Mersey Ferry 3

LUNCH WITH A COLLEAGUE the other day led to happy conversation about our origins. He hailed from Devizes in Wiltshire, a county very dear to my own heart. And I from Claughton, Birkenhead (named after the birch forest on the headland - once a favourite hunting ground of English kings) on the Wirral Peninsula. I don't have opportunity to go back there much these days but it's always good to reminisce.

I remember cherry blossom and the scent of apple orchards in and around my childhood home. My parents' house backed on to the apple orchard of the Northern Baptist Bible College (just down the road from St Aidan's Anglican Theological College) and on summer nights I drifted off to sleep to the echoes of mighty preachers holding forth in the Missionary Convention Tent set up annually on the college lawns. The great hymn "Will your anchor hold in the storms of life?" was etched early upon a small boy's memory and imagination. I wasn't altogether sure mine would.

And St Andrew's Road was home to no fewer than six clergy houses, of various denominations. It was an easy walk to any one of a dozen or more churches and I was an enthusiastic and eclectically interested regular visitor to most. The dear priest at St Werbergh's, Grange Road was one Fr John Lennon. "Lovely to see you here: but don't forget now to go to your own Church as well, will ye?" School, too, was nearby and I'm still in touch with one or two who were my closest allies (one in Winchester, another in Plymouth), and grateful for what I think of as one of the finest Church (of England) Youth Fellowship Groups anyone could wish for. Though my Dad was one of the local policemen it was always the case, from the age of 8, that I yearned and hoped for the day to dawn when I'd be ordained a priest. Christian ministry of one kind or another was almost bound to be one of the options to be considered given the decidedly ecclesiastical surroundings in which I spent carefree boyhood days.

Perhaps when time allows, some day, I'll write more of Wirral days. It's only necessary for me to close my eyes to hear the doleful sound of fog horns in what was then the still very busy River Mersey. And I can smell the scent of strong coffee and cigarette smoke wafting about the decks of the Mersey Ferries. A tuppeny return North Circle bus ride got me and my pals down to Woodside Ferry Terminal from where, in our heads and hearts the ferries would transport us to India, China, the Americas, and the Isle of Man (!) - though, in unimaginative truth, they actually only went as far as New Brighton sands, or Liverpool!

Then, miraculously quickly given that we'd just sailed by Mersey ferry from Calcutta, home for sausages from Charles Dashley's, and chips and beans. And my mother's rhubarb pie. Rob McLaren and I must have lunch again soon. I'd be fascinated to know whether our time together set him thinking any more about similarly happy days in Devizes ...

Q: what got you started blogging?

Two Bloggers, after Norman Rockwell

HE'S A BLOGGER, I was told. Bemused, I made a mental note to see if Google could help me with this new piece of slang. Who or what was a Blogger? Google came up with the goods, of course, and by 2006 I'd joined a worldwide online community, and I've never looked back.

The idea of a largely private and pretty much personal journal was what appealed at first. And then the contacts grew, the sense of connectedness that is so much a part of my theology and life-practice. And I found I was learning something new and invigorating most days. And that I often wanted to contribute even just a little something into the world's conversation, and just see what happened.

So today I'm a dedicated Blogger. The daily writings of people I'd previously never have dreamed of having contact with are a welcome widening of parochial boundaries. Bloggers are listeners, and the fruits of their written labours amount to a silent speaking. A deeper poetry. Thinking of William Stafford's "Listening" for the umpteenth time this week:

" ... the walls of the world flared, widened ..."

winter

IF THERE'S ONE ISSUE that keeps coming to the attention of a parish priest, whether on a global or a personal scale, it is that people need to be heard, to be listened to deeply. Hearts, souls, minds and bodies drowning in a perpetual cacophany of competing voices yearn to be heard, to be recognised. There's probably not a profession under the sun, nor a relationship anywhere on earth that wouldn't benefit from some training about the importance of listening deeply. Fortunately the necessary training need not be anything very formal nor need it cost very much save the setting aside of time and real attention. We're already well on the way to changing the world when we realise that the greatest gift we can give someone is an attentive listening.

When Someone Deeply Listens To You

When someone deeply listens to you
it is like holding out a dented cup
you've had since childhood
and watching it fill up with
cold, fresh water.
When it balances on top of the brim,
you are understood.
When it overflows and touches your skin,
you are loved.

When someone deeply listens to you
the room where you stay
starts a new life
and the place where you wrote your first poem
begins to glow in your mind's eye.
It is as if gold has been discovered!

When someone deeply listens to you
your bare feet are on the earth
and a beloved land that seemed distant
is now at home within you.

- John Fox

Prayer is about this kind of listening. God listens deeply all the time. But we human beings are tactile souls. We learn that God speaks and listens through human contact that speaks and listens. The little boy who was frightened of the dark remonstrated with his mother, who'd said "Don't be frightened, God is with you, even in the dark". And she never forgot the little chap's answer: "Yes, but I need God with skin on!"

May we who would pray learn how to listen - to God, of course, and to God in one another, so that "a beloved land that seemed distant is now at home within you".