Not funereal, please

Catching up on some group emails I encountered this: "Not a funeral service but a celebration of G's life." What is it with this? I hear it more and more - "We don't want a sad service, Vicar, he wouldn't have wanted that."

Well I bloody well would. What do I expect when I die? General celebrations? Carrying in the coffin to Ding Dong the Witch is Dead? I would want to think that when I go there might be the odd tear shed, and perhaps one or two people with at least a vague sense of emptiness and desolation.

Of course, it's the demise of faith that lies behind it all. Strip away hope for what lies ahead, and you're left with nothing to do but look back - and perhaps try somehow to deny the reality of death and sorrow. "Not a funeral service" means something very much less. The Anglican funeral rite contains these words:

we have come here today
to remember before God our brother/sister N;
to give thanks for his/her life;
to commend him/her to God our merciful redeemer and judge;
to commit his/her body to be buried/cremated,
and to comfort one another in our grief,

which is so much more than "celebrating the life" of the deceased. The Christian ceremony looks back, and celebrates what was, but it also looks ahead in hope to the resurrection, and to God's judgement. That last bit is important. It allows us to admit that the dead person was not perfect. We don't have to come over all dewy-eyed and suddenly transform them into plaster saints. I didn't know G, but if they were perfect I'll eat one of my hats. A "celebration of the life of" rather hits any sense of reality about the late beloved on the head.

Of course, nowadays lots of people are not believers, and their obsequies ought honestly to reflect that, but a streak of realism ought also to be present even in one of those depressing humanist gatherings. If all we have is a backward look, then at least take off the tinted lenses.

The jolly approach is also unfair to the bereaved. They do feel grief, and loss, and guilt and all kinds of awfulness. We are there to offer support and comfort, and should be able to do so without feeling that somehow it compromises the joy of the occasion.

So, in short, give me a traditional funeral any day. It's so much fuller and richer than those celebration thingies.

The Christmas letter

Dear Friends,

A year has sped by since the last Christmas missive, and while on the one hand it seems like only Yesterday that I was seated at the Steaming Keyboard in the white heat of Creativity, on the other hand, so much has happened that I must necessarily be selective. But what to select? I could, I suppose, produce a Good Bits version, and leave out all the Not So Good Stuff. But that would seem both uncharacteristic and somewhat dishonest. Yet I must also avoid the opposite Extreme, for I am frequently castigated (in certain family quarters) for pessimism.

So. to pick out salient events in the past Year:

Young Master James continues his career in Asbestos Removal and continues to drive a White Van. He has ambitions to move into the area of Land Reclamation, believing that while asbestos will eventually be Eradicated, land will remain in abundance - or at least, the Polluted variety will. He has also sufficiently mended his heart as to meet a new girlfriend, called Rebecca. She seems an eminently Suitable young woman, save for her voice, which is audible only to Bats. Or at least, so it seems to an Aged Parent who now wears two hearing Aids. These are of the Digital variety, and possess the excellent property of being able to tune out background Noise in Restaurants and Public Houses. At home, they can tune out anything by dint of the Off Switch.

Master Laurence, having relinquished his employment as a Hospital Porter, embarked for a time on career in part-time Barmanship, but is currently resting while enquiring after an Apprenticeship as an Electrician. Time will tell whether this will bear fruit. He passed his Driving Test with flying colours (to a mixture of parental Pride and Apprehension) and now navigates his brother's ancient Fiat around the shoals and rapids of Greater Manchester. How long this will continue is problematic; a minor collision with a sturdier Volkswagen has raised questions as the to Roadworthiness of the Cinquecento.

Miss Polly contines to flourish at school while apparently taking extra lessons in how to be a Cool Chick. She has taken up the guitar, and occasionally can be heard in Practice. She has inherited her Mother's ability to sing in tune, but alas, so far seems to have her Father's guitar Skills.

The Good Doctor continues to work at Stepping Hill Hospital, and has now been joined by a third Consultant Microbiologist. (All three are Women, but quotations which involve words such as "Hubble" and "Bubble" are regarded as Unamusing.) The new arrival's Advent was announced as the dawn of a New Age, in which there would be sufficent Microbiological Consultation to allow Sarah to return home at a civilised time of the evening. In the Event, it seems that the third Consultant has discovered areas of Microbiology which had hitherto lain untouched, such that the individual Work Load appears to be diminished not one Whit. On top of this, Sarah continues to be involved in the Children's Work at church and to pursue her ambition to walk across the country by obscure Footpaths.

I myself continue in relative good Health while complaining about the Stresses and Strains of Team Rectorship. A recent training course held for Team Rectors by the Diocese turned out mainly to consist of asking what it was that Team Rectors actually did. This was a mild Disappointment, as most of us were there to ask that selfsame Question. I have also recently bought a new Digital Camera, which is providing much harmless Amusement. And by virtue of tales too long to tell, I have also acquired two new guitars. This means that I am now unable to play a whole four Instruments, which is something of a personal Record.

In September, Gavin the Curate departed to take up a new ministry as Army Chaplain and is now ensconced in Paderborn, Germany. There were Tears shed, and much waving of Handkerchiefs, but the greatest Revelation associated with his Departure was that Curates do actually work. At least, since his move, the Rector finds himself doing much more than has been his wont!

I have no wish overly to tax my Readers, and am aware that this will not be the only Round Robin to have graced their Christmases, and will therefore end with every Good Wish for Christmas and the coming Year.

Yours etc.,

The D word

I started to read Richard Dawkins's The God Delusion recently. There are several reasons why I haven't done it sooner, but the main ones are that people I trust have assured me that it doesn't say anything he hasn't said elsewhere, and that he doesn't need my money.

But here I am with a free copy that came my way, and I read the preface. I think the project is going to be a long one. I had to go and lie down in a dark room to recover. Others have already criticised the work in lots of ways, so I probably won't bother here, but the bit that gave me a headache was this:

"Just as feminists wince when they hear 'he' rather than 'he or she', or 'man' rather than 'human', I want everybody to flinch whenever we hear a phrase such as 'Catholic child' or 'Muslim child'. Speak of a 'child of Catholic parents' if you like; but if you hear anybody speak of a 'Catholic child', stop them and politely point out that children are too young to know where they stand on such issues, just as they are too young to know where they stand on economics or politics."

Presumably this latter means that it is impossible to speak of a French or English child. After all, the child has not chosen which nation to be born into, knows nothing of its politics and economics and may grow to prefer speaking Greek. Come to think of it, he or she may never make a conscious decision to be French or English. Perhaps most of us should simply be described as of French or English birth; the only real French or English people are those who have become naturalised citizens.

The problem is that Professor Dawkins must know that belonging to a religion is a cultural as well as intellectual phenomenon. Why does he pretend it's otherwise? Or perhaps he really does purely equate religion with assent to a set of propositions. In which case he is abysmally ignorant.

And I'm not sure which would be worse in an academic. But then, I suppose Dawkins stopped being an academic a long time ago, when he became a science populariser (and a good one at that). Here he seems simply to be venting spleen, which is OK, I suppose, but is seriously disappointing.

Black Death Awareness Week

Well, no, not really. But I was recently chatting with Prof. Lindsey Davies, the National Director of Pandemic Flu Preparedness at the Department of Health (as one does), and a thought occurred to me. She had been saying that public awareness of the fact that a world-wide outbreak of nasty influenza is well overdue seems to swing wildly between panic and complacency. As bird flu strikes in South East Asia, the tabloids run scare headlines, and the internet sale of dodgy antiviral drugs soars. Then there isn't a huge epidemic and everyone forgets about it. Yet the danger remains, and the likelihood of a massive flu outbreak continues to hover over us.

What we ought to be doing is raising people's awareness of several things. Firstly, that eventually (perhaps quite soon) it will happen. Secondly, that if we are prepared for it, the impact will be lessened, and there is no need to panic. And thirdly (there's more, but no one wants more than three points at a time) we need to raise public awareness of basic hygiene. Why is using a handkerchief a lost art amongst younger people? Coughs and sneezes really do spread diseases, (as do unwashed hands) but lots of people seem hardly to realise it, and so on....

The key in responding to the threat, then, is neither to panic nor to ignore it, but to be prepared, to be aware of how to respond, and how to minimise the spread of illness. Many people will fall ill, and quite a few will die. There will be a strain not only on the health service, but on all areas of life. Yet it is survivable, and with preparedness it need not be as bad as it could be.

Being a preacher, I couldn't help drawing a spiritual parallel. Many people believe in God, and will resort to prayer and even churchgoing in a crisis. And often they seem disappointed that it seems to offer less comfort and strength than it promises. Part of the reason is that the necessary preparation is lacking. Of course, God does tend to come through, but he can build much better on a foundation of steady spirituality. Where there is a constant habit of prayer and worship, and a way of thinking that acknowledges God from day to day, there is a firm basis for dealing with the lows and highs of life. Otherwise we tend to swing between panic and complacency, and end up wondering why we never bothered to have any spiritual preparation in place.

Coming back to the worldly, Prof Davies asked me what preparations our diocese has for a flu pandemic. After all, there may well be a lot more funerals, pastoral needs and so on, while quite a few clergy will no doubt be out of action, and the bereaved will still be wanting the same care and consideration for themselves and their nearest and dearest. So I looked it up on the diocesan web site. The good news is that there's an entry for " flu pandemic". The bad news is that there's no actual content linked to the header. No doubt preparations are in train....

Back

What do you mean, "Back"? You never said you were going away!

Which is why this blog will never feature on widely viewed blogs of the world. But we've been to Belgium on holiday. At this point, of course, we are always asked (yes, we've been twice before!), "Why Belgium of all places?" On the face of it, it does seem strange. After all, who knows anything about the place? The most famous Belgian ever was a fictional detective created by an english woman.

One answer, of course, would be beer. The Belgians brew really great beer. Of course, most of them don't appreciate the stuff. The best selling beer in Belgium is a lagerish swill called Jupiler. And of course, they perpetrate Stella Artois. But they also do Westvleteren. This is one of the famous Trappist beers, brewed at an actual Trappist monastery in the eponymous village near to Popperinge in the heart of Belgium's hop growing region. It's produced in small quantities and is very rare. But if you go there, you can drink the stuff in the nearby bar and just possibly buy some to take home. (We failed.)

But there are plenty of other reasons. The people are friendly. (Not to each other; the Walloons and the Flemings hate each other cordially, but both are delighted to discover that you are British.) The art and architecture are great, the countryside is delightful and the food is great (and always comes with chips, which are a proud Belgian invention, even though we English have made them our own).

We stayed in the south, near Malmedy and the Haute Fagne, a (relatively) high altitude fenland with lots of bleak and windy peat bogs and corresponding fauna and flora. One way of seeing it is by railbike, which was fun, in a physical sort of way. Here's a video that Sarah made by accident...

So anyway, home we came, and plunged again into the hectic round of the real world, so that August almost passed without a blog entry and my fans despaired.

A Good Role Model

We went last night to see Die Hard 4. It was quite fun, with Bruce Willis an older, balder, leaner and if possible meaner John McClane. He shot, burnt, slashed, crushed and generally pureed the opposition for a couple of hours in a suitably satisfactory manner. In addition, his character appears to have given up smoking. So he is not going to encourage any impressionable young viewers to do anything dangerous. That's encouraging.

Smoking in church

A few weeks ago the local council sent me a no smoking sign which has to be displayed at the entrance to the church, in accordance with the new law against consenting adults smoking indoors.

I'm hardly the first to notice that people don't actually smoke in church. (I once saw a teenager reach for his cigs, only to be slapped down by his friends.) I'm not sure whether smoking was ever acceptable in churches, though perhaps in the eighteenth century it may have been. I have a totally unresearched mental image of some gouty squire huddling near the brazier in his box pew and sucking on a clay churchwarden (which is a type of pipe). But I suspect the image is fanciful.

Anyway, my first instinct was to bin the offending article, but someone pointed out the huge fines that can be levied for not telling the congregation not to do what they are already not doing. So I checked the official web site and discovered that you are allowed to customise the notice. So I came up with this: