Reflection 19th June 2011
Well this is the last reflection for Alexandra! It is hard to know what to write. Some of me is tempted to have a few ‘last words’ about things. But I will not give in to that temptation. Some of me is tempted simply to write what I would normally write, and just ‘leave off’. But that would not do justice to the very special circumstances I find myself in today in this congregation.
So here is a reflection that is about my week, but is also about something else too.
This week has been spent packing up Robyn’s house. What changes there have been in the last year since we were married! Hayley (Robyn’s daughter) moved out, then I got the Job in Switzerland which meant leaving Alexandra after six years and which is the occasion for Robyn and I to live together for the first time since we were married. Robyn’s brother Barry, who lived in a little community with her for the past 18 years has also moved out into his new unit with a mate.
There is so much change and growth! In ‘systems theory’ they say that if you ‘tweak’ one part of the system, then every part of the system adjusts. You can’t put a new piece into the jigsaw puzzle, without creating a whole new configuration of pieces.
This is what happened when I arrived in Alexandra. I was the new piece, and over the last six years there has been considerable ‘re-ordering’ going on, not least of which was the re-ordering of the internal space of the Church. This change signalled something. That a pulpit was worth turning into a font and that it was a good thing to bring the altar forward and to enable us to really gather as the body of Christ when we celebrated the Eucharist.
This re-ordering led on too, to a re-ordering of who was involved and who was less involved. It led on to our involvement with the community garden and kitchen, and the forums. Neither you as a congregation nor I as priest are the same people we were at the beginning. I hope we have achieved something.
Each re-ordering involves some loss, and the reconfiguring of life into a new shape.This, as you might have tired of hearing me say, is the baptismal life. We are called to live a life of constant transformation. This transformation is a life of dying, entombment and rising. This is what is happening to Robyn and her immediate circle. This is what is happening to me and you, this is what is happening between Robyn and me.
The good thing about this circumstance, which seems so full of loss and pain, is that it is part of God’s plan. The end result is not death and decay, but a ‘new resurrected body’. We know this because we have the first person for whom this was ever true (Jesus) as our God. Following Jesus means not being so afraid of the ‘death’ that we do not give anything a try.
The other thing about the packing up that I have discovered is that Robyn and I work in different ways to achieve the same ends. At one point in the move, Robyn was saying to me that I should get on with things more. I said ‘I will get there, but in my own time.’ Then, one Saturday I decided to clean out the clothes drawers, so that I could decide what to take and what not to take. To Robyn’s amazement, I went through it like a dose of salts.
Robyn is more considered, and for me not a fast enough worker when there is work to be done. But in the long run the work is done.
We have had our moments during the packing up process, but I have tried to remind myself that the anger I sometimes feel is just the pride of someone who can not make the world do what he wants it to do.
There has been a lot of apologising going on too.
All in all, I think that we have become more solid with each other over the move than before. This is like another step in being married. More of my unpleasant side has come out during the move than I have let out with Robyn before. The promise ‘With all that I am and all that I have I honour you’ is easy when it is my best side. But when it is my impatient or critical side that comes out then how does that represent an ‘honouring’ of another person?
I am surprised at how it is possible to ‘come back’ after ‘going away’ for a while, after some incident.
Today is Trinity Sunday. Every time I think about the Trinity I immediately think about what it is like to be married: different people always offering their best, trying to find ways to bridge the gaps, trying to see things from another person’s point of view, trying to make relative something that has been a cause of strife.
All this describes the dynamics of love that are not dominating and diminishing of the other, but represent the dynamics of love of people who are trying their best to stay open to the other. I am often amazed and helped a great deal, for example, by the things that I do that I am not proud of, that Robyn just laughs about. I feel really loved when she does this.
This is what I think must be going on in the inner life of God. The Son loving the Father and the Father loving back. Each influencing the other and changing the other. Holy Spirit binding all three in love. When love works this way then a new event (like moving to Switzerland!) becomes an occasion for the deepening of relationship.
I have noticed this too with the members of the congregation. It is always the way that appreciation is expressed at the end of a relationship. But members of the congregation have come up to me to express their appreciation of my ministry. Thank you for that. It has been a significant journey for me to deepen my relationships with you in love, which has then been able to transcend much difference.
I have also had so many expressions of appreciation from people in the Town who have appreciated a ‘character’ as a priest, and who offered something more than the kind of religion that stays in the ghetto and does not make claims of people to consider what it might be to think that Christians do not have two heads, but have a serious ‘take’ on the world that is truly life giving. Our shorthand for this kind of life is ‘Life in the most holy and glorious and blessed Trinity!’ Blessed be God forever! Amen!
Your companion on 'the Way' and priest,
Paul Dalzell.