Howard’s Tears

Dear friends,

Can you remember who taught you to read? Can you remember the first book that really caught your imagination? There is, really, nothing in the universe like a good book. Character, plot, and the opportunity for freedom, within a world of your own imaginative creation, guided by of the author’s script.

The ability to read (and write) are, to my mind some of the most fundamental of human rights, forming the bedrock of anything we might understand as civilisation. Yet almost without exception, parents today present their children at the school gate (aged five) in a state of abject ignorance as far as reading is concerned. The crucial first five years (and I am with Kate on this) are the best and most formative time of any child’s life. I understand the horrible pressures (both economic, social and institutional) on parents to work, and also the invidious parasitism of the internet and dragons of consumerism, but it is not rocket science. Under fives need regular time, and if just ten minutes of that time each day is spent reading to, and with a child, their world is enriched, and enlarged, both in spirit, and in what then becomes possible for them. No one wants to think of their child as “deprived”, and so we climb mountains to give them every possible material thing. Yet, by just not reading to and with them, we are in fact placing them at a significant disadvantage.

A good friend of mine passed away last year. His death was not unexpected, but nevertheless untimely, from cancer. Visiting him near the end at Guy’s hospital, I asked him in his quiet darkened side room, which of the London libraries and their reading rooms he loved the most. For Howard, single and solitary as he was, had been an avid reader throughout his life. (He found the study of Physics at Oxford not to be challenging enough, so taught himself Russian at the same time. His working life was spent mathematical modelling for the NHS, and his non working life reading. He loved literature of all kinds.)

At my question, Howard’s eyes filled with tears, and I could tell he was walking in these places right now in his mind, breathing in the stillness, the polished wood and leather, sitting in his favourite spots, running his hand over the spine of a long loved classic. Perhaps Dostoevsky. “All of them,” he said. I wasn’t sure whether he was mourning his own loss for the treasures that he had found, or ours in a society that was growing up around him, living only on the surface of things, falling out of love with books.

Worship Services

Advent Sunday 30th November

9.30am Morning Prayer at St John’s Stoke Row with Revd Kevin Davies

11am Holy Communion at St Peter and Paul, Checkendon with Revd Kevin Davies

Midweek zoom service: Wednesday Evensong at 5.00pm  410 935 129

Sing Along

It is in vogue to pan the BBC at the moment, but Auntie is still capable of moments of glory. The Songs of Praise team, to name one such, produced a glorious celebration of “Assembly Bangers” (you can’t say we aren’t on trend here) on Sunday, which was a complete outpouring of happy and infectious joy. See how many of these school classics you are able to sing along with. Here’s the link to the program on the BBC iplayer. Can you guess the top three?

For the readers among you – did you know that about 20% of children across the UK are below their expected reading age? This is mostly nothing to do with the education system, rather it is simply a function of the very low “baseline entry level” that I indicated above. The Times is running a national campaign to get Britain reading again, which you can find out more about here.

Do join us a week Saturday (6th Dec) from 10.30am in Checkendon Village Hall where the church will be hosting our coffee and mince pie morning. It will be a wonderful chance to catch up with the whole community at the start of Advent. Plus, you can enlarge your own reading horizons for free – come and browse the book exchange, and swap some of your good reads ahead of the long winter evenings. As before, church services for December and Christmas across the Team are now on the website.

The cold weather has seen the return of the green woodpecker to the lawn, feeling his way around the ant nests. Vibrant and splendid in winter plumage, as green as the grass, with red cap and yellow rump, he is the sight to be beaten right now. Although the spectacle of the red kite dive bombing the bird table and attempting to snatch robin’s bacon fat from under the (very low set) roof whilst on a 90 degree fly past  at only four feet from the deck and three feet from the dining room window is something to behold.

The new liturgical year begins on Sunday: the woodpecker should note that the colour changes from green to purple; do join us as we recite the Ten Commandments at the start of the pentiential season. “People get ready, there’s a train a-coming”.

Peace be with you all. Your Rector,

Canon Kevin