The Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya, who was murdered in Moscow several years ago, wrote in her book Putin’s Russia, “There is a part of every society that wants nothing more than to be lulled into sleep.” [1]It was a striking statement about how there is a part of us which simply does not want to know too much.  It is sad but true observation that we cannot bear too much reality. We seek to shield ourselves from reality, not to take too close an interest in things, or simply overlay complex situations with our own prejudices and biases. The problems that swirl around us – from the threat of global economic instability,…

Often with all the challenges we may be facing we might feel like getting into our own little boat and heading off into the middle of the lake where no one can disturb us. However, once we are out in the lake, we are not guaranteed serenity. I remember once picking up a small poster which read, “Dear God, help me; the sea is so wide, and my boat is so small.”  The size of the lake itself can be overwhelming, and then storms whip up so that the serenity for which we went in search is replaced by fear.   Nowhere, then, is entirely safe, and perhaps that is very much…

One of the things that fascinate children in a particular way is planting something and watching it grow.  Do you recall how mesmerised you were when you first planted something and watched it begin to grow?  I recall doing it with sees of wheat in moist cotton wool. The advantage of this particular process was, of course, that one didn’t need to wait very long to see the result of one’s planting! Planting and harvesting for a child is perhaps as fascinating as it is because it mirrors children’s own reality, their own potential and promise. Maybe this is why the child within us likes to plant a tree to mark the…

Weddings are always something special in our life. I am not simply thinking of our own wedding, but our attendance at other weddings. Such occasions bring before us something for which we all long: the simplicity of falling in love, the promise of exchanging a commitment to each other, the hope of beginning a life together.  A wedding mirrors something fundamentally human to us.  We feel right in the world. In the midst of all the other troubles and uncertainties we experience something with all the promise of being good, true and beautiful. And the occasion fascinates us. Somehow it brings us home to ourselves. For some, their wedding is not the…

Imagine for a little while a moment in your life which was full of possibility.  Maybe it was when you first started school, or started work, or left home.  Perhaps it was a moment of commitment such as when you got married, or at the birth of your children.  A moment rich in possibility, full of promise!  Can you remember how there was no certainty about the future at that time, but somehow there was a sense that this what life was about?  All of life up to this point somehow seemed to come together and open out into the future.  And the something new was full of promise. Our celebration of the Resurrection and Ascension…

In Jeanette Winterson’s remarkable little novel, The Passion, the main character, Henri, who had been personal chef to Bonaparte, sits alone after an array of adventures, reflecting on what it means to be truly free.  “Bonaparte,” he muses, “taught us that freedom lay in our fighting arm, but in the legends of the Holy Grail no one won it by force . . . I think now that being free is not being powerful or rich or well regarded without obligations but being able to love.  To love someone else enough to forget about yourself even for a moment is to be free.” To love someone else enough to forget about yourself…

On 16 March 1978, the Italian politician Aldo Moro was kidnapped by the Italian Red Brigade on his way to a session of the House of Representatives in Italy[1]  He was a close friend of Pope Paul VI.  Behind the scenes, the Pope was a main player seeking his release, even secretly offering a large ransom for his freedom.  In St. Peter’s Square, the pope voiced his anguish, “do not despair, we pray: Holy Virgin, Queen of the Heavens, Give strength to our intercession [and] to your prayers.”  But the reply was silence.  In May of that same year, Moro was killed. When he presided at his friend’s funeral Mass Paul VI’s anguish was so…