The Church Of The Holy Rood -- Wool, Dorset, U.K.
|
The Church Of The Holy Rood -- Wool, Dorset, U.K.
|
|
|
The ebb and flow of sacred and secularLast month I enjoyed a holiday in Cornwall, blessed by good weather, good company, beautiful places to see and great things to do. One of the places I visited was St Michael’s Mount. My first sight of it was like something from a fairy tale: a castle set on a rocky island set in a glittering sea beneath a cloudless blue sky. A few days later I visited it, walking across the golden sands and along the causeway that is dry at low tide, to reach it, returning by ferry once the tide had come back in. This was something of a dream come true for me as I first saw it on a family holiday many years ago, and had been entranced by it. On that occasion we were not able to visit the Mount but now my dream has been fulfilled, and the experience did not disappoint. Sadly, not all of our ambitions and dreams can be fulfilled and others turn out to be less than we hoped for. It left me pondering how we can focus on things that will not disappoint rather than on false hopes. St Michael’s Mount itself seemed to hint at an answer: Like its French counterpart, Mont St Michel, and the Northumbrian island of Lindisfarne, it originally housed a monastery where men stepped aside from normal life to be with God. Being regularly cut off from the mainland by the tides accentuated the focus on the presence of God, while the causeways that re-connect island and mainland as each tide turns are reminders that we are called to be active in the world as well. It reminds me of the story Jesus told (Luke 12.16-21) of a rich man who had a bumper harvest, built new barns and then settled won to enjoy a life of ease, only to find that night his life was demanded of him. The dream was shattered, his ambition to sit back and enjoy his wealth was in tatters. As Jesus comments “So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich towards God.” Lives that allow for a regular interplay between the divine and the human and strive to make the connections between the two are more likely to find fulfillment than a life wrapped up in purely personal concerns. Your friend and parish priest,
|
|
Send mail to the webmaster (see Contacts) with
questions or comments about this web site.
|
