Film Friday Reflection: Le Mans 66
When the brilliant Ken Miles is asked to slow down in the 24 hour Le Mans race, so that his team mates can catch up with him and they can …
Blog Archives
Wednesday Riffs: Known & Dreaming
Known Eliashib and Hassenaah, Baruch, Zaccur, Jedaiah, Meremoth and Azariah, Palal, Rehum, Hashabiah, Zadok, Jadon, Malkijah, Hanun, Shallum, Rephaiah. You may not know any of these, Or even say their …
A thought for a Monday: Fuel for Another Day
He stood among them, surprised them, Opened the conversation with four words, ‘Peace be with you.’ How they needed it, so he said it again, ‘Peace be with you.’ Their …
Film Friday Reflection: Made in Italy
There is a saying – wherever you go, there you are. And it is certainly true of father and son Robert and Jack, when they head off to Italy to …
Wednesday Riff: A Place of Calm
I lift my eyes up to the mountains, To the sky, to that wide open plain above The trees, the homes, the skyscrapers, To that space beyond the borders, Beyond …
Easter Monday Rewrite: Running
She is running now, her legs not moving fast enough, her heart beating like it might explode. She hadn’t understood at first, hadn’t seen clearly. Had mistaken him for someone …
Film Friday Reflection: Escape from Pretoria
This remarkable true story is all about keys. And the way political prisoner Tim Jenkin secretly fashioned a whole set in his cell. He and his friend were incarcerated in …
For Easter Week
A Sunday Moment #palmleaves&freedom The crowds spill out on A hero-welcoming day, The town filled for a Festival now upstaged by A smiling king on a colt. The crowds want …
The Hills We Climb
He is with us on the hills we climb, (Often feeling like mountains to us) Hills we cannot avoid, Hills of our own making, The hills thrust upon us. The …
Nine Witness Stories for Holy Week
Nine Witness Stories for the days of Holy Week, 2021 By James Clarke These stories were commissioned by Hereford Diocese for their Holy Week Internet project. Shared with permission. + …
For Easter: The Son
Heat, bugs, and temptation, 40 days, the pressure on, then Starts his mission, jampacked, A rollercoaster that’s a fact. Stories, wisdom, healing… A man down through the ceiling, Meets a …
Monday Rewrite: Temples
The new temple dismounts and strolls around the old temple. The sound of the crowd still ringing in his ears. Those calls for rescue and freedom. ‘Hosanna! Save us!’ The …
Film Friday Reflection: A.I. Artificial Intelligence
When Monica and Henry ‘adopt’ the human robot David, they are given the option to programme, or imprint, him to love them. After a while Monica does just that, and …
Wilderness Thoughts
Desert Son ‘I will call them out into the desert And speak tenderly to them there.’ So he goes, out into the dry place, Away from the distractions, To focus, …
Thursday Riff: For us
He has made this troubled wilderness his home, He’s walked through the valley of the shadows here, This Good Shepherd, come to save his sheep, The king in dusty, creased, …
Wednesday Riff: Hold On
Hold on to the good stuff, The encouragements and smiles, Those things that spur you on, Those things that lift you and Point you in the right direction, The lessons …
Monday Rewrite: It was only later
It was only later that I realised. When I woke on that morning my thoughts were a scramble, a fistfight of recollections jostling to outdo one another. I couldn’t make …
Film Friday Reflection: Greenland
In the new disaster movie Greenland a comet heads for the earth, and John Garrity receives a text telling him to take his family to an airbase in order to …
Monday Rewrite: Chained
Two Roman soldiers are chatting. 1. I’ve just spent the last 6 months fighting the barbarian hordes, oh my goodness, those peasants are revolting! They don’t use a knife and …
Film Friday Reflection: The Highwaymen
There is a strange and unexpected moment in this movie about two Texas Rangers on the trail of Bonnie and Clyde. One of the rangers, Maney Gault, is hanging around …
Wednesday Riff: The One
The one who drew close to us, The one who knew us long before we began to know ourselves, The one who stuck with us, though many times we turned away, …
Monday Rewrite: Beginning Again
She looks into his eyes, as he offers his hand, and it’s as if she can see a whole universe in there. Planets coming into being, stars being birthed, comets …
Film Friday Reflection: Jojo Rabbit
At one point in this satirical tale set in war-torn Germany, Jojo’s mother embarrasses him by jumping on a wall and dancing. She has of course no right to do …
Wednesday Riff: Wonderful and Complex
We are wonderful and complex, Unique and precious. We don’t all learn at the same rate, We don’t all appreciate the same things. We don’t all laugh and cry at …
Monday Rewrite: The Bible is not a work of art (a prayer)
Lord, save us from sticking your word into a glass case, from holding it at arm’s length when it belongs in the sublime and crooked ways of our living. Help …
Film Friday Reflection: News of the World
Captain Kidd is an unusual news journalist. An ex-soldier he now travels the far flung towns and communities of post-civil-war America telling recent news stories to those who have not …
Wednesday Riff: Blessed
Blessed are you when you can muster a smile, You never know who might get the benefit. Blessed are you when you pick yourself up After another stumble or slip. …
Monday Rewrite: Hardwired
They found themselves in a strange world, a different world from the one they had known in their youth, one where our little stories were all that mattered, and it …
Film Friday Reflection: The Dig
Ralph Fiennes perfectly embodies the deferential, self-taught excavator Basil Brown, in this true story of the sensational archaeological dig at Sutton Hoo in the late 1930s. As war looms, he …
Wednesday Riff: Desert Son
‘I will call them out into the desert And speak tenderly to them there.’ So he goes, out into the dry place, Away from the distractions, To focus, to listen, …
Monday Rewrite: Elijah and the angel
[From the forthcoming book Lost in the Supermarket] ‘You need something to eat,’ I said. He was sitting in the sun behind the store, looking dehydrated. I’d had a nudge …
Film Friday: The Matrix
At one point in this mind-bending, reality questioning movie the hero Neo goes to visit the all-knowing Oracle, to see if he may be the one to free the earth …
Wednesday Riff: Your Presence
Your presence, How we need it, How I need it. To give us courage, Patience, Strength, Meaning. The energy to keep going, The promise that there is more, The impetus …
Monday Rewrite: Hagar and the Angel
From the forthcoming book Lost in the Supermarket, Hagar meets an angel in the nappies aisle… Episode Twelve Hagar I almost tripped over her. She was slouched in the nappies …
Film Friday Reflection: Run Fatboy Run
In Run Fatboy Run, as Dennis attempts to run a marathon he has not really trained for, he hits a wall. And he can’t break through it. So he is …
Wednesday Riff: Peace
You Lord keep in peace Those whose minds are set on you. You know how our minds race, How they dip and dive, How we paint ourselves into dark corners, …
Talk on the Four Friends ripping up a roof – Mark 2 v 1-12
Monday Rewrite: About Monsters
There are monsters, often small, but they cast a large shadow. Outlines that stalk us through the hours, down the corridors of the years. Wearing us down, eating into our …
Film Friday Reflection: Rogue Warriors
Not a film this time, but a three part series (currently showing on BBC iPlayer) about the remarkable story of the founding of the SAS in North Africa, in 1941. …
Wednesday Riff: God in the Ordinary
The silences and the noises, the waiting and the wondering, the nudges and the hunches, the longings and the questions, the doubting and the believing, the moments and the hours, …
Monday Rewrite: Perspectives
Numbers 13 v 25-33 One lot returned with giants in their eyes, seeing the mountains and the problems, the failings and frustrations of the land. The possible potholes and pitfalls. …
Film Friday Refection: Book of Eli
There is a moment towards the end of Book of Eli when Eli is asked about the nature of the Bible he is carrying. He says this, ‘It’s beat up, …
Biblical Tales of Perseverance
Against All Odds Biblical Tales of Perseverance The promise, the encouragement of help, of strength renewed, of feet lifted from the miry clay of life’s struggles. May we know that …
Wednesday Riff: Furniture
There are times when life feels tidy, Organised, neatly controlled, All the bits safely within our grasp, Motivation flowing from a tank full of energy. And there are times when …
Monday Rewrite: Lost in the Supermarket?
We make our way through the maze of shelves. So much on offer, though we can barely afford it all. Special offers. Two for three. Guaranteed life changers and soul …
Film Friday Reflection: Three Billboards outside Ebbing Missouri
There are a few surprising happenings in this bitter, brutal film about a mother crying out for justice. Not least when the local advertising guy, Red Welby, finds himself in …
Wednesday Riff: The Penguin
‘Don’t worry…’ we are told. If only. But Jesus tells us more, offers us something else. Go and find something green, he suggests. Something that flies, or sings, or blossoms. …
Wednesday Riff: Three Boxes of Frankincense?
What if the wise men Had not conferred before setting off? Before packing their bags and Saddling up in search of the starry king. Had not compared their presents. ‘I …
2021
You are our help in our troubles, Our calm in the storms, Our strength in the pressure and trials, Out stillness in the hurrying. Our song and our lamenting. Our …
