Pierre
Teilhard de Chardin was a Jesuit Priest, Philosopher and Palaeontologist. He
lived from 1881 to 1955 and he was not always popular with the Roman Catholic
authorities because of his work on the origins of our species. I have a small
book of his work called “On Suffering”, which contains excerpts from his works.
I think that one that he wrote in northern France, at the height of the First
World War in November 1916, is worth quoting now as we face another time of
uncertainty:
“And I’ve
come to think that the only, the supreme, prayer we can offer up, during these
hours when the road before us is shrouded in darkness, is that of our Master on
the Cross: ”Into your hands I commit my spirit”. To the hands that broke and
gave life to the bread, that blessed and caressed, that were pierced; ….. to
the kindly and mighty hands that reach down to the very marrow of the soul –
that mould and create – to the hands through which so great a love is
transmitted – it is to these that it is good to surrender our soul, above all
when we suffer or are afraid. And is so doing there is great happiness and
great merit.”
We are going
through a dark period at present and at such times it is so important to be
aware of, and grateful for, those powerful and loving hands.
Happy Birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday Sara, ( my daughter-in-
law) happy birthday Father Peter!!
I should perhaps point out there is a slight age difference between the two, although I
hope that they are both able to celebrate a little with some birthday cake and a glass of
cheer!
We also heard last week of two other people who shared a birthday, on 29th March, Bob
Weighton and Joan Hocquard were both 112 years old!
They both lived through the ‘Spanish Flu’ pandemic of 1918 which, world wide, was
believed to have claimed between 50 to 100 million lives, more than those lost in the
two World Wars, and believed to have been spread by those soldiers returning from the
First World War. We may all hope and pray that the present coronavirus does not reach
those proportions!
Thinking of birthdays I was reminded of a lovely lady that we used to know in Dorset,
the mother-in-law of one of my fellow Readers. Dorothy was born on Christmas Day
and actually died on Good Friday, well into her nineties. She was a very religious
person, with a good sense of humour, and always compared our time here on earth as
books which had been ‘lent out’ from God’s own Library, some for a long period and
others for shorter times, but all in the end would be returned to God’s loving care.
In these present times it is good to take comfort in our faith and the knowledge that we
never ‘walk alone’, wherever or however we may be, and that as our Lord promised,
each and everyone of us will in the end, have a place in his eternal Kingdom.
Amen.
Michael Tonkin
1 st April 2020
“ To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under
the heaven:
A time
to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that
which is planted;
A
time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance.”
Well known lines
from Ecclesiastes 3. It is probably true that for many of us the
coronavirus, and the effect it is having on our lives, has given us some
time that we did not have before. One must start by applauding
those thousands and thousands of people who have put themselves
forward as volunteers in so many different ways to help the many
overstretched services that are trying to cope with this
deadly virus.
One of the other
very useful ways, Carolyn and myself have found to fill this time, is by
corresponding, by phone, email or FaceTime, with family and friends around
the country, and even further away, letting them know how we are, and more
importantly finding out how they are coping during these difficult times.
It would seem very appropriate that our Gospel reading from John
told us of Jesus’ visit to see his good friend Lazarus, and his sisters Martha
and Mary, on hearing that Lazarus was unwell. Even more striking in
this story is the very open emotion, “Jesus began to weep”, that our Lord
showed on the apparent death of Lazarus. Sometimes in the Gospel stories
it seems that Jesus is uncaring about his family, yet that could not be further
from the truth, for Jesus’ whole being is to bring love and healing to all he
meets, as he does to his friend Lazarus. Yet Jesus is also critically
aware of the path his Father has set him on, and nothing, or no one shall
divert him from it. So we move ever closer to the culmination of that
path, to Good Friday, the cross and the joy of Easter Day.
There is, as is
written in Ecclesiastes, a time for all things and there will be an end, when
we are out of the clutches of this deadly virus, and it is to be hoped and
prayed, that when that time comes, we remember to stay in touch with those whom
we love and hold dear, perhaps a little more often than we have done in the
past.
