What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Mary Magdalene – Pray for Us

    Am terribly saddened to hear news just in from the Bishop of California that two of the icons of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco have been destroyed.

    One was of John Donne and this one was of Mary Magdalene.
    Mary Mag

    I saw her every day when I spend three weeks living at Grace Cathedral last year. She always seemed to me to be particulary striking, serene and somehow unsettling. She was a bearer of the divine, in other words.

    There are images which some people cannot bear. This proved to be one one such.

    Mary Magdalene and John Donne – pray with us for a world free from violence, free from attack, free from fears within and fears without.

    Amen.

    , , ,

4 responses to “Prayers at a time of tragedy”

  1. Linda Watson Avatar
    Linda Watson

    It’s hard to imagine that only a few hours ago I was in your beautiful church in that wonderful city that sometimes I think of as mine. My heart and my prayers go out to all the families of the bereaved and injured tonight.
    “Rest eternal Lord, grant unto them and may light perpetual shine upon them”

    Reply
  2. Diane Avatar
    Diane

    Amen. And yet again the people of Glasgow showed themsleves at their warm-hearted best, with unsolicited offers of practical help.

    Reply
  3. The Revd Tom Green Avatar
    The Revd Tom Green

    Thank you for this prayer Kelvin.
    Here in Australia the week before last, a guy dressed as a Muslim (and was in fact one) held a lot of people hostage in a very posh but well-patronised cafe in the business/law precinct the city of Sydney. He had a lot of irrational demands. It was a very well-planned and he held up the people and the city in terror for 12+ hours. He was actually a bully and unhinged mentally. In the end the police broke in and in the ensuing gun battle 2 people were killed by the gunmman then the gunman himself.
    We lie quietly here in Australia with relatively little racial violence (but lots of domestic violence -the gunman had heaps of charges)
    We understand this incident does not equate with what happened in your city
    or to the schhool-children in Pakistan but it stunned us.

    So I thank you for your skill to put this simple prayer together.
    Tom

    Reply
    1. Kelvin Avatar
      Kelvin

      Thanks Tom – we were all watching and praying along with those in Sydney last week. These events are world events. Paradoxically they bring us together.

      Reply

Leave a Reply

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

Previous Posts

  • Piscy Blogger Spotted

    Hey, why didn’t you tell me that Duncan MacLaren is blogging? He is Associate Rector at St Paul’s and St George’s in Edinburgh (aka P’s and G’s) I know he’ll be coming up with interesting stuff because I’ve read and reviewed a book of his. It was one of the more interesting bits of thinking…

  • Edinburgh?

    Off to Edinburgh yesterday. The transformation of the city in August is never anything less than extraordinary. Visitors cannot really appreciate what it is like to see a city thus transformed. Watching Edinburgh in August is like seeing a maiden aunt take to the gin on New Year’s Eve and do the can-can. Every year,…

  • Kilt Monday?

    Can anyone tell me who designated Monday as Kilt Monday? Was it the spiritual residue of so many bekilted pipers marching about on Glasgow Green in the rain over the weekend? Three kilt incidents – all on Monday. I just don’t get it. Firstly, a long discussion after Morning Prayer which included the sentiment that…

  • Sunday Sermon -12 August 2007

    I’d like to begin this morning with a poem. In fact it is something that one of you quoted to me this week. I remembered the fragment and wanted to look it up. “The Place Where We Are Right,” by Yehuda Amichai From the place where we are right Flowers will never grow in the…