Green Patches

The Heffalump Psalm

With Monday morning looming large, I was reflecting earlier on the new piece we've chosen for me to learn in my voice classes: Frances Allitsen's setting of Psalm 27 The Lord is my light The soloist here appears to have all the confidence and direction of a ship in full sail. I fear the Greenpatch version - and to be fair I've only been learning it for one week - sounds more like AA Milne's Piglet running away from an imaginary Heffalump ! It does worm its way into one's thinking, however. tum tum tum tum tuuum, tum tum tum tum tum tuuuuuummm tum... I can feel another 'earworm' coming on...

Happiness

is rediscovering some oil and pastel crayons that you'd forgotten you owned. Tidying does have something to be said for it, then, after all!

"Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten. Then when you hit puberty they take the crayons away and replace them with books on algebra etc. Being suddenly hit years later with the creativity bug is just a wee voice telling you, "I'd like my crayons back, please." from "How to Be Creative" by Hugh McLeod, with thanks to Moot and Michael Radcliffe.

And from the sublime to the ridiculous

I love the sound of breaking glass.  Though not the original version, unfortunately. As I mentioned earlier, the green boxes and sacks are neatly arranged outside the back door, (much to GP dog's delight) and the new kerbside recycling collection is due to launch any day now. Yes, there's been a certain amount of confusion when trying to remember that cans and glass no longer go together, and the council's definition of recyclable plastics is somewhat limited, but never mind, it's a start. It's noticeable how much longer it takes for the kitchen and wheelie bins to fill up now that plastic bottles and card  are separated out. From now on, sneaking packaging into the pedal bin because you can't be bothered to step a couple of feet outside is an arrestable offence - in the same category of heinous crimes as squeezing the toothpaste tube from the wrong end and leaving the toilet seat up!

Green Christianity and Romans 8

Courtesy of Matt Stone.

Romans 8:18-25

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. 

This is a passage of hope, and more, of a hope that encompasses the entire creation. It includes a sober assessment of the frustration and decay that the environment now suffers, but says IT WILL NOT END THERE. Paul’s words here are light years away from the prophetic speculations of some Christians who think that the world will one day be “Left Behind”. No, the apostle Paul here counsels that the reign of God includes the renewal of creation, its rebirth.

This naturally leads to the question, so what does that mean for me here and now? My response is, if God does not consider the earth to be disposable, should we?

 

Join Point A to Point B...

When I'm calling youuuuuuuoooooh

A tenuous link

Every cloud has a silver lining, it seems. For here, in all his glory is the Greenpatch offspring's 'beardie,' (Bearded Dragon) aka Ridge (!). That last exclamation mark is part of his persona. When we acquired him, I decided that his name was just the sort a typical 70's TV cop might have used: dynamic, go-getting, devil-may-care, handsome....(insert adjective of your choice here).  Which of course - unless you happen to be a lady beardie, poor  R is not.

This Telly Savalas of the reptilian realm spends his days sitting on a rock in deep contemplation, and his nights...well...sitting on a rock, or with the occasional foray into exotica, sitting under an ornamental plant. From time to time he toys with his favourite dish of cricket, locust, or grub...live! We have the occasional break out, when constituents of tomorrow's meals on wheels escapes their container and makes off into the far blue yonder. The bathroom is a favourite place; spotted one heading for the airing cupboard early this morning, whilst Mr GP retrieved one from our bed! Yeuch. I know we're supposed to love God's tiny creatures...but sometimes I think the wandr'ing wild and free can get just a little out of hand.

Which leads to the tenuous link of the title - another random thought; all this vocational musing is obviously having a dire effect on my powers of creativity. Greenpatch dog hit a rough spot a few weeks back. To be blunt, a few itchy spots, of the type that religious Frontlining failed to budge. After checking for signs of yet more of the Almighty's tiny creatures, and giving thanks that there were none, I hied me down to the local pets superstore to stock up on skin cream.  It did the trick, eventually, though not before I started to get fits of the queasies. As I said, call me a prude, but I'm afraid that, much as I love our hairy horror, there are some things that take me to the edge of my personal comfort zones. And I'm afraid applying tea-tree lotion to a dog's undercarriage is one of them.  Luckily, the menfolk stepped in and helped apply lotion and tlc to the poor, afflicted canine.

Though more seriously, it did make me think, and I'm not being facetious in any way, of the time when Francis forced himself to embrace the leper. What would be my modern-day equivalent of that leper? And in the light of that, rendering first aid to a Fido with impetigo-like symptoms is very small beer indeed.

    

Oh Joy!

Though not, sadly, the Franciscan variety. Should readers have noticed a lack of blogging on the Greenpatch front, let it be known that it's not through shortage of news. I have plenty to say. However, fate, in the person of the new-fangled compose editor has intervened, and to my intense annoyance, my favourite gizmo, the autolink facility -  seems to have vanished into that great scrapheap in the sky. I am faced with the terrifying prospect of having to get acquainted with HTML! This could take some time. So, for the time being, I will leave you in suspenders about what possible connection a certain Nick Lowe hit has to do with our areas new, super-duper kerbside recycling facilities!

Likewise with my vocational musings. As I e-mailed a friend earlier, I am currently wrestling with what should be a straightforward, 1,500 word identification and evaluation of marks of my calling, as if I were trying to assemble one of those flat-pack DIY pieces of furniture. The pieces are scattered everywhere, and I can't read the instructions properly. It's not the contents that are causing me difficulty. For once I'm fairly clear as to what said marks might be (quite reassuring, really!). But try and fit them into the framework provided, and, instant 'analysis paralysis.'  The only remedy, I reckon, is  a Nice Cup of Tea, an application of Franciscan simplicity and then sleep on it.   

Where God Is

Christians don't take God into the world. They discover God actively working there for good through all sorts of people and situations whether Christian or not. God challenges us all to join in with his mission of love to the world.

- After Sunday

Thanks to Dave Walker of Cartoonchurch for pointing me in the direction of this site.

The 'D' Word

(picture above from wikimedia commons)

"God is the lead dancer and the soul is the partner completely attuned to the rhythm and patterns set by the partner. she does not lead, but neither does she hang limp like a sack of potatoes." (Thomas Merton, quoted in Listening to the Music of the Spirit: The Art of Discernment, by David Lonsdale: Notre Dame, IN: Ave Maria Press, 1992)

"The thorny issue of discerning God's will is mentioned but not examined. The author is forthright in saying we would "be fools to believe we knew God's will for certain." Yet the sense of seeking the will of God hovers around much of the spiritual journey he maps. Do we pray to find definite guidance, even direction, for the decisions we face? Or do we pray for courage and wisdom to make those decisions for ourselves, and so take the responsibility for the consequences instead of blaming them on God?" (Peta Dunstan in  Church Times review of Deep Calls to Deep: Going further in prayer by David Foster, Continuum, 2008)

As my course moves into a new phase, the 'green' tinge remains, but readers might notice  the not so  much dreaded as ever-fascinating 'D' word moving to the forefront. I've never been one of those people who appear to think that God micromanages one's life down to what colour socks to put on in the morning. However, the tricky issue of maintaining the delicate balance between trusting that God's will will be done and individual responsibility is one that's kept the Greenpatch thinking cap in constant use these last few years.

A friend put me on to Listening to the Music of the Spirit last week, and I'm finding the imagery of  God as the lead dancer in co-operation with the soul really speaks to me, resonating as it does with recent experience. Looking back through old photos (our silver wedding comes up in a few months time) at a rather scared looking younger self being steered up the aisle on the arm of my father - reminds me of the co-operation, trust and teamwork  that's needed in any sort of partnership, especially, as I discovered, if one of you is taller than the other. Beneath the yards of tulle a tug of war was taking place, as I made determined attempts to loose myself from his well-intentioned but rather too firm grip, (think old Victorian portraits a la aspidistra and you'll get the picture), turning what should have been a dignified glide into a sort of hop, skip and jump more often seen in a three-legged race!

Or if you've ever performed that perilous square dancing move the basket, when by supporting themselves with arms round the shoulders of the men, the women should be twirled round in the air. In my (admittedly limited experience) the move generally ends up more like this:

Women who do not want to go flying can a) push down with their elbows, b) keep the basket slow by tripping up the men, c) grab the men round the neck to strangle them or `accidently' digging a thumb in under the ear or d) determinedly lean back. Most `respectable' dance clubs prefer to keep the women under control (which leads to a faster basket); the barn dance crowd likes to show off. I leave it to the women to say whether they want to go flying, and don't do it at all in a crowded room since flying feet are quite heavy weapons.

Armed with this wisdom, I'd like to think that my dance   with God will take on all the purpose, skill, certainty  and championship quality of these people. Sadly, knowing myself only too well, I fear the reality will be more like the scenario here!

Summoned by smells

Sorry! I just couldn't resist the pun.  Leafy Surrey has taken creativity to new heights. (Or should we say depths?!).

A scale model of a cathedral has been created from rotting vegetables to inspire people to compost at home.

Sand sculptor Mark Anderson built the miniature version of Guildford Cathedral as part of

Surrey

's 3Rs - "reduce, reuse, recycle" - campaign.

The 4ft (1.2m) replica, which is made from green waste , is on display at Bocketts Farm near Fetcham,

Surrey

for two weeks.

It is designed to encourage residents to make their own fertiliser.

More here.

If you look over to the far right of the photo, you can see the Lady Chapel where Mr GP and I were married nearly 25 years ago. Do you think we could persuade them to preserve it for  another four months? It would make such an attractive tablepiece!

And now, if you'll excuse me, I feel the Lord is calling me to reconstuct Michelangelo's David out of the Greenpatch compost heap. 

Overlooked during Lent

Simon Marsh reflects on "wilderness" and thanksgiving:

What kind of training and help do I need in order to arrive at a good decision about what I may or may not offer back to God? Is there anyone whose example I might follow? Is there man, woman or child who has risen above the grubby business of self-interest and temptation; anyone I can look up to, be inspired by, want to emulate? Where could I engage such a person in conversation? Where could I learn what inspired and motivated him or her? How can I learn not to feel pain when I give something away, but rather to revel in the laughter and joy of God’s creation itself? How do I learn to be a cheerful giver? Who am I? What am I called to be and do? And how?

THERE’S AN “ESSENTIALS” CLUE IN THE “WILDERNESS” …

read more here.

On Communion

From Reflections on Life :

Goodgoat is in training to be a member of the Third Order of the Society of St Francis. Franciscans try to make Holy Communion a central part of their lives and to reflect on it. I was doing that this morning at a morning service and something clicked - you know when you’ve been thinking about one thing and then that one thing somehow combines with something else?

For more, read on here.

Full of the joys of Spring!

Spring has sprung, the grass is 'riz.  And we know exactly where the birdies is.... Doing what birdies do in full view of Mr GP at breakfast apparently. So we can expect the patter of tiny birdies at some point in the near future.

Now I can't  bring you a film of our two little sparrows, obviously. But here's a Youtube clip that always makes me smile, (and makes me feel ten years younger). Bazou is  the same breed as our Greenpatch dog. He's slowed down slightly as he's got older, but like Bazou, we still say he goes through life at two speeds only. Full speed ahead or stop. There are no 'inbetweens!'

Are You Self-Sufficientish?

Asks Eco-Worrier over at  the 'Times.'  Anna Shepard passes on Ten unexpected benefits of being self-sufficientish from Andy and Dave Hamilton, urban guides to almost self-sufficiency. There are some great tips on their site for you to follow. Thus spake the Greenpatches whose sole effort to grown her own produce just now consists of cultivating a rather forlorn basil plant on the kitchen window sill. (Next to the would-be Honesty plant).

I wonder if Mr GP might be interested in the Hamilton's recipe for nettle beer?  It'd provide me with the ideal excuse to put off that weeding for a little longer!

The Herald of The Great King

God's Troubadour, by Gloriana.

Spring has sprung

and Greenpatches is back with a new, even greener look after a self-enforced Lent Lite break. Honesty  - after the  namesake plant  Lunaria annua and its close cousin integrity -  force me to admit that this time round the 'Buy Less, Live More' campaign went ever so slightly pear-shaped for me personally. Which isn't to say that I spent the season stuffing my face with chocolate and cavorting round the local shopping centre with a smoking credit card clutched between my teeth. Lent it certainly was, a strange mix of struggle and suprise at the unexpected way God works. But as I emerge, (with a stinking cold - you can't win them all!) it's with the distinct sense that something has been taking place amidst the angst. There are seeds of growth there, even if I'm not 100 per cent certain of what they'll grow into eventually.

It's not unlike what I've optimistically christened my Compton Durville Honesty plant - (some seeds pictured above). Others planted out last autumn and currently growing like crazy on the kitchen window sill. At least, I think and hope that they're Honesty plants; never having tried to germinate any before now. (there was some bird seed that had got into the mix as well). It'll be terminally embarrassing if they turn out to be something else! So far, though, what's growing seems to match up to all the descriptions of Lunaria, Honesty, Silver Dollar, Money, I've even seen it described as a Eucharist Plant. I'll simply have to be patient, and wait until the flowers start to appear.

Shades of Mike F's quotes from the Holy Cross Lectionary blog some months back:Sit there - don't just do something.

Free yourself up from the busy-ness, get the help you need, show up, make yourself available, sit there, don't just do something.

And then, be ready to wait. Discerning God's call is not your thing, if you are into instant gratification and multi-tasking.

La modification de l'environment

Cartoon Wallpaper : For the Birds

Found  earlier in a box of old photos: an essay written by Ms Greenpatches back in French primary school, many years ago. Just look at the fiddly graph type paper they had to write on, and proper pen and ink; none of this new-fangled  free expression nonsense in those days!

It's the following paragraph that made me smile:

C'est vrai que c'est plus cher d'enterrer les cables electriques que de les pendres a des poteaux, mais ca gache le paysage. Et pensez aux pauvres oiseaux qui se perchent dessus...

A  St Francis in the making, there! Even if her scientific knowledge hadn't quite caught up with everything else. Oh, and anticipating protest from my now adult offspring, yes, I know I missed off the accents. All this HTML is beyond me! Click below if you want to read the real thing in all its glory.

 

Psalm 51

 

Create in me a pure heart, O God, and

renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Do not cast me from your presence or

take your Holy Spirit from me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation

and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.

Oh, and the ability to work out how on earth to get my images to come out larger than thumbnail size wouldn't come amiss, either!

Enough

From Mr Greenpatch's cycle blog:

Have been catching up on some reading. Particuluarly impressed by "Enough" by John Naish. (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Enough-John-Naish/dp/0340935901)

The central tenet of this book is that we would be happier if we could realise when we have enough of something and having more won't make us any happier, indeed could make us feel worse. (Interview here gives a feel of the ideas:
http://www.newconsumer.com/news/item/we_speak_to_john_naish_author_of_enough/

This simple proposition is one of the pieces of wisdom I have come to realise as I get older. An e.g. of how I applied a couple of years back was in taking the policy decision to break the ages old habit of listening to the Today program from the moment of waking to arriving at work. I felt I had reached to point of news saturation. This doesn't mean I have cut myself of from the real world, I will listen to news headlines/peruse the BBC online news/watch the occasional newsnight and avidly listen to podcasts on subjects of special interest or quality ("From our own correspondent" being an e.g. of latter).

What I don't want to do is fill every idle moment with news updates which seems to be the desire of 24 hour news channels (and apparently society in general if the evidence of our dentist waiting room is anything to go by. A giant plasma screen has been installed there showing BBC News 24 as if somehow hearing about a stock market crash here or the latest news of the diana inquest there is going to take patients minds off the upcoming visit to the dentist's chair...)

Back to the book, the crucial world is in the title. One of the pre-requisites to knowing when you have enough is having sufficent of something in the first place. So really its a new experience for us, as recently as my parent's generation scarcity was the norm. Also having enough means having more than nothing. So its OK for me to want (any buy) a high tech gadget that I can attach to my bike to help me navigate my rides without constant stops/recourse to maps.

'Sit there - don't just do something'

Free yourself up from the busy-ness, get the help you need, show up, make yourself available, sit there, don't just do something.

And then, be ready to wait. Discerning God's call is not your thing, if you are into instant gratification and multi-tasking.

From Order of the Holy Cross Lectionary Blog with thanks to Mike F.

Ash Wednesday

For the first day of the Methodist Church Buy Less, Live More campaign click on the link.

Here I am Lord 2008

Or to put it another way - Let's Go Round Again. The title seems quite apt, though not the lyrics in this context!

Yes, it's That Time  Again as well as being almost a year since the start of the Greenpatches blog. What on earth was I thinking about when I threw caution (and commonsense) to the winds threw in my lot with the Methodists and signed up for their No New Shoes Lent campaign? Come to think of it, what murky motives lie behind the 2008 Greenpatch foray across denominational lines as the campaign is extended throughout the whole of the Methodist Church UK?  Spend Less, Live More launches any day now.

I can remember wondering what on earth I'd got myself into. Fellow bloggers might well remember me agonising over what constituted the little essentials of life with much reflection on the definition of 'underwear' and whether tights fell into that category or not. I was following a well-established tradition here. (You'll need to go back to the original post to read about Adrian Plass's disciples and the sandals dilemma!).

To an onlookers if might all have seemed somewhat superficial at times, but in retrospect it marked the beginning of a definite learning experience about what constituted my 'foundations,' which extended beyond shopping, eating and consumer habits. The learning, I discovered, was as much in the process as in the actual practicalities of the journey. Running parallel as it did with both a college course on Chrisian response to environmental issues and with the start of my first novice year with The Society of St Francis concentrated the mind wonderfully.

A year later, I can't claim to be as green as Kermit the frog, nor yet possess the simplicity of St Francis. But, there's definitely evidence of small amounts of slimming down  - more mentally and spiritually than physically, (to my horror, I've  started to develop the beginnings of a spare tyre!).  Never mind. You can't win them all!

Lost in wonder

My admiration for Dave Walker's cartooning skills grows by the day.  His latest says it all!

Things hidden

Some gems from the Church Times feature on Richard Rohr, speaking  about his new book Things Hidden:Scripture as Spirituality:

“There’s a set of people they’re calling ‘the emerging church’,” .... “We’re finding Lutherans, Methodists, Anglicans, Presbyterians, Roman Catholics, Evangelicals, all ‘emerging’ at the same level with the same kind of conclusions (the need for a deeper, more contemplative spirituality) all over the place. It’s got to be from the collective unconscious, or the Holy Spirit, or both: it’s happening so quickly.”

Judging by his outspokenness on the institution of the Church, he seems to have avoided the pitfalls. “It’s pretty amazing to me,” he says with a wry smile. “I’ve been a priest for nearly 38 years, and people ask me why I haven’t been shut down or shut up while so many others from my time have — and I do wonder. . .

“Maybe it’s because I’m not angry. The Franciscan tradition teaches you not to take yourself too seriously: not to get pompous or clerical, but to underplay your status, your career advancement, fight against it if possible. So that served me well.”

“The point of prayer is always union with God. But the side-effects are wonderful: it makes you a little less narcissistic, a little less offendable, because your ego isn’t centre stage.

Although he does not expect others to join him in such a set-apart lifestyle, part of Fr Rohr’s frustration flows from his regret that more Christians do not provide a deeper spiritual alternative through the example of their everyday life. “I do think we should close down all church programmes and just teach people how to pray. I don’t mean how to say prayers, but how to cultivate inner awareness. Then we’d have a church that really would be an alternative consciousness.

  “For the most part, Christians are as greedy, ambitious, egocentric, and warlike as anybody else. There’s just this overlay of God-language.”

The secret to detachment, he suggests, is to learn how to live more fully in “the now, not the past or the future”.

Some people do discover “presence”, ..., “in love-making, in nature, in the presence of great music. As a spiritual teacher, that would be my whole desire, to say: ‘Don’t just look to the churchy moments.’ If you’re contemplative, you’re going to find these moments everywhere. And once that begins, life is no longer divided into the sacred and the secular: it’s one world.”

Fluffy bunnies unite!

Overheard in the station cafe the other day:

Little girl and accompanying adult - probably her mother, are seated opposite the fruit machines.

LG Do you know something? Rabbits can't be superheroes.

M Really? Well, that is interesting. Why not? Why can't they be superheroes?

LG Because...because...(puzzled pause, then...triumphantly) They don't have muscles!

Poor Mum tries to smooth things over by pointing out that Mighty Mouse and Superted  are superheroes all right and they're not brilliantly well-endowed in the biceps department either, but no, LG isn't convinced. By now I realise that what sparked this piece of philosophical musing was a picture of a concrete-jawed, muscle-bound specimen of the rabbit family on the front of a fruit machine. I wonder if LG has ever met Peter Rabbit and cousin Benjamin Bunny. Maybe if they'd worn their underpants on top of their trousers instead of pinching cabbages and lettuce in Mr McGregor's garden they, too, would be playing a starring role in amusement arcades and pubs  instead of adorning china mugs and  chintzy tea cosies the length and breadth of the land.

And stretching the analogy somewhat, I'm wondering how many people dismiss people like St Francis; not being able to get past the popular image of him  and the birdbath, surrounded by assorted wildlife that could have come out of a Disney cartoon. Yet look at what he founded. 

Fluffy bunnies unite. You don't have to lose your Y-fronts to be a superhero.

Camomile tea, anybody?

Don't Panic!

It's been an interesting few weeks during which (in retrospect) I seem to have been taking on some of the character traits and coping strategies of Cpl Jones of the classic TV Series 'Dad's Army.'  Good intentions and eager to point out to others the very same flaws that I possess in abundance! Never mind; at least I'm able to recognise them and hopefully learn from them. Too much navel-gazing can be counter-productive I'm sure - yet on the positive side of things, by admitting to  my own weak points, I'm beginning to see how I can maybe use them to help others in similar headless chicken mode. It's strange how often folk in similar situations of self-doubt have come across my path recently. And  perhaps if I pause to apply the metaphorical tweezers to my own eye before I nose into other peoples' affairs, all will be well.

Not forgetting a sense of humour, of course. Does St Paul list that amongst his list of gifts I wonder?

Synchronicity

One of the greatest dangers in the spiritual life is self-rejection.
When we say, "If people really knew me, they wouldn't love me," we
choose the road toward darkness. Often we are made to believe that
self-deprecation is a virtue, called humility. But humility is in
reality the opposite of self-deprecation. It is the grateful
recognition that we are precious in God's eyes and that all we are is
pure gift. (Henri Nouwen with thanks to Mike. F. of the Mercy Blog)

Read here for more  on humility, self-rejection, penitence and prayer.

Synchronicity, grace, 'God-incidence' or simply the wonders of the world-wide web. God really does  work in mysterious ways sometimes as He weaves threads together to make the most unexpected patterns. 

Status anxiety

Greatness begins by being aware of the insatiable desire for significance and then working to find that significance in others, which is Christ.

Following Columba on Matthew 20:20-28

Hear My Prayer - 2

As postcript to my musings on prayer from last month: Have you ever had one of those moments when you read or hear something and your immediate reaction is to exclaim Yesssss!! I've just experienced one of those on reading MikeF's reflections on Fruits of Prayer.

I think there is a degree sometimes of confusion in our minds about prayer and success. I have noticed this particularly clearly in some evangelical/charismatic churches and prayer groups ("taking the land for Jesus," "claiming the victory of Christ over..." etc.) but we are all vulnerable to this kind of thinking if we are not sufficiently self-aware.

The pattern is that we identify a need for prayer, formulate (liturgically or on-the-fly) a prayer for that need to be met - implicitly or explicitly, we also formulate the terms in which we will recognise that it has been met - and we then evaluate the "success" or otherwise of the prayer in terms of whether these terms have been fulfilled. Whether we have been praying for healing for a minor ailment, or for the evangelisation of a sub-continent, the pattern is broadly similar.

Prayer though, it seems to me, is above all about fruits rather than success, to use Nouwen's definition. Prayer is vulnerability to God…

God 'doesn't do waste' - really!

Ladies and gentlemen, here is my second attempt to bring you the profound wisdom of Dave Walker from Cartoonchurch:

OK, resolutions. Last year I set my sights too high I think. This year I plan to draw more, put things away when I have finished with them, join an environmental organisation, do the bins the night before, cut dilly dallying by 12-15% and generally be a marginally better person. How about you?

and

The Archbishop of Canterbury in his New Year Message broadcast last night:

...God doesn't do waste.

He doesn't regard anyone as a 'waste of space', as not worth his time – from the very beginnings of life to its end, whether they are successful, articulate, productive or not. And so a life that communicates a bit of what God is like, is a life that doesn't give up – that doesn't settle down with a culture of waste and disposability – whether with people, or with things...

(thanks to Mootblog for the original link, although I used the news service for this post because of the Youtube access. When I try to embed clever things like this I tend to end up with a bad attack of 'malformed HTML!)