To be thankful

On the 69th birthday of the NHS, here are sixty-nine reasons to be thankful:

1. For every hand held
2. For every restless researcher, in pursuit of an elusive cure
3. For every patient receptionist, calming the anxious arrival
4. For every porter, expert in negotiating emotions as well as corners
5. For every play therapist, busying imaginations whilst bodies rest
6. For every phlebotomist, extracting the stuff of life in order to give it back
7. For every cleaner, fighting a battle with the invisible enemy
8. For every medical student, eager to join the fray
9. For every GP, meeting whatever comes through the door with professionalism
10. For every nurse, working out the meaning of care by delivering it
11. For every anaesthetist, measuring life by breaths.
12. For every surgeon, wounding to heal
13. For every tea poured
14. For every chaplain, speaking volumes, sometimes with words
15. For every physiotherapist, moved by movement
16. For every pharmacist who regards precision as the best medicine
17. For every radiographer, looking hard at what cannot be seen
18. For every occupational therapist, paying extraordinary attention to the ordinary
19. For every paediatrician, with big patience for little patients
20. For every hand washed
21. For every paramedic, always quick, never rushed
22. For every midwife, treating each birth as if it were the only one
23. For every theatre technician, using tools and loving people
24. For every audiologist, savouring the sound of sound
25. For every breath monitored
26. For every oncologist, fighting a battle cell by cell
27. For every medical school lecturer, honing tomorrow’s talent
28. For every manager, balancing competing needs whilst life hangs in the balance
29. For every volunteer greeter, lowering the threshold for those who fear to step over it
30. For every immunologist helping each me to fight back
31. For every nurse practitioner – caring, advocating and communicating
32. For every endocrinologist, whose moans are hormones
33. For every psychologist, whose landscape is the mind
34. For every prosthetist, whose best limbs are not their own
35. For every brow furrowed
36. For every caretaker who takes care that others might deliver it
37. For every secretary who controls a diary to set its owner free
38. For every cardiologist, never missing a beat
39. For every volunteer driver, getting people to places
40. For every chiropodist, healing the heels
41. For every caterer, feeding those too tired to taste
42. For every geriatrician who believes getting old should be getting better
43. For every Community psychiatric nurse whose patch is people
44. For every bed manager who rarely sees their own
45. For every ward clerk who keeps track because they keep up
46. For every ward housekeeper who keeps house like it was home
47. For every opthalmologist who sees what seeing is
48. For every practice nurse jabbing flu in the arm
49. For every speech therapist, who wants all to have a voice.
50. For every dentist, by gum
51. For very heartbeat counted
52. For every dietitian , fed by a desire to help
53. For every staff nurse, professionally compassionate
54. For every ward sister, compassionately professional
55. For every dermatologist, whose care is more than skin deep
56. For every gastroenterologist, sick to the stomach at preventable illness
57. For every medical librarian, who wields information like a scalpel
58. For every first cry
59. For every Orthopaedist, bone tired but mending bones
60. For every neurologist, who minds
61. For every tear shed
62. For every counsellor whose door is open
63. For every pathologist, for whom the worst disease is inaction
64. For every obstetrician for whom every birth is a triumph
65. For every estates manager for whom the building is a medical instrument
66. For every unpaid minute worked
67. For every music therapist, for whom the sweetest notes are not on a patient’s file
68. For every last breath
69. For every day

A big conversation begins in Newbury

In August last year, I was still finding my way around a new town. After 19 years in West London, I was starting to adjust to a new life in West Berkshire. My frequent forays into my new home town were navigated by landmarks and useful shops, rather than street names. One morning I bumped into a man staffing a very small stall outside the home-wares shop. Above him fluttered a banner all about ‘building community together’, and on his table were leaflets all about ‘community conversation’. Keen to find my way into the local community, I introduced myself as the Minister of the town’s Baptist Church, and suggested that we had a conversation.

One thing led to another, and two more conversations with that man and his colleagues at West Berkshire Council. A training course in restorative practice followed, which provided an introduction to some of the most motivated and compassionate providers of social care I have ever met. After that, a date was put in the diary, a registration completed with the Big Lunch and the Great Get Together, and plans launched with new friends at the Council.

Today sees a Community Conversation in Newbury Baptist Church some nine months after that first encounter. A collection of people drawn from the local community – of all ages, backgrounds and professions, will share their lunch and share their ideas for the town where they live. Like any other conversation, I know about its beginning but not its end. Outcomes may be as varied as the people who scribble their ideas on our table cloths – but it is good to talk.

I have been considering the nature of conversation, and reflecting on how differently the phrases below play on the mind:

• Talks are under way
• Discussions are being held
• There was a full and frank exchange of views
• Negotiations have begun
• We’re talking now

Although they should all mean similar things, it seems to me that each comes with its own ‘baggage’. In the language of translation methodology, each has ‘collocated meanings’, whether intentional or not. Today’s conversation really is just that. Hosted by a local church, supported by the local council, attended by local residents, it is a conversation – a start, a beginning. At the end of a week where anger has spilled onto the streets, that can only be a good thing.

Have always loved these pieces of coloured glass – hoping for lots of ‘reflections’ today. CLICK for full size

A review of ‘Home’ by Jo Swinney

Pictured below is Jo Swinney’s new book next to a hedgehog house in my garden. Please note that it is a hedgehog house and not a hedgehog home – since it cannot really be the latter until it has an occupant.Years ago, when I was new to both ministry and published writing, I wrote an article on small groups and insisted that the word ‘homegroup’ rather than ‘housegroup‘ should be used – since home was ‘more than a description of location’.

I have a feeling Jo would agree. Jo has had, to coin a phrase, more ‘homes than I have had hot dinners’. Both during her childhood and since, she has moved far, wide and frequently. Along the way she has picked up not only the self-awareness and wisdom which infuses the book, but she has also caught on the wind the distant sound of a melody which we choose to call home. This book is really an extended invitation to join her on the quest for that elusive melody.

In the book, Jo will take you with her to Canada, Portugal, France, Africa and…Surbiton!  Don’t expect a travelogue, though – this is something far more profound. Jo writes with a disarming and, at times, uncomfortable candour – but the net result is a warm and engaging read. Ultimately the book is a call, in her own words, to ‘re-embrace where I am’, which will find a resonance for many. This may be especially so when, as Jo puts it ‘people are scattered like dandelion seeds in a gale, far from the soil they grew in and sick with longing to get back’. All of this is anchored with an analysis along the way of King David’s quest for home in the Biblical accounts.

Jo writes as a Christian, with faith stitched into her very words as it is woven into the fabric of her life. That said, it is a long time since I have read a Christian book with such an honest invitation to readers of other faiths or none to join her: ‘I hope you’ll stick with me and engage with the book and with me, even where we might see things differently‘. Well done to her for writing it, and to Hodder for printing it.

Jo writes that Christians look for, and find ‘the fingerprints of God’s provision, goodness and kindness in every aspect of their lives’. I trust that many will find this book to be a help in looking for them. I did.

Pixellated pilgrimage

When Simon Reed wrote the foreword to my book Journey earlier this year, he included the following:

CLICK for more information

In the week that the story has broken about Uluru appearing on Google Street View, maybe I should just accept the inevitable and click my way through the Camino. What do you think?

Pentecost on the morning after

Today is Pentecost Day. Thousands of churches will mark today as the occasion when the Spirit of God is poured out on the faithful who turn their hearts and faces to God. Those who have read this blog for some years will remember that I like to associate Pentecost with an explosion of colour. I was fully intending to do so today. Inspired by a fellow Baptist Minister, I decided to go with the colour theme again, and conduct a little polychromatic experiment.

It seems to me that when the Spirit came, all the promise which was there in the prophets, all the anticipation which was there in John the Baptist, all the grace which was there in Christ came cascading down on the hopeful crowd. For the first time ever, all the rainbow colours of God’s grace could be seen in a way which was only monochrome in anticipation. The colours were there all along in the waiting – but nobody could see them.

Today I shall issue lenses from these glasses to the children and ask them to look at the light coming in through the church’s plain windows:

I shall then ask each child to find an adult and then ‘bring them in’ on the wonderful surprise:

CLICK for full size

On Pentecost day, a hope so often seen in bland monochrome is washed in glorious colour.

The big question, of course, is whether I should ‘change the script’ on the morning after another terrorist attack. I believe that I should not. After all, Pentecost is the day when the Christian church expresses the belief that ordinary people given extraordinary blessing have both mandate and capability to change the world. Pentecost is not the day when the church looks at the world not with blinkers to shield it from the nastiness. Rather, it is the day when it dons the spectacles of faith and sees the most glorious possibilities even in the darkest corner.

A visit to the trailblazers

Some time over 370 years ago, a group of Baptist believers started meeting in Newbury. After meeting for some years in a room above what is now the Camp Hopson store, they moved to a new site in an area of the town improbably known in the 1700s as ‘Egypt’. They built a simple meeting house there, and acquired a small plot of land as a burial ground. The site was far from ideal, occasionally prone to flooding, and offered only the simplest of facilities. Singing was a cappella, with a tuning fork to start them off, and later a wooden pipe to accompany them. Over the years, some of the faithful were buried in the little burial ground, and others within the building itself, including one beneath the pulpit.

In 1859 the congregation moved to a new building in the town’s main thoroughfare. The building was much better suited to their purpose, and included a chandelier with ‘no less than 62 gas jets’ according to an early historian. The old building was acquired by the Brethren, who then worshipped there until 1998.

It was after they left that the building and land were cleared to make way for a new development, and the graves of those early Baptists were found. They were re-interred that same year in a cemetery outside the town, with a monument erected in 2000.

Yesterday evening, with bright sunshine slanting across the gravestones, I visited that memorial.

CLICK for full size

I found it humbling to stand and look at this diminutive memorial. Like the people it remembered, it was neither brash nor grand. Like their witness in ‘Egypt’ of old, it was simple. As Pastor to the Newbury Baptists, I inherit the Gospel ‘torch’ which they faithfully held and then passed on. Like them, I am still asking questions about how best to serve the town and people where I am placed. The inscription at the base of the memorial speaks volumes:

CLICK for full size

I trust that I can do the same…

A cautionary tale

In the light of Monday night’s terrorist attack in Manchester, Twitter was doing all the things it at which it is both best and worst yesterday. On the positive side, it was helping to fuel the #roomsformanchester initiative and providing a ‘virtual noticeboard’ for those looking for loved ones. On the negative side, it was providing the usual portal for those intent on spewing half-truth and prejudice of every kind.

It was one of those days when Twitter was constantly ‘on’ in the background, and I saw the notification of Roger Moore’s death shortly after hearing that Manchester’s youngest victim had been named. Straight away, comparisons started to form in my mind – his urbane sophistication against her childish innocence. His many adventures lay behind him whereas hers will lie forever unfulfilled before her. Reacting to all of this, I posted a version of the tweet below:

After about 30 minutes I took it down, and here are some of my reasons why.

• It is a mistake to assume that loss is on any scale of merit – loss is loss is loss
• The actor’s family will be missing him just as the little girl’s family are missing her.
• It is human life itself which is precious – old, young, famous, obscure, all are indescribably precious to somebody.

I write this because I want the digital landscape to be a kind place. I want it to be a place where the air is clean and opinions can exchange without any need for shouting. I want to believe that people will make it that way by policing their own content, as I have done. It is to that end that I have written about this very small episode of mine – we learn by mistakes.

To all who grieve – today, and whatever day you may read this – may you find comfort and peace.

Anticipating a bigger conversation...

Not long after moving to Newbury last Summer, I fell in love with Joseph Hillier’s sculpture ‘binary conversation‘. Most days I pass by the sculpture, and see the two heads locked in some permanent but silent conversation. It is impossible to read their expressions, and yet the space between them buzzes with some unheard exchange. Theirs is a conversation at once both attractive and exclusive – I want to join in but I cannot.

CLICK for full- size

In truth, my fascination with conversation goes back way beyond my arrival in Newbury. In 2011 I wrote a communications handbook entitled ‘Who needs words’, and conversations were a key element:

If we see communication as a gift from God and a reflection of his nature within us, then there is a sense in which every interchange – be it a conversation about last night’s football or a discussion about the end of the world, is a sacred exchange. We are talking creatures, because God made us that way, and as such we should not take any form of communication lightly. Our stories should be wholesome, our sermons should be honest, our reporting should be accurate, our listening should be keen and our speaking should be beautiful.

In an age where many of our conversations take place in the sterilised space of digital exchange, it is easy to forget how much genuine conversation depends upon more than words. We need to see each other:

Whether in a large gathering or a one-to-one context, the ‘face recognition software’ which is part of the human psyche means that we can soon read from others’ faces whether or not communication is working. It might be that we see a light in the eyes as understanding dawns. Alternatively, we may note an animation to the facial features, a creasing round the eyes as a smile spreads, or a furrow of the brow as they listen hard. Even a sceptical raised eyebrow suggesting that the listener does not agree with our argument or accept our facts is evidence that they are engaged with what is going on. These and other micro-gestures of the face tell us that the person is truly participating in the communication. The enlivening of their faces means that they are willing to join in the dance of communication which animates the space between us.

In short, when it comes to conversation – I am a fan! When the opportunity arose to facilitate a community conversation in the town where I live, I could not have been happier. After months of preparation, that conversation is now in prospect on Saturday June 17th at noon.

• It is a conversation whose setting is informal – a shared lunch on a weekend when many communities are getting together.
• It is a conversation whose invitation is broad – to all who will come
• It is a conversation whose remit is open – what is good and what could be better about living in Newbury
• It is a conversation whose style is messy – scribbling thoughts and ideas on tablecloths as we go
• It is a conversation whose aspirations are high– finding identifiable issues and projects where the community can work together to address them.
• Its is a beginning – set within the context of restorative practice, this conversation could prove to be no more than the hors d’oeuvre to a banquet of genuine community cohesion.

It is a conversation which I anticipate with great enthusiasm. Care to join in? Click on the image below for details.

A response

When I was little, my father would occasionally produce an (increasingly dog-eared) book called ‘What can I do today’? It was full of ideas in response to that very question. Ever since the last post on this blog, many lovely people have asked pretty much that question – what can I do? You will find an answer if you click on the photo at the bottom of the page.

Jonathan, one of my sons, works for The Christie Charity – a world leading expert in cancer care, research and education, based in Manchester. Just before Mothering Sunday he wrote the post below, and I reproduce it here with his enthusiastic permission. If you would like to help The Christie answer that perennial ‘what can I do’ question in the face of cancer, please click the photo of mother and son below! Thank you.

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Click to ‘do something’ for The Christie

…still there

Earlier today my wife and I sent this update out to many far and near.

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As most of you are aware, Fiona has suffered some serious health problems in recent years.  Some months ago, it became clear that her cancer had become active again and that there was no further effective treatment.  Until now this has not had a significant impact on our daily lives, but recent weeks have been more challenging and so we felt that it was time to share this news.

In April 2012, Richard wrote a blog post called Easter and the Second Shoe.  Written at the time of Fiona’s first relapse (and followed by Advent and the Third Shoe and Treasures of Darkness) it speaks of the Christian’s ‘indefatigable hope’.  Five years later we retain our confidence in the power and purposes of God, and ask you to join with us in praying for courage and wisdom in this new season.