Shirty Letters

 …   “How much did you earn during your lifetime ?”  or,  “How many friends did you make ?”  or,   “How much progress did you make on your career ?”  or,  “How much influence did you have on people ?” Were any of these to be the questions Christ will ask when he comes again in glory,  many of us could approach the judgement day with great confidence.

But nobody is going to hear any of these questions.  The question we are all going to face is the question we are least prepared for.  It is the question:  “What have you done for the least of mine ?”

Henri Nouwen

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Most merciful Redeemer,  Friend and Brother,

may we know you more clearly,

love you more dearly,

and follow you more nearly,

day by day.

St. Richard of Chichester  ( 1197 – 1253 )

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Wandsworth.  The New Jerusalem ?!

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Men love women. Women love children and children love hamsters.

Heard from Charlie Scott 16.10.14

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My guide for modern communications :-

Face-to-face dialogue and human contact cannot be beaten. Second best is the clarity of a landline call.  Always answer your mobile phone straight away unless you are driving.  Ignore calls from 0845 or 0843 numbers but ‘unknowns’ may be known unknowns as Donald Rumsfeld pointed out.  Answer a text message as soon as you can.  Answer an email within 24 hours  –  the sooner the better. Avoid Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other ‘social media’  –  who needs on-line abuse from ‘trolls’ ?  Not I for one.

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“She didn’t know whether it was Shrove Tuesday or Sheffield Wednesday”   – attributed to Chris Jones, Ashmolean Trustee.

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Lead by example

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After a poo, wash your hands with soap and water.  After a wee, just a rinse will do.

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Early to bed, early to rise makes you healthy, wealthy and wise.

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How you treat others in life, particularly those you deem of lesser importance than yourself, will come back to haunt you.

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GOD SEES ALL

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Never assume !

June Patrick

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It doesn’t matter what you do for a job so long as you do it to the best of your ability.

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The simple things are often the best.

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If you say you are going to do something … do it.

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Manners makyth man and woman

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‘Whenever we forgive instead of letting fly at one another, bless instead of cursing one another, tend one another’s wounds instead of rubbing salt into them, hearten instead of discouraging one another, give hope instead of driving one another to despair, hug instead of harassing one another, thank instead of criticizing one another, praise instead of maligning one another … in short, whenever we opt for and not against one another, we make God’s unconditional love visible …  ‘

Henri Nouwen   † Jesus :  A Gospel  †

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Love and fear ; that’s all there is.  But love is greater.

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” I never set out to be weird.  It was always other people who called me weird “.

Frank Zappa

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  In my Georgian scrapbook I wrote that only two good things have ever come out of Russia  –  the Lada Niva and Fabergé jewellery.  To that list we must add Tchaikovsky.

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Tremble, you who build up riches.

Tremble, you with opulent lives.

Tremble, when you meet the poor

and see Christ in their eyes.

© Owen Alstott 2002

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Treat people as you would want to be treated yourself.

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 “Whatsoever you do to the least of my brethren, you do unto me. What you do for the least of my children, you do for me.”     Jesus

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There is no ‘them and us’ in society; there is only us.

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“The mystic and the schizophrenic find themselves in the same ocean … but whereas the mystic swims the schizophrenic drowns.”   R.D.Laing

 … “the schizophrenic can learn to swim !”   Aidan Shingler

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Watch therefore : for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.  Matthew 24. 42

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 ‘Love is, like five loaves and two fish, always too little until you start giving it away.’   Quote on my Tabgha T-shirt bought 1992

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In your fifties try and walk five miles a day.  In your sixties try and walk four miles a day.  In your seventies … and so on.

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“There are three sorts of friendship : true friendship centred on the good of the other, which is fully deserving of the name of friendship ; friendship based on what is pleasant ; and friendship based on usefulness”.      Jean Vanier,  paraphrasing Aristotle 350 B.C.

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May I add a codicil to the above, perhaps to be inserted after the ‘true friendship’, that there is also a friendship (a little one-sided) grounded in one’s perceived recognition of future good in another person . People may disappoint you but redemption may be around the corner.

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“The great question that has never been answered and which I have not yet been able to answer, despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, is ‘What does a woman want ?'”.      Sigmund Freud

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“The capacity to love develops in the very first months of a child’s life through the relationship with their mother. One needs the experience of a first love that is unconditional.  If the small child is wounded by rejection or the absence of this first love it is likely to lack self-confidence and have great difficulty in later life”.     J. Vanier

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“There’s nothing you can know that isn’t known.

Nothing you can see that isn’t shown.

Nowhere you can be that isn’t where you’re meant to be.

It’s easy.

All you need is love, all you need is love,

All you need is love, love, love is all you need.”     Lennon & McCartney

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” I am becoming increasingly convinced that both physical and all problems relating to the mind have their origin in a fundamental lack                                                                or loss of love. ”             Suzanne 

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The Way

When all about you

  is dark and overcast.

When darkness seems

black and empty.

Friends have appeared

to disappear into thin air

And you find yourself

lonely and alone  ∼

Trust in the Lord.

The way will be shown to you

Like music of the spheres

all aglow

The right road will be

in front of you.

W.Jones

October  2002

 Parish Church of St. Basil,

Toller Fratrum,

Dorset

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Statistically, 6 out of 7 dwarfs are not Happy !

Vole Samuelson 2015

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Sticks and stones may break my bones

but it’s words that can truly hurt me

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“Happiness is meant to be shared”

William  with Misa : ‘Walking the Camino’, closing lines

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“It is one of the advantages of getting older, that you can see how everything had meaning.  You think everything is your choice but it’s not.  Gradually there is the discovery of being chosen, of being                                  shaped in order to be an instrument.”                          Jean Vanier

Absolument, Jean ,  je suis en accord.  Même chose pour moi.  Nous sommes logés à la même enseigne.   Jamie

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‘There came then his brethren and his mother and, standing without, sent unto him, calling him.  And the multitude sat about him, and they said unto him,  Behold thy mother and thy brethren without seek for thee.  And he answered them, saying,  Who is my mother, or my brethren ?  And he looked round about on them which sat about him, and said,  Behold my mother and my brethren ! For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother.’

Gospel of St. Mark Chapter 3, vs 31-35

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‘Agnelli once told me: in any successful company there must be an uneven number of directors and three is too many’.     Clement Freud

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Faux sincerity sucks

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It is better to be childlike than to be childish

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There’s a lot of noise voiced at present concerning the Human Rights Act.  How about having a Human Responsibilities Act too ?

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“Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”

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Try not to do things ‘for yourself’.  If you concentrate on doing things for other people you will find that good things come your way.

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Apathy I find a bit pathetic

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‘Life is the flight of the alone to the Alone’       Plotinus (205 – 270 AD)

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‘The stars are like letters that inscribe themselves at every moment in the sky.  Everything in the world is full of signs.  All events are coordinated . All things depend on each other.  Everything breathes together.’           Plotinus

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Always try and leave a public place a little bit tidier than you found it 

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‘ … Jesus’ life was defined by rejection. His neighbors laughed at him, his family questioned his sanity, his closest friends betrayed him, and his countrymen traded his life for that of a terrorist. Throughout his ministry, Jesus gravitated toward the poor and the rejected ones, the riffraff.’

 Philip Yancey from The Jesus I never Knew

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 ‘being unwanted is the most terrible disease a human being can experience. When you die, the Lord will not ask you how much you have done with your life, but how much love you have put into the doing.’     Mother Teresa

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I’d rather be a humble trier than a tumble dryer

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Do all the good you can,

By all the means you can,

In all the ways you can,

In all the places you can,

At all the times you can,

To all the people you can,

As long as you ever can.           John Wesley

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My take on lawyers ….

Why use three words when thirty will do.

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“As you get old, you lose interest in sex, your friends drift away and your children often ignore you. There are other advantages of course, but these are the outstanding ones.”

Richard Needham, 6th Earl of Kilmorey

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