Easter Sunday, April 12, 2020

And there are no cars in the Anglican church parking lot across the street. That in itself is, 'an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace'. That is the definition of a sacrament that I learned at a High Anglican Church camp I went to with my friend Sue Peters the summer after grade 5. Looking at the empty lot this morning I was moved and reminded of that definition; by staying away from their church the members of it were showing their real concern for all people in our community. That certainly is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. 

It's so hard to grasp the reality of the threat this virus poses to us all over the world. When we look out the windows of the houses we are confined in, if we are fortunate enough to have houses, and see sun shining and spring greening as always, all seems normal. Members of religious communities are used to taking the leap of faith that we all must take now. Even if this virus seems virtual, something we only hear about on the radio or see on tv or You Tube or some other social media, we have to behave as medical and scientific experts tell us we must if we want to save our lives and those of our fellow earthlings. Fortunately most of the people in BC are feeling, thinking and most importantly acting humanely. 

 

The sun is pouring into my newly rearranged sunroom,the buds on the hazelnut trees that I planted four years ago and that haven't produced a nut yet are about to burst and the forsythia is a hopeful spray of yellow. Nature's renewal is always a solace in times of trouble. I hope the world comes out of this time of struggle against a novel virus with a renewed sense of the fact that we share this planet and we'd better work harder together to help each other to preserve it. 

Lately I've been reading, Fields of Blood, by Karen Armstrong. It's well written, informative, fascinating and far beyond me, but I am gleaning a fraction of what she writes. It's especially germane because she presents a vast historical look at the tension that has always existed between religion and politics in human civilizations. In Canada the moral compasses of church and state seem to be pointing in similar directions at the moment. Some evangelicals around the world seem to be taking a different tack. And Trump, Bolsonaro and Victor Orbán are on their own wheels of fortune, spinning around in their tireless pursuit of material self interest. This made me very interested to read the part of Karen Armstrong's study that shows how ancient their reptilian brains are. Most of humanity moved beyond this approximately 120 million years ago when the limbic system developed over the core reptilian brain. As she writes:

 However in her discussion of the much earlier Shang Dynasty (1600 to 1046 BCE ) we see another more reptilian picture:

And so it goes. 

Jay and May's Easter walk to see the cherry blossoms along the canal near their place

Jay is wearing the shirt he got at Five Fathoms in Vernon. They did most of his tattoos.