What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • The Past Tense

    Sometimes museums are terribly annoying. I found myself getting all worked up about this thurible.

    image

    Well, It wasn’t exactly the thurible that got me worked up but the card next to it.

    image

    The caption uses the past tense. “Censors were used…”

    Censors are used. It somehow felt so frustrating to look at an object that I could pick up and use in my daily work and which seemed to me to be in as good a state as when it was first made and yet see the caption speaking about the use as being something in the past.

    As I looked around the same gallery, all the references to anything liturgical were expressed in the same way:

    “Music was important in the Christian liturgy…”

    There’s no was about it.

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

  • The Sound of the Photocopier

    The sound of the photocopier was heard in the land. It is a little known fact that the week before Holy Week is now referred to in the Calendar as Photocopier Week.

  • The Scottish Episcopal Church and the "Listening Process"

    Seen this? http://www.aco.org/listening/reports/scotland.cfm It is the response of the Scottish Episcopal Church to the “Listening Process” in the Anglican Communion. We will leave aside the fact that although it is supposed to be a process of listening to lesbian and gay people there is nothing in the response about what any lesbian or gay person…

  • Sermon – Passion Sunday

    This week is the start of a mini-season in the church – we are travelling through Lent towards Holy Week – the Great Drama. This final part of the journey, we call Passiontide. The time of the Passion. There is, of course, a very particular view of what the Passion of Christ is about –…

  • Topics to blog about

    Andrew has commented on a previous post about topics to blog about. His suggestions are The environment Slavery ( any why it is still practiced ) Ecumenical concerns and relations with other religions Children, and how we can bring them into the Faith Someone else has commented that Andrew could set up his own blog.…