John Davies - Notes From a Small Vicar

Who stole the tarts?

‘Let the jury consider their verdict,’ the King said, for about the twentieth time that day.

‘No, no!’ said the Queen. ‘Sentence first—verdict afterwards.’

‘Stuff and nonsense!’ said Alice loudly. ‘The idea of having the sentence first!’

‘Hold your tongue!’ said the Queen, turning purple.

‘I won’t!’ said Alice.

‘Off with her head!’ the Queen shouted at the top of her voice. Nobody moved.

‘Who cares for you?’ said Alice, (she had grown to her full size by this time.) ‘You’re nothing but a pack of cards!’

At this the whole pack rose up into the air, and came flying down upon her: she gave a little scream, half of fright and half of anger, and tried to beat them off, and found herself lying on the bank, with her head in the lap of her sister, who was gently brushing away some dead leaves that had fluttered down from the trees upon her face.

‘Wake up, Alice dear!’ said her sister; ‘Why, what a long sleep you’ve had!’

Florists, artists, grown-ups, children, we have loved getting close to the astonishing stories of Alice in the Wonderland which Lewis Carroll created. And part of our great enjoyment of these tall tales is that they oddly relate so well to the tall tales which make up our lives.

The world we live in is driven by fantasies - the fantasy that we can stay young forever, the fantasy that we can infinitely mine the world’s resources without causing lasting harm, the fantasy that putting greater wealth into fewer and fewer people’s hands will somehow benefit all. This relentless fantasy world, it’s the way things are, we’re told. Whereas in truth, it’s nothing but a pack of cards…

Let us hold fast to this: a truth which the Church of England deacon Charles Lutwidge Dodgson would have preached: this is God’s world and because it is so much better than those worlds we imagine for ourselves, God invites us to imagine it with him - he gives us Jesus to show us the way - how by his Spirit we can bring it into being.

- from a special Alice in Wonderland themed service as part of Austwick Church's Alice-themed flower festival, Austwick Street Market and Cuckoo Fair weekend, May 25-27 2019. Pictures and the entire service text here.

 

Prayer - a simple breathing exercise

John's Notes: Parish Newsletter editorials

June 2019

A world of strange imaginings

John’s Notes: Parish Newsletter editorials

May 2019

The Queen said to Alice, ‘I’ll give you something to believe. I’m just one hundred and one, five months and a day.’ ‘I can’t believe that!’ said Alice.

I remember once visiting a nursing home where in the lounge an aged lady beckoned me over to her, drew my ear close to her mouth and said to me secretively but proudly, “I’m a hundred and ninety years old, you know.” “Are you really?” I said, playing along. “You look good for your age.” 

“And something else,” the one-hundred-and-ninety-year-old said to me. “Yes?” “I’m going to give you a donation of a hundred thousand pounds.” “Really?” I replied, “That’s very generous of you.”

“I can’t believe THAT!” said Alice.

Can’t you?” said the Queen in a pitying tone. “Try again: draw a long breath, and shut your eyes.”

Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said, “one can’t believe impossible things.”

I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why sometimes I believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast!”

These days - particularly if we’re in the habit of starting our day with the news - it seems we’re all required to believe six impossible things before breakfast, as mediated to us by tweeting politicians, pay-rolled pundits and ‘reality’ TV stars. In such a slippery world it’s challenging keeping hold of those beliefs we hold dear, those truths we hold self-evident. And yet, though this may sound nonsensical, one of the best ways to do this is to permit ourselves to engage in strange imaginings.

The Judaeo-Christian scriptures invite us to imagine ourselves in a world where, for instance, swords are reinvented as ploughshares, spears as pruning-hooks. And amongst those who have decided to make this their reality are people like Alfie Bradley, an artist who created the 27ft (8m) ‘Knife Angel’ sculpture currently on display at Coventry Cathedral, made from 100,000 blades handed into police across the country. And Alison Cope, who, in the five years since her18-year-old son Joshua was stabbed to death, has since spoken to over 280,000 people in schools, prisons and groups across the country, inviting her audiences to imagine a world without knife crime, and by imagining it, to bring it into being.

During the weekend of the Austwick Street Market this year, Austwick Church is hosting a special Alice in Wonderland themed flower festival. On the Sunday morning we're having a special Alice-themed celebration service. Why not? It’s only by allowing ourselves into a world of strange imaginings that we can start to make seemingly impossible things come wonderfully true.