What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Christmas Day Sermon 2012

    Many of you will be aware that I recently have returned from a big sabbatical trip to churches in Canada and the United States.

    I was there to learn and reflect and grow and I did that by making contact with the most interesting folk I could find in church life on the other side of the North Atlantic.

    Inevitably I spent quite a lot of time poking around churches over there and coming from this cathedral, I was interested in what cathedrals over there were up to.

    Which is how I found myself in the National Cathedral in Washington DC just a day or two after the American Election in November.

    It is a mighty building. Far bigger than we are but when I saw it, it was not looking its best. Still recovering from an earthquake which wobbled all its stonework, they have netting strung all across the nave to catch falling fragments. So you stand in this enormous church unable to look up and appreciate the great spaces.

    Unable to look up, instead I went down. For underneath the nave is a maze of twisty passages which lead (more…)

5 responses to “The Convent”

  1. Avatar
    Anonymous

    I really enjoyed the programme, looking forward to the next part.

    Couldn’t help grinning all the way through though thinking of you and a certain remark about convents and nuns from last year!

    Reply
  2. Mark Avatar
    Mark

    “wish more people did it”
    I tried to post a comment here, but it disappeared…

    anyway, I just said, be careful, because I’m scared I may get “itchy feet” again and want to reexamine looking at monastic life.

    I was disappointed by how rude two of the people were, but the sincerity of the lady who had been hurt by her family and was “afraid of God” was amazing stuff.

    Reply
  3. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Monastic Life
    I thought about monastic life at one point. However, when I went to a monastery to consider it more thoroughly I was stricken with a plague of boils and ended up being told to flee by a doctor. Notwithstanding my hesitation about the possibility of God meddling any more with humanity than by God’s becoming incarnate, there was no arguing with a plague of boils and I never went back.

    Reply
  4. Mark Avatar
    Mark

    Hey, but I never got boils! And as I was saying to Fr Philip last week it was that very experience in the monastery that has left a mark on the rest of my life. I simply don’t want to play along with materialism to the same extent anymore…

    Reply
  5. Moyra Avatar
    Moyra

    It was certainly interesting watching from an insider’s point of view…

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Provincial Conference

    I'm going to most of the Scottish Episcopal Church's Provincial Conference, which begins today. These things happen every four years or so. I didn't sign up until the last minute. The trouble is, I never could imagine that I would not be there.It is taking place at Herriot-Watt University – somewhere I have never been…

  • Zebra Dung Lion Rover

    The BBC reports that a remote-controlled vehicle carrying zebra dung is being used by a Stirling University student to study the behaviour of lions in captivity. And all this happening just down the road at Blairdrummond.The BBC have a picture of the lions, but not the zebra.

  • Social Software

    I know this is a bit geeky, but I wanted to point anyone interested to this article in Darwin Magazine o­n what is being called Social Software.I've long held that the internet is all about people and not about computers or technology at all, just as the telephone is all about conversation and communication rather than…

  • Sermon – 29 August 2004

    Hospitality I?m not sure what you think about Jesus. He certainly was not the perfect guest. Here he is in this week?s gospel causing all kinds of trouble. He notices where people are sitting and proceeds to give them a rather pious lecture on giving up their places to one another so that they won?t…