May 2021 – Notes from Bambi

Wind!

Wind is the particular type of air that is required for Pentecost. On the day of Pentecost there’s no such thing as a weather forecast that says ‘too windy’.

Which is good because there has been a significant increase in the amount of UK energy requirements produced by wind over the last year. The UK is a windy place so why not make use of this free resource that is carbon neutral. After all we have a centuries old history of doing so and you can still see the old brick windmill towers in some parts of the landscape.

There are of course old towers on some churches. Maybe a new life for some as the bases for wind generation. that would be in keeping with the Spirit of Pentecost (note that some churches already generate power from solar energy).

Most of all, of course, the church needs wind inside its structures. not just a sort of gentle breeze but a full blown wind that ‘blows the bleeding doors off’. If the wind of the first Pentecost blew the followers of Jesus away how much more energy would that take today, after centuries of windless stagnation?

As a so called’ breath of fresh air’ I can tell you first hand that it takes a lot. I no longer concern myself with the inside of the church and its stagnant air. I can tell you that out here the wind is blowing freely and it’s wonderful.

From my remembered bible: At once there was a sound like a rushing wind.

Blow wind, blow.

JAL 23.05.2021 In (windy) Longdendale.

Air

On Ascension Day I zoomed early morning prayers from the quarry for the Lay Community of St Benedict. This small greening space can seem like an outdoor room with the tree canopy overhead. Wind was blowing down the valley from the east, not too hard, but enough to ruffle emerging leaves. The birds were singing. It’s beautiful place for worship.

And the air there is lovely: clear and fresh. Air is essential for Ascension Day. without air, no ascension.

Of course without air, lots of others things would be missing too, as we’ve learnt so unkindly during this COVID year. Others are still caught up in the desperate need for air, a mix of atoms and molecules we can’t even see.

Right now air is one of the things that unites us with each other and with Jesus. That sense of being united in one breath is vital to our community building. Right now all across the world, people need to remember that we breath the same air.

On a very clear day in Longdendale, with the air is very clear and the reservoir is being a huge reflecting pool, all of heaven and earth open up to what I call The Mighty Blue. May we be open to that too, to the sharing of the air and the dancing through it, to the breathing in and out, to the unity of God and humanity. To the Air!

From the remembered gospel: Jesus blessed them.

Bless us with earth, fire and water, but most of all bless us with air!

JAL: Longdendale, 13th May 2021, Ascension Day.

Small stuff

When Julian of Norwich sees a Hazelnut, it appears that she did not immediately crack it and eat it (although she may have done so later). She looked at it. It was very small.

We’ve been out walking in Derbyshire again this week. The Peak District National Park is 70 years old this year: Britain’s oldest national park. Small is relative. The National Park is a lot bigger than a hazelnut but small on the surface of the earth. It’s very beautiful.

I recently heard about a project to map the lost temperate rain forests of England (here). This fascinates me as Woodland is one of my favourite habitats. Local walking for over a year due to the pandemic has opened me to many smaller and small things and I’ve begun identifying stuff I’d not previously given much consideration. I have a fungi book and thanks to the lost rain forests website I’ve also downloaded resources for identifying mosses and lichens.

Things get smaller and small. As I look at these tiny species I see a new world. Julian of Norwich remarked that the hazelnut was ‘All that is made’. That’s how the world is. A complex interweaving of smaller and small things, all that is made.

So as I walk a bit further afield over the next few months continuing our ‘Joining the Dots’ project (an attempt with @therevbobw to link all our various walks together) I shall continue to use my new knowledge of small things as I make my pilgrimage and gaze at all that is made.

From the remembered gospel: Jesus showed them a mustard seed, the smallest of all seeds.

Thanks for the small!

JAL: in Derbyshire, 8th May being the Feast of St Julian of Norwich