Richard's Ramblings

  Our new pad has an electrically operated gate for our cars to come in and out (to our electrically operated garage, which is being used for storing assorted unopened and part-opened boxes for the time being.) The pedestrian gate opener is obstructed (on purpose, for security reasons) by a padlock. So how do parcel deliverers, meter readers and bearers of mulled wine (thankyou Robin   😊 ) gain ingress? Well, they press the groovy wi-fi connected camera doorbell which rings my and Leisa’s iPhone, wherever we might be in the world, displays their pic and allows one or both of us to tell them that we’ll be right down (if the dog is safely in) or ignore them if we’re in Woop Woop so that they can leave goodies at North Ward or JCU PO. Except it’s not connected yet. Give me a day or two to understand the accompanying installation instructions. Two well-known instances in scripture of Jesus, as it were, pressing the doorbell, are in Revelation 3: “Behold I stand at the door and knock.” And

  This is the season for angels. They tell John’s and Jesus’ mum and dad that they’re going to have babies who will be pretty significant, and then they rouse shepherds in the field, “watching over their flocks by night” with the news that the Messiah has been born in Bethlehem. The poor shepherds are scared witless, but the angel tells them to pull themselves together and jolly well get down town to worship the Christ child, lying in a manger as he might be. 
  Let me tell you, I believe in angels.  I haven’t got the foggiest what an angel looks like. As with most things to do with the divine, our imagination and consequently our language can’t grasp what the Holy Spirit means when God’s Word talks about angels. Probably not a muscled hermaphrodite sprouting ginormous wings.  But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that in God’s economy of care for us, there is an agency which watches over us, guards and protects, and in the final moment of this existence leads us to the One who was

  As a child, did you used to tell people your address in this ascending format: 33 Queenswood Rd, Forest Hill, London SE23, Surrey, England, Great Britain, Europe, Earth, The Solar System, The Milky Way, The Universe? I did. I forgot about the childhood practice for years until I started taking Morning Prayer at Anglican churches. The 1662 Book of Common Prayer (of Blessèd Memory   😇   ) and contemporary prayer books have so-called State Prayers, where one prays for The Sovereign. It might be sung, Leisa and I can still intone “O Lord, save the Queen/And mercifully hear us when we call upon Thee.” In Australia, good republican that I am, I substituted The Governor-General (doesn’t scan if you try to chant it) and, reversing my youthful habit, added titles in descending order (not in the rubrics, don’t try this at St James, strictly KCIII only.) So, GG, PM, Leader of the Opposition, Premier of Queensland, Mayor of Moreton Rivers. I don’t remember why I didn’t include the local MP, Pet

  Moses was a hard act to follow. Joshua didn’t make a bad job of succeeding him, though, did he. I have a soft spot for Joshua, “the son of Nun.” Let me tell you why. I’m adopted, I know my birth mother’s name, but nothing else about her. The London Borough of Lewisham social worker who divulged her name in the late 1980s suggested that it would be fruitless to try to find out who was my natural father, because birth certificates in the days when I was born would typically say “Father unknown” in adoption cases. So I have long suspected that I am the rightful Duke of Westminster. Anyway, back to Joshua, who, like me, was the “Son of Nun/None.” He came to mind this morning when Ready Movers dropped off packing boxes for our move on the 19 th . We were at a gathering during the week where someone asked how many house moves folk there had had. Leisa and I won, hands down. Moving house is said to be among the most stressful events in people’s lives. Often, memories of a home built togethe

  Our pup’s most treasured possession is a rubber ball, a bit bigger than a tennis ball. She carries it around in her mouth, plays with it in the garden, puts it carefully on her bed or in her crate. Often, she lets it roll somewhere inaccessible to her, like under our bed or a sideboard. Other times, she forgets where she’s left it. But when I get a text from Leisa saying that she’s on her way home from JCU, and I tell Maudie that “Grimble’s coming, find your ball!” she miraculously finds and retrieves it, and waits at the door, ball in mouth, to present as a gift to her human. OK, she’s a dog, she can’t slope off to Myer’s perfume counter and ask, “Wotcha recommend for the human who’s got everything?” But you get the idea. She offers what is most precious to her, to her precious human. Mark 12 and Luke 21 carry the story of the widow’s mite, a tiny sum, approximately six minutes worth of a daily wage at the time. But it was everything to her, it might have been all that kept her from