Those of you who’ve been asking when I’m going to write my book on journeying will be glad to know that at last I’m starting to write it. I’m going to call it “I wouldn’t start from here if I were you: a reflection on honest journeys.” There will be chapters with these headings:
- The journey makes us what we are: where have we come from and what has the journey done to us?
- Journeying with traditions
- Journeying with the Psalter
- Journeying in Shetland
- Journeying on Holy Island
- Journeying through illness
- Journeying through Holy Week lockdown
- The ongoing journey: finding faith to keep going
I’m now putting the first chapter together thinking about the holy places I’ve passed through since I was born. It’s something you might like to think about for yourself. Find a picture of the church and think what memory comes into your mind. Here goes then - strap yourself in - I’ve been in a lot of them in 53 years! Where are the places and the people in them that make us who we are?
Times when we are aware of the closeness of God are sometimes called ‘thin places’ (an expression which comes from the Celtic and Northumberland Christian traditions). ‘Thin places’ are those occasions when the veil drawn between us and God seems especially thin. These are often not in a church building. I’ve found God more powerfully in creation than in church when church has been bad!
But in starting out this writing journey, I begin by thanking God for the times when church has had those saints in her who have through their example shown me something of Christ. As I reflect on what has stayed with me from the places above, it is times when each of them have stopped worrying about the mundane and have taken risks pointing their communities to the Kingdom.
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