Book Review: Jesus and the Powers, Tom Wright and Michael F. Bird (SPCK)

If the unenforceable pub ban on Sex, Politics, or Religion, as topics of conversation to ensure that tempers do not get too frayed, then clearly Wright and Bird are skating on thin ice in tackling two out of the three volatile subjects.

Tom Wright is well-known for an intellectual and theological approach to New Testament interpretation in its historical setting without somehow losing the common touch. It’s a skill he possesses and has brought once again to this book on Politics and Christianity.

In summary, he and Bird not only argue that for Christians to retreat from politics with either a small p or capital P is as much a terrible mistake as interpreting Christianity and the call of Christ entirely within the bounds of social reform and justice for all. I particularly like this sentence:

‘The gospel cannot be reduced to a this-world project of social betterment. But neither is the gospel an escapist drama for the soul pining for the angelic door of heaven’.

Is the book sufficiently punchy? Yes, ‘I’d say so. It’s not a ‘tome’ at 178 paperback pages. It’s more a collection of well-argued and sometimes entertaining articles stitched together culminating in defence of liberal democracy as the best, or maybe the ‘least worst’, form of government to date, better than the tyrannical reign of totalitarian regimes whether religious like the Taliban, or political like Communist, or fascist dictatorships, or kings and queens.

Is the book timely? Definitely. With Trump versus Harris, our recent electoral swing to Labour, and hotly contested social and political issues like gender fluidity, sexuality, cancel-culture, Israel and Gaza, Russia and Ukraine, China and Taiwan, and the worldwide trades in human trafficking and the millions on the move as refugees (almost exclusively away from totalitarian regimes to liberal democracies), this is a very timely book.

If you’ve never really stepped back as a Christian to consider issues of conscience, and where the limits of obedience to the state should lie, this is a great read. And the limits of fought-for civil liberties such as free speech, freedom of belief, association, and assembly, that we’re in danger of taking for granted, read on!

And, if you are not a Christian but find yourself living in a society shaped, at least historically, by biblical morality and the teaching of Jesus, this is a book for you, if only to consider in a fresh light how we have reached this point in our political evolution in 2024.

This is one of those Stop and Think books.

Is it light-hearted? No, but I did enjoy the authors’ brief foray into the mind and political thinking of JRR Tolkien and the Lord of The Rings and made a mental note to re-watch the DVD set when winter draws in!

This is one of those Stop and Think books

Only one thing irritated me. At first, I thought it was a typo, but as the error is repeated throughout the book, it must have been an editorial decision, an error of judgement maybe, but not a careless mistake. I’m referring to lowercase ‘h’ and ‘s’ when referring to the third member of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. But I’ll leave that for you to judge!

I feel I haven’t done the content of the book justice, but to do so would add too many words. Best to beg, borrow, or buy a copy.

Paris ’24 10,000m update…7 days to go

Friday 26th July 2024

Later today the Opening Ceremony for the Paris 2024 Olympics will explode into life around the Eiffel Tower.

Excitement over the Olympics, held in Paris for the first time since 1924, is crackling away nicely. The previous Paris Games, a century ago, were made famous in 1981 by the film Chariots of Fire in which Eric Liddell, a Scottish Christian, runs for the glory of God and Harold Abrahams, an English Jew, runs to overcome prejudice…and, not to forget, Vangelis’s theme tune.

Et moi?

I’m not running my race for any lofty moral or spiritual goals, but to attempt to match the 10,000m world record time, 26.11, set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020 but over 5,000m by August 2nd, the day of the 10,000m final…seven days from now.

Progress?

Sadly recent attempts to bring my 5K time down have been thwarted. Yesterday I abandoned an attempt…mainly due to misjudging the direction of the wind! Doh! I was running into the wind not with it as planned. Today I woke up feeling decidedly odd with some labyrinthitis and have delayed a steady 5K run for a few hours.

But one doesn’t give up. I’m hoping the Olympian efforts of Team GB and others will inspire me over the final week to push, push, push. No pain no gain, eh?

One doesn’t give up…there are always hurdles to overcome

There are always hurdles to overcome. We’ve woken up to the breaking news that arsonists have targeted train lines in and out of Paris disrupting travel plans for 800,000 passengers on the move. As I write this there are no details, no one has taken responsibility, and the Opening Ceremony as planned will go ahead.

So…in the meantime, it’s Vive La France, much cheering for Team GB, and here’s hoping my earbuds don’t fall out listening to Vangelis whilst urging my two pins to go just a tad faster.

Jesus was cross…a strange place to find hope!

Despite all the political turmoil, scandals, coarseness, and the polarisation of recent years threatening to drown out all hope, I see hope.

In part, what gives me hope is the public reaction towards hypocrisy, double standards, false promises, and dishonesty whenever these moral failures come to light e.g. Boris Johnson and others who set the Lockdown rules only to break them, or the Post Office scandal, or antisemitism in a Labour party espousing non-racism, or the bullying of young athletes by coaches striving at all costs to meet success criteria.

In other words, as a culture and a nation, we haven’t completely lost sight of what is right and good even if our leaders cannot reproduce the qualities we long to see in the world in their own lives.

And if we dare to look closer to home – nor do we reproduce those standards. We are all tainted with a tendency towards imperfection.

In recent years, anger, disappointment, and frustration have built up towards our political and religious leaders, so it might be a good moment and instructive to stop and listen to Jesus’ red-hot verbal attack on the leaders of his day.

Matthew recorded many of Jesus’ verbal assaults in one chapter – chapter 23. Even as a child, I can remember the profound impact this chapter and others had in forming my moral compass. Sometimes my reaction was simple, more like a pantomime – booing the Pharisees and cheering Jesus – but, I would argue, something of inestimable value has been laid in the ‘Christian’ nations by being marinaded in the Scriptures over many centuries – despite our shocking failures to steer clear of moral failure.

At least we know from what heights we have fallen.

A sample:

‘The Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat, therefore do what they say but not what they do, for they say but do not do’

‘Woe to you, Pharisees, hypocrites! You shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves nor allow those who are entering to go in’

‘Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup, that the outside may be clean also…you are like whitewashed tombs which appear beautiful outwardly but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so, you appear righteous but are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness’

How can there be hope if we are all flawed?

St Paul, a former Pharisee of course, and a target for Jesus’ criticisms, later spoke out in like manner after his conversion to Christ, and in doing so shed light on his former life as a committed Pharisee:

‘Men will…have a form of godliness but deny its power’ 2 Tim 3 v 1-5

And there, in one short verse, is the hope. Paul, formerly Saul who dragged Christians off to prison or stood by as they were, like Stephen, murdered and martyred, had discovered the secret of hope. He had abandoned the outward form of godliness in favour of the power of godliness.

What was this power that Paul had found? And can we? Can our culture find its way back from the hypocrisy of recent years? Can we as churches? Or as individuals? What was the ‘gospel’ (which simply means ‘good news’) of the kingdom that Jesus, the apostles, and Paul proclaimed?

Before we pursue the answer to those questions we need to take one step back.

Had we been alive in Jesus’ day we would have known that the ‘Pharisees-party’ was very popular, as were the Sadducees, their rivals.

Here’s a summary of their message:

1. Israel existed but only under Roman rule

2. Israel, due to her disobedience to the Law, had lost her sovereignty to the Romans

3. Therefore to earn God’s favour once again, and be restored to full sovereignty, complete obedience to the Law of Moses is required

4. In addition to the Law, traditions that ensured obedience to the Law must be observed

It’s an appealing message and offers hope: the hope of self-determination, the overthrow of Roman rule, and the recovery of Israel as a theocracy under the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Paul, and many others, were caught up in the religious-political zeal and joined the Pharisees who set about enforcing the Law of Moses with as much mercy as the present-day Taliban exhibit imposing Sharia Law on their communities. It’s comparable.

As a result of his conversion to Christ Paul had abandoned this approach.

‘But now the righteousness of God apart from the Law has been revealed’ Romans 3 v 21

Apart from the Law! Paul argues that the Law, although good in itself, cannot reproduce its goodness in us, and that ’goodness’, ‘godliness’, or ‘righteousness’ that was in Jesus is available to us, not by human effort, but faith.

‘..the righteousness of God is through faith in Jesus Christ to all’ 3 v 22

It’s the difference between watching a non-swimmer trying to stay afloat in water through effort and a swimmer believing the water will hold them up. It’s the difference between human effort and faith.

When Paul wrote to the Christians in Rome he declared his aim, his purpose:

‘We have received apostleship for the obedience of faith among all nations’ 1 v 5

Not obedience to man-made Pharisee-like efforts to obey the Law but the ‘obedience of faith’. A father stands at the bottom of a wall on which he has placed his 5-year-old son telling him to ‘jump and I’ll catch you’. If he trusts that his father will catch him, he’ll jump and it’ll be the obedience of faith.

So…back to the question What was this power that Paul had discovered?

‘I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ; it is the power of God for salvation for everyone’ Rom 1 v 16

Christianity is not an externally imposed set of rules and commandments and our attempt to live by them, good though they are. True Christianity is not a religious duty participating in outward forms e.g. taking communion, being baptised, lifting hands in worship, kneeling to pray, or helping our neighbours – all of these things we may do, once we have become Christians, but, attempting to reproduce this righteousness without the ‘power’, we fall headlong into the Pharisaical ‘holier than thou’ trap of establishing a self-righteousness.

Christianity is not an externally imposed set of rules and commandments

True Christianity is inward not outward. We need the power inside us, like the water we need to believe in the water to hold us up to become a swimmer, we need Christ Himself in us, not just his teaching, or Moses’ Law.

This is the ‘gospel’ the good news that is utterly surprising to so many of us in England surrounded by so many churches and immersed as we have been for centuries in Christian culture and tradition.

In the hours before Jesus’ arrest he spoke to the disciples about this remarkable future in front of them:

‘I will pray to the Father, and he will give you the Spirit of truth who dwells with you but will be in you…then you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me and I am in you…if anyone loves me…my Father will love him and we will come and make our home with him’

John 14 v 16f

When I heard this, and particularly when I read this for myself, I was astonished; I had thought Christianity was a religion to be adhered to, a set of (good) commandments to follow, an external set of rules, and the teachings of Jesus to obey.

By the time I had reached my teens, I had serious doubts about the reliability of the New Testament, whether Jesus had existed, and, in particular the resurrection. This is not the place to tackle all those questions, but I did find convincing answers to these questions but that still left me with a decision.

I could see that if Christ – in fact, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit - could take up residence in me – then I could be changed from the inside out. But like the non-swimmer struggling to believe the water will hold him/her up, I struggled to come to that point of faith and to ‘take the plunge’, ‘the leap of faith’, or to be more accurate to the New Testament receive the gift of righteousness freely given

Eventually, I did take the plunge and receive the gift.

And that is my source of hope. Not only do I retain hope within a world beset with political and social ills, flaws, and failings, I have hope for myself and all who have stumbled across this secret, the secret that Paul discovered, and many millions of others have since the resurrection of Christ…that He isn’t far off in heaven demanding our obedience but living out His life in us and through us in this world.

I like Paul’s phrase ‘…to all who believe…’. It’s not just Paul’s, it’s the ‘note’ or the music throughout the New Testament.

I could see that if Christ – in fact, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit - could take up residence in me – then I could be changed from the inside out

I wasn’t sure whether to use the title Jesus was cross. The risk is that we think Jesus is cross with ‘me’. Nothing could be further from the truth. Think of Nicodemus the Pharisee who was too scared of his peers, so he came to Jesus at night. Jesus treated him with respect and welcomed him. Or what about St Paul, who had participated in violence and murder against believers? When Christ appeared to Paul on the road to Damascus, he said: ‘Why do you persecute me?’ He came to Paul to choose him to be an apostle to Europe. None of us are unloved.

Or, to counter the double negative: All of us are loved.

From its opening pages, the bible is full of this curious love in the face of our sin. When Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves to cover their sense of shame having failed by eating the forbidden fruit, God came to them – He didn’t remain offended and aloof - and provided for what they needed. He came with love.

When Jesus came, he was criticised by the Pharisees:

‘The Pharisees complained saying, ‘Why do you eat with…sinners?’ Jesus answered and said ‘Those who are well do not need a physician, only those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.’ Luke 5v31,31

So, I have hope, the same hope of any doctor.

Diagnosis complete, we can move on to healing and wholeness, to forgiveness and being filled with God Himself, and therefore…hope.

POSTSCRIPT: Try saying these words as a prayer if you are serious about abandoning everything to follow Christ: ‘Heavenly Father, I abandon all my useless efforts to be righteous. Please forgive me for all my failures. I come to you now with my hands open to receive You and all you want to give me from this point on. Amen.

Guest poet: Harry Baker - Impossible

Impossible - by Harry Baker

𝓟𝓪𝓻𝓲𝓼 ’24 10,000𝓶 𝓾𝓹𝓭𝓪𝓽𝓮…18 𝓭𝓪𝔂𝓼 𝓽𝓸 𝓰𝓸

I’m feeling the pressure of the deadline…can this 66-year-old athlete (?) run 5000m in the world record time for 10,000m, 26.11, set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020 by August 2nd, 2024, the day of the 10,000m final in the Paris Olympics?

Hmm…this is not me. Hair colour is…inaccurate…and the terrain is hardly the Portway! Nonetheless, I feel there’s something here - a sense of purpose.

Not according to this morning’s efforts.

27:04 this morning for a 5K loop up and down the Portway.

Again, perfect running conditions: cool, very slight breeze, dry. But the legs?

Thoughts include cutting out alcohol, resisting the pull of the toaster, and overcoming the sports-junkie-couch (but not today, there’s some serious tv viewing with Men’s Final Wimbledon and England v Spain footy later).

Also, adding in 1500m runs on the gym treadmill to get legs and lungs used to running faster.

Two and a half weeks to go.

‘They that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall run and not grow weary’

Yes, this is my prayer.

Thank You

Descending from Tryfan
In an early morning autumnal mist
Three nights of hill-bound
Body odour to prove our ordeal
The welcome end in sight
And my joy is eclipsed
By sudden uncalled-for
Patella pain

A decade passes
And I, unable to run
And reduced often to
Less than a child’s pace
A young man no longer young
Stoic I, sad at heart
But head held high
Push on with private prayers

After-dawn rituals continue
There’s cereal, toast, tea
Bible readings, and tie-tying
All with variable success
A pre-work regularity but
Interrupted on this day
By one unbidden word:

‘Run!’

A command from Beyond
Authoritative, inescapable
Unharsh, inaudible
More than a word

So, crippled I
Locate my battered trainers
Old from lack of use
And find a gravel path
And obey, for a quarter of a mile
Then a mile the next day
Half-marathons follow on
Patella pain consigned
To the past

I run now on new fuel
Offerings of thanksgiving
To the One
Who interrupted my prayers
And made me an
Implausible parable
On two legs:

Therefore strengthen the hands
That hang down
And the feeble knees
And make straight paths for your feet
So that what is lame
May not be dislocated
But rather be healed…
…let us run the race

Paris ’24 10,000m update

25 days to go…

This morning I set out with the intention to meet my target and break 26:11 for a 5K around Bristol Harbourside.

If you’ve been mad enough to follow this post over the past year or so you’ll know my aim: to run 5000m in the world record time for 10,000m, 26.11, set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020. And to do so by August 2nd 2024, the day of the 10,000m final in the Paris Olympics.

Weather conditions at 7a.m. were perfect: blue sky, no gales, and early enough not to have to dodge commuters walking, biking, or e-scootering to work.

Man, it was tough!

Arriving back at the car I pressed my Fitbit watch to stop, and once recovered, looked at the time 26 mins! However, closer inspection revealed that the time was 26:13 AND the route I took was 4.93K, 70m short of a true 5K.

So…not quite 5K…and not quite fast enough.

Just over three weeks to go. Kummon!

Back. Shower. Tea. Cereal. More tea.

Paris ’24 10,000m update

35 days to go…

If you’ve been mad enough to follow this post over the past year or so you’ll know my aim: to run 5000m in the world record time for 10,000m, 26.11, set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020. And to do so by August 2nd 2024, the day of the 10,000m final in the Paris Olympics.

Not only is this a physical challenge but it also carries a moral/technical dilemma. Look at the Strava time below – 1 second off the target time of 26:11.

I should be cock-a-hoop…but celebrations are tempered by the official Severn Bridge Parkrun time: 27:10.

Why the discrepancy?

1. On Parkruns it takes a few seconds to reach the start line unless you are one of the Jaguars that see a 5K as a sprint…but it doesn’t take a full minute!

2. Strava is ‘generous’ and so shows more favourable times. Bit like weighing yourself on uncalibrated scales that show ½ a stone lighter

3. The official distance needs to be re-checked

I suspect number 2 may be the most significant factor!

Back. Shower. Tea. Toast.

Last comment…I struggled to keep up with the 28’ pacer as much as he struggled to run slow enough to hit 28’. I am indebted to him as a target in his light blue Pacer vest some yards ahead before a late burst from me and a passing Thank you as I lolloped towards the finishing tunnel.

Back. Shower. Tea. Toast.

Still small voice

Beer beach. Almost July.
Even with the sun skulking
Behind lumpy grey clouds
And an onshore breeze
To cool the pebbles
It is warm enough

Warm enough to sit,
Read, remove a layer
And later, sandals on
Wander over to the beach café
For a flat white and a brie
And cranberry panini

 Lunch, and to listen
Until time itself disappears
And the world of thoughts
Recedes
And some aural centre
Draws you in

Not gravity, not to-do lists
Not worries, nor plans
Neither angels nor demons
Only the sound of the beach
Filling all, upholding all, as if
One can swim at any depth

Suspended inside sound:
Breaking waves crashing
Like thousands of crisps
Trodden underfoot
Forlorn seagulls crying
Searching for scraps

An irritating Pekinese angry
In its over-stretched skin
Hull grunts of a fishing smack
Hauled over the pebbles
And much silence, the silence
Of an uncrowded beach

Into which I hear
All I need to hear

Summer?

It’s a temporary fixture
Like one-summer ants
Accelerators down
Scampering around on
Sun-scorched paving slabs
All to collect a leaf,
And march triumphant

Before death,
Hoisting their green flags

It’s burning beach sand
Underfeet furnaces
Making flamenco dancers
Of even the most reserved
A staccato dancing
Desperate hunt for cool
Blades of green grass

Before the sand chills
So fast at the sunset hour

It’s inane music
Filling the void
No one permitted to dip,
Or speak of life in the raw,
Or grief-stricken hearts, but
We weep with those whose
Suntans are for next year

Before the sounds of
Our final goodbyes dissipate

It’s for removing shirts
Flouting flesh-covering rules
It’s beach cricket. Intense.
Annual family contests
Fiercely fought, bat and ball,
Battling like warring hippos,
Unto death…well, loss anyway

Before stumps are drawn
Chilled beers are sunk

And we carry one another
Across lengthening shadows

Paris Olympics 2024 – 43 days to the 10,000m final

My aim is to run the 10,000m world record time, 26.11 set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020 but over 5K by August 2nd, the day of the 10,000m final in the Paris Olympics.

Recent times:
April 19th 27.47
May 18th 27.35
June 15th 27.11

This morning Harbourside 5K…26:30

And I can tell you, that hurt!

Chuffed and puffed…but can I knock off 20 seconds to dip under Joshua Cheptogei’s 10K world record for a 5K by August 2nd the day of the 10,000m final in Paris???

Paris ’24 10,000m update

Bonjour! Signs of progress!

Over the past year, this blog post has not been littered with positive news. If you’ve read a few you’ll know that this 66-year-old athlete (?) periodically introduces you to yet more Anglo-Saxon and Latin-sounding injuries: Morton’s Neuroma, Plantar Fasciitis, Achilles tendonitis, a torn calf-muscle, and anno dominitis.

But to break the fug, the gloom, and the despondency, finally, there’s some sunnier news.

I’m going to give some credit to my osteopath who has altered the way I exercise before running and a good running club friend who has insisted I should stretch after running. If, just prior to a Parkrun, you come across a fella waggling each joint in different planes and lunging as if there’s no tomorrow…it could be me. Plus a warm-up run of a few hundred metres, ideally, before pressing my Fitbit 4 watch to start recording the run.

Two recent runs to report:

6th June, Cumberland Basin

It’s not much after 6 am and we’re off on a bright but chilly morning with a slight northerly breeze along the familiar Harbourside 5K route, past the rowing club, and on up to the cranes turning into the city centre, back to the harbour wall, returning to Hotwells, over the small bridge and turning Fitbit ‘Off’ just before reaching the car.

Result: 27.49 for 5.08km - approximately 27.22 for 5K

My aim is to run the 10,000m world record time, 26.11 set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020 but over 5000m

15th June, Severn Bridge Parkrun

Windscreen wipers working hard on the drive up the M5 and across the Severn Bridge tell their own story, and blustery winds charging up the Severn from the south are ready to make 200+ runners run at a 10-degree angle. The diagonal rain comes and goes. It’s all the way up the impressive motorway bridge and back down. I find it hard to gauge pace, and to decide whether I have enough puff to push on faster for the finish.

Result: 27:11 for 5.00km Fitbit watch - official time, however, was 28:06 - evidently it takes a while to cross the start line!

My aim is to run the 10,000m world record time, 26.11 set by Ugandan Joshua Cheptogei in 2020 but over 5000m by August 2nd, the day of the 10,000m final in the Paris Olympics.

Place your bets!

Juggling with water

In a dream as a child,
Creeping downstairs
In the dark, I sat
Composed, adjusting the
Ragged piano stool
And played Rachmaninov’s
2nd piano concerto in C minor
Faultlessly
Each finger and note
Plunging into an infinite pool
Of untrammelled light

It was so vivid
A copy of a reality
Evading this conscious realm
Early in the morning I followed
My dream to the same stool
But my fingers turned to butter
And the notes and chords
Evaporated never to return
Like a juggler whose sticks
Had turned to water
I sighed

And now? Years piled upon years?
Here I am. And there you are.
Do we prefer the dream world
Of realised hopes, like miracles
Grace-gifts from elsewhere?
Or,
Do we reconcile ourselves
To the world of cuts and bruises
Of hoped-for solidity
Slipping through our fingers
Like water into sand?

Jazz-jamming bum notes flow on,
Unashamed stepping stones

On the subject of water,
I stumbled across
An unlooked-for treasure
Tucked away in an ancient psalm
You keep my tears in a bottle
You have recorded each one
In Your book
Now? Now, with eyes closed
Jazz-jamming bum notes flow on,
Unashamed stepping stones
Sounding like spring rain

Polished Arrows, Jenny Sanders

Polished Arrows is a non-fiction departure from Jenny Sanders’ recent Children’s books Charlie Peach and The Magnificent Moustache and other stories.

Polished Arrows is more than an extended bible study on discipleship, or a manual on how to grow towards spiritual maturity, it is a comprehensive look at various aspects of real life as a believer – for example, past hurts and forgiveness, dealing with regret, and the ministry of the Holy Spirit. And, although the author is not self-indulgent in using personal illustrations, the theory is clearly anchored in her own experience.

I found the historical Arrowsmith technology – selection of the wood, smoothing the shaft, and dealing with knots for example fascinating. It serves as a clear and powerful metaphor of God’s purposes for us – to be fashioned as arrows and fired into the world - throughout each of the twelve chapters

At the end of each chapter is a study section where Jenny has listed a few questions to allow for group discussion or individual reflection.

It serves as a clear and powerful metaphor of God’s purposes for us – to be fashioned as arrows and fired into the world

I particularly enjoyed Chapter 4 Abrasive Grace, using Elijah as an example, and Chapter 6 Knotty Issues illustrated via Naaman’s miraculous healing. I am certain that anyone reading Polished Arrows will find several chapters that stand out as personally relevant. One of the strengths of Polished Arrows is that each chapter can be read as a ‘stand-alone’ study but also as part of the overall process of being formed into a polished arrow and fired into the world.

Polished Arrows is thoroughly biblical, quoting extensively from the Old and New Testaments but the language is conversational in style rather than theological and so will appeal to those who love the word of God but are put off by unnecessary use of technical jargon.

A weekend diary ramble, London

It’s Saturday, 1st of June. There’s no excuse for the British summer not to take to the stage now. It was so promising at 7.10 standing in the cool air and warm sun on the platform at Sea Mills waiting for the two-carriage train on the first leg to Paddington.

Temple Meads is bustling but quiet. Few are managing speech, preferring to sup at their black Americanos like babies on the teat and consult their mobiles for news that maybe could wait.

I’m no better. I look once, no twice, to check my reserved window seat number on the Paddington train. The London-bound herd has to migrate to Platform 11 and the immense beast arrives, loads its passengers, and is gone, slithering snake-like round the bends exiting the station after the briefest of hesitations.

I have my window seat and a table from which to watch the oncoming clouds and the disappearance of summer.

Fussing with available networks I navigate to a poem on Word written in 2020 when I was feeling rough, maybe with Covid. Reading it again, and fleeting fragments begin to coalesce. It’s called 20kg to highlight how administrative errors by computers are just as racist as humans.

Did I mention clouds? How dull the countryside looks compared to when it’s bathed in the summer sun.

The hubbub of conversation fills the carriage. I hear random words: pig, dry-cleaning, rugby, steak, Treacle (someone’s nickname!)…

I am in a curious bubble cut off from the world cocooned in tiredness – it was a long day yesterday and, with five hours sleep, I feel as if I’m in a tunnel of impenetrable cotton wool.

Reading. Last stop before London. No seats left around the table. I’m waking up, I think. Maybe it’s writing this that’s keeping me conscious. Poor daughter 1, who’s meeting me and will be full of words to pour out, may have to suffer Pa, whose capacity to listen is greatly diminished and needs the nap that he cannot have.

Here’s that poem:

20kg

No words flowing in my veins

No lift of consciousness

To see things small and great

Knowing they are one of the same.

I am unwell.

Corona alarm bells are ringing

Medical professionals pass me

From one number to the next

From one Covid screen to the next

On-line I yield my NI number, my NHS number, my mobile number,

My DOB, my postcode and

Although, when ill, humour is suppressed,

I laugh as the United Kingdom’s database

Cannot identify me!

Have I slid between a crack in the binary?

Could there be an unknown portal between 0 and 1 and 1 and 0?

That algorithm, that App, that whirring computer,

That overheated, CO2 polluting, electricity sapping,

Power-consuming mega, giga, terra server

Cannot identify me!

It required a human to pull strings,

An agent with a pulse

A simple kind woman on a telephone

To put Kasparov ahead of Blue once more

To identify a fellow human, a citizen, a real

Flesh and blood tax-payer, Portsmouth supporter,

Whisky-loving, cigar-smoking, God-arrested, retired Chemistry teacher

And father of five.

Did a whiff of Windrush just slide by?

Of being denied

Though the truth, standing at 38 degrees and not quite well

Had walked upon Jerusalem for six decades and more?

I had smelt the it.

The officials who, unlike the woman, denied rights

Denied existence, denied certain proof, denied humanity

And, hiding behind endless forms

Couldn’t identify…

…Jocelyn John and many others

Jocelyn John with her 20kg bag allowance uprooted and deported

On Christmas Day

Jocelyn John who, unlike me, didn’t find a woman to defeat Goliath

But who fell between the 0s and the 1s

With more documents than needed to build a bridge to Grenada

Was sent away, deported, unidentified, an innocent branded a criminal

On Christmas Day.

It took 10 minutes to find me

The lost, unidentifiable, me

For those moments I was no-one

Applying for a Covid test, feeling unwell

But otherwise fine.

Birth certificate? Check.

But for Jocelyn five years passed,

Three million contested minutes later

An official apology emerged

A repatriation, a restoration, a righting of wrongs,

And JJ’s name is back where it always belonged - in the computer.

Jocelyn John. UK citizen. British.

Bring out the fatted calf.

Put rings on her fingers and

Buy her a new pair of dancing shoes

Let us eat and be merry

For that which was lost has been found.

End of diary entry #1.

Diary entry #2

Monday. On carriage A seat 16 from Paddington heading home. Reserved. Window seat. Facing forwards. Table. Quiet coach. Perfect. A rather peaceful-looking golden-haired dog across the aisle from me. I hope he/she understands the word Quiet.

Two days on tubes, buses, shags pony have taken me to Surbiton, down by the river and the first of numerous flat whites. Thence to The Telegraph open plan offices with sleek black laptops forlornly looking for their operators on a Saturday morning. It’s like a beehive with the queen bee in the easily accessible centre – the Editors’ oval holy of holies.

Across to a street market for an eclectic and international choice of hot food. Jerk chicken consumed; we head back to number one’s flat to zonk out watching a film.

Pre-church flat white on Sunday with number three, then St John’s, or ‘Saint’ as it’s known colloquially. There is an emphasis an immediate ethos - a ‘cool’ and contemporary vibe. Great music, good sermon on the equal need we have as humans for communion with God and community with each other. Can’t knock it. A far far cry from the stiff and formal CofE of my upbringing, ancient stone floors, musty, green-edged hymn books and the all-important black prayer book that only the regulars knew how to navigate…and much silence. Switch that to noisy, rock concert, and emotion and you’ll understand the difference. Could be summed up as the gap between religion and relationship but the truth is that both can easily become a tradition that binds its adherents into a self-perpetuating pattern, empty of meaning. So…ignoring the style…one needs to dig deeper to see if it’s a case of style over substance or substance exhibited in a more exuberant style. For example, the previous Sunday, a lady preached who had been miraculously healed from paralysis, a wheelchair to walking miracle following prayer. If accounts like that don’t stir the blood and justify the feet dancing and hands waving what will!

After church, we move on to lunch at a bar/restaurant offering food from Tel Aviv, Sicily, and Lebanon. Bit later we’re in a lift hurtling into the sky and landing up in a rooftop bar looking down on the Gurkin. 40 floors in just few seconds. St Paul’s looks like a squat little house far below.

…the previous Sunday, a lady preached who had been miraculously healed from paralysis…

Of course, in between all these places are serious and humorous conversations, and ‘impossible to hear’ moments on noisy tubes, people watching, eye-catching buildings, tall and modern, and historically recognisable districts. At one point, for example, we’re near Spitalfields, which figures strongly in the novel I’m trying to write, located in the summer of 1796.

I’ve frequented numerous bathrooms; all clean, with an array of soap dispensers, hand driers, and flushing techniques. One has to be mentally agile these days. I’ve ascended and descended I don’t know how many escalators, stairs, and ramps and passed by the 2012 Olympic stadium, now home to the Hammers, as if it’s normal to do so.

And now, all is done. Just the return journey with the still silent dog to my left and the dull green countryside on a dry, cool, and cloudy day. Saturday and Sunday, by contrast, were very sunny and warm.

You’ll have noticed I have restricted this diary entry mainly to activities and places – an external rather than an internal account. The distinction between private and public, facts and feelings, is interpreted differently by different individuals but the footballers’ refrain ‘what’s said in the dressing room remains in the dressing room’ isn’t a bad adage.

Over and out.

Book Review: Mornings in Jenin, Susan Abulhawa

Jenin, a Palestinian city on the West Bank is the backdrop to this searing and beautifully written fiction; half-novel half-history.

Susan Abulhawa’s book will transport you into the rugged geography of Israel and Palestine and the heart of the struggle between two sides locked into a seemingly endless conflict. Mornings in Jenin examines that conflict from the perspective of a Palestinian writer.

Of course, I have read Mornings in Jenin in the aftermath of Hamas’s appalling and murderous spree on October 7th 2023. I can offer no certainty about the author’s viewpoint on the moral equivalence of Hamas’s pre-planned grotesque action and the devastating military response by Israel in Gaza.

The story follows the fortunes of the Abulheja family, Palestinians…

But to comment on the present war in Gaza would deflect us away from reviewing Mornings in Jenin.

If you are in search of an author who can turn suffering and a deeply ingrained sense of injustice of a whole people, families, and individuals into beautifully written paragraphs and sentences that capture desperation, humiliation, fear, hope, and defiance without ruining love and tenderness and generosity, you should read Susan Abulhawa’s Mornings in Jenin.

The story follows the fortunes of the Abulheja family, Palestinians, forced from their homes in Ein Hod in 1948 by Israeli soldiers and moved en masse to Jenin, a refugee camp on the West Bank. The final chapter is set in Jenin in 2002 in the aftermath of the Israeli military strike and battle that lasted 12 days and resulted in the destruction of property and life on both sides.

I could quote many paragraphs that lift the reader beyond vivid fictional description and well-crafted prose into the realms of poetry and the spirit.

Bear in mind I am half-American by birth, so I take this quote on the chin:

‘Amal, I believe that most Americans do not love as we do. It is not for any inherent deficiency or superiority in them. They live in the safe, shallow parts that rarely push human emotions into the depths where we dwell…the kind (of love) that dives naked towards infinity’s reach. I think it is where God lives.’

or,

‘David cried silently. He stood over his sister’s body…though he made no sound, the force of his grief was strong, hovering over the graves like rain that cannot fall.’

Perhaps the greatest compliment that I can muster for Mornings in Jenin is that, just as it is virtually impossible not to believe that Jesus’ parable of the prodigal portrays real historical individuals, Susan Abulhawa has clothed her fictional characters with such flesh and blood, emotions and conviction, and aging flesh that they come alive as you read the book. You can almost touch them, taste their food, and drink their sufferings.

‘David cried silently. He stood over his sister’s body…though he made no sound, the force of his grief was strong, hovering over the graves like rain that cannot fall.’

Yes, I can, and would, argue the toss about her historical analysis of the opposing Israeli/Palestinian causes but if, like me, you see the hand of God in the remarkable return of the Jews to the land of Israel, may I recommend you read this book; maybe it will cause you to ‘dive naked towards infinity’s reach…where God lives’.

Jumping from the sea wall

I think I was four
When my tongue wrapped itself
Round a new word:
Subtract
It may, of course, have been
Take away, or minus
But I added it to my arsenal
Of ideas of having less

At four, I knew
I had less height, less strength
Less girth, less stamina
Than the grown-ups
The urge to close the gap
A burning fire: how oddly
We strive for the things
That will overtake us

But even at four, or five, or six
Our secret comparisons
Invisible and inward,
Bristle with life:
Elizabeth is beautiful
Somehow Carol is not
Love, added and subtracted
Rushes in like the tide, and away

My friend, arms raised, yelling
Jumped off the sea wall
Into the waves…I held back
Washington never lied…but I?
Whoever dealt the cards
Gave some to all, not all to one
What we lack others have
That’s the arithmetic

Freely you have received
Freely give
Oh! this somersaulting universe
Under a tutelage of grace!
Having less is a baptism,
A plunging into a vast ocean
I lack courage…but only in me
It comes as a gift…to share

Paris Olympics ‘24 - May 18th

I am very glad to report - enfin - an improvement…aiming for 26:11 by August 2nd, the date of the 10,000m final at the Paris Olympics. 26:11 is the world record for the 10,000m…I’m aiming to equal of break that record…over half the distance 😊

Paris Olympics ’24 – 17th May 2024

It’s now 90 days to go before the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games 2024 in Paris, and an update is called for.

The 10K Final is scheduled for Friday, August 2nd 2024 at 9.20pm

My 5K aim is to run at or under 26 mins11 seconds. This is the time Ugandan Joshua Cheptegei ran for the 10K world record.

26 mins 11s ?

Tomorrow I will attempt the Chepstow Severn Bridge Parkrun to close the gap between my Parkrun pb this year of over 28 minutes and 26:11.

Until tomorrow’s result…au revoir mes amis

Not Just Mud - a trilogy

Not just mud i

It all started with pulling my

Fingers free from the mud

Abandoned at low-tide

Dark, tacky, sweet-smelling

Mud to sink toes and feet in

But at my age then,

I wanted to be a crab

So, immersing toes and fingers

Side-slipping, I chased the

Outgoing tide until…

…it was the sight of a

Real, live, salty red crab

That stopped me:

Curiosity pulled at my fingers

Until, with a thwook,

Out of the mud they came

I took hold of the hard edges

Of the crab’s crusty shell

And let its flailing legs

Make patterns in the mud-ripples

Before baptising it

In a pool and letting it

Get clean away, then it was back

To plunging my fingers in then out

I wondered even then:

What could I make with mud?

Mud: the impotent left-overs

The detritus of decay

Washed here and there

By forces too strong to resist

Wind, tidal surges, estuary madness

Mud: weak, wet, and worthless

But my fingers went to work

First a handful, squeezed

Until the sea stopped draining free

I looked at the grey-brown sphere

Formed between my palms until

It was a scoop of ice cream…

Next? Something like a cone

Squeezed and rolled, emerged

It all ended with Mother

Picking me up

Mud still in my hands

And between my toes until

I was bath-baptised and got

Clean away…to bed, dreaming

Of mud-men and mud-women

Majestic and mighty

Not just mud ii

The years passed by

And mud had turned to clay

And clay had turned to stone

And the stone had turned

Into sculptures

Of tall men and tall women

Striding across long grass

Leaving behind an evolution

If not an evolution

Then a metamorphosis

My gnarly fingers

And swollen joints testifying

Of a lifetime sculpting

Making a fading dream

Become impervious

A vision taking on solid forms

Of a people, a stone race

Of magnificence rising up

From all that’s unseen

Beneath the soles

Of our shoes. Sixty years it took

Before halted again,

Not by a crab but

At my god-likeness

Not just mud iii

My brother was a doctor

My sister a warrior

In low moments I thought

I had wasted my life-clock

Felt like grey-brown mud

Squeezed dry by the world

Just a scoop of nothing much

A sculptor barely scraping by

It was not a voice I heard

But something

Not an angelic visitation

But each cell of my body

Began to exult - I saw

The loving hand of God

Reaching down into the poor

And broken mud-people we are

And yielding, if we will, to the

Divine finger-moulding-pressing

We rise, like wet clay on a wheel

Into the mud-men, and

The mud-women

Of a four-year-old’s dream

The weak, wet, and worthless

Now tall, mighty, and magnificent