蜜芽传媒

A reflection and prayer to start the day with Canon Simon Doogan.

Good morning.

鈥楨veryone in鈥� was the campaign to provide accommodation for homeless people at the start of pandemic.
It also raised the public expectation of longer-term solutions for that proportion of our population overlooked by the mantra 鈥榮tay at home鈥�.

As for most clergy, staying at home confined me and my wife to the house that goes with my parish: a warm, dry, spacious property with plenty of garden.
Minor grumbles are rightly countered by Christ鈥檚 famous words:
Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests;
but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.

But in John鈥檚 Gospel there鈥檚 a reference to home I find far more unsettling.
Immediately prior to his arrest, Jesus makes the withering pronouncement on his disciples:
The hour鈥� has come when you will be scattered, each one to his home.

It鈥檚 like the protagonist in John Banville鈥檚 novel The Sea, who recognises with shame how the greater part of his energies was always given over
to the simple search for shelter, for comfort, for cosiness.
鈥淏efore I saw myself as something of a buccaneer,鈥� he says 鈥渇acing all-comers with a cutlass in my teeth, but now I am compelled to acknowledge that this was a delusion.
To be concealed, protected, guarded, that is all I have ever truly wanted鈥︹��

While staying at home has plainly helped keep people alive, getting out again will be equally essential to prolong all our living.

Lord hear our prayer for those
who will not wake up this morning in their own home or anyone else鈥檚.
For the rest of us
draw us out of our nests again, safely and sensibly
to the wonder of the world which is all of our oysters. Amen