for explanations about getting lost on LEJOG) and as we know everyone gets lost now and again only some stories about getting lost, or taking a wrong turning are more credible than others. I’d spent three days walking on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, which is another one we need to go back to after this lock down is officially over. But I got lost when I encountered a summer fair in the park and some paths were closed off. Anyway, Bob worked out where I was and I came out on the main road, so walking along the footway I eventually made it to the random car park.

Random car parks are another thing we might need to repurpose if we don’t use cars so much. What could we make them into: skate parks, tennis courts, giant hopscotch grids?

Jesus’ parables about the lost are often remembered in my experience of facilitating RB sessions. They are a problem though: only one thing seems to get lost at  time. Obviously it’s easier to look for things if you only loose one at any particular moment, but what if you loose a lot of things at once? This seems to be more like some experiences, my dad’s for instance.

At the moment a lot of people seem to be loosing the argument for honesty and the request for an apology. When a lot of people loose the same thing I observe that the situation becomes heated. A lot of other people don’t think it’s lost and keep pointing in different directions. Our society seems to be becoming more fragmented, which is not good at any time but particularly now. There’s a lot of really important life or death stuff going on, so its important not to get distracted, or it could be worse than ending up in a random car park.

From the remembered gospel:
Jesus said: ‘Which of you having 100 sheep and loosing one does not leave the 99 on the fell and go and look for the one that is lost?’

The one and the 99, or is it the 48 and the 52 still?
God of the Cosmos,
If only we could fizz off our anger in a black hole
or use it to whip up a dust storm on a far planet.
As it is we have to live with honesty and dishonesty,
with contrition and a lack of it,
with anxiety as much as with serenity.
Even if we cannot change everything
or bring back every lost one
we can be changed ourselves:
fill us with your Spirit,
so that we retain the integrity we need to live on
as servants of your kindom, lost-searchers and pilgrims.

JAL: 26.05.2020 in Longdendale.

 

 

The Way to Go!

Day 49 of the End to End in 2019 was after a rest day (hence the gap) and on the way from Wigan towards Preston. There’s no doubt I notice big differences this year from last year. Many folks have remarked how this walk could not have happened this year and that’s probably true so far. But a walk like LEJOG is always there and can be done many ways. Will I do it again? Who knows.

One of the things about being on a walk for four months in that you miss things (although of course you see others). It’s easy to get in the zone and ignore what’s going on elsewhere.  Some stuff takes a long time to process. Yesterday, for example, I had a paper published on line about work I did before I retired. You can read it here: https://sacredtexts.hcommons.org/using-the-remembered-bible/

One day we will look back on this period of lock down and think about it differently. For now we make our way through it as best we can, looking out for the signs of how far we have to go, any alternative routes, and distracting happenings on the way.

I was walking along the Leeds and Liverpool Canal in 2019 (some folks call this the Liverpool and Leeds Canal), which certainly takes the long route to Leeds (or Liverpool). Originally designed to take in lots of places that wanted goods taken between Leeds and Liverpool that’s not surprising. But actually we often take roundabout routes. It’s not until later that we see this more clearly.

That day ended at the Boatyard Bus Cafe near Adlington: a bus repurposed into a cafe. What will we repurpose  un-needed aircraft in to? Many steam engines were broken up when the steam age ended. Will we find aircraft graveyards and will heritage flying become a different thing? Or do we just all expect to be able to get back on a cheap flight to somewhere else anytime soon? I passed two repurposed airfields on the walk: one had been turned into a retail park and the other was used to store whisky.

There are many ways we could go from here. As I think about my paper on remembering the bible I know that my own ministry has not been the sort of path taken by many. Whilst I think I did the right thing, it’s easy to have doubts or feel isolated when others seem to just keep plodding the same route and give no sign of looking up or much indication that they’ll try out the ideas that you report as successfully tested. I can talk about Remembering the Bible (RB) or write about it, but really it’s a thing you do together. I’m a bit tired of the ‘that’s nice dear’ responses of too many folk I encounter.

Most days walking included doubts. Most days not walking do too. Last year’s reflection was on Psalm 139, so good any day:

From Psalm 139
Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

All knowing God, who sees what we do in public and in secret,
Help us to face up to our responsibilities as residents of this planet.
It matters what we do with its resources and the rubbish we generate.
Hold us to account.

To which I’d add this year:

It matters what we do in private and in public.
Your kindom is a place of honesty and openness and justice.
It may cost us dearly, but lead us clearly,
that we may follow as nearly as we can.

Grant all a quiet night

JAL: 25.05.2020 in Longdendale.

Flashes of Wigan

Day 48 of the End to End in 2019 took me to Wigan Pier via Scotsman’s Flash. The flashes, strung out alongside the Leeds and Liverpool Canal are wild life havens these days and there were plenty of waterfowl, insects and wild flowers. The Goat Willow was letting off fluff everywhere making quite deep piles beside the path, a phenomenon that has been repeated this year recently on my walks in Derbyshire.

Another thing that resonates with last year is child poverty. We seem to be living in Orwellian Days where doublespeak breaks out in every briefing, where two legs are good but headless is better, where the lock down rules apply to everyone except to some people, where leaders are hard to distinguish  and leadership is an absent joke.

But alongside all of this distracting nonsense children continue to live in increasing poverty that none of them have chosen.  Just so you know there are some serious moment on LEJOG, I wrote this reflection on Psalm 137 a year ago today:

From Psalm 137
By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion.
There on the poplars we hung our harps,
for there our captors asked us for songs,
our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

The exiles are expected to sing happy songs in the place of their captivity. They remember the songs but don’t have the heart for them.
We do not always feel like singing happy songs.
As the years go by the divisions in our society seem to be as deep as ever:
Children grow up in poverty,
More families rely on food banks.
I cannot sing happy songs about these things.

My mood today is much the same. I did used to sing a lot on LEJOG, making up stuff as I went along.  I’m certainly singing a lot less at the moment.

Wigan will be as closed to day as most other parts of the NW of England. The Orwell, the pub landmark by the canal, will be closed, as will many of the shops and all the pubs, cafes and restaurants. As people walk by on the tow path, it may be easy to overlook the fact that the community is struggling with some of the worst poverty rates in the area, and certainly with poverty that we should all be ashamed of, and carry on to the next landmark. But today my lament is for Wigan and for the Orwellian fact that we are being encouraged to lie and cheat our way out of this pandemic as if that was our new moral compass, bright and shiny and ready for the new direction. I’m not prepared to go that way: poverty will never be good, abject poverty will never be better.

From The Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell. “A human being is primarily a bag for putting food into; the other functions and faculties may be more godlike, but in point of time they come afterwards”.
(I’ll be honest, I didn’t remember this, I looked it up)

I lament with all those who are on God’s side.
I remember the starving of the poor,
the callousness of food vouchers for poor families,
the shame of longer and longer food bank lines,
the humiliation of not being able to feed your own children.
I will not sing a happy song: grant justice God of all!
When all are fed justly, may we also all sing again.

JAL: 23.05.2020 in Longdendale

May the force be with you

Day 47 of the End to End in 2019 was to Vulcan Close in Vulcan Village, hence today’s title. I was also walking in this area on 5th January 2020 when we were joining up some sections previously walked. See ‘Wigan Appears Again’ on the afterlejogblog: https://foowr.org.uk/afterlejogblog/

It was good to walk through industrial areas like this on the green corridors that have now been created by the canals, and in some cases former canals, like in the Sankey Park. This became the ‘new normal’ a couple of centuries after the canals were first built. To begin with these were major transport arteries for coal and iron and other heavy products. Life for those living on the canals was pretty grim. The introduction of railways led to gradual abandonment of canals. This must have meant huge changes of life for the people who lived and worked on them. Already precarious and barely sustainable, many must have faced worse poverty and its accompanying ill health and poor education.

These changes from one normal to ‘new normal’ happen as a result of human activity and different economic demands. We face challenges about a new normal now in 2020. As ever it is the poorest people in our population who have already seen the greatest affects of COVID19. And of course, those in middle income groups fear finding themselves in similar situations. The reinventing of ourselves, our economy and our society are ongoing projects. What will be the equivalent of these green corridors in our new normal 2020?

Already there are plans for more cycling and walking in towns and cities, something that others have been campaigning about for years. What are the implications of on line working, or the ability to provide temporary housing for homeless people during the Pandemic. Could these signal new ways of working or housing people that are possible and maybe more sustainable in ‘new normal’. If we can teach 15 children in a class for some reason, why would we go back to teaching 30 in a class for other reasons?

Unless of course we’d misunderstood the challenge and didn’t think we should upset the status quo. Unless we thought it was fine for the poor to get poorer and the rich to continue to benefit from tax havens. Time for the Magnificat again I think. May the force be with you.

From the remembered bible: Mary Sang: ‘The poor will be lifted up and the rich turned empty away’

Mary’s song (to the Tune of Waltzing Matilda!)

Once long ago in a village called Nazareth,
An angel told Mary a mother she’d be
As she watched and prayed and sang this Magnificat
God gets bigger and bigger in me

Chorus
God gets bigger, God gets bigger
God gets bigger and bigger in me.
And she watched and prayed and sang her Magnificat
God gets bigger and bigger in me.

Oh how my spirit rejoices in God on high
Just like the mother of God you see,
As I watch and pray and sing my Magnificat
God gets bigger and bigger in me.

Down go the rich and up come the humble:
God always sides with the poor you see,
And I watch and pray and sing this Magnificat
God gets bigger and bigger in me.

JAL: 22.05.2020 in Longdendale.

 

More fudge anyone?

Day 46 of the End to End began at the Anderton Boat Lift and continued along the Trent and Mersey Canal, via several tunnels, until it met the Bridgewater Canal. During the course of the walk I met the Fudge Boat. From what I’d already heard about it, the fudge boat seemed somewhat mythical: a canal boat going up and down canals in the North of England selling many different flavours of fudge, all made on board. But it was real, it was in front of my eyes. The elderly couple who run this enterprise were friendly and keen to share fudge. We had a chat, I tasted some samples and bought some fudge for Bob.

Bob has his own LEJOG fudge story of a man in a van who gave him a fudge in 2003, having first asked him if he was a diabetic (he’s not). Fudge has it’s own place in the annals of the End to End (though not quite on a par with ice cream or fish and chips). A year ago, some folks commented that this blog was mostly about food. Well, you will need some if you attempt LEJOG!

Meanwhile in 2020, there’s also a lot of fudge about. It’s interesting how this squidgy sweet substance has come to be used as a metaphor for some sort of cover up or inadequate response to a situation. I certainly prefer it to war metaphors.

Today falls on Ascension Day, the day remembered for Jesus leaving the disciples. It’s a tricky one for modern rememberers. The footprints were there, they’d seen his resurrected body, ate breakfast with him, heard him speak. He’d promised to continue to accompany them, but then he left them. Did it feel like a second bereavement?

There was a moving COVID story on the news of a GP who had been in ICU on a ventilator for over a month, who said his only plan was ‘to get home to his family’. He was interviewed at home with them, but the report finished with the news he’d had to go back to hospital. In Mental Health Week there’s no doubt that that there’s a lot more anxiety about: plans don’t work out, there are people to worry about and circumstances to frustrate us

In my email correspondence with an old friend, we have been revisiting Julian of Norwich (I blogged about her on 8th May). What can a 14th century woman offer us in these times: more fudge?

Julian led a full and complex life. As she reflected on it through her writing she was holding together many different ideas: those she’d been taught about God and faith and those that had been validated by her direct experience. Likely as not they didn’t always add up. In her writing we see her trying to work this out. It helps me to know that as a human being she was doing just what I have been doing all my life. And yes I do pray: some days it’s all I can do. Not because I think God has favourites, but because being on God’s team of mercy, justice and love is the shirt I’ve worn all my life and the scarf I will continue to wave.

But it does bring with it tough questions. At the moment I’m considering how to ‘clap for carers’ and ‘boo for visas’ at the same time. More fudge anyone? No thanks.

From the remembered gospel: And then he left them.

Where’s Jesus when you need him?
Right here alongside me or over there cartwheeling across the universe?
I give thanks for the fudge makers on their small boat;
for the rich history of human spirituality that links me to folks in challenging times and places through ages and across cultures;
for the willingness to be disturbed in faith, to question and to pray anyway.
Jesus, there’s no doubt I prefer you here alongside me than way away.
May the strength of the Holy Spirit, advocate and helper,
preserve us in challenging time, uphold us in trouble,
heal us in sickness, forge us in Love.
And when the time comes for choices, may we decline the fudge
in favour of the truth that God demands from kindom sharers.

JAL: 21.05.2020 in Longdendale.