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Episode details

Radio 4,2 mins

'Look harder, look deeper, look more carefully. There is always more to see.' Rev Dr Giles Fraser - 26/07/16

Thought for the Day

Available for over a year

鈥淚 can鈥檛 come to church today, Dad. I have things to do. And Pokemon to catch.鈥 I vaguely remembered some Japanese manga-style cartoon show from back in the noughties. But this is different, apparently. As my son explained, Pokemon Go is something you now play in the real world 鈥 or, at least, the semi-real world. For viewed through your mobile phone screen, the real world is augmented by the appearance of a myriad of fantastical creatures that you catch and do battle with. And the origins of these little Pokemon creatures are in Shintoism and the many animistic spirits or kami that inhabit the Shinto universe. But this not being my tradition, my thoughts turned to that great religious visionary William Blake. Like my son, he wandered the streets of South London 鈥渟eeing things鈥. "When the sun rises, do you not see a round disc of fire somewhat like a guinea!" Blake asked himself. Oh ! no, no ! I see an innumerable company of the heavenly host crying "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty!鈥 ... Now that鈥檚 augmented reality. For despite all the technological wizardary of Pokemon Go, I feel there鈥檚 something a bit small scale about people peering at the world though the filter of their mobile phone screen. Where鈥檚 the scale or ambition in that? 鈥淚f the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite鈥 - that was Blake鈥檚 advice. But 鈥 I know what you are probably thinking - as my son was in Kennington park chasing magical creatures, I was in church chasing magical creatures of my own. Well yes, they exist in my imagination. But they also exist in reality. Like Blake, I can see them. Angels and archangels and the whole company of the heavenly host. Forget Pokemon Go. It was the Bible that enabled Blake 鈥渢o see the whole world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower.鈥 And like Blake people have been 鈥渟eeing things鈥 for centuries. We call them poets, artists and visionaries. Their technology is the imagination - and with it they encourage us to look at the world longer and deeper - and to see things we had missed. There鈥檚 this wonderful little exchange between Prospero and his daughter Miranda in The Tempest. 鈥淲hat see鈥檚t thou else?鈥 he says to her 鈥 words that my own daughter had tattooed on her arm when she went off to art school. And I was rather proud she chose those words. Yes, this is the world before you, the everyday workaday world. But what else is there? Look harder, look deeper, look more carefully. There is always more to see.

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