THE FIFTH SUNDAY AFTER EPIPHANY
5th February 2006
Graphics and cartoons appear only in the printed version
QUOTES OF THE WEEK
The most hilarious story.....is the revelation by a BBC director that ‘television crews were given counselling after the "disturbing experience" of filming the Normandy Landing Reunion in 1994 and watching veterans' grief'. Fortunately for those wading ashore in Normandy in 1944, stress hadn't yet been invented. Anon
.....his pupils are half-hidden under his eyelids, "as if the eyes have stopped between floors".
Alan Bennet
The majority of people live below the level of belief or doubt. It takes application and a kind of genius to believe anything. T.S. Eliot
All faith depends on revelation, and the proof of the revelation is in the peace that it brings. Rational argument can get us just so far, in raising the monotheistic faiths above the muddled world of superstition. It can help us to understand the real difference between a faith that commands us to forgive our enemies, and one that commands us to slaughter them. But the leap of faith itself — this placing of your life at God's service — is a leap over reason's edge. This does not make it irrational, any more than falling in love is irrational. On the contrary, it is the heart's submission to an ideal......
Roger Scruton
BETWEEN THORNS
An old priest was dying. He sent a message for his bishop and archdeacon to come to his home. When they arrived, they were ushered up to his bedroom. As they entered the room, the priest held out his hands and motioned for them to sit on each side of the bed. The priest grasped their hands, sighed contentedly, smiled and stared at the ceiling. For a time, no one said anything. Both the bishop and archdeacon were touched and flattered that the old priest should ask them to be with him during his final moments. They were also puzzled because the priest had never given any indication that he particularly liked either one of them. Finally, the bishop asked, "Father, why did you ask the two of us to come?" The old priest mustered up some strength, then said weakly, "Jesus died between two rogues, and that's how I want to go, too"
EARWAX, ANGELS, NEEDLES,
CRICKET, COCKATOOS AND MARILYN MONROE
Andrew Neaum
I read on the news last week that scientists (genuflect, genuflect) have discovered a genetic basis for the astonishing fact that some people have oily ear wax and some dry and flaky ear wax. Now there's a thing! How important this must be to the future of humanity.
Angels on pins or needles
It reminds me of the medieval scholastic theologians, so often reviled by scientifically minded sophisticates, and their purported debates as to how many angels can dance on the point of a pin. Did they really do so I wonder? A quick piece of research into angels on pins reveals the following, from an interesting fellow called Cecil Adams's on his Website called "The Straight Dope"....
......According to unimpeachable sources, it's not how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, it's how many can do it on the point of a needle - which, of course, makes more sense....... The earliest citation I can find is from a book by Ralph Cudworth in the 17th century, which is a suspiciously late in the day.
Valuable insight on this question is provided by Isaac D'Israeli (1766-1848), the father of British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli. Isaac was an amateur scholar who published several books of historical and literary "curiosities," which were quite popular in their day. D'Israeli lampooned the Scholastic philosophers of the late Middle Ages, notably Thomas Aquinas, who were famous for debating metaphysical fine points.
Aquinas wrote several ponderous philosophical tomes, the most famous of which went by the awe-inspiring title Summa Theologica, "summary of theology." It contained, among other things, several dozen propositions on the nature of angels, which Thomas attempted to work out by process of pure reason. The results were pretty tortured, and to the hipper-than-thou know-it-alls of the Enlightenment (i.e., D'Israeli's day), they seemed a classic example of good brainpower put to nonsensical ends.
For example, D'Israeli wrote, "Aquinas could gravely debate, Whether Christ was not an hermaphrodite [and] whether there are excrements in Paradise." He might also have mentioned such Thomistic puzzlers as whether the hair and nails will grow following the Resurrection, and whether or not said Resurrection will take place at night.
D'Israeli goes on to say, "The reader desirous of being merry with Aquinas's angels may find them in Martinus Scriblerus, in Ch. VII who inquires if angels pass from one extreme to another without going through the middle? And if angels know things more clearly in a morning? How many angels can dance on the point of a very fine needle, without jostling one another?"
I have not been able to turn up the text D'Israeli refers to (my 17th-century files are just a mess), but it sounds like the work of some would-be comedian. Martinus Scriblerus (dimestore Latin for "Martin the Scribbler") is a pseudonym of a sort in common use among Enlightenment satirists, and the quoted items are burlesques of actual treatises in Aquinas's Summa.
Fact is, Aquinas did debate whether an angel moving from A to B passes through the points in between, and whether one could distinguish "morning" and "evening" knowledge in angels. (He was referring to an abstruse concept having to do with the dawn and twilight of creation.) Finally, he inquired whether several angels could be in the same place at once, which of course is the dancing-on-a-pin question less comically stated..... yes, medieval theologians did get into some pretty weird arguments, if not quite as weird as later wise guys painted them...
Hardly weirder than studying the genetic make up of ear wax though.
Angels on cricket stumps
All of which brings to mind my time as a young teacher in Rhodesia. Rhodesian schools were fanatical about sport, and so even someone as disdainful of sport as I am was required to coach and oversee a rugby team in winter and a cricket team in summer. Every Saturday of the summer term was spent umpiring my cricket team, either at home or away at some other school. Strangely I enjoyed this very much, not least because my team never lost a match. This was no thanks to any of my skills at cricket, though it might have had a little to do with my relaxed and cavalier approach to the game. I was friendly with an eccentric and very talented teacher of French, who like me was most emphatically no sportsman. During the lunch break on one sunny Saturday, all the coach/ umpires from our school and the visiting school were sitting together eating sandwiches. One of the visitors, obviously a cricket fanatic, was waxing long and lyrical about googlies, off breaks, on breaks, leg breaks and the finer points of his team's performance. At last he paused for breath, whereupon my French teacher colleague rippled the sudden and blessed silence with a question: "Tell me," he said, "how many angels, do you think, can dance on the end of a cricket stump." There was a stunned silence and then the visitors, to a man, literally turned away from him for being a foul blasphemer against the God cricket.
In it for the money
I was talking to a judge a week or so ago, one towards the end of a long career. I asked him what had most changed in his profession since he began so many years before. He replied, with little hesitation, "the legal profession has ceased to a profession and become a business, a change I regret very much." I remarked that much the same could be said of the medical profession, but not of the church. For I remain one of the few professionals in town who, when called out in the middle of the night, answers the call without even considering charging for it. The clergy counsel down and outs, lunatics and others, sometimes for hours, without a thought of any monetary reward. This means, of course, that we are often taken for granted, that our skills and abilities are undervalued and that if we are at all conscientious then we are sometimes run into the ground. However, it remains one of our little noticed glories. To be a clergyman or clergywoman remains a calling, a vocation, a profession in the sense that we profess values and truths and learning that are not to be measured by mere money. Teaching too, to a great extent, remains a profession in the sense of which I am talking. Teachers are under-valued in our society and if at all conscientious, tend to work far beyond the call of duty.
Marilyn Monroe and cockatoos
My love of birds is being sorely tested at present. The blackbirds are ravaging my tomatoes and the cockatoos my walnuts. Intelligent and sly are the cockatoos. They glide silently into the tree, do their damage and leave with derisive shrieks of triumph. Their startling whiteness, interestingly, is shaded into a camouflaged greenness in a leafy tree that makes them difficult to spot. I would like to paint a huge canvas of a life-like sulphur crested cockatoo, but with its great grey beak painted a bright and glossy red. I would entitle it simply "Marilyn Monroe". Signed Andy Warhol rather than Andy Neaum it would be hailed a sensation and surely make me rich. What would that do to my profession of values and truths and learning that are not to be measured by mere money, I wonder.
It used to irritate a friend of mine that when he went to confession he never got the chance to tell the priest the good things he had done. Monica Furlong
CONGRATULATIONS
Birthdays:
Brayden White 7th Feb
Trevor Batey 8th Feb
Joan Harder 9th Feb
Anniversaries
Max & Bev Ralph 11th Feb
THE A.G.M.
The Annual General Meeting takes place on the 1st of March. The Treasurer requires the accounts of organisations who have them well before this date please, so that they can be included in his Statement of Accounts. Reports too need to be submitted.
INTERESTED IN THE FAITH?
The Enquirers Course begins on Tuesday, in the Library at 7.30pm. It is still not to late to sign up. It should be a stimulating and interesting short course taken week and week about by your two clergy, starting with the Rector this week.
THE PRAYER LINE
Anyone interested in being part of the Prayer Line, please contact Hilary Akers 58 314267, as the list of participants is now being prepared. All prayer requests are treated as strictly confidential. Hilary Akers
EVENING GUILD
The first meeting of Evening Guild will be held on Thursday, February 16th commencing at 1.30pm with a Eucharist. M. Kidman- President.
ASHES TO ASHES
Names of people whose ashes are interred in the Memorial Garden and whose families we wish to trace or make contact with - Muriel May BOND 19/2/86; Mary Thelma COOPER 5/11/96; Rosaline Evelyn GLUNING 31/12/95; Arthur William HALSEY 20/6/87; Patricia Emily JOHNSON 21/8/95; May MOON 8/6/98; Edward William SHEARER 21/9/48; Leo Eric ROGERS 5/8/2001. If anything is known please contact either Rosemary Mitchelmore, Patricia Gibson or Betty Bush.
LADY DAY
The Diocesan celebration of Lady Day this year takes place on Saturday, March 25th, in Wangaratta. St Augustine's is again conducting the Pie Stall and Raffle, books will be available soon.
BRING A FRIEND
Later in the year we plan to hold a "Bring a Friend Sunday". Any suggestions for this will be gladly listened to, and do start looking speculatively at any friends you are fortunate enough to possess.
SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITIES
The Social Responsibilities Committee have successfully applied for funding from Anglicare in order to further our work in the community. The Play Group, so quietly and efficiently run by Roz Dunlop, is to receive a modest but nonetheless useful $850 towards promotion and equipment. A further $1,950 has been granted to help us set in place our planned "Share" program. This is to be a Referral Service, run in cooperation with other agencies in the city, to enable folk who come to us, or who are referred to us, in need of rather more than just a handout of food. Part of this program will be a training session for volunteers (once a week for five weeks) on how to deal in a professional and caring way with such needy folk. It will be conducted by Andrea Fisher. Anyone interested in this training please have a word with the clergy, Andrea Fisher, Heather Pearson or Charlotte Brewer. The clergy certainly intend being a part of the training and Monday's Parish Office volunteers should seriously consider being so likewise. The more volunteers we have the better. It is intended to start the training sessions on Thursday the 4th of May at 4.00pm and on subsequent Thursdays.
MEN'S BREAKFAST
There is the first Men's Breakfast of the year on Saturday February the 18th, starting with a Eucharist at 8.00am for those who wish to come. The breakfast itself begins at 8.30am. Please sign up on the list in the Narthex.
HARVEST FESTIVAL
The annual Harvest Festival will be on the last Sunday in February, the 26th. As usual we will attempt to make it a celebration of more than just the harvest of paddock and garden. All our professions and hobbies yield a harvest of good things and so symbols of all of these, as well as fruit and vegetables, can be used to decorate the church.
IMPORTANT DIARY DATES
Feb 14th Pastoral Care Meeting 5.00pm
Feb 15th Parish Council
Feb 16th Evening Guild
Feb 21st Afternoon Guild
Feb 18th Men's Breakfast 8.00 Eucharist, Breakfast 8.30
Feb 19th Pastoral Care Sunday
Feb 25th Wedding
Feb 26th Harvest Festival
Mar 1st AGM (Ash Wednesday)
Mar 17th Youth Event
Mar 18th Weddings 2.00pm & 4.00pm
Mar 25th Lady Day
Mar 26th "Out Reach" publication day
April 21st Synod
April 22nd Weddings 3.00pm & 4.30pm
April 23rd Wedding
May 4th Training of Social Responsibilities Volunteers
May 13th Men's Breakfast 8.00 Eucharist, Breakfast 8.30
May 13th Wedding 1.00pm & 3.30pm
May 13th Turaton Concert
May 28th Patronal Festival St Augustine's
Jun 17th Wedding
July 28th Soiree
Jul 30th "Out Reach" publication day
Aug 18th Youth Event
Oct 8th Pet Service 5.30pm
Oct 15th "Out Reach" publication day
Oct 21st Wedding
Oct 23 - 26 Clergy Conference
Oct 28th Wedding
Aug 12th Men's Breakfast 8.00 Eucharist, Breakfast 8.30
Oct 28th Men's Breakfast 8.00 Eucharist, Breakfast 8.30
Nov 3rd Youth Event
Nov 4th Wedding
Nov 11th Church Fair
Nov 18th Wedding
REQUESTS FOR PRAYER
Liam Bognar, David Burrow, Hamish Fisher, Bill Hunter,Tim Maher, Denise McKellar, Ann Mills, Margaret Noble, Margaret Osbrough, Kon Tokarew, Carole, Christine, Glenda, Ian, Joe, Jason, Mary, Raeline, Shannon,
Anniversary of Death
May Stonehouse 5th, Beryl Cormican 6th, Amelia Meloury, Jennifer Clarke 8th, John Chapman 9th, Sylvia Walls 11th,
Duties for 5th February 2006
Celebrant 6.30pm Sat 4th The Revd Gail Bryce
Celebrant 8.30 The Revd Gail Bryce
Celebrant 10.30 Canon Andrew Neaum
Celebrant Dookie 8.45am Canon Andrew Neaum
Celebrant Katandra 10.45am The Revd Gail Bryce
Readers 8.30 Pat Griffin, Heather Pearson
Readers 10.30 Jenny Pleming, Nancy Noonan
Servers 8.30 Michelle, Steve, Debbie
Servers 10.30 Glen, Wayne, Renee
Euc. Assts 8.30 Ian Bryce, Carole Henderson
Euc. Assts 10.30 Bev Condon & Jenny Pleming
Intercessors Victoria Heenan, Nancy Noonan
Welcoming 8.30 Heather Pearson, Cecily McDonnell
Welcomers 10.30 Cheryl Richards, Frank Steen
Sidespeople 8.30 Joy Campbell, Trevor Batey
Sidespeople 10.30 Nola Brewer, Charlotte Brewer
Tea 8.30 Pat Gibson
Mowing Lionel Waterson, Adrian Evans
Duties for February 12th 2006
Celebrant 6.30 Saturday 28th Canon Andrew Neaum
Celebrant 8.30 Canon Andrew Neaum
Celebrant 10.30 Canon Andrew Neaum
Celebrant Dookie 8.45am The Revd Gail Bryce
Celebrant Katandra 10.45am The Revd Gail Bryce
Readers 8.30 Gwyn Cowland, Heather Fitzgerald
Readers 10.30 Joan McCann, Jenny Moran
Servers 8.30 Michelle, Steve, Debbie
Servers 10.30 Jenny Pleming, Georgia, Sally
Euc. Assts 8.30 Heather Fitzgerald, John Griffin
Euc. Assts 10.30 Carole Henderson, Maureen Cormican
Intercessors Pat Griffin, Children
Welcoming 8.30 Anita Saville, Jeanette Berry
Welcomers 10.30 Jenny Moran, Sandra Simonis
Sidespeople 8.30 Gwyn & Merv Cowland
Sidespeople 10.30 Alan Akers, Adrian Evans
Tea 8.30 Erma Wilson
Mowing Russell Family, Michael Egan
THIS WEEK IN THE PARISH
Monday 6th February Martyrs of Japan
Canon Andrew's Day off
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
Tuesday 7th February
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
12 noon Ministers' Fellowship
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
7.30pm Enquirers' Course - Library
Wednesday 8th February
7.45am Mattins only - Lady Chapel
8.45am Nursing Home Round
10.00am Eucharist - St Augustine's
11.30am St Mary's Guild Eucharist, Lunch and AGM
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
3.45pm Wardens' Meeting - Library
5.30pm Hospice Meeting
Thursday 9th February
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
9.30am Children's Church Preparation
11.00am Eucharist - Multi Cultural Centre
2.00pm Eucharist - The Valley
5.30pm Choir Practice
Friday 10th February
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist - Lady Chapel
3.30pm Evening Prayer - Lady Chapel
Saturday 11th February
The Revd. Gail Bryce's Day Off
7.45am Mattins & Eucharist (Traditional rite - Lady Chapel)
6.30pm Vigil Eucharist
Sunday 12th February
8.30am Sung Eucharist - St Augustine's
8.45am Eucharist - Dookie
10.30am Eucharist Children's Church - St Augustine's
10.45am Eucharist - Katandra
5.30pm Evening Prayer