Anzac Day reflection

On Tuesday Anzac Day, prayers for peace will be held at St Paul’s Cathedral, for the third year running.

We will remember those who said no to war. As in the past three years, we will lament the carnage in which so many young people were killed. There is an irony in meeting in the Cathedral: as the prayers are offered, the sound of military drums and marching will be heard.

As we have prepared these prayers of lament for the killing fields so far from Australian shores, we have been made aware by the Australian historian Henry Reynolds of war fought on Australian land.

His recent books, The Forgotten War and Unnecessary Wars, are a shocking reminder of the dispossession of indigenous people as European invasion took place.

That is an uncomfortable truth. It also questions why Australians have been so ready to travel around the globe to fight in wars generated by imperial powers, the British Empire and now the United States.

Christians of all people are called to remember these things which are so easily forgotten. With Easter so close to Anzac Day we are brought face to face to the cross on which Jesus was killed by the Roman Empire. And to his call to be peacemakers.

This is particularly urgent this year as military attacks are being threatened or carried out internationally.

The following statement is included in the Order of Service.

This is a service of lament, repentance and hope on the centenary of the First World War. We will lament the destruction and waste of so many young men and women on all sides, the pain and anguish suffered by those who returned, by their families and communities.

This is focused in 2017 in recalling the slaughter of Passchendaele, Fromelles, and Pozieres, those who said no to war, the forgotten Aboriginal wars.

We will repent of the ongoing war and violence in our world and in our hearts, and hear again the hope of God’s gift of peace, given to us in the Crucified and Risen Lord, being lived out in many scenes of conflict.

We will honour the courage and self-sacrifice of all who fought in the First World War by praying for peace and doing all we can that makes for genuine peace, that young men and women may never go to war again.

In this time of heightened tensions, we especially pray that Australia and other nations will not be led into war again.

Rev Dr Wes Campbell

Indifference

(a poem written by Studdert Kennedy - a chaplain in the 1st world war, - but the sentiment feels appropriate to me when i think of Australia's attitude towards asylum seekers.) 

Indifference, by GA Studdert Kennedy 

When Jesus came to Golgotha, they hanged Him on a tree, 
They drove great nails through hands and feet, and made a Calvary; 
They crowned Him with a crown of thorns, red were His wounds and deep, 
For those were crude and cruel days, and human flesh was cheap. 

When Jesus came to Birmingham, they simply passed Him by. 
They would not hurt a hair of Him, they only let Him die; 
For men had grown more tender, and they would not give Him pain, 
They only just passed down the street, and left Him in the rain. 

Still Jesus cried, ‘Forgive them, for they know not what they do,’ 
And still it rained the winter rain that drenched Him through and through; 
The crowds went home and left the streets without a soul to see, 
And Jesus crouched against a wall, and cried for Calvary. 

by GA Studdert Kennedy
 

AN EASTER REFLECTION

My wife an I and I own a Golden Labrador dog (of course she is beautiful) her name is Gabby. Most mornings Gabby and I go for a walk for about ½ hour.
We live in the Harcourt Valley and only have one rural road along which we can walk. Along that road a farming family used to have a horse named Sally. She “lived” in a good sized paddock which had a stand of pine trees and a small spring fed dam. Each morning on our walk I would look out for Sally. And if I did not see her I felt a bit glum. However more often than not on our return journey home I would see her through the pine trees or out in the open. And I was always happy to see her. It was that different perspective coming from another direction that allowed me to see Sally.
If you read any of the Early Church Saints (either men or women) they often talk about the “dark night of the soul”. What they meant by that was that they had a sense that God was absent. No matter how long their devotions, how dutiful their service they had this sense that God was not there. Then they would stop fretting, stop trying too hard to connect with God and the moment of joy would come as they sensed God again in their lives and in their activities. It was that different perspective that enabled them to experience God again.
In John’s gospel there are two stories in chapters 3 and 4 which seem at first unrelated, but really I think quite intentionally linked. The first story is that of Nicodemus coming to Christ at night (dark time represents evil, tragedy, God absent). And Jesus offers him “Light”. The second story is that of the woman at the well in the midday heat and Christ offers her “Living water”.
Easter and Pentecost offer us the possibility of a different perspective.
To see Christ anew, and too understand in a different way how God’s grace and love is available to all people and at work already in our world.
For example the unexpected hug, the kind or loving word, the act of grace by another, in a time of reflection, the moment of recognition that Christ has been here, the word that enlightens us, these experiences offer us that different perspective, they offers us that “Living” water or the “Light” that shines on the darkness.
Lord, give us ears to hear and eyes to see your actions in the world.

Rev jon Watson

Anzac Day

(Context - In Australia we have an annual remembrance day which is focused on the battle at Gallipoli in the first world war. This year marks 100 years since that tragic day.It is a big event in Australia with many vents held at all levels of the society and with a massive media focus. The day is called ANZAC day because it particularly focuses on the participation of the Australian and New Zealand armed forces at Gallipoli)

None of you need to be told that yesterday Australia celebrated the hundredth anniversary of the landing at Gallipoli. For several years we have been reminded more and more of Anzac Day and in recent months our media has been full of stories. Whole series of programmes on television have been based on the First World War and its impact on young Australians and New Zealanders. Many thousands gave up their lives for their country by dying in the fighting and many more paid an enormous price as they lived with the consequences of injuries and gassing. If we have been reading, watching or listening, we will have heard story after story of what it cost these people.

Is it just a coincidence for us who are called to follow Christ the Good Shepherd that the Gospel reading for today is about being ready to lay down our lives for others? Was Jesus talking about war or could he have been thinking of other ways of protecting the more vulnerable members of our communities?  Many of us these days are more familiar with ideas of the futility of war and hope that we and our children and grandchildren are never called to lay down their lives like this. But there may be other ways in which this call may come.

A teenage girl learned that a friend was self-harming and looking at methods of suicide on the internet. She immediately spoke to her mum and together they went to see the mother of her friend. The mother was grateful but the daughter has completely cut herself off from the girl, feeling she had betrayed her trust. Some of their friends are also not talking to her and this is deeply hurtful as she was trying to save her friend’s life and thought she was doing the right thing. Is this what it means to lay down your life for someone else?

A man was widowed several years ago and has two teenage children. He feels stuck in an unsatisfying job. He has toyed with the idea of doing something different but that would require several years of study and he thinks his only priority should be educating his children so they can have better opportunities than he has had in life. They need the income from

One of the reasons given over and over that women can expect to have considerably less savings in superannuation when they retire is because they take time off from the work force to have children and to look after them. Are women laying down their lives for the future of this country by sacrificing their wealth or even their comfort in old age to have and care for children?

There are thousands of grandparents looking after children, giving their lives so the young ones don’t have to go into government sponsored care of some sort. And there are many people, some elderly who have given up their lives to take care of others with disabilities.

Perhaps it is time someone proposed a day to celebrate the sacrifice of all these and the many others, who give their time, effort and money, not in big dramatic gestures but in everyday, low-key plodding on and on through the years.

We could assure these people that Jesus, the Good Shepherd cares for them, or suggest that they might like to read Psalm 23 from time to time because it has been a comfort to us, but what I suspect might encourage them and restore their souls would be for others to occasionally carry their burden for them so they could have a chance to lie down in green pastures, beside still water for a few days. We can make some sacrifices to enable them to have some financial help where that is needed.

REv Julianne Parker

Like Eagles

Isaiah 40: 21-31 A Reflection.

It all begins in mystery;

voices in the darkness,

whispers strained after,

questions.

Do you know?

Have you heard?

Can you possibly understand even just a glimmer?

Above the vault of the heavens

and beyond the deep night,

is the point where mystery takes breath

and light begins.

The one whose love is source of all,

looks with tenderness upon everything that has been made,

numbers and names each of earth’s inhabitants

and notes their various locations.

Like grasshoppers they leap about

as they make their way.

Some rise high, use their

wealth and power

to dominate and control

they will be brought to nothing.

Like plants they sprout,

green, proud and strong,

little dreaming that one day a divine breath will come

to blow scorchingly upon them;

they wither, and are reduced to dust.

They will be carried away to nothingness,

along with their memory.

We are left to wonder at mystery,

but she evades our grasp.

Invited to make comparisons,

to identify her equal,

we find none;

we are silent.

A voice speaks to challenge:

Behold: each star in its allotted place,

each one numbered

and recorded, along with its name

in the celestial register;

they are all present, none is missing.

Can there be any mightier

than the one who has appointed them?

You who have become discouraged and fearful,

believing you have been abandoned,

that the one who called you into being is absent

and there is none to hold you to account;

you are mistaken.

You are remembered, you are known.

You were never lost;

even in this place, far from where you want to be,

the tireless mystery knows you, finds you.

Her love for you does not weaken,

His care for you is undiminished.

Those who are about to faint with fear and sorrow

will find strength.

Those who feel that they have no future

will find hope.

Laugh into the darkness,

gesture with defiance towards the night.

The beauty power of youth is a wonderful thing,

it, too will pass.

Even the fittest will grow weary and fail

and the finest athlete will become weak and exhausted.

It is those who know the presence of their maker,

who hold fast to his promises,

who trust in her love;

these will stand.

They will complete the journey that has been set before them,

they will not fall.

They will be like eagles.


©Ken Rookes 2012
This is a reflection on Isaiah 40:21-31. It's a bit of a work in progress, but I think it might be helpful in getting into the spirit of the passage.
It's Friday night and I have made some amendments!