We have just returned from a holiday to Northern Portugal, visiting Porto, Braga, Aveiro and the Douro Valley, all of which was stimulating and allowed us both time to recharge the batteries. The emails that I have just waded through were a reminder that whilst we relaxed, the world carried on!

Whilst away I started to read the book “That They May Face The Rising Sun” by John McGahern which has been adapted into a film of the same name that I think is still available on the BBC iPlayer. The book is set in a sleepy Irish village where not a lot happens and you become immersed in the slow pace and routine of the community. To mimic this the book has no chapters or breaks but just relentlessly plods on. I’m not selling it well am I, but you have to be patient with it, as the book and the film give greatly if you see beyond the need for instant gratification in our world that needs immediate responses.

One of the main characters is Ruttledge who was training to be a priest but dropped out because he lost his faith. Yet he becomes the glue of the community and their house is the meeting place for the “nothingness” to happen. Of course, in reality the “nothingness” is everything to the people within the community and their deep connection to each other, the seasons and nature is exemplary.

The book was deliberately chosen by me to slow the “doing” and to heighten the “being” whilst I was away. Yet in reality the balance of those two states needs to be addressed not only when we are on holiday, but every day of our lives.
The “Our Calling” document that we are starting to look at as a church could be construed as a task orientated exercise, another list of things that we should be doing as a church. Yet the reality is more nuanced than that. There may be new avenues to explore and take up, and indeed for other parts of church life that need to be completed because they have run their course. Yet the bigger picture of the “Our Calling” document is to enter into a way of life that leans more towards the “being” of our existence. It just becomes who we authentically are.

We are grateful to Tim and Caroline in facilitating this exploration into Our Calling, fuelled in part by their own experience in a previous church. Please read in this magazine and the weekly notices to be informed of how this will shape us going forward.
Holidays are joyous moments in time, but they are a passing moment that goes by all too quickly. Yet if they afford us a reboot such that we can “turn and face the rising sun”, then a lasting value is provided that will continue to shape and influence us long beyond the summer clothes have been put away