A Parson to India

Indians love a mantra and you can find them posted everywhere. They vary wildly from the snappy to the banal to the totally mysterious . Crises are good for theology. They are what holds it to account. The Theology of Crisis which emerged in the early 20th Century helped draw academic discussions back to the revealed faith, but also gave it enough resilience to speak into the darkness of conflict and authoritarianism that overshadowed Europe and the world after 1914. Crises are almost always bad for churches. The Church of England, having had a strong sense of mission and impact in post-war reconstruction across Europe, ecumenism and the development of the welfare state, has felt the impact of too many crises over the last fifty years and, now shaking from a series of scandals and crises on a national scale, seems to have lost all confidence. Campfire in Wayanad A sense of crisis can be good for people. It can give a strong sense of meaning, purpose and direction. It can help prioritis...

Sunset in Kerala, where we're staying. Aging is a strange process. Working in the Church means working with the elderly, and one of my striking memories from beginning ministry was people of later years telling me that in their minds they were still in their twenties – that they did not recognise the face they saw in the mirror. There is a grief expressed in that sense of loss. On the other hand, my favourite quote to use at weddings is from that old romantic Karl Marx: ‘But where could I find a face whose every feature, even every wrinkle is a reminder of the greatest and sweetest memories of my life?’ I love Jeanette Winterson’s novel Written on the Body , and while I have no tattoos I understand the impulse – and perhaps it relates to a Christian soteriology that is directly written on the body: ‘by his stripes we are healed’ – not a reference to the Tiger – certainly not to our little Tiger cub who has caused so much trouble today. The point is often made that the resurrected ...

Cave temple at Badami We have a beloved parishioner who tells me from time to time that he isn’t ‘into religion’. He means, I think mostly, that he doesn’t like formality – processions and vestments – he would prefer it to be more authentic – unscripted sermons, emotive worship. I found myself thinking of this when I was turned away from a church in Goa. I was wearing a shirt but I hate trousers in hot weather and was in respectable chino-style knee length shorts. The guard wagged his finger at me entering the churchyard and wordlessly waggled his finger at a sign saying “dress appropriately” and marched back to his office. I thought uncharitable thoughts.  I aim always to be respectful – I once chased after Apollo into a French church to remove his cap. Some sort of verger chased after me which probably looked quite comical. I hardly think God cares any more about 3-year-olds wearing hats as he does about men revealing their knees, but, in my reading of Scripture, God cares a lot ...

Massive wall at a temple in Hampi. No cement used.  We bailed out of our last hotel a day early. It was an Ashram in Guledagudda – a town so uninspiring that every Indian we’ve told we stayed there has stared at us in utter astonishment, as if visiting England I’d elected to stay in Slough or Swindon, or the Nadir of all that is good and holy, Reading. Incidentally, I used to have a DVD player, which was a bit dodgy, especially with over used DVDs including the Lord of the Rings extended trilogy and the MTV drama Awkward (footnote: awkward is one of my favourite words – the ‘wkw’ just doesn’t seem plausible in an English word but so perfectly – autologically – fits a word that means something that doesn’t fit), and when it was struggling in what is now known as the circle of death moment (frequently experienced here in India in times of poor wi-fi) it would reproduce the warning “READING” in 80s digital script, and we’d all groan “oh no, stuck again in Reading” – and put the ket...

Sunset on Agonda Beach I snuck home to Putney this afternoon. It was a little odd at 3:30pm – a usual time for Sunday Evensong at a cathedral – to be joining the morning Eucharist. I’d been alerted about a technical issue and was happily free, though the problem had been solved without me. The family were all resting from a very hot episode at the beach, and I’d just sat down with Verghese’s excellent The Covenant of Water.   It was lovely hearing those well-known but far-off voices – I occasionally glanced at the screen but computers really aren’t any good in sunshine, and I was somewhat supine on my treehouse balcony recliner. The 10am service has got longer since I left but I didn’t mind at all in my relaxed configuration – I thought the music came across very well and particularly enjoyed Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring . Everything clearly is going strong at home – though someone should take the curate out for a drink on Wednesday night, and maybe phone any bishops you know and tel...

A hidden tunnel at the caves on Elephanta Island The world is full of little doors. They’re the places where you can sneak through to see, experience, be part of something special. Some are opened by money, some by connections, occasionally blind luck, and some by social status in its many forms – fame, reputation, notoriety. Some of those doors you would not want to go through. I’ve been reading Shantaram about an Australian convict’s time in Mumbai (where we’re currently staying). He writes (it is a novel, though somewhat based on fact) of being taken into the underworld in the 1980s – living in the slums, brothels, visiting a slave-market, generally things that weren’t on our city-tour, and not even acceptable in the 80s. (On slave-markets the protagonist speaks of his anger and impotence, as he’s told that without slavery the children he is observing would have died of starvation – they are described as being the lucky ones. ) Our children are moved by the visible poverty and esse...