And Now We Turn to Peace ~ Celtic Advent Day 20

The second Advent Candle is lit

Today was the second Sunday in Advent and so two candles are now lit on the Advent Crown at the 1,000 year church. The light is increasing in the midst of winter dark.

Last week I explored Hope. This week's theme is Peace. I must admit that, only a few days away from a General Election here in the UK, I am not feeling very peaceful and haven't got a thought in my head about what I might write. But I will trust.

On the first Sunday in Advent I wrote about an alternative set of themes for the weeks of Advent followed by contemplative Carmelite nuns. The theme of their first week was 'waiting', and for this second week of Advent, 'accepting'. It may be that in holding peace in one hand and acceptance in the other we will find a gentle path through the days to come, whatever they might hold.

As we are following the older, wilder, trackway of Celtic Advent it may be that we will find wisdom and comfort in the old saints. It comes to me that this would be the perfect week to write about St Pega of the Fens and St Caemgen, or Kevin, of the Open Hand. And we will sink into poetry, carrying with us the shining thread of hope already spun. And, next Sunday, the third candle will be lit, of that at least we can be sure.

Often at protest rallies a cry goes up, "No justice, no peace!", and it can feel that those two things are interwoven, that without the former we can never achieve the latter.  I have been inspired by the people of the Grenfell silent walk, who shout only for "justice!" for the victims and families of the horrific Grenfell fire. At the start of the walks we shouted for both but slowly they separated; peace in one hand, acceptance in the other. In this case acceptance that the path to justice is long in the midst of this, it matters to remember that to find peace in a world which seeks to unground us is also Resistance. 

In 1968, in response to the Vietnam War, Anerican novelist, poet, and environmental activist, Wendell Berry said; 

"We seek to preserve peace by fighting a war, or to advance freedom by subsidizing dictatorships, or to 'win the hearts and minds of the people' by poisoning their crops and burning their villages and confining them to concentration camps; we seek to uphold the 'truth' of our cause with lies, or to answer conscientious dissent with threats and slurs and intimidations....I have come to the realization that I can no longer imagine a war that I would believe to be either useful or necessary. I would be against any war."

Nothing has changed. 

And so today I will end with one of Wendell Berry's own poems which always brings me a sense of great peace; 'The Peace of Wild Things'.

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great
heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry

St Blaise holy well

References:

https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/peace-wild-things-0/

https://eu.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Berry

Writer Sarah Bessey is exploring the Advent themes of the Carmelite nuns on her blog at ~

https://linktr.ee/sarahbessey

When Grenfell ~ a poem

Yesterday was the monthly silent walk in solidarity and community with the people of Grenfell. Touching times, as ever. There is so much to be found there which is an inspiration for how to live more deeply and lovingly in the world, how to stand firm in the face of corporate indifference, how to keep hope alive in a world which so often suggests that it would be easier to let it die. It is both a privilege and a blessing to stand beside them in my own small way.

This month's walk was smaller, which had been expected over the summer months, but it is so often the case that when we break a habit it is hard to go back to it, even when we want to. I hope that people return after the summer holidays and, if you have ever thought of joining in the walk, please do. It takes place every 14th of the month, gathering at 6pm at Notting Hill Methodist Church, and walking from 7pm. You can check the details on the silent walk Facebook page here https://www.facebook.com/GrenfellSilentWalk/ I know that it matters so much to those who continue to fight for justice for their loved ones that as many as possible stand with them. News moves on to the next thing. It is so easy to forget. It matters that, this time, that doesn't happen.

And here is a maybe-finished poem which has been going round and round in my head as I walked over the last few months. With thanks to John Clare, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Gerrard Winstanley, Gerald Manley Hopkins, and Terry Pratchett for the borrowed lines. I hope that they wouldn't mind too much. It was done with much respect for their own journeys with the Land.

When Grenfell

When Grenfell,

when green fell,

when the green heart fell,

they dropped it and we picked it up.

They call it protest, we call it love.

And I am walking hand in hand with John Clare

who walked the land as prayer

and saw it lost,

the fences raised, the green ways dust,

and we have tied defiance in our hair,

and ceased to weave with toil and care

the rich robes that our tyrants wear,

know this earth was made a common treasury

for every man to share.

Because there is no justice, there's just us.

And we are all peasant poets here

we will not give way to fear.

Gerald Manley Hopkins, pray for us;

let kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame,

reclaim the blaze that wrote their names

in ash, turned hope to stone,

took their homes.

Just another Enclosure, 
another Land Grab,

another Clearance, 
another little tyrant with his little sign shows 
where man claims earth glows no more divine,
but this glow is not going out.
Our silent footsteps fan the flames,
keep live the spark,
community becomes the still beating heart, 
and where the green heart fell we pick it up.
They call it protest, we call it love.

(Jacqueline Durban, 15^th August, 2018)

References:

'Men of England' by Percy Bysshe Shelley https://threeacresandacow.co.uk/2016/01/men-of-england-by-shelley/

Terry Pratchett, "There's no justice. Just us." https://www.azquotes.com/author/11842-Terry_Pratchett/tag/justice

Gerrard Winstanley https://www.azquotes.com/author/29570-Gerrard_Winstanley

'As Kingfishers Catch Fire' by Gerard Manley Hopkins 

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44389/as-kingfishers-catch-fire

'The Mores' by John Clare https://threeacresandacow.co.uk/2014/07/the-mores-by-john-clare/