coraclethe magazine of the iona community

coracle summer 2012 issue 4/52

coracleThe Iona Community, 4th Floor, Savoy House, 140 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow G2 3DHt: 0141 332 6343 f: 0141 332 1090e: coracle@iona.org.uk w: http://www.iona.org.uk/coracle.php© the iona community 2012/contents © the individual contributors Work and worship, Prayer and politics, Sacred and secular …

‘WHERE YOUR TREASURE IS …’: ACHRISTIAN PERSPECTIVE ON THEFINANCIAL CRISIS Kathy Galloway andDavid McNair p3

ONE PLANET, ONE PEOPLE Paul BakerHernandez p10

VULNERABILITY AS THE HEART OFTRANSFORMATION Donald Eadie p14

LACK OF VISION Susan Dale, with MikeHolroyd p17

GENEROUS GOD: A PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING

Generous God,we thank you that, time after time,in the most surprising places,you spread a table for usand welcome us to the feast of your presence.Sometimes we feel like amazed guests at a banquet,a great celebration;sometimes we meet youat a kitchen table among friends,sharing daily bread;sometimes as children enjoying a picnic,laughing, singing in the sunshine;sometimes in a dark valley, on a hard journey,by the barbed wire, bread is broken.Always we find nourishment,always enough for all who come;always we are blessed by sharing –this is the gospel feast.

Jan Sutch Pickard, from 50 Great Prayers from the Iona Community, Wild Goose Publications, www.ionabooks.com

Cover photo: © David Coleman

The Iona Community is:

• An ecumenical community of men and

women from different walks of life and

different traditions in the Christian church

• Committed to the gospel of Jesus Christ, and

to following where that leads, even into the

unknown

• Engaged together, and with people of goodwill

across the world, in acting, reflecting and

praying for justice, peace and the integrity

of creation

• Convinced that the inclusive community we

seek must be embodied in the community

we practise

So we share a common discipline of:

• Daily prayer and bible study

• Mutual accountability for our use of time

and money

• Spending time together

• Action for justice and peace

And are, together with our staff,

responsible for:

• Our islands residential centres of Iona Abbey,

the MacLeod Centre on Iona, and Camas

Adventure Centre on the Ross of Mull.

And in Glasgow

• The administration of the Community

• Our work with young people

• Our publishing house, Wild Goose Publications

• Our association in the revitalising of worship

with the Wild Goose Resource Group

The Iona Community was founded in Glasgow in

1938 by George MacLeod, minister, visionary and

prophetic witness for peace, in the context of

the poverty and despair of the Depression. Its

original task of rebuilding the monastic ruins of

Iona Abbey became a sign of hopeful rebuilding

of community in Scotland and beyond. Today, we

are almost 250 Members, mostly in Britain, and

1500 Associate Members, with 1400 Friends

worldwide. Together and apart, ‘we follow the

light we have, and pray for more light.’

Coracle is the bi-monthly magazine of the Iona

Community. Views expressed in it are not

necessarily the policy of the Iona Community, but

the Community seeks the exchange of thoughts

and ideas as a basis for finding common ground.

Letters are welcome, but may be edited because

of space restrictions. For advertising or

photography specifications, please contact the

editor. Unsolicited material is welcome (by email

or on disk) but cannot always be included.

next copy dates:

please contact the editor

contact details:

The Iona Community, 4th Floor, Savoy House,

140 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow G2 3DH

t: 0141 332 6343 f: 0141 332 1090

e: coracle@iona.org.uk

w: http://www.iona.org.uk/coracle.php

editor Neil Paynter

administration Karen Turner

template design Wendy Ball, 2ND STOREY

formatting by Neil Paynter

printed by Bell & Bain, Glasgow

1 coracle summer 2012information andfrom the holycity

Coracle is the magazine of the Iona Community, a

charity registered in Scotland No: SC003794

Company No: SC096243

coracle 2summer 2012from the holy

city

features1 From the holy city: The Big

Noise by Peter Macdonald

3 ‘Where your treasure is …’: a

Christian perspective on the

financial crisis by Kathy Galloway and

David McNair

10 One planet, one people by Paul

Baker Hernandez

14 Vulnerability as the heart of

transformation by Donald Eadie

17 Lack of vision Susan Dale, with Mike

Holroyd

22 Signs of peace: letter from

Gaza by Alison Swinfen

news

8 Faslane Easter witness for

peace by John Harvey

9 ‘We keep singing’ by Wendy Young

travelling folk

13 A place of modest miracles:

Santa Maria de Fe Hotel,

Paraguay by John L. Bell

interview

20 An interview with Hanan Al

Sanah Hanan Al Sanah and Margo

Sabella-Marshall

tribute

23 A tribute to Iona Community

member Robert Currie by

Norman Shanks

24 a touching place news

and letters

prayer

26 From the grassroots

22 advertisements

From the holy city:The Big Noise

Peter Macdonald

Festival-goers in Britain know to expect rain – lots of it. The biblical curseof rain for forty days and forty nights would rate as a good summer inthese parts. Yet each year thousands of music lovers gather in fieldsthroughout this verdant isle to turn perfectly decent pieces of greenpasture into muddy swamps.

A few weeks ago I sat in one of those fields, in the rain, huddled beneathan umbrella, wearing my best Iona-waterproof gear, with seventhousand other soggy souls. We were there for a performance by aremarkable group of children from Raploch, a housing estate on theedge of Stirling. You may wonder what drew such a large audience for aschool concert. Was there, perhaps, an England football match on thetelevision that night? I admit the presence on the bill of GustavoDudamel and the Simón Bolívar Orchestra of Venezuela may have been afactor. However, for the many parents and grandparents, local residentsand the huddled masses, the main attraction was the Big Noise children’sorchestra.

The Big Noise is part of Sistema Scotland’s mission to transform livesthrough music. The Sistema name is taken from the youth and children’sorchestra movement established in Venezuela in 1975 by Dr JoséAntonio Abreu. El Sistema is a state-funded voluntary sector organisationwhich oversees 125 youth orchestras, 31 symphony orchestras and over300,000 young people, mainly drawn from deprived backgrounds, whoattend its nationwide music schools. Gustavo Dudamel, now also musicdirector of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, is its most famous formerpupil.

There was hardly a dry eye, or bottom, in the crowd as the childrenperformed with one of the world’s great orchestras. I was lucky enoughto attend a performance of the Simón Bolívar Orchestra in the Usher Hallin 2008 when they were one of the big hits at the Edinburgh Festival butthe Big Noise concert in a muddy field on a Raploch rainy night was ofgreater significance. It was a statement about the potential of youngpeople and their communities, so often denigrated and deniedopportunity. It was a celebration of the power of music and art ingeneral with profound social, political and spiritual implications.

Maestro Abreu, quoted in the programme notes, believes that, ‘the mostholy of human rights is the right to art’. This reminded me of an inspiringpiece by John Tusa, former broadcaster and arts administrator, whowrote:

The arts matter because they are universal; because they are non-material;because they deal with daily experience in a transforming way; because theyquestion the way we look at the world; because they offer differentexplanations of that world; because they link us to our past and open thedoor to our future; because they work beyond and outside routinecategories; because they take us out of ourselves; because they make orderout of disorder and stir up the stagnant; because they offer a sharedexperience rather than an isolated one; because they encourage theimagination, and attempt the pointless; because they offer beauty andconfront us with the fact of ugliness; because they suggest explanations butno solutions; because they force us to think about the difference between

the good and the bad, the false and the true. The arts matter because theyembrace, express and define the soul of a civilisation. A nation without artswould be a nation that had stopped talking to itself, stopped dreaming, andhad lost interest in the past and lacked curiosity about the future.

(From Art Matters: Reflecting on Culture, John Tusa, Methuen Publishing,1999)

As an organisation committed to transformation – personal and political,local and global – we should celebrate that much of our activism isexpressed through art.

We are a community of composers and songwriters, wordsmiths andstorytellers, photographers and painters, musicians and singers, knittersand nutters who help us laugh at ourselves. We express who we are andwhat we believe, how we see the world and why we long for transfor-mation in word and song and symbol. Such creativity of thought andaction is not only needed in a post-modern age, it is vital as we seek notonly to interpret events but to shape them.

As darkness fell on Raploch and as the Big Concert reached its finale, alocal man encouraging his kids to wait till the end was overheardexplaining, ‘It’s just gettin’ tae the guid bit, where they dance aboot anpit oan thur jaikets.’

Today the word on the streets of Raploch is ‘Mambo!’. *

God bless,

Peter l

* See www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEuYGVAn4Jw&feature=fvwrel

Peter Macdonald is the Leader of the Iona Community.

SISTEMA SCOTLAND: THE BIG NOISE

From Sistema:

The work of Sistema Scotland is already changing the lives of thechildren and the community of Raploch.

To help us sustain this programme and develop other centres inScotland, and for more information, go to:

http://makeabignoise.org.uk/welcome-to-big-noise-raploch/

http://www.fesnojiv.gob.ve/en/mission-and-vision.html

Sistema Scotlandc/o Big Noise Raploch90 Drip RoadStirlingFK8 1RNadmin@sistemascotland.org.uk

‘… Watching the Simón Bolívar Orchestra play is to begiven an image of the kingdom of heaven: differentpeople, differently gifted, staying together throughharmony and discord and producing something beautifulfor this world and its people …’

– John L. Bell, from ‘Thought for the Day’, BBC Radio 4

coracle 4summer 2012

feature

3 coracle summer 2012feature

It was a Tuesday – October 29 – when a decade of American optimism andprosperity was shattered. As stock prices plummeted with no hope ofrecovery, panic rippled across the country – afraid they would lose theirsavings, people rushed to withdraw their money. Those who didn’t reachthe bank in time went bankrupt, as the banks collapsed. The year? 1929.

Fast-forward 79 years and one of the world’s oldest and most importantinvestment banks, Lehman Brothers, had just filed for bankruptcy. Marketconfidence was shattered and stock markets all over the world lost billionsof dollars. A financial crisis ensued to the point where Ben Bernanke, Chairof the US Federal Reserve, suggested that the world was just hours awayfrom complete financial meltdown: a world where businesses couldn’tborrow, cash machines ceased working and the life savings of millions ofpeople disappeared.

By the end of October 2008, governments across the world hadcommitted $7 trillion dollars of public money to secure risky assets,underwrite threatened savings and recapitalise failing banks. In doing so,governments rewarded those who had taken huge risks for personal gainand in the process destabilised the global economy. It was a classic case ofsocialisation of losses and privatisation of gain.

This bailout effectively shifted debt from banks to nation states, and, as wehave seen in Greece, there are now risks of whole countries goingbankrupt.

The impacts have been felt globally. In the UK and Ireland we have felt thesharp impact of reductions in public spending and rising taxes. But theworst impacts are on the poor in developing countries, who are vulnerablebecause they are poor – they mostly don’t have savings or social securityprogrammes to fall back on.

As a direct result of the crisis, an extra 120 million people will be living onless than $2 a day, and global unemployment will rise to an estimated 240million people. This is the highest figure on record, with disproportionatelydamaging effects on women. In 2009, World Bank researchers estimatedthat the crisis would cause an additional 30,000-50,000 infant deaths insub-Saharan Africa alone.

MONEY DEPENDS ON TRUST

To understand what happened, we must go right back to the beginning, tothe nature and the purpose of money. The first thing to understand aboutmoney is that it isn’t real. It’s an idea dependent on trust. Imagine aprimitive society. I have a bow and arrow. You have a bowl of rice. If I’mhungry, I can trade my bow and arrow for your bowl of rice. But thisdepends on me needing the rice at the same time as you need the bowand arrow. The possibilities are fairly limited.

But as society developed, the concept of a medium of exchange emerged.The idea that I could exchange my bow and arrow for something, apebble, for example, which I could redeem at a later date, expanded thepossibilities for trade and commerce dramatically. But I can’t eat pebbles orhunt with them, so I had to trust that the pebbles I got for my bow andarrow would, one day, buy me some rice. Without trust in the medium ofexchange, the system falls apart.

The second thing to note is thatfinance is inherently unstable andcrises are inevitable. In the past twodecades, we had major financial crisesin Latin America, East Asia, Europe andAmerica. Take the example of NorthernIreland’s housing market in 2006. Agovernment savings investmentscheme provided to citizens of theRepublic of Ireland had matured,meaning that hundreds of people hadthousands of Euros to spare. With theeasy availability of cheap buy-to-letmortgages, many invested in NorthernIreland’s ‘undervalued’ propertymarket. This led to the average houseprice increasing in value by £600 perday – everyone was talking about it;those with houses were gloating, thosewithout houses were panicking thatthey would never be able to affordone.

Of course, such growth wasunsustainable and prices collapsed.Whenever too many people startinvesting in the same thing, it creates abubble. And bubbles always burst.When people lose confidence in thesystem and start to pull their moneyout, everyone else starts to panic andpull out too. The bigger the bubble, thegreater the impact, and in a worldwhich is globally connected this canbe contagious.

In the lead-up to 2008, banks in the UShad developed a culture of lendingmoney to people who couldn’t pay itback – but they didn’t really care. Thissounds ridiculous, but mortgage firmswere lending money, then sellingthese loans to others, who in turnsliced and diced the loans, packagedthem up and sold them on. The buyerof these loans rarely knew orunderstood what they were buying.Some banks were lending over $100for every $1 of capital they actuallyheld. But if you are making a bonus ofseveral million a year, why askquestions? After all, you could alwayssell the loans on to someone else.

After years of this practice, thehouse of cards finally collapsed. In2008, lots of people starteddefaulting on their home loans andthe markets lost confidence. Banks,which lend to one another, stoppedtrusting that the assets of otherbanks were secure. They lost trustin the medium of exchange, so themoney that oiled the wheels of thefinancial system dried up.

This would all be fine if this so-called ‘casino capitalism’ wasseparated from the rest of theeconomy. But bankers were usingreal people’s money to bet onthese risky assets. If the banks wentunder so would small businesses,ordinary people’s savings and theability of our economies tofunction. So governments usedtrillions of taxpayers’ dollars toguarantee savings, underwritefinancial institutions, and injectmoney into the banks to get themlending again. But (aside from themoney for the bank bailouts) theloss of confidence in the bankingsystem, the amount of money thathas been lost on the stock andproperty markets and thereluctance of banks to lend havehad a direct knock-on effect on thereal economy.

Many questions have been askedregarding the personal responsi-bility of bankers who benefited –and are still benefiting – fromactivities that have caused suchhavoc internationally. But bankersare not the only ones to blame.Central banks and politicians keptinterest rates low and enabled theeasy availability of credit – whichencouraged lending, fuelledgrowth based on ever-increasingdebt, and contributed to thebubble which eventually burst. Byand large, citizens asked noquestions when times were good.Perhaps, too, we need to askquestions about our own personalresponsibility for the money thatwe borrow and the money weinvest.

The financial crisis also raisesquestions regarding the nature ofspeculation. One of the most

shocking things that happened in2008, was that, as the stock marketand property became anincreasingly risky investment,speculators started to shift theirmoney into commodities –including basic food stuffs likewheat. This is one factor whichdrove up global food prices andmeant that the poor in developingcountries were paying higherprices for daily necessities. In India,lentil prices have tripled since 2008;urban families typically spend 55%of their income on food.

Of course very few people wouldsay it’s OK to generate a passiveincome at the expense of the poor– but in a globalised world, wheredecisions in London impact on thefreedom of those living in slums inLusaka, it’s easy to distanceourselves from the impacts of ourbehaviour.

This crisis also raises morefundamental questions about theway that our financial andeconomic system works and who itserves. Does it promote prosperity,or perpetuate poverty? If so, howcan we use our economic systemto build the former and challengethe latter?

PROSPERITY AND POVERTY

Prosperity is about things goingwell in accordance with our hopesand expectations. This includes asense of continuity – that we don’texpect things to fall aparttomorrow – and a sense that ourprosperity as individuals isdependent on the prosperity ofthose around us, the people withwhom we share our lives.Prosperity is about the capabilitiesthat people have to flourish. Dothey live long? Can they take partin the life of a community? Canthey appear in public withoutshame and disgrace? Can theykeep themselves warm? Can theyuse their school education? Canthey visit friends and family?

For decades, the dominanteconomic model for pursuing thegoal of prosperity has beeneconomic growth – with the

assumption that higher incomes meanincreased choices and an improvedstandard of living. Rising GrossDomestic Product, a measure of theeconomic activity of a nation, isassumed to be a proxy for risingprosperity. This has been the singlepolicy goal that has defined Westerneconomies for the last century.

Yet, between 1990 and 2001, for every£100 worth of growth in income, just60 pence contributed to reducingextreme poverty – hardly an efficientway of challenging poverty – given allthe resources and energy required tostimulate such growth. It has also beenfairly bad at challenging inequality. Inthe 1980s a chief executive of a FTSE100 company earned around 25 timesthe ‘average’ salary. In the 2000s it hadincreased to around 120 times.

And in richer nations wheresubsistence needs are largely met,does an increase in the averageincome result in increased prosperity?The evidence suggests that this is notthe case. At low-income levels, anincrease in GDP increases happiness,but at high-income levels, there is notmuch difference. People in Colombiaare generally happier than people inFrance, Austria, Canada and Japan,despite huge difference in theirincomes.

Two other issues raise questions overthe value of continual economicgrowth. The first relates to stability andthe second relates to finite resources.

One analysis suggests that capitalismis a process by which money isperpetually sent in search of moremoney. Financiers lend in return forinterest, merchants buy cheap and selldear, landlords collect rent, and so on.At its simplest level, the capitalist takesmoney, buys labour, power andmaterials and produces a commoditywhich is sold for a profit. This profit isthen reinvested to make more money.The capital seeks new investmentopportunities and, as long as it findsthese, capitalism expands at acompound rate. But when there arelimited investment opportunities,there is a problem. In the past decades,the level of capital exceeded profitableinvestment opportunities. And so,

‘Where your treasure is…’: a Christianperspective on the financial crisis

Kathy Galloway and David McNair

5 coracle summer 2012feature

virtual markets were created –derivatives and synthetics thatmade money out of money with noreal underlying value – until thewhole thing collapsed. Since the1970s surplus capital has increasedyear on year by 3% – meaningthere is more and more moneyneeding profitable investmentopportunities. When thoseopportunities cease to exist, crisesoccur. Some analysis suggests thatthis is a recipe for deeper and morefrequent crises in the future.

The second problem is that theproduction of commodities andthe pursuit of economic growthrequire the input of resources andthe output of waste. On a finiteplanet with a growing populationwe need to consider theimplications of a model thatassumes constant growth inconsumption. If our lifestyles areusing resources or creating wastethat impinges on the ability of thepoor to achieve at least a minimumstandard of living, then we need toquestion that.

There are also broader questionswith regard to our stewardship ofthe earth’s resources. In the last 35years alone, human beings,overwhelmingly in the developedcountries, have destroyed one-thirdof the world’s non-renewableresources. So while the idea of anon-growing economy is horrifyingto the economist, the idea of acontinually growing economy ishorrifying to the ecologist.

THE GOOD THAT I WOULD, I DONOT …

It’s important to understand asmuch as we can about our presentfinancial situation, since it directlyaffects all of us in one way oranother. Some of the veryirresponsible actions taken over thepast few years were possible onlybecause too few people werewatching – it’s easy to see nowhow advantage was taken of thefact that, for most of us, finance andeconomics has been something wethought was too difficult tounderstand, or even to ask

questions about.

But it’s especially important forChristians to confront hardquestions about the use ofresources, including money,because they lead directly todeeper issues that are at the heartof our faith. And as we face hugechallenges – accumulating debtand bankruptcy, unemployment,homelessness, hunger, exclusionand powerlessness – at home andinternationally, we ask, what doesgood news to the poor meantoday? How does our faith speak tothe crises of our time?

The first and perhaps the mostimportant thing to remember isthat we are not alone. We arechildren of a God who loves thelost and the least, who runs out tomeet us when we are in a mess,and who in Jesus stood alongsidethe outcast and the poor. John’sGospel tells us that in seeing Jesus,we also see the one who sent him,not to judge but in love, and thepoor and powerless are especiallyclose to the heart of God. Thespiritual realm is embedded ineconomic and political reality.

In fact, the economic and politicalreality of Jesus’ day was not sodistant from ours as we mightimagine. It encompassed acutepoverty and inequalities of manykinds, a brutal military andimperialist occupation, forcedmigration, slavery, indebtedness,corruption in the taxation system,loansharking and the exclusionfrom religious, political andeconomic life of the mostvulnerable – lone women, thephysically and mentally ill,foreigners and outsiders of manykinds. Still today, across the world,and in our own countries, peoplesuffer under these burdens.

And now, as then, we also struggleunder the weight of our ownfallibility and weakness; we arealways tripping ourselves up. It isnot just the spiritual realm which isembedded in economic andpolitical reality – we are too. We areall born into complicity with

oppressive structures and systems,part of a dehumanising world order forwhich we did not give our permissionbut which is very difficult indeed towithdraw from. For example, evenwhen we want to do such a seeminglysimple thing as open a savingsaccount in a bank, we cannot be surethat our savings will not be used forpurposes that cause suffering topeople somewhere, or that damagethe environment. Paul's words inRomans: ‘For even though the desire todo good is in me, I am not able to do it. Idon't do the good I want to do; instead Ido the evil that I do not want to do’,speak to and for us all. This is sin, theseparation that divides us from Godand from our neighbours.

Every day, sometimes through our ownself-interest and hardness of heart,sometimes despite our best intentions,we act in ways that relentlessly distortor diminish the image of God in ourfellow human beings. Every day we dothings that damage the earth ourhabitat. Every day we deny thegoodness of God’s creation. In theoccasional honest moments when weget beyond our illusions, we recogniseour brokenness, the ways we woundour lives, the lives of others and the lifeof the world. Ultimately, we step awayfrom God’s covenant relationship withus.

THE COST AND JOY OFDISCIPLESHIP

But ‘you have made us for yourself, andour hearts are restless till they rest in you’(St Augustine). By the grace andgenerosity of God, flawed and dividedas we are, we are invited to belongmore deeply to one another. What wecannot do for ourselves, Christ does onour behalf. His costly reconciliation is atthe heart of the gospel, overcomingour divisions. Out of a dividedhumanity, God is making a united onein Christ. Even in difficult times, this isgood news to be thankful for.

But not just a united humanity; thatunity and reconciliation is for thewhole creation. Nothing can separateus from the love of God, which extendsto the whole creation. The kingdom orreign of God, announced by John theBaptiser and Mary, proclaimed by

Christ, offers a vision of the lovingpurpose of God who is at work inhistory to renew, restore and healthe brokenness of creation so thatGod’s will may be done on earth asit is in heaven. So the call toconversion, to transformation oflife, which was so central to Jesus’ministry and which is the ongoingtask of his church, can never just beabout our personal spiritual lives, oreven our theologies and churchlives. It is about our whole lives –our politics, our cultures, oureconomics, how we spend ourmoney and our time – because nopart of life, and not even death, isbeyond God's love. All are in Christ.

When he summed up and affirmedthe Jewish Law as loving God withour whole lives and our neighbouras ourselves, Jesus made theeconomic as also being ‘for Godand for our neighbours’. In his lifeand teaching, the Church is warnedabout the dangers of wealth andcalled to bring good news to thepoor. A failure to feed, clothe andrelate to those in need is presentedin Matthew 25 as a failure to knowand respond to Christ himself inthe world.

Perhaps we see God’s purposeexpressed most clearly in thecentral Christian practice of sharingin the Lord’s Supper/HolyCommunion/Eucharist. It is adefinitive sign of how all thatcomes from God is to be offeredback to God and shared with ourneighbours. We come to Christ’stable knowing our own emptiness,our failures in sharing, ourcomplicity with the world’sinjustice, our sin. Conversion,turning away from that order toGod’s economy of sharing, is hard.We are hungry to change, and thathunger we cannot satisfy ourselves.So we stretch out our hands, andwe are fed; not because we aredeserving, but because we areloved, and it is in the nature of Godto feed hungry people. By gracealone we are fed. And when wehear the words ‘this is my Body’, weremember the total identificationto death of Jesus with all humanity.

In the bread broken and the winepoured out to be shared are bothsuffering and hope, both the costand the joy of discipleship.

‘I hate your religious festivals; stopyour noisy songs; instead, let justiceroll like a river, and righteousness likea stream that never runs dry’ (Amos5:21–24). So spoke the prophet,and indeed, if we get so caught upin the correctness of ourremembrance, or the beauty of ourceremonies and prayers, or ourown nourishment, that we forgetthat people are still hungry and weare united with them in Christ'sBody, then we rather miss the pointof Jesus the bread of life. The breadwas broken to be shared. Failure topractise economic sharing ispresented in 1 Corinthians 11 as afailure to know and respond toChrist in the sacrament.

A faith response to economic crisisbegins with our prayer: God give usgrace to share our bread.

Restored relationships are at thecentre of our communioncelebration. With thankfulness wecan sit at table with our Lord,knowing that all are welcome atthe feast. We are part of a newcovenant, a new relationship, a newcommunity in which we areforgiven, accepted and freed. Butwe don’t get to be particular aboutwho we share with, even if they’renot the people we would haveexpected or chosen or evenconsidered. As part of the Body ofChrist, we sit down with streetchildren and peasant farmers, withsoldiers and protesters, withdispossessed and excluded peoplefrom all over the world.

It’s worth noting that every miracleof Jesus, every healing act, everyencounter he had with individualsall had two outcomes. First, aperson was fed or healed, raised totheir feet or turned in a newdirection, changed or challenged.Second, that person was invitedinto a new relationship and into anew life in community. We canthink of the crowds fed by thelakeside, of the women and men

isolated by their sickness orstigmatised by their occupation or wayof life. But we can also see it in thosewhose meetings with Jesus includedan economic exchange:

l A new relationship for the men whobrought gifts for a king and found achild born in a shed.

l A new relationship for tax-collectorsand outcasts.

l A new relationship for the womenwho financed Jesus.

l A new relationship for the womanwho anointed Jesus, henceforthknown not for the greatness of her sinsbut for the greatness of her love.

In the way Jesus transformed theseexchanges, we can see:

l the restoration of the capacity toshare, the transformation of thepersonal

l the restoration of the necessarymaterial provision, the transformationof the economic

l the restoration into relationship in anew form of kinship, the transfor-mation of the political.

All of these are expressed incommunion.

A faith response to economic crisisasks whether our exchanges lead tothese outcomes.

‘Where your treasure is …’

Jesus once told a story about how thekingdom of God was like a preciouspearl. It was in the context of a muchlonger discourse, in which hechallenged his listeners to think abouttheir own values, particularly on thesubject of wealth and poverty. Hislisteners were mostly poor people, andlike people in all times and places,probably they had something of abelief that if only they were rich, thentheir lives would be better, moresecure, less anxious. But Jesus washaving none of this. ‘No,’ he said, 'youdon’t need any excess, just enough fortoday. Don’t stockpile, don’t store up:today, this moment, is all you knowyou have. The rest is in the hands ofGod. Your surplus will profit younothing!’

The sun shone cheerfully down as about two hundred of us, from ChristianChurches and communities across the country, converged with ourcolourful flags and banners on the nuclear submarine base at Faslane onthe Gareloch, on the Saturday before Palm Sunday.

This was the second Easter Witness for Peace organised by SCANA(Scottish Clergy Against Nuclear Arms) – a gathering for prayer, for a picnic,and as yet another action to make clear the Churches’ utter opposition tothe use or threatened use of weapons of mass destruction, which are‘theologically and morally indefensible’.

We heard strong statements from Church leaders: from Alan McDonald,former Moderator of the Kirk’s General Assembly; from David Mumford,Dean of the Scottish Episcopal Church’s Brechin diocese; and from BishopJoe Toal of the Roman Catholic diocese of Argyll and the Isles. KathyGalloway, former Iona Community Leader and now head of Christian AidScotland, gave an impassioned plea to make a final push to get rid ofnuclear weapons in Britain and to release the enormous sums misspent onthem for far more urgent and beneficial use; and Bruce Kent, former headof CND and a regular protester at Faslane, shared with many his hope thata Scottish initiative to remove nuclear weapons from Scottish soil wouldkick-start their total dismantling across the world.

The event was chaired by David McLachlan of SCANA, with worship led byLynn Peden and Ainslie Walton, also of SCANA, and we sang songs led byGraham Maule of the Wild Goose Resource Group. A huge range of peoplewere there, mixing the very young with the really old, individuals andfamily groups, able-bodied and physically challenged – including quite afew for whom this was a first. And the police looked on dispassionately,held the ring, as it were – and took loads of photographs!

And always in the background, locked securely behind the gates and therazor wire, the obscenity of Trident loomed over us – the massive ‘plank inour eye’, as Alan McDonald put it, while we in the UK are so busy urgingother countries to remove ‘the dust’ in theirs.

Did we make a difference? As we remember again that lonely man on adonkey, riding into the centre of power surrounded only by palm branchesand a few bemused followers, it’s really a no-brainer. As St Paul put it somemorably: ‘God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; Godchose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is lowand despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things thatare’ (1 Corinthians 1:27–28). In that faith, we witnessed, we prayed, wepicnicked, and we celebrated the reality of the coming reign of God – nothere yet, but as sure as the sun which rises, every day, over the barbed wireof Faslane. l

www.scana.org.uk

7 coracle summer 2012feature

coracle 8summer 2012feature/newso

A little bit later, he told them to sellall their belongings, and give theirmoney to the poor. Jesus made acorporate response to need –rather than the individual accumu-lation of wealth as an insurance, hesuggested instead a sharingcommunity, in which each wouldhave enough for the day.

That’s very challenging indeed toour ears. Our current model ofindividualism and wealth creationlacks norms, limits and prioriti-sation when it comes to thecommon good. But what seemslike the insatiable desire forindividual freedom is likely to leadto greater rather than fewerconstraints because our naturalresources are finite. This desire hasbecome increasingly damaging: itwill hurt our children andgrandchildren as we mortgagetheir future to it, and there is a kindof ethical obscenity in ourconspicuous over-consumptionwhen so many suffer such povertyand want. Beyond the modestmeeting of needs, there is plenty ofevidence to suggest that ourpresent way of life does not makeus happier or more content, butrather makes us more anxious andinsecure. ‘Where your treasure is,there will your heart be also.’ Jesussays that the capacity for living atrue life is greatly, and perhapsfatally reduced in those who havewealth.

Such self- and other-harmingbehaviour is a symptom of whatthe Bible calls idolatry: the exaltingof our own desires over love of Godand love of our neighbour. There isno doubt that economic growthand wealth creation has becomean idol of our age. This is not new,but its consequences are more far-reaching in our globalised world. Itis easy to reject the idol of wealthon an intellectual level – it is muchmore challenging to change ourbehaviour, to re-evaluate where ourheart lies and to repent of the sinof economic idolatry.

‘I came that they might have life, andhave it abundantly’ said Jesus,reminding us that life has many

dimensions, spiritual, social,environmental as well as economic.Rather than view economics as anopportunity to pursue self-enrichment through monetarypossessions, we can vieweconomics as the task of goodstewardship, the faithfulmanagement of the householdresources. But good stewardship,certainly in a Christian and biblicalcontext, is not about maximisingprofits, share returns or propertyholdings. It is about ordering thehousehold so that all its members,including the most vulnerable, cangrow and flourish. The economic isthe clearest possible indicator ofspirituality.

Our resources are gift. We are notGod: we did not create them out ofnothing! We seek to order them inobedience to God’s purposes ofjustice and love. Ultimately, all areheld in trust, not just for our benefitbut for the wellbeing of the wholecommunity, and for the future, andwe are accountable for that trust.To be a steward is about effectivelysharing the blessings of creationwith all of creation.

Such a task requires a holisticapproach – there is no sense in avision of helping the poor whichignores the reasons why they arepoor or a vision of environmentalstewardship without addressingthe factors behind the degradationof ecosystems.

A faith response to economic crisisasks, ‘How does our economicstewardship contribute toabundant life for everyone?’

Abundant life includes valuingthings which don’t necessarily leadto economic growth or profit.Wellbeing relies on stable and closerelationships, physical and mentalhealth, meaningful work andleisure as well as income. We knowthat indebtedness has a negativeimpact on relationships – it’sestimated that 10.7 million peoplein the UK suffer relationshipproblems because of moneyworries. There is also clear evidencethat where income differences

around us, we have no basis forgoing to the state to argue forstructural change. But the churchgives us the context in which wecan think through and support oneanother in living an alternativevision. We have the opportunity toraise children in a way that valuesthe multi-dimensional nature of lifeand challenges the temptation toidolise money. We can support oneanother in living according to God’snorms in the work that we do andin valuing those who have no paidemployment.

Biblically, sharing the blessings ofcreation is the mark of theredeemed community as well asthe changed individual. In oursharing, we can witness to adifferent, more compassionateeconomics. This may well set ourfeet on a different journey. In thecourse of his three-year ministry,Jesus moved from private faith topublic witness, from personalcomfort to shared vulnerability,from self-sufficiency to interde-pendence. It is the journey ofdiscipleship he is always calling usto join him on. l

Kathy Galloway is Head of Christian Aid Scotland,

and a former Leader of the Iona Community. She is

the author of many books, including Sharing the

Blessing: Overcoming Poverty and Working for

Justice, SPCK, and Living by the Rule: the Rule of the

Iona Community, Wild Goose Publications,

www.ionabooks.com. David McNair is Head of

Growth, Equity and Livelihoods at Save the Children

UK. Previously, he led Christian Aid's tax and

development work. He is writing in a personal

capacity.

Photo: the Monymusk Reliquary, National Museum

of Scotland, by David Coleman

between rich and poor are smaller,community life is stronger. Not only arepeople more likely to trust each otherin societies where equality is greater,but there is less violence, health isbetter and life expectancy longer,levels of education among childrentend to be higher and there is moresocial mobility. Public policy could beintentional in recognising the value ofrelationships for a stable society. Thismight affect how we view our homes –rather than as a way of generatingunearned income through ever-increasing property values, we mightview houses as a habitat in which weflourish.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus told hisdisciples that they were no longer hisservants; now they were his friends. Hewas not withholding knowledge orpower from them; what he was doingwas transparent, open, shared. Many ofthe abuses of power evident in thefinancial crisis involved thewithholding of information andknowledge, and collusion with thatwithholding. We cannot be personalfriends with everyone, but we can holdon to the friendship values ofacceptance, exchange, openness andtrust in others.

A faith response to economic crisisrequires us to challenge inequality andaffirm mutuality.

YOU DID NOT CHOOSE ME BUT ICHOSE YOU …

In this crisis, there is a temptation tohide away in our churches and inprivate religion or personal spirituality.But Jesus came to show how muchGod loved the world, so we must turnagain to the world. This goes to theheart of our confession of faith. Wecannot proclaim Jesus Christ the Lordof life, and not stand against all thatdenies the promise of abundant life tothe world. Alone we can achieve little –but God has given us the church: aChristian community of shared lifeexperiences, which, in the power of theHoly Spirit, fosters committed faith andenables the individual to criticise andchallenge the status quo.

Our words must be consistent with ourlives and actions as a community. If weare not caring for the neighbours

Faslane Easter witnessfor peace

John Harvey

Barbed wire fence at Faslane ©

David Coleman

coracle 10summer 2012news/feature

I was immediately drawn to what looked like a model of a village in thehallway of the typical Bogotá house we had entered, the office of ChristianAid partner Justicia Y Paz. The model was about one metre square in size;the village consisted of eight huts on little stilts, each hut had a shinycorrugated metal roof. The area surrounding the huts was dotted withtrees and a few chicken coops that even held little model chickens. Therewas a sign on the perimeter fence that contained this village, but mybeginner Spanish was not yet proficient enough to interpret it.

Our host, Father Juliana, a Redemptorist priest, entered the hallway andembraced us with his smile. He noticed our interest in the model andthrough interpreted Spanish explained that this was a model of a ‘humani-tarian zone’. The sign said ‘No one with arms may enter. This area is protectedby the precautions of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.’

What initially appeared to be a quaint little model was now representativeof a courageous response to a grim reality for many living in Colombia. 5.2million people are internally displaced in Colombia, the highest number inany country in the world. The first humanitarian zones were establishedafter hundreds of families had been forced from their homes by paramili-taries and/or the military in a land-grabbing move by palm-oil growers.With Colombia’s abundance of mineral resources, demand for the land hasnot lessened. The humanitarian zones provide an opportunity for familiesto regroup against the risk of displacement and to re-establish their liveson the land that has much more than monetary value to them.

A satchel, hat and scarf hang on the wall of the landing in the Justicia YPaz offices as a memorial. These items were all that was recovered fromthe field from which the campesino who owned them had disappeared.Justicia Y Paz provides accompaniment for the displaced populations(peasant, indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities) with the aim toforming the humanitarian zones. They have a strong human rights focus,offering legal advice, and have had groundbreaking success taking casesthrough the Inter-American legal system.

Father Juliana explained that campesino communities and the humanrights activists they support often require international protectiveaccompaniment. He conveyed his sincere appreciation of this accompa-niment, but with some sadness asked why the life of a campesino shouldbe seen as of less worth than that of an international accompanier. We hadjust visited Peace Brigades International (PBI), another Christian Aidpartner, prior to visiting Justicia Y Paz. PBI provides just such protectiveaccompaniment, and produces useful analyses of the complex politicalsituation in the country and carries out important representational andadvocacy work. Their energy and commitment to the cause of humanrights is challenging and inspiring to say the least.

There are those who, having been displaced, cannot foresee returning tothe land: the only option for them is a move to the city. So the informalsettlements positioned precariously on the steep hills of Bogotá’s suburbscontinue to grow. We visited one such settlement with Christian Aidpartner Mencoldes, the Mennonite Development Foundation. This visitprovided a close look at the challenges of living in such unstablesurrounds. It wasn’t hard to imagine the deluge and destruction following

9 coracle summer 2012news

one of Colombia’s convectionalrainstorms, as we stood lookingdown the steep dirt tracks into thevalley. In the valley floor stood astagnant lake where the communitywashed their clothes. Only two ofthe numerous surrounding hills werenot densely packed with the homesof migrants. One hill was an openquarry, and the dust from the lorriesand diggers blew across the valley asthey carted off Colombia’s mineralwealth for the benefit of otherselsewhere. Another hill lay eerilybare, but for one isolated tree.Disaster risk reduction work, which isbuilding resilience to futureincidence of flooding, is a relativelyrecent endeavour of Mencoldes. Likemany Christian Aid partners acrossthe world they are having to includeadaptation to the effects of climatechange into their remit of work.

The bare hill with the isolated tree,known locally as ‘the hanging tree’,was a powerful reminder of whatbrought Mencoldes to work in thisarea in the first instance. The hill is avisual reminder of the paramilitarypresence in the area. Should anyonetry to build a home on this hill itwould be burned down the nextday. It is the vision of Mencoldes toprovide an alternative toparamilitary involvement for theyoung people of this area.Paramilitary recruitment offers asecure income, albeit by illegalmeans, and a sense of identity.Mencoldes seeks to provide a morepeaceful and positive sense ofpurpose. Their Centre for Culture andHope sits juxtaposed to the bare hillwith the solitary tree. Offeringlifeskills workshops and creative artsprogrammes, they are helpingyoung people gain confidence andbelief that they have other optionsin life. They also work to challengethe culture of domestic abuse, andseek to expose the selective assassi-

nation of young people in southernBogotá by illegal armed groups.

The joined-up nature of the workof Christian Aid partners inColombia impressed me greatly.Each of the partners had a visionfor helping people at the variousstages in the experience ofdisplacement, with the humanrights activists and lawyersdedicated to exposing andchallenging the ingrained injustice.

Catherine, my colleague in theBogotá office, reminded me of ourprivilege ‘not to speak on behalf ofthe poor, but to amplify their voices’.Their voices beckon us on topersevere in the cause ofchallenging injustice and endinginequality.

After admiring the model of thehumanitarian zone in the hallway,we were invited into a meetingroom, where we heard the storiesof success and frustration inJusticia Y Paz’s work. Amongstthese stories, we heard thepersonal accounts of why the staff,human rights lawyers, journalistsand theologians were involved inthis work. Some felt duty-bound bytheir faith to respond to the need,and others had been moved to actafter losing close friends and familymembers in the ‘internal armedconflict’. They concluded withwords that would have moved usto tears if we hadn’t already beenweeping: ‘Despite the thumps, wekeep singing.’ l

To find out more about Christian Aid’s work in

Colombia and to help support its partners there:

http://www.christianaid.org.uk/whatwedo/the-

americas/colombia.aspx

www.christianaid.org.uk

‘Justicia’ photo by Wendy Young

I feel a bit like George MacLeod, although I’m not particularly tall, norweighty of mien, nor holder of the Military Cross for bravery atPasschendaele and Ypres. I don’t recall ever having been Moderator of theGeneral Assembly of the Church of Scotland, or rescuing Iona Abbey fromruin. And I’m certainly, so far at least, neither a Lord nor dead. Plus, I’mEnglish! However, when I lived in Edinburgh exile – way back in the 1980s – Iremember how Lord George, leaning emphatically on his cane (so far I don’thave one of those either) would challenge the entire Church Assembly overnuclear weapons. Year in. Year out. Hopeless, year in. Hopeless, year out. Thereceived wisdom of the day was that, without nuclear arms, enormous gun-toting Soviet atheists would be gaily trampling down the flowers inBellahouston Park, snowy boots, Communist Manifesto, clinking bottles ofvodka and all.

Abruptly, one magical year (1986, was it?), those of us supporting George onthe pavement outside the Assembly felt a sudden frisson. The old soldierhad stood to his duty one last time and the gathered Elders had suddenlycapitulated: ‘Have you heard? They’re voting through a motion condemningnuclear weapons as anti-Christian!’ Water on stone? Georgic frustration? Thespirit, holy or otherwise? The one vital thing was that Lord George hadpersisted and, billionth snowflake, hundredth monkey, ripest banana orwhatever, the critical moment had arrived.

Well, a (very little) bit like MacLeod, since the turn of the millennium, I'vebeen banging on about an idea whose time has clearly come, but to whichwe remain largely and confusingly indifferent: One Planet, One People. Afterall, it’s obvious, isn’t it?: we are all profoundly interdependent: in personalrelationships, family, local community, nation and, beyond all else, on ourone exquisite, exquisitely fragile earth. Independence is fine, especially fromoppressive systems of governance and exploitation, but blinkered individ-ualism? It’s precisely because our individual fingers and thumbs arephysically linked in exquisite harmony that our hands are such marvelloustools. Exactly so, we humans are essentially and inseparablyindividual/communal. Essentially and inseparably. It’s of our very essence.And it makes us beautiful – and capable of so much beauty.

ONE PLANET ONE PEOPLE

So what do we have?: a rather splendid Universal Declaration of HumanRights, coupled with some pretty anodyne entities supposedlyimplementing it, overwhelmed by a dominant system that relentlesslydenies those rights to the majority of the world’s people and peoples. And,obviously, and correlatively, a planet going down in flames. Politicians liveon too short a leash to make great ideals concrete and genuinely universal.Practically all the great movements of history have come from the people,from below not from above: Rosa Parks, Nelson Mandela, Julia Ward Howe,the Pankhursts …

And now: One Planet, One People. Could it be us?! The fire this time?

Does anyone else remember Greenham Common? If George MacLeod wastrying to climb a gumtree, imagine how the women who staggered up tothat air base after their long anti-nuclear march felt. A Welsh group, ‘Womenfor Life on Earth’, their ‘little march’ was instantly consigned to obscurity by

‘We keep singing’Wendy Young

Wendy Young, Education and Church Development Officer with Christian AidScotland, reflects on a recent field trip to Colombia, where she met with ChristianAid partners defending human rights under threats of imprisonment and death.

One Planet One People Friend of the Iona Community Paul Baker Hernandez –activist, musician, Echoes of Silence founder andauthor of ‘A Declaration of Interdependence’ – writesfrom Managua on Earth Day …

Paul Baker Hernandez

coracle 12summer 2012

feature

11 coracle summer 2012feature

the hacks of corporatocracy. But(and is this the key?) the womenwould have none of it: theydecided to stay ‘for as long as ittakes’. And so they set up camps atGreenham’s very gates. And so theychanged the world, so became thelegendary heart of the UK anti-nuclear movement. And nineteenlong years later, the cruise missileswere gone. Nineteen years – ‘for aslong as it takes’. And today, wheneven nuclear weapons pale besidethe actual ongoing destruction ofthe planet – occurring right now aswe breathe – where are ourGreenhams?

For a start, what about working toget this implemented:

A DECLARATION OF INTERDEPENDENCE: ONE PLANET, ONE PEOPLE

‘We, the peoples and people of thisone exquisite – and exquisitelyfragile – planet hold these truths tobe self-evident:

That all persons – children, womenand men, of every race, calling, creed,colour, condition and age – arecreated equal. There are noexceptions.

That they, collectively andindividually, are endowed withcertain inalienable rights. Amongthese are life, liberty and the pursuitof happiness.

That the fundamental sources andresources to achieve these rights –peace without threat, force orweapons, pure air, fresh water, anuncontaminated earth, nourishingfood, good health, creativeeducation, a secure home, equitablejustice, local and global responsi-bility, authentic, proportionate,participative representation andworthwhile work – also belonginalienably to them all, for ever.

That this inheritance – theseresources truly without price – cannever be taken over or away byindividuals, classes, corporationsand/or states for their own exclusiveor majority use, exploitation, profit orcontrol.

Rather, that it is the marvellous giftand responsibility of every humangeneration to enjoy and utilise theseresources with respect and delight, ininterdependence with all peoplesand with the whole multitude ofspecies, both animal and plant, withwhich we co-inhabit this tiny, fragileplanet.

And, within that gift, to hand themon, enhanced, to the children of ourchildren’s children.’

So, yet another worthy documentto gather yet more cyber-dust insome remote cyber-archive onsome distant cyber-planet?

But, if we add – and act on – this:

‘To make this Declaration reality wetherefore require our employees, thegovernments of the world, to re-allocate at least 1% of all budgetscurrently dedicated to the military,war and the arms trade –money,materials and especially the creativelives and expertise of theirmembers – to bring fresh water toeveryone on earth. And to redress thefemale/male/racial imbalance atevery level.

Not only will these measures help re-green the planet and avert loomingwars over water, so much moreprecious than oil, but also, bybeginning the deliberate build-downof weapons, will mark a vital psycho-logical turning point for humanity,especially in the true honouring ofwomen, other so-called ‘minorities’,children, and all who have given theirlives for peace.

Further, it will improve global healthdramatically, saving additional vastquantities of resources and freeingup armies of skilled personnel forurgent medical and other tasks.

Finally, it will at last provide, in thewonder of a healed, balanced andcooperative planet, a truly fittingmemorial to all those who gave theirlives believing their sacrifice would atlast “end all wars”.’

But we have to act. It is up to us. ‘Ifnot now, then when? If not us, thenwho?’ But how do we, charmingthough we may be (yet so

insidiously corroded by Me Firstconsumerism), even begin to takeaction as seriously as the women ofGreenham or George MacLeod? OnePlanet, One People. Forget Earth Day.Every day is Earth Day. There arecritical moments in every life. This isone such moment for the entireplanet, for all of humanity. In theGreenham women’s and LordGeorge’s spirit, we must act boldly. Tohave a habitable planet for ourchildren, we must commit ourselvesas they did to ‘as long as it takes’. Ittruly is a matter of life and death.

I’m lucky – for all its imperfections,Nicaragua today is some way tobecoming an enormous peace camp.So many of the MacLeod/Greenhammeasures are beginning to beimplemented here: peace,cooperation, solidarity, free education,free universal health care, women’srights, children’s rights, the healing ofimpoverishment, of community, of thevery planet. All within the context of aLatin America suddenly on fire,throwing off the increasinglycatastrophic US/European Way ofDeath in order to build a truly humanand humane world, based oncooperation and environmentalintelligence rather than the self-consuming, criminal cancer of dog-eat-dog capitalism. (For moreinformation on this, search: ALBA, theBolivarian Alliance for the Peoples ofOur America; and CELAC, Community ofLatin American and Caribbean States.)

Expecting to go out with a whimper, Ifind myself suddenly riding thisglorious bang. How lucky can you get?And if that luck holds, I’ll be givingLord George an enthusiastic high fivein some distant eternity! But for thosewho can't get over here, share in thatluck, the excitement: how to bring thisoptimism and creativity to our jadedNorth? To begin with, how aboutgetting your school, college, faithcommunity, union, local council,business … to formally adopt theDeclaration of Interdependence, andto commit to some or all of thefollowing:

l Call on all MPs, MEPs, Members ofCongress, etc to offer this Declaration,

and its related actions, to our ownnations, to the EuropeanCommunity and other such unions,to the world’s militaries, and to theentire international community, tobe formally adopted.

l Call on them, and on the UN, todeclare an annual GlobalInterdependence Day

l Spread the Declaration relent-lessly – through the web,independent media, articles, radio,TV. (And I’m always ready to comeand discuss all this and sing a fewditties.)

l Set up Interdependence circlesand camps to campaign for itspromulgation, acceptance andimplementation. (Could thisbecome an Occupy theme?)

l And challenge the news mediaeverywhere to cover these greatLatin American initiatives which,again imperfectly and embryon-ically, are actually offering afunctioning alternative humanesystem to the whole world.

George MacLeod focused on oneburning issue. How about if weeach pick one action idea and work‘for as long as it takes’ ?

The earth itself is our mostcompelling advocate: alreadyNicaragua is enduring vastthunderstorms, a month beforetheir normal time; globally, there’smuch more to come. The writing isfirmly on the wall, but we arepeople of hope, not fear. We onlyhave one life – why piddle it awayon childish consumerism whenthere’s Occupy’s glorious vision andALBA’s alternative reality toimplement – to celebrate? Aren'tthese the wonderful continuationand celebration not only of theGreenham women’s/MacLeod’swork, but also of the millions ofpeople like ourselves all round theworld, moiling away unseen andunremarked, day in, day out, forlove, for justice and peace, forbeauty?

One Planet, One People! We are thefuture. Where else will we find one?

PRAYER TO A LABOURER

Stand up and seeThe wonder of the mountainSource of the sun, the water, and the wild wind.

Stand up and seeThese hands With which you labour;Stretch out, grow tall,Join hands with your sisters And your brothers,Working together, By deepest blood united,Knowing together, The future can be now!

Victor Jara, from his song ‘Prayer to a Labourer’ l

Paul Baker Hernandez was thrown out of his

Trappist monastery for secretly making a guitar from

a toilet seat and other recycled oddments. 40 years

on, his guitar has led him to invade queen’s castles

over nuclear weapons (heading up a posse of

bishops), sing protest songs to Popes, join Jackson

Browne and Martin Sheen on Central American picket

lines, and help fight off death squads attacking

Salvadoran exiles in Los Angeles.

He now lives in a marginalised neighbourhood of

Managua where he helps dig eco-water ditches, and

makes up rude songs about cellphones, Starbucks and

other dictators. He takes regular tours of the US,

Canada and the UK to raise awareness and funds for

the work of Echoes of Silence.

Echoes of Silence – ‘artists with dirt under their

fingernails’ – works to build peace with justice,

through beauty and concrete action. Beauty offers a

glimpse of wholeness, keeping alive the vision of a

healed world, and moving people profoundly to take

concrete actions to make peace-filled justice. Echoes

emphasises the arts as vital channels for communi-

cation and interchange. We particularly support

projects to end war, to reduce global warming, and

to build community information and action

networks locally, nationally and internationally.

For more information:

http://echoesofsilence-ecosdelsilencio.pbworks.com

To hear some of Paul’s music:

http://www.myspace.com/paulbakerhernandez

For an interview with Paul:

http://www.prx.org/pieces/74938

* Paul will be in Scotland/UK in December/January,

offering lectures, workshops and cultural presen-

tations about Nicaragua, ALBA and the new

sustainable world order. Book now at

paulbaker2004@yahoo.com

‘For as long as it takes’ …‘… So many of theMacLeod/Greenhammeasures are beginning tobe implemented here:peace, cooperation,solidarity, free education,free universal health care,women’s rights, children’srights, the healing ofimpoverishment, ofcommunity, of the veryplanet. All within thecontext of a Latin Americasuddenly on fire, throwingoff the increasinglycatastrophic US/EuropeanWay of Death in order tobuild a truly human andhumane world, based oncooperation and environ-mental intelligence ratherthan the self-consuming,criminal cancer of dog-eat-dog capitalism …’

– Paul Baker Hernandez,Managua, Nicaragua

Photo: Paul on an Echoes of Silence tour in Canada,

photo ©

It is both a great honour and a great responsibility to be with you at a timelike this. Your willingness to journey through the death of three Churches intothe birth of a new Church, your courage to live and work with difference, youropenness to wait on God for the fruitfulness which the Spirit will bring is forus an inspiration.

I choose to speak on the theme: ‘Vulnerability as the heart of transformation’.These are not my words but those of our Anglican Archbishop, RowanWilliams.

I have also chosen to speak in the context of a question: ‘What could ourexperience of the human body, and in particular the experience of those of uswho live with impairments, physical and psychological, bring to our beingreshaped within the Body of Christ?’

‘We are,’ as the Psalmist said, ‘wondrously made’ (Ps 139:14). The human bodyhas infinite pathways of communication, memories stored up in organs andcells. The body is our teacher, yet we are so slow in our learning, in ourlistening, and in our being gentle with it.

THE JOURNEY FROM THE CENTRE TO THE EDGE

For much of my life I have taken my body for granted, enjoyed sport, lovedwalking in the mountains, and through most of my working life, and to myshame, worked all hours. In 1987 I commenced my work as Chairman of theBirmingham District of the Methodist Church. Five years later, my experienceof living with my body changed. I was told that I have a developingdegenerative disc disease. There have been three major spinal operations,including the implanting of scaffolding to support the spine. I live withcontinuing pain and physical limitation. I am unable to stand or sit for morethan a few minutes.

I asked those in authority in the Methodist Church for help to minister from achair, a ministry of stability and availability, and was told that to be a minister Imust be mobile and be able to work a three-shift day. I was confused, I wasangry and I wept.

The journey away from the centre of the busy life of the church to the edgewas, paradoxically, a journey deeper into the heart of things. It wasunexpected, unwanted and yet became a frightening liberation.

What were the fears? The letting go of identity, role and relationships. Livingwith the new aloneness, the new silence, the new limitation. Living withfeelings of marginalisation and abandonment, and living with the death ofthe old life, and not being able to imagine a new life with meaning andpurpose.

During this time, a Jesuit priest, Gerry Hughes, came to visit me and webegan to explore what was happening and to interpret the meaning. Heaccompanied me in this way for nearly 10 years. He helped me both to builda bridge into the future and later to let go dreams and wishes, and to facethe emptiness and the waiting within weakness.

Waiting with openness for what is new is not easy. In this experience webecome pilgrims. Gerry spoke of the journey from the centre into the

Behind the reception desk of the Santa Maria de Fe Hotel in Paraguay isa book entitled ‘Odd Jobs’. The cover has a photograph of a middle-agedwoman sniffing the armpit of a younger man. The book is for theexclusive use of past or potential voluntary General Assistants at IonaAbbey or the MacLeod Centre.

It is from the village of Santa Maria de Fe that for several yearsvolunteers have come. Guests on Iona during that period may know thedistinctive names of Rufino, Fabiana, Dario, Maria Gloria, Liliana, Milciadesor Elida, all of whom share the common denominators of belonging tothat village, speaking Guarani (the indigenous language), Spanish andEnglish, and knowing Margaret Hebblethwaite. People who read TheTablet may recognise her as a former associate editor of that publication,or may know her from a number of books on spirituality and theology.

Margaret is an English Roman Catholic who felt drawn to live in thisimpoverished Paraguayan village and discern by what means she mightencourage the life of people who not only in ancient history but in morerecent times had been demeaned and persecuted.

Santa Maria de Fe is one of 30 pueblos, or villages, which grew uparound 17th-century Jesuit missions commonly called the ‘Reductions’.The term is highly deceptive. It does not infer that the locals wereoppressed by the Jesuits. Rather, it describes how the indigenous peoplevoluntarily reduced the distance between their habitations in order tosettle in communities near the Jesuit churches, where they wereevangelised by people who honoured their distinctive culture and, insome ways, prevented them from being enslaved as many other NativeAmericans were.

The small museum which sits on the opposite side of the village squarefrom the hotel bears witness to how exactly the Jesuits encouragedindigenisation. Beautiful statues of Christ, the Virgin and a variety ofsaints were sculpted by a progressive Italian called Brassanelli, whosegreat gift was to move from conventionally passive sculptural images tothose which, despite being made of wood or plaster, exhibit energy. Hisnative apprentices were encouraged to emulate the style, but more, tomake the effigies look like locals. Thus long before Vatican II encouragedthe indigenisation of religious artwork, the people of Santa Maria had aJesus who looked every much a Guarani as one of them.

In subsequent years Paraguay endured wars against a triple alliance of

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coracle 14summer 2012

travellingfolk/featureVulnerability as the heart

of transformationBrazil, Argentina and Uruguay, andin the early twentieth century theChaco War with Bolivia. Its bordersshrank, but the southeasternprovince, called Los Misiones,remained intact. With a smallscattered population (6.2 millionat the moment), a land massalmost twice that of the UnitedKingdom, no seaboard and littleby way of mineral wealth, thenation’s continued poverty owesmuch to the corruption of thedictatorship of General AlfredoStroessner, which lasted from 1954to 1989. During this period realand suspected dissidents weretortured and murdered and thebasic Christian communities whichdeveloped in the 1970s wereregarded as subversive. There arepeople in Santa Maria who stillbear the physical and mental scarsor unrequited grief from thatperiod.

Bringing no ready-made answers,but allowing the community tobenefit from her experience andskills, Margaret Hebblethwaite hasenabled great transitions tohappen. The hotel is one of herprojects, both giving work to localpeople and providing a place ofhospitality in a small town whichhas no other such accommo-dation. Another project hasinvolved the resourcing of anInstitute of further learningthrough the Santa MariaEducation Fund. This enables localpeople, free of charge, to study fortheir own interest, and awardsbursaries for university education.One of the cultural innovationshas been the provision of teachersof violin and Paraguayan harp sothat children may learn bothhistoric classical and indigenousstyles of playing. On my visit I wasprivileged to hear four teenagersgive a private recital of nationalharp music which was of

A place of modest miracles: Santa Maria de Fe Hotel, Paraguay

John L. Bell broadcasting standard.

Through her initiative, youngpeople who could never dream ofgoing abroad have been given theopportunity to come to Iona toimprove their English languageskills and to gain experience ofworking in a place of hospitality.Rufino, who was on Iona six yearsago, is now the manager of a 23-bed hotel and is both studyingand teaching in a local university.Maria Gloria and Milciades, whoare more recent ex-vollies, sharethe management of the SantaMaria Hotel, translate with greatagility from Spanish and Guaraniinto English, and introduce gueststo the variety of opportunities inthe area.

For people who would like adifferent break in a small countrywith a distinctive culture, and whodon’t mind hearing the occasionalcock crow at 4 in the morning, thisplace – with its sharedcommitment to the values of theIona Community – is worthvisiting. l

For information on accommodation, tour weeks, etc:

http://www.santamariahotel.org/index.php/en/

For the best guide to the nation: Paraguay by

Margaret Hebblethwaite, Bradt Guides, 2010

For an insight into local life: With Love from Santa

Maria by Margaret Hebblethwaite, Darton, Longman

and Todd, 2012

John L. Bell is the author and editor of many books,

including collections of songs from the world

church. He is a member of the Iona Community and

of the Wild Goose Resource Group.

Photo: Maria Gloria and Milciades, by John L. Bell

Donald Eadie

Phot

o: Ou

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e the

San

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aria

Hot

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John

L. B

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An address given to the Vinter Konferens, Stockholm,2011. The theme of the conference was ‘En Kyrka utanväggar’ (‘A Church without walls’) …

15 coracle summer 2012feature

borderlands. ‘The borderlands,’ hesaid, ‘are the place of explorationand discovery; they are the newcentre.’

‘There will be new companions,’ awise old friend promised. And tomy great surprise and joy this hasbeen true. I have met wonderfulpeople I never knew existed. I haveencountered propheticcommunities. Much of my timewas, and still is, lived in a lovedroom. And people began to cometo the room, not for counselling ortherapy but as those who are alsopilgrims within the borderlands.

Some seek the life-giving presenceof God within this wondrous andterrifying world, and within thestory of our lives. Others seek helpto live their faithfulness to Godwithin complex and ambiguoussituations. Some are bruised andoppressed through different formsof religious bullying yet live with apoignant sense of the ‘otherness’and the intimacy of God, and ask ifthis is enough. Others appear to bebeyond the reach of the Church yethave spiritual needs and ask faithquestions. ‘This room has becomemy church,’ one person said. Andmonths later: ‘No, the world hasbecome my church.’ Physicallimitation, perhaps even divinecalling, brings us to a marginalisedplace. It becomes for some of us aconversion experience.

A director of mission fromRotterdam also visited my room. Hespoke of our listening to the voicesof people and communities on themargins of society as the missionpriority. ‘The borderlands,’ he said,‘are the context where God’s Spiritworks to convert the Church.’

THE CONNECTION BETWEEN OURBODY AND THE BODY OF CHRIST

And second: I speak of theconnection between ourexperience of our body and theBody of Christ. We areunderstandably hesitant to makethese connections. For Paul, theimagery of the body is central toboth his experience and histeaching.

‘We are all brought into the onebody by baptism’ (1 Cor 12:13).

‘When we break bread, is it not ameans of sharing in the Body ofChrist?’ (1 Cor 10:17).

God’s call, says Paul, is to be drawninto the mystery of the Body ofChrist, to share in his life, suffering,death and resurrection. ‘We carry inthe body the death of Jesus so thatthe life of Jesus may also be madevisible in our body’ (2 Cor 4:10).

The power of the resurrection isonly experienced through sufferingand the cross. This perplexingmystery belongs to the way of Godin the world. ‘The continuingpassion of God in the world,’ aSouth African friend said, ‘is carriednot in abstract ideas but in ourhuman bodies and souls, in ourwillingness to absorb evil, suffering,grief and shame willingly.’

I want to introduce you to some ofthose new companions who havehelped me to make theseconnections. In 1997 a group ofpriests, women in religious orders,and Methodist ministers, all livingwith physical or psychologicalimpairments, began to meettogether in Birmingham. We stillcome together four or five times ayear.

There have been 12 of us, amongthem Angela, an AustralianFranciscan nun who lives with MSand is in a wheelchair; Bob, anAnglican priest, who also has MSand is in a wheelchair; Stan, aMethodist minister who has livedfor many years with the illnesscalled depression, and now liveswith cancer; Kath, his wife; Bernie, aLa Retraite sister living with asevere spinal condition and withpain; John, an Anglican parishpriest, and his wife, Jo, who wasborn with cerebral palsy and is in awheelchair and communicatesthrough a small light-pointerattached to her head, which beamsonto a qwerty keyboard on her lap.

In this group we explore themystery and meaning of our ownsuffering. We are real, and notheroic, we listen with acceptance

and without judgements and learnfrom the discoveries and insights ofothers, and we seek the resources tolive honestly and compassionatelywithin places of darkness, weariness,frustration, pain and vulnerability. It isour experience that the Church speaksmuch of pain and suffering but isembarrassed by it.

What are we learning?We are learningfrom the experience of dependency; forsome this means dependency onothers for the toilet, for the washing notonly of our feet but of the whole body,for receiving food and drink, for beingdressed and undressed. We knowsomething of being stripped of roles,responsibilities and masks, ofnakedness and exposure, of the loss ofdignity, and of humiliation.

Jesus at the end of his life was alsostripped, stretched horizontal on across, and handed over to others, and inhis final hours is shown as almostnaked. We are beginning to makeconnections between his physicalvulnerability and our own experienceof weakness. And more, we arediscovering theological and spiritualmeaning within this experience of ourbodies.

We are learning from our experience ofpain, of physical and psychological paininterconnected within the memory ofthe body. We are critical of a Westernmedical culture that sees pain as simplysomething to be got rid of,anaesthetised, zapped. We are learningthat pain can be a message. Weconsider the place of pain in theChristian pilgrimage.

We are drawn into a contemplation ofthe Passion of Jesus, what his bodybore within that journey, the receivingof the help offered by Simon of Cyrene,the offer and refusal of the druggedwine, the women watching, the soldiersand others drinking and jeering.

We live with the mystery that there arethose in the world who are the ‘pain-bearers’, and that sometimes somegood comes out of all that suffering,and this has its place in the redemptiveprocess. We use the feeling of solidaritywith others in pain – victims ofearthquakes, floods, hurricanes,tsunamis, HIV/AIDS, TB – as a focus for

prayer. Sometimes we catch glimpses of God in pain.

We are learning from our experience of depression. One person says: ‘I’vefound a oneness with people with all sorts of mental difficulties. I’ve founda wisdom in insanity that I miss very much now that I’m back in the so-called sane world.’ And another speaks of living in ‘a kind of chemicalisednumbness, within which he is learning the presence and goodness of Godwithin the sense of the absence of God’.

We are learning that theology must not be left to those who are fit andstrong. Theology must also be wrestled for through pain and disability:these are the raw materials of our encounters with a mysterious, silent,hidden and powerless God.

We are also learning from something utterly central to our meetings: welaugh and laugh; we leave the meetings energised and with a deeperhope and trust. This is the group where, above all, we are able to beourselves, and show others who we really are.

RECEIVING THREATENING GIFTS

And finally I speak of receiving threatening, dangerous gifts which couldtransform.

It is our experience that the Church finds it difficult to receive the gifts ofGod through those who live with impairments. We are ‘an uncomfortablepresence’. In the story of Jesus washing the feet of his disciples and SimonPeter’s difficulty in accepting this, it is as if Jesus is saying to us ‘If you arenot able to receive you can no longer be a disciple of mine’ (Jn 13:1–20).

Openness to receive the gifts of God through encounters which maythreaten us includes the possibility of transformation, as Simon Peterdiscovered in his encounter with the Gentile Cornelius (Acts 10:1–48), andas Jesus discovered with the Samaritan woman at the well (Jn 4:1–15).

I want to introduce you to more of those ‘new companions’, this time in thecontext of Sarum College, a theological college near the beautifulCathedral in Salisbury. We have had three conferences there and indifferent ways explored the faith journey of the impaired pilgrim. On eachoccasion there have been between 20 and 30 people.

And among them: Susi, a wheelchair user, a former nurse who workedbriefly on the Afghan border of Pakistan. Gordon, a wheelchair user, livingwith MS, a lecturer in the Physics Department of Birmingham University,dependent on the care of his wife, Dot. Anne, who is on the autismspectrum and is Autism Consultant for the Diocese of Oxford. Sally,another wheelchair user with MS, formerly a teacher of religiouseducation, with her husband and carer, Gerald. Ros, a wheelchair user, aMethodist mission partner in Nigeria, a pioneer in mental health provision,a spiritual director. And Peter, who lives with a spinal condition and withchronic pain, and who had to retire early as a minister. His thesis on thespirituality that emerges from impairment speaks of ‘dangerous gifts’,threatening gifts, challenging the traditional view of God and of God’sworld.

What are the gifts of those living with impairments? We bring ourexperience of darkness as the context of hidden growing and transfor-mation. We bring our calling to go into the fearful places without beingimprisoned by fear. We bring our experience of fragility, of physicalweakness, of what it means to trust, and of the mystery of strengtheningwithin our continuing reality. We bring our experience of restorationthrough touch, embrace and holding, and of an inner healing which isdeeper than physical healing. We bring our experience of our bodies, asource of wonder, pleasure and pain, the dwelling place of God, where wemeet God in the here and now of our actual humanity.

We bring our experience of waiting,waiting into the unknown. We bring ourexperience of anger. We bring faithjourneys which sometimes include theexperience of dereliction, of God-forsakenness, of being apparentlywithout faith in order to grow in faith.We bring our experience of playfulness,of humour, of laughter.

We bring our discovery of bread on theedge and of wells of water under ourfeet, in desert and destitution, as didboth Elijah (1 Ki 17:1–7) and the slavegirl Hagar before us (Gen 21: 8–20).Consecrated food from heaven is notconfined to lie under white cloths inour churches.

We bring these gifts and many others,not as victims but as liberators.

CONCLUSION

I have come with a story of a journeyfrom the centre to the edge, of makingconnections between our experience ofbody and the Body of Christ, and ofreceiving threatening gifts which couldtransform. And to share in your conver-sations. And with my own questions toyou: What does the journey towardtransformation through vulnerabilitymean in your situation? What are yourstories of frightening liberation? How canyour transforming journey as Churchesbecome a sign of transformation in yoursociety, the showing of a different way, adifferent paradigm? The world has aright to say to the church: ‘Unless I seethe marks of the nails in your hands, Iwill not believe’ (Stanley Magobe,Methodist Church in Southern Africa). l

Donald Eadie is the author of Grain in Winter: Reflections

for Saturday People (Epworth Press). He is also an occasional

contributor to Wild Goose books. He is a friend of the Iona

Community.

St John’s Cross, Iona © David Colem

an

coracle 18summer 2012

feature

17 coracle summer 2012feature

‘Immortal, invisible, God only wise, In dim light, inaccessible, hid from my eyes.Most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days,If the words just would come to me, your name I would praise’ …

I stop singing and the congregation carries on without me. I stand lost inmy own thoughts in the dimly lit church, clutching a copy of HymnsAncient and Modern. I remember the words of the first verse (with just afew alterations!) but the second and third verse elude my memory, and all Ican see of the page is the hymn number (conveniently typed in large boldprint) and a number of grey squiggles, which I assume must be the words.At least I can just about tell how many verses there are as there are spacesbetween the squiggles.

I am visiting a local church. I had asked on my way in if there were anylarge-print books and service sheets available. ‘Yes,’ came the answer, ‘wedo have some large-print sheets with the readings on, for some of ourregular elderly worshippers.’ Reluctantly, it seemed, he handed over thesheet. I felt guilty: I am not elderly and not a regular.

The readings and psalms are indeed in quite large print, not so the hymnand service books however. As I look around I am aware that, at the age of52, I am the youngest in the church by at least two decades. This interestsme greatly. I wonder: how do others in the congregation cope with smallprint? Surely, when you consider that over 65 percent of people diagnosedwith a visual impairment are aged over 65, some of the people around memust be affected, especially by conditions such as macular disease, whichaffects the central vision and the ability to read small print. Perhaps theyjust have a much better memory than I do! Over 250,000 people in the UKare currently registered with macular disease.

EXPERIENCES OF WORSHIP, CHURCH AND FAITH

This unimpressive Sunday morning has led me to think more aboutworship and how having limited vision can affect our ability to participate.

Mike and I emailed some people with a visual impairment, who areinvolved with research, and asked them about church and worship. Anniewas the first to respond:

I only get to church now when someone has time (or remembers) to pick meup. Walking there on my own would be too difficult now as it means crossingseveral roads. When I go people make a great fuss of me, but it is hard now tojoin in in the way I used to. They have everything projected onto a screen atthe front of the church – the words of the hymns and prayers – and of course Icannot see them now. I can’t really see people’s faces either; so often, at theend of a service, I can’t see who I am talking to. I am a bit of a spare part really.Not useful for anything!

When you lose sight, just getting to church is a major hurdle, but thechallenges do not stop there. Sarah emails:

As you know, I had huge issues with my faith when I lost my sight. I foundpeople treated me very differently. I felt patronised and ignored. I had alwaysbeen the one who supported others, now I found myself as the one who wascared for, or not, as the case usually was, and I was never asked what wouldactually be helpful.

The church I attended was a busyMethodist Centre where there was ateam of people in charge of takingservices and organising the church, etc.They did have some large-print hymnbooks and service sheets, which were abit helpful, but unfortunately my sightwas so bad that I couldn’t even readthese, especially given that the newlighting system was turned down to‘give soft conducive lighting forworship’, i.e. ‘DIM’. Often I felt totallyexcluded from worship and didn’tknow how to change that. I also feltvery angry with God, and churchcertainly did not feel like the place toshare this. Everyone seemed to betelling me what I should think and feel!One rather earnest young man eventold me he thought that blindnesswould be a good challenge for thehealing group!

Assumptions about what it means tobe ‘blind’ or ‘visually impaired’ areembedded in our society and culture.The word ‘blind’ often hasconnotations in the Bible of sin andpunishment. It is the opposite of‘walking in the light of God’. And yetthe Bible contains some quite diversematerial on the issue of blindnessand visual impairment. Could it be,for example, that St Paul himself wasvisually impaired? We know that hespent some time not being able tosee at all, but there is evidence tosuggest that he continued to livewith partial sight. Also, the book ofTobit is centred on a character who isblind. Yet there is an overwhelmingamount of negative references toblindness in Christian tradition. Butwe need to explore our stories withinscripture in order to be able to tell adifferent story.

What is particularly interesting whentalking with people about theirexperience of faith and visualimpairment is that it is often otherpeople’s reactions that present farmore barriers than faith itself. For

some, the faith journey becomesinternalised, with church playing aless significant role than it mightotherwise have.

Another aspect of worshipping assomeone who is visually impairedis the language of liturgy. Take, forexample, this from a collect in theChurch of England’s Book ofCommon Worship: ‘Open our eyes toglimpse thy glory and our lips to singthy praises with all the angels …’

Most would read this withoutanything but prayerful thoughts.Imagine for a moment, however,what it would be like to read this,or indeed listen to it, when you areblind or losing sight.

Gradually, those writing liturgieshave made them more inclusive togender, but disability, especiallyhearing or sight loss, is still noteven thought about. Even in one ofthe prayers in the Wee WorshipBook, the leader says: ‘You openedour eyes, to see how the hands of therich were empty …’ A metaphorwhich enables people to thinkabout poverty and wealth could,however, make someone who islosing sight feel excluded.

Mo writes: I never realised growingup how sexist the texts were in theBible. I just took it for granted to think‘women’ as well when we prayed forall men. The new prayer book haschanged all of that. For the good Ithink! Now losing my sight, I sit inchurch and hear prayers andreadings which, as surely as eggs areeggs, tell me that being sighted is thenormal thing for a Christian, andthat being blind is definitely not OK.The prayers effortlessly go over theheads of others in the church. Theydo not seem to notice, whereas theword BLIND for me seems to stick outlike a sore thumb.

So there is a challenge here to anyof us who engage in planningworship and writing liturgies.

Mike makes the point that he isvery happy for those who have fullvision, but is happy too with hisless-than-full vision. Happy whenworship celebrates the gift of oursenses, but struggles when there is

an implication that his experienceof vision is negative, or in someway lacking.

For many of us who are visuallyimpaired there is also something inall this about maintaining identity.Mike and I have had many conver-sations about this, and this is justone excerpt where we were talkingabout being valued for who we are:

Mike: ‘I remember one particularexample: I was going into chapel andsomebody who I knew very well washanding out the service books orhymn books, whatever it was, andshe said: “Here’s yours.” And I can’tremember exactly what happened,but I probably said, “I don’t needone.” And I asked her about thisafterwards, and she said, “Well, I don’tthink of you as any different thananybody else.” So that kind of felt likea double issue because she hadaccepted me as part of thecommunity, and treated me exactlythe same, so it felt like theacceptance was not based on who Iwas, but on who perhaps she wantedme to be.That’s a very smallexample.’

Sue: ‘But it’s quite a big thing in a waybecause what she had given youwasn’t helpful for what you needed… She was saying you are just thesame as everyone else, which in onesense was accepting, but in anothersense it was denying you neededanything to enable you to access thethings in the same way …’

In order for worship to beauthentic, it surely must enable theworshipper to engage with Godand others in the present. Thismeans being able to come as weare, celebrating our uniqueness inthe context of our diverse humanexperience. If worship focuses onthe supremacy of one particularway of being, i.e. moving from lackof sight to sight, then the worshipexperience becomes less thanauthentic for the person for whomthis is not possible. If our identity iscaught up in the way in which weengage with the Divine, then itfollows that worship needs to be aspace where we seek wholeness inour present situation.

PRACTICAL STEPS

We want now to explore somesimple practical steps that couldhelp churches to include those whoare losing their sight or are visuallyimpaired.

Most of the things that would makea big difference are related to twowords: awareness and assumptions.Awareness:most of us remainunaware of the experience of peoplewho navigate the world differently.We live in a very visual world, and itis easy to forget that for some thevisual is not something that helps tomake sense of either the physical orspiritual landscapes that surroundus. Assumptions: because there areso many myths that surroundblindness. For example it iscommonly believed that if someoneis blind they are compensated by asuperior sense of hearing; whereas inreality if someone loses their sightthey often find hearing moredifficult because they have lost thevisual clues that often help us tomake sense of what we hear. Thesighted can take everything in atone glance; we who are withoutsight have to persevere with ineptquestions.

There are as many differentexperiences of being visuallyimpaired as there are people with avisual impairment. Within mostcongregations (especially whereolder people predominate) there willprobably be some who are affectedby serious sight loss. This may not beobvious, they may not use a whitecane or guide dog, but they may beaffected none the less. Simply havinglarge-print materials available maybe all that is needed. People oftenfind it very hard to ask for theseresources, feeling embarrassed thatthey can no longer participate in theway they used to. Normalising theuse of large-print resources makes iteasier. For example, on attendingservices in Iona Abbey congre-gations are informed that large-printor Braille service and hymn booksare available if required, and theseare brought to where the person isseated. I found this helpful because ifyour vision is poor you cannot

Lack of vision Susan Dale, with Mike Holroyd

Community members Susan Dale and Mike Holroyd explore worship, church andfaith experiences of those who are visually impaired. Susan is partially sighted.Mike is registered as blind. Both are engaged in research projects exploring theexperience of people living with a visual impairment …

19 coraclesummer 2012feature

coracle 20summer 2012

interview

MARGO: What motivated you to want to go to university? What weresome of the obstacles that you faced to get there?

HANAN: I am the youngest of nine sisters and saw how disempoweredwomen around me were, which is why I wanted to go to university. Upuntil the age of 18 I believed that family and our patriarchal society wereto blame for women’s problems. Higher education was discouragedbecause of fears that our encounter with the outside world wouldcorrupt us. We were expected to adhere to strict dress codes and werenot allowed to partake in matters defined as the male domain. It tookme a long time to assert myself within the family and the wider society. Ieventually persuaded my family to let me go to university, who agreedon one condition: that I marry someone from my tribe. I agreed, but theman I eventually married was by choice.

Once I got to university, a different kind of discrimination emerged: thatof being a member of a minority community. It became clear that ourimpoverishment was caused by Israeli policies that destroyed ourtraditional way of life as a nomadic pastoral society. We are only allowedto live on 3 percent of the land, even though we make up 20 percent ofthe total population of the Negev – we are around 200,000 people.

Ironically, we are Israeli citizens, but despite being equal in the eyes ofthe law, when it comes to implementing the law, that is a different story.Israel declared most of our lands a military zone in 1953 and forced thecommunity to move into seven towns they created for us, known as therecognised villages. They promised us access to jobs, better educationand other services and benefits, but in truth we live in one of the mostdeprived areas in Israel with over 70 percent unemployment and wherethe allocation of resources is nominal.

The situation is even worse in the 45 unrecognised villages, as Israeldisputes that these villages own their land, despite the fact that thecommunity holds official deeds from the Ottoman period. Theunrecognised villages lack running water, electricity and access toeducation and basic health services. They also face constant homedemolitions. One village was demolished 33 times – they are even askedto cover the cost of these demolitions, when in reality they can barelymake ends meet.

MARGO: How did the weaving project start?

HANAN: It was important to develop a project that supported localneeds, and the idea for it came in 1991 to try to reinstate women’s pastrole in society. After Israel’s establishment, women’s roles in the pastoralway of life eroded, as they were no longer needed in agriculture or toweave Bedouin tents, because they were rehoused in permanentstructures. It may have started out as a simple weaving project, but it hasbeen a source of sustenance and encouragement for over 1400 women.

MARGO: What changes have you witnessed in your work?

HANAN:What haven’t I seen?! What keeps me going is the change I seedaily. It is now normal for women to get jobs. The first Bedouin female

always ‘see’ the pile of large-printbooks at the back of church. Asimple question from thosegreeting people as they enter thechurch could mean the differencebetween someone being able toparticipate in worship and themremaining silent observers.

If there is a regular member of thecongregation who tells you theyare visually impaired, ask themwhat their needs are. It may be verywell-meaning to purchase a Braillecopy of your hymn book but thiswill only help if they are Braillereaders! Some other format may bemore helpful.

Remember that there is no God-given commandment that worshiphas to involve a lot of writtenwords – be they sung or spoken.Some of the most profoundworship can involve few words,repeated phrases or even silence.Sometimes spontaneous worshipcan be more accessible to thosewho cannot read carefully craftedliturgies and songs. Many visuallyimpaired people are unable to readfluently in any format, unless a lotof learning has taken place inadvance.

If you are preaching, explain yourvisual aids so that those whocannot see them can share in theexperience. We have heard ofexamples of good practice wherethe preacher has, in advance,emailed descriptions of any visualmaterial to be used. If usingoverhead projectors ensure thatthe images are clearly visible, and,again, make sure alternativeformats are available if needed. Textshould be printed in a clear font, forexample Arial or Verdana, ratherthan the more ornate Times NewRoman.

Ask the visually impaired person togive a few members of the congre-gation some instructions on‘guiding’. It makes such a differenceto have confidence in the personwhose arm you are taking. Beingdragged or not warned of hazards(such as steps up the communionrail) can be a rather frighteningexperience! Also, when you are

talking to someone who is visuallyimpaired it is helpful to say yourname: your voice may berecognised but it sometimes takestime to put names to voices – anddo tell them when you are going tomove away. We have often foundourselves talking to a blank space,which is quite embarrassing!

Do not get too stressed aboutusing ‘politically correct’ language –‘see you next week’ is a phraseused regularly by people who arevisually impaired! When designingworship, though, it is worththinking about whether thelanguage used includes or excludesthem. This does not mean nothaving any readings relating toblindness. Blindness is after all partof our lived experience, and hasbeen so since the beginning ofhuman history. It is more importantperhaps to think about how we uselanguage and the impact this hason people who may have differentabilities and experiences, whetherthis be as women, as gay men orwomen, or as people with aphysical or mental healthchallenge.

People who are visually impairedcome in all different shapes andforms. Some have enough sight toread large-print text, others accesstext through computer software orBraille. Some can recognise a friendat arm’s length, others rely on audioclues. Some grieve the loss of theirsight, others accept it as an integralpart of who they are.

This issue of valuing our lifeexperience is a crucial buildingblock to all our attitudes. It is sooften assumed by both sightedand visually impaired people alikethat the experience of visualimpairment is negative, undesiredand leaves one in a state ofbrokenness. Whilst many people doof course struggle with the loss ofvision, there are many of us whofeel that our visual impairment is aneutral experience, or indeed, insome cases, a gift or a blessing. Topromote one response overanother would of course beinappropriate and pastorally

physician and nurse in the Negev aredaughters of women in the project.The first Bedouin woman to get herdriving licence is a woman in theproject. The first women to open smallbusinesses in the unrecognisedvillages are graduates of adulteducation classes. More youngwomen are going to universitybecause their mothers are investingtheir incomes in their education. It hasalso had a social impact whereby theireconomic independence led them torefuse polygamous marriages.

I’ve been working quietly with thewomen to empower them throughthe adult education programme, theweaving and the tourism projects forthe last ten years. We managed tobuild a good support base among thewomen and some men in thecommunity. In the past we would nothave been able to have our voicesheard, but over time we got involvedin advocacy and the media andestablished a women’s newspaper,

Hanan Al Sanah, interviewed by Margo Sabella-Marshall

An interview with Hanan Al Sanah

Hanan Al Sanah, by Margo Sabella-M

arshall

disastrous. In our worshippingcommunities we need to be wiseenough to hold in tension thesevarious responses.

Sarah says: I yearn to just beenfolded in worship. To be acceptedby other people and be able toparticipate. I yearn for a time whenmy sight, or lack of it, does notmatter. What matters after all inworship is God!

The last words come from NicolaSlee’s poem ‘The darkness of God: ablessing’. This poem is dedicated toMike and also to theologian JohnHull (who is blind), and moves us toembrace and celebrate not just thelight of God, but the darkness also:

And so the darkness of God shall be a blessingand the shadow of God will be to you a light more lovely than the dawn,a lamp more gleaming than the sun.And your blindness shall be the mark of your faithfulnessand God’s faithfulness shall be sealedby the star of everlasting night.

(From Praying like a Woman, NicolaSlee, SPCK) l

Bread and wine © David Coleman

Hanan Al Sanah is Director of the community and educational programmes atSidreh Women’s Association in the Negev, in the south of Israel. A groundbreakingwoman in her Bedouin community, she toured Scotland in spring 2012 and spokeat Fairtrade Fortnight and at the Scottish Parliament. Here she speaks with MargoSabella-Marshall of the fairtrade shop Hadeel, about her life, work and hopes forthe future. (The interview was translated, by Margo, from Arabic into English.)

21 coraclesummer 2012interview

we are ineligible for funding frommost international developmentagencies because Israel is considereda developed nation.

MARGO: Can you tell us somethingabout your tourism programme?

HANAN: The tourism project raisesawareness about our history andpolitical struggle and welcomesvisitors from all faiths and nation-alities. Most visitors come expecting tohear an idyllic story about our life andare shocked to learn about our livingconditions and the political reasonsthat led to that. Most people leavewith a positive experience. But despitethe popularity of the rugs with Israelis,they do not like to hear that the Statediscriminates against us. They onlywant to hear that our communitysubjugates its women. Nonetheless,there have been many Israelisupporters throughout the years,helping to raise awareness of ourissues.

MARGO: Do you see any hope foryour community?

HANAN: Given the currentgovernment’s policies, I’m not hopefulof any positive change in the nearfuture. It will only come when thereare honest intentions to resolve thesituation.

I do have hope in people, who want tocontinue improving their situation.The weaving project is a model ofsomething that came in response to aproblem that needed a solution. l

To view and purchase items from the Sidreh Women

Association’s weaving project: www.hadeel.org

Hadeel is a fairtrade shop selling crafts from Palestinian

social enterprises in the West Bank, Gaza and Lebanon.

Iona Community members Carol and Colin Morton, who

spent many years working in Palestine/Israel, were instru-

mental in setting up the shop.

WILD GOOSE PUBLICATIONSNEW PUBLICATIONS

Pathways for Pilgrims: Discovering the Spiritualityof the Iona Community in 28 days, Chris King (book)

£9.99 (plus post and packing)Fundamental to the Iona Community’s understanding ofspirituality is the conviction that God’s Spirit permeates

the whole of life – ‘every blessed thing’, as GeorgeMacLeod said. God is thus to be encountered and

experienced in the busy daily routine of our lives, andthrough our relationships, not just in tranquil moments

and remote, beautiful places like Iona.

The Community’s approach to spirituality does notdistinguish between the sacred and the secular. Prayerand politics, work and worship are all of a piece. This

holistic spirituality of engagement – rooted in prayer andscripture – stands in contrast to some of the more

ethereal, nostalgic and self-indulgent approaches on offerthese days.

Pathways for Pilgrims is a timely resource for individualsand groups wishing to explore this integrated approach tospirituality. Each of the four weeks of the book covers an

area of the Iona Community’s engagement: with God, withthe church, with the world, and engaging as community.

The days include a ‘community experience’, a Bible reading,material for reflection, prayers and thoughts to ponder.

The book was structured and edited by spiritual directorand workshop leader Chris King, and written by membersof the Iona Community, with contributions by Norman

Shanks, Jan Sutch Pickard, Brian Woodcock, John Harvey,Peter Millar, Graeme Brown, Ruth Harvey and Neil Paynter.

Ready or Not: Children, Spirituality and JourneyingTogether, Ruth Harvey (ed.) (book) £10.99

(plus post and packing)How does being with children offer us a glimpse of God?On our adult faith journey, do we remember the wisdom

of our own childhood thoughts? And in what ways are we,as adults, open to the wisdom that children in our midst

share about God, faith, life, death and spirituality?

Being in the company of children – as a new motherhungry for soul food – led Ruth Harvey to ask these

questions, and to share them with a range of about 30others – some parents, adoptive parents, foster parents,grandparents, godparents, aunts, uncles, foster siblings –

which resulted in this original collection of stories,reflections, meditations, poems, songs and dialogues.

The contributions, including pieces by Peter Millar, DonaldEadie, Yvonne Morland, Em Strang, Ellen Moxley and NeilPaynter, explore how the wisdom shared by children inwhat they say and do can lead us closer to God. They

explore themes of adoption, parenting, illness, disability,birth, death, passion and more.

Ready or Not can be used for personal reflection, groupstudies and in worship – it offers resources and inspiration

for finding God and spirituality in the midst of thebusyness, messiness, pressure, nurturing, despair and joy

of life.

Ruth Harvey is a Quaker and a Church of Scotland minister.She is the editor of Wrestling and Resting, and a

contributor to many Wild Goose anthologies. She is amember of the Iona Community.

TO ORDER: 0141-332-6292 admin@ionabooks.comwww.ionabooks.com

because the local press wasn’tinterested in printing stories aboutwomen’s issues or rights.

Our women have been on theperiphery of our society and wewanted to draw attention to theirissues. The Sidreh Women’sAssociation wanted to change thestereotypical perception thatmany have of Bedouin women:often seen as disempoweredvictims. Instead, we wanted tohighlight their strengths andabilities. It was also an importantway to raise issues faced bywomen in the unrecognisedvillages, because they are oftenbeing silenced by the State.

MARGO: You spoke about thestereotypical image of the Arabwoman in your own society. Howdo you challenge thesestereotypes in the West?

HANAN: I take myself as anexample. I worked hard to get towhere I am, but at the same time Ididn’t disown my society. I feelthat Western societies see us asweak victims of our owntraditions, and that if women dogain any rights and becomeempowered it is thanks to outsideinfluences and not their ownsociety. I believe that women canstill live their lives and fulfil theirdreams, but at the same timecontribute to the betterment oftheir society. Women aren’t theweaklings that people sometimesthink we are, but what we needand want is the access to opportu-nities to enable us to be partic-ipants in society.

MARGO: Has it been easy for youto take a leadership role in yourcommunity?

HANAN: Change isn’t easy,especially in such a traditionalsociety, and especially when itconcerns women. I always feltunder attack so I had to constantlyreassert my point of view. At thesame time, I didn’t want toalienate my family because I lovethem, so I found ways to helpthem understand my life choices.

MARGO: What do you tell yourtwin boys about your work?

HANAN: I want to avoid passingdown stereotypical attitudestowards women because I believethat our hope for the future is ifyounger generations changedtheir attitudes. I am always tellingmy boys to see women as humanbeings and not be influenced bywhat they hear from members ofthe community who aim todiminish women’s standing. Thatwomen, like men, can do whatthey want.

MARGO: What is your impressionof the Scottish Parliament?

HANAN: It was a wonderfulexperience and I was impressedwith women’s rights attained inthis country, but there’s a big gapbetween what they have gainedand what we still struggle toachieve. We are fighting for basicrights to education, housing andwork; theirs is a struggle for morerepresentation in Parliament. I feelthat we face many morechallenges than they do, butbecause of the progress they’vemade over the years, I think that itis easier and quicker for them toget more rights.

MARGO: How can Coracle readerssupport you and your work,especially the weaving project?

HANAN:We need help inmarketing our products. Webelieve in this project because it isour traditional craft. It has enabledwomen to get an education andgain economic independence. Toyour readers these rugs may justbe consumerist goods, but for usthey have brought a ray of hopeinto our society. They can be foundat Hadeel in Edinburgh, but we arehappy to take orders, whichHadeel can facilitate.

We work with many women, butour budget is small compared towhat we aim to achieve. It wouldbe great to get funding for otherprojects, but we have foundobstacles. Some donors havewanted to impose conditions ontheir funding, so we refused theiraid. Oxfam Great Britain supportedus in the beginning; but despiteour community’s impoverishment

To the west, sea and Israeli warships, 6 km out from the shore, lined up onthe horizon. In front, small yellow-and-blue fishing boats. To the east, KhanYounis refugee camp, focus of much aid activity. To the south, greenhousesand olive trees, date palms and orange groves, planted on land left whenthe Israeli settlers went to settle more land on the West Bank. To the north,Gaza City. On the horizon, watchtowers and a large air balloon watchingGaza’s every move from the other side of the separation barrier.

We are with the Vice President of administrative affairs at Al AqsaUniversity. The university specialises in fine art and physical education. It ismade up of new buildings generously funded by Gulf states and Turkey.Men and women are segregated and our host is keen to explain that thisis a mark of respect for women, who are honoured, he says, with thehighest place in society. The line through the campus which representsthis gender division is a hibiscus hedge.

The buildings we are shown used to be the villas of Israeli settlers. This wasthe best land in Gaza and the villas were spacious. We are taken to thebasements of the buildings first of all and shown the bunkers and bombshelters. It is clear that these people lived in constant fear. Now thebunkers are prayer rooms, decorated with images of peace and with rugs.They are full of the peculiar calm which soaks into the walls of places ofprayer.

Overhead there is a buzzing noise, which I don’t really register. Our hostnods to the sky: ‘The Israeli drones.’

We enter the large lecture theatre in the new block and suddenly hear thesound of bombing close by. ‘They are bombing,’ our host says, in a matterof fact way. We take our cue from his reaction and continue our walkacross the campus, speaking of buildings and teaching and hibiscusflowers, not bombs.

We walk over towards the Faculty of Fine Art to an installation made as asign of peace from the spent shells which killed and maimed manyhundreds during the 2009 war. Then we begin to view the artwork in thedifferent classrooms. Everywhere the theme of the land, the suffering, thelove of kin and family, and the re-use of bullet-blasted materials to expressdefiance, anger, hope and a long-sustained cry for justice. There are nowords between us. The images speak for themselves. The art tells the story.Our host is bursting with pride at the extraordinary achievement andcourage his students are communicating here.

A message arrives, and we learn that houses and trees to the north of Gazahave been destroyed by Israeli bulldozers. Our host turns back acrosscampus towards the point of farewell, pressing hibiscus flowers into thepalms of our hands. l

Alison Swinfen visited Gaza early in 2012 as part of the EU Tempus programme ‘Lifelong Learning in Palestine’,

which is directed from the University of Glasgow’s Refugee, Asylum and Migration Network and from the School

of Education. She and others were hosted by the Islamic University, Gaza. Her task was to produce a report and

ethnographic detail of what kinds of activities are currently being undertaken in universities, NGOs and civil

society organisations to support the most vulnerable in their education throughout their lives. The work feeds

into the next research stages of the overall project, with return visits and further connections planned for the

future. Alison is a member of the Iona Community. To read her series of Letters from Gaza, go to the Iona

Community’s website: http://www.iona.org.uk/news.php?id=288

Signs of peace: letter from GazarAlison Swinfen

www.hadeel.org/info@hadeel.org

23 coraclesummer 2012tribute

A touching place:news and letters

reviews

Tribute …interrupted by wartime service inthe RAF, with a spell training as apilot in Canada. On resuming hisstudies he graduated MA in 1950and began training for ministry atChrist’s College in Aberdeen.During this time he was veryimpressed by the work andwritings of George MacLeod,shared in the rebuilding of IonaAbbey and in 1952 joined the IonaCommunity, which continued allhis days to be a significant drivinginfluence in his life. Bob had anactive student career: he was asuccessful sportsman, representingthe university at rugby, hockey andsquash; he was president of theStudent Christian Movement; andhe took part in several studentshows. He has described himself asa very restless student, and did notsit his final BD exams, which inthese days was not an obstacle tobecoming a minister; and from1953-54 he served as assistant toUist Macdonald, one of thefounding Iona Communitymembers, in the busy parish ofWallacetown Dundee.

In January 1955 Bob was ordainedand inducted to BoquhanranChurch, Clydebank, where he spentfourteen happy, busy years and hada very effective ministry, buildingup the congregation and engagingactively in the life of the localcommunity, where he is stillremembered with warmth andrespect. In February 1969 he waspersuaded to accept a call, whichhe had not sought, to DowanhillChurch in the west end of Glasgow.This was a very different situation –an aging, predominantlytraditionalist congregation with, asBob put it, ‘great individual talentbut no central cohesive policy’.These were difficult years and Bobfound himself waging a long battleagainst Presbytery indifference tothe exceptional cultural heritage inthe Dowanhill building, despitesplendid support from the thenHistoric Buildings Council andconservation groups – a battle thatwas eventually lost: the congre-gation no longer exists, althoughthe building survives in its present

GROUNDBREAKING COMMUNITYVENTURE ON IONA: NEWS FROMSCOTTISH CHURCHES HOUSINGACTION

From Alastair Cameron, ChiefExecutive of Scottish ChurchesHousing Action:

Iona will see some much-neededaffordable homes built, as theresult of the recent sale of land onthe Church of Scotland glebe,adjacent to the parish church, toIona Housing Partnership (IHP).

As long ago as 2003, IHP identifiedthe glebe, then owned by theGeneral Trustees of the Church ofScotland, as a possible site forbuilding new affordable homes,and entered negotiations withthem. The sale of the land tookplace at the end of 2011.

The proposal is for 5 houses to bebuilt on the glebe, which lies justoff the road linking the village withthe Abbey. IHP now requires theraising of funds to build theseproperties, which will be used bylocal people in need of their ownhome. The Tudor Trust has alreadyhelped fund this project.

Iona Community memberRaymond Young was closelyinvolved in this venture. One ofRaymond’s many hats is as a Boardmember of the Rural HousingService, which was instrumental inmaking the case for unmet housingneed among islanders. Hedescribes how important it is: ‘TheIona proposal is unusual andpotentially groundbreaking. Since2003, there have been a number ofcommunity land purchases thatincluded housing – such as Gigha.However, until very recently therewere no grants available to buildnew housing for rent – only forimprovement of existing houses.These communities had to rely onhousing associations. New housingassociations are difficult toestablish (the trend is for largerorganisations), and the letting,management and maintenancedoes not necessarily reflect the

A TRIBUTE TO IONACOMMUNITY MEMBER ROBERTCURRIE, by Norman Shanks,Paisley Abbey, 12 April, 2012

I’m sure that everyone here thisafternoon has a particular memoryof Robert Currie – Bob. In themind’s eye we can see him still –large as life, with a cheery greeting,a kind word of encouragementand concern.

He was a straightforward andgood man, compassionate andgenerous almost to a fault. He hada sharp and active mind, with aparticular interest in theology andliterature. His life was rooted in hiscommitment to Jesus Christ and tothe church but there was agentleness and an openness abouthis faith: he was not afraid todoubt or question. He recognisedthat our life is a pilgrimage, aquest, and that the readiness toexplore leads to deeper insightand spiritual growth.

Bob was born in Aberdeen 87years ago, the eldest of three sonsof a master blacksmith who, by thesound of things, was a rather strictand formidable character. Fromschool Bob proceeded toAberdeen University, where hejoined the air squadron, and thisresulted in his studies being

incarnation as Cottiers. It was goodthat Bob’s subsequent experiencesin ministry – as chaplain to theQueen Mother Maternity Hospital,then at the Western Infirmary andcommunity minister in Partick, andfinally as Associate Minister here –were so happy and positive.

The other main pillar of Bob’s lifewas his family. Bob and Sheila weremarried in 1955, and Sheila keptBob’s life in working order, as itwere; and through the inevitableups and downs of family life therewas a strong sense of mutualsupport and love. When Gill, Richardand Lesley were growing up theyremember Sheila playing theleading part in family organisationand discipline with Bob’s round theclock working hours and thedemands of his ministry. But he wasthere for them when needed, andthey remember with affection theoutings to the cinema, the familyholidays back in Aberdeen, the visitsto places like Acharacle and Iona.Bob and Sheila’s home was alwaysfull of people – some of theextended family who needed tospend time with them, waifs andstrays Bob brought back for a meal –and the family had to hold back sothat the food went round. Bobwould literally go out of his way forothers: when picking up one of hisfamily at the station he would askthe people waiting for a taxi ifanyone wanted a lift. The move toRedlands Road from the Dowanhillmanse was a major exercise indownsizing: to the end Bob wasunder pressure to declutter andoffload more of his huge collectionof books and papers. Bob and Sheilawere very happy in their time atRedlands Road; in their retirementthere was much to do and enjoytogether – the Florida holidays andvisits to Stratford with Johnny andRena, the trips north to the family inAberdeenshire, the worship and allthe other activities around theAbbey here. After Sheila’s death 18months ago, Bob coped withremarkable courage andcheerfulness but the struggle withinwas clear to those close to him.

Bob had a wide range of interests.

He was very well-read and lovedmusic, especially the organ. Heserved on several Iona Communityand Presbytery committees andremained a member of the localmedical ethics committee untilvery recently. He was a regular atthe annual Scottish ChurchTheology conferences at Crieff anda very diligent attender at themonthly Iona Community FamilyGroup meetings, where he isremembered with the utmostaffection and respect. Bob wasalways warm and open, consis-tently kind and generous. He tookpeople at their face value; youknew where you were with Bob;there was a very attractive almostinnocent vulnerability about him,something indeed of the characterof Jesus in whose footsteps hesought to walk all his days.

Prayer

Be Thou, triune God, in the midst ofus as we give thanks for those whohave gone from the sight of earthlyeyes. They, in Thy nearer presence,still worship with us in the mystery ofthe one family in heaven and onearth … Tell them how we lovethem, and how we miss them, andhow we long for the day when weshall meet with them again.

George MacLeod, from ‘A Veil Thin asGossamer’

Notice: Long-time member David Levison died on

19 April, 2012. A tribute to David will appear in the

autumn Coracle. (Ed.)

local circumstances.’

The Iona initiative gives theopportunity for genuine communitycontrol of a community asset. ScottishChurches Housing Action, whichworks with churches of all denomi-nations to secure affordable homesfrom under-used property, is keen tolearn lessons from Iona. Theopportunity exists to spread themodel to other rural and islandsettings.

Work is under way on mainland Argyll,on Arran, and elsewhere, to ensurethat the churches play their part intackling the shocking shortage ofaffordable homes in rural Scotland.

NEWS FROM THE IONA HOUSINGPARTNERSHIP (IHP): THE ‘BUY ABRICK FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN’

Iona is an iconic destination whichattracts thousands of visitors eachyear. Visitors to the island arewelcomed; indeed most of the 130resident population rely on tourism insome way for their livelihood. Iona isalso a place which draws people backtime and time again. Regular visitorscontribute to the life of the island andare welcomed back as friends ratherthan tourists.

A large percentage of the houses onIona are now used for holiday lettingor are holiday homes. While necessaryfor the island’s economic stability, thisalso means that not many houses areavailable for sale or for rent to peopleliving on the island. Several familieshave left Iona in recent years due todifficulties in finding suitable housing.

The Iona Housing Partnership wasformed in 2003 by the Isle of IonaCommunity Council to answer thegrowing demand for long-termaffordable homes for island residents.In September 2011, after a long andsuccessful fundraising programme,the West Glebe field was purchasedfrom the General Trustees of theChurch of Scotland.

The project is now at an exciting andcritical stage. Iona HousingPartnership aims to build 5 houses onthe site to fulfil the local need foraffordable homes, but we needsupport to bring these houses intoreality. To donate to our ‘Buy a brick

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From the Editor: Due to reduced space since

Coracle was moved from 6 issues a year to 4 issues, I

have been finding it harder to fit book reviews into

the magazine. For that reason, I am now going to

include reviews online, at times, on the Coracle page

of the Iona Community’s website. For this edition’s

reviews, go to the link below. There you will find

‘George Mackay Brown: The Wound and the Gift’ by

Ron Ferguson, reviewed by Jan Sutch Pickard; and

‘Seeing the Good in Unfamiliar Spiritualities’, by

Gethin Abraham-Williams, reviewed by Murdoch

MacKenzie.

You will also find links to the new Wild Goose books.

Peace. (Ed.)

http://www.iona.org.uk/coracle.php

25 coraclesummer 2012a touching place

coracle 26summer 2012

prayer

fundraising campaign’, please go to:http://www.justgiving.com/IonaHousingPartnership, or contact: TheTreasurer, Iona Housing Partnership,Lechnabahn, Isle of Iona, PA76 6SPFor news: www.welcometoiona.com

KAIROS PALESTINE: ‘THE IONACALL 2012’

A group of Christians from manyparts of the UK and beyondgathered on Iona during Pentecostweek 2012. Under the guidance ofRev. Dr Naim Ateek and Dr MarkBraverman they considered theirresponse to the Kairos Palestinedocument and the situation inIsrael/Palestine. Read the Iona Call2012: http://www.iona.org.uk/news.php?id=313

CHURCH ACTION ON POVERTY’S‘CLOSE THE GAP’ CAMPAIGN

From CAP:

It’s time to close the gap betweenrich and poor. The ‘Close the Gap’campaign is built around ordinarypeople and churches pledging tojoin the movement and do whatthey can. We know that if we give,act and pray together we can builda more equal society: www.church-poverty.org.uk

TRILLION DOLLAR SCANDAL

From member Arthur Chapman, andOne International:

Irresponsible multinationalcompanies are lobbying hardagainst new laws that would lift thelid on the trillions of dollars theypay to governments across Africafor their natural resources. Thesesecret payments allowunscrupulous leaders to pocketsome of the profits instead ofinvesting in vital services likeschools, roads and health clinics.Join in calling on European leadersto stand up to corporate lobbyistsand end these secret deals. Withyour help we can lift the veil ofsecrecy and help millions getthemselves out of extreme poverty:http://www.one.org/international/

WORLD DEVELOPMENTMOVEMENT CAMPAIGN TO CURBCOMMODITY SPECULATION

From WDM:

Banks are earning huge profitsfrom betting on food prices inunregulated financial markets. Thiscreates instability and pushes upglobal food prices, making poorfamilies around the world gohungry and forcing millions intodeeper poverty. To act:http://www.wdm.org.uk

‘NAE NUCLEAR WEAPONS HERE’

From Scottish Campaign for NuclearDisarmament:

Please support Scottish CND’s newcampaign ‘Nae Nuclear WeaponsHere’. We want people to add theirpin to our map to show thatpeople in every corner of thecountry want to see nucleardisarmament. To add your pin:http://naenuclear.org

PUBLICATION OF INTEREST

Radical Human Ecology: Interculturaland Indigenous Approaches (co-edited by Associate memberAlastair McIntosh): ‘This volumepioneers radical new directions. Inparticular, it explores the power ofindigenous and traditional people’sepistemologies’: www.ashgate.com

NORTHERN REGIONAL PLENARY,CHESTER, OCTOBER 6TH, 2012

From member Margaret Smith:

The Iona Community’s NorthernRegional Plenary will be held inChester, October 6th, in the WelshPresbyterian Church, St John St, at11am. Steven Broadbent will talkon modern Christian themes inart. Worship will be afterquestions. After lunch there will bethe opportunity to view theMethodist Art Collection; we alsohope to visit Steven Broadbent’sstatue of the Woman at the Well inthe cloisters of Chester Cathedral.

Children's activities will bearranged in the morning ifrequired. For cost and details:smithjmdj@btinternet.com

POSITIVE CATHOLICS

Some Community folk willremember Vincent Manning, whowas Camas Coordinator in the late1990s. Vincent has been involved inrunning the charity PositiveCatholics: a peer support network

of women and men who are livingwith HIV and have a Catholic faith:http://positivecatholics.com/

CITY OF SANCTUARY

City of Sanctuary is a movement tobuild a culture of hospitality forpeople seeking sanctuary in the UK.Find out how towns and citiesaround the UK are becomingrecognised as places of safety andwelcome: www.cityofsanctuary.org

JOIN THE IONA COMMUNITY’SRESIDENT STAFF ON IONA OR ATCAMAS

Are you looking for an alternative,counter-cultural and spirituallychallenging way to live and work?Then consider joining the Residentstaff at our centres on Iona or atCamas on Mull, to share in acommon life and extend our ministryof hospitality to guests from all overthe world. For more information:www.iona.org.uk/iona_staff.php oricrecruitment@iona.org.uk

Bread for the road

We will take what you offer,we will live by your word;we will love one anotherand be fed by you Lord.

John L. Bell, from There Is One AmongUs: Shorter Songs for Worship,www.ionabooks.com

Prayer of the Iona Community

O God, who gave to your servantColumba the gifts of courage, faithand cheerfulness, and sent peopleforth from Iona to carry the word ofyour gospel to every creature: grant,we pray, a like spirit to your church,even at this present time. Further inall things the purpose of ourcommunity, that hidden things maybe revealed to us, and new waysfound to touch the hearts of all. Maywe preserve with each other sincerecharity and peace, and, if it be yourholy will, grant that this place of yourabiding be continued still to be asanctuary and a light. Through JesusChrist. Amen

AFFIRMATION

I believe in you,my companion,the human Christ, the worker Christ,the conqueror of death.

By your measureless sacrificeyou have begotten the new human beingwho is destined for liberation.

You are livingin every arm raisedto defend the peopleagainst exploitative domination,because you are alive on the ranch,in the factory, in the school.

I believe in your truceless struggle.I believe in your resurrection.

Christ, Christ Jesus, be one with us.Lord, Lord my God, be one with us.Christ, Christ Jesus, take sidesnot with the oppressor classthat squeezes dry and devours the community,but with the oppressed,with my peoplethirsting for peace.

Prayer from a basic Christian community in Nicaragua,collected by Ian M. Fraser on his travels in Latin America(From Living Letters of the Word, www.ionabooks.com)

OPEN DOOR COMMUNITY JESUS PRAYER

Our Beloved FriendOutside the Domination SystemMay your Holy Name be honouredby the way we live our lives.Your Beloved Community come.

Guide us to:Walk your walkTalk your talkSit your silenceInside the courtroom, on the streets, in the jail housesas they are on the margins of resistance.

Give us this day everything we need.Forgive us our wrongsas we forgive those who have wronged us.Do not bring us to hard testing,but keep us safe from the Evil One.For Thine is:the Beloved Community,the power and the glory,for ever and ever.Amen

Open Door Community, Atlanta, Georgia*

FROM THE GRASSROOTS

Lord God of all,who, out of nothing,created this universe and launched it on its wayin nebulae and starry clusters;

who opened the eyes of the prophet to seelife-giving possibilities in a valley of dry bones;

who raised Jesus Christ from the dead;

give us the insight,when situations seem without hope,to stand before you as did Ezekiel,empty-handed and expectant,to affirm what you,the source of life,may do which is beyond our power.

Wherever this world husbands but‘a little life in dried tubers’, *we give thanks that,from the grassroots,you call people to emerge,as would seed to bear fruit;who in small communities and house churchesturn to you to find a trustworthy promise of new life for the world,who set out, in community,to know you better and take your Way,growing in faith and helping others to become mature –that transformed life may mark the world’s course.

We rejoice in you,God the Lord,who, out of nothing,summons into being the church to be like light and salt,giving life meaning and flavour.Amen

Ian M. Fraser (From 50 New Prayers from the Iona Community,www.ionabooks.com)

* The Open Door Community is a residential community which seeks to dismantle

racism, sexism and heterosexism, abolish the death penalty, and proclaim the

Beloved Community through loving relationships with some of the most

neglected and outcast of God’s children: the homeless and our sisters and

brothers who are in prison: http://opendoorcommunity.org

The Open Door Community is one of the Iona Community’s sister communities;

one of the communities members pray for each month.

* T.S. Eliot, ‘The Wasteland’

From the grassroots