Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

The 0ne who Comes to Steal, Kill and Destroy vs. the One who Gives Life.

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“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

I thought of this verse the other day.
The younger sister of a particularly nasty classmate of mine at boarding school tracked me down on Facebook. She never interacted with my posts, not even liking them. However, whenever I was on, the horrid chat ping, and there she was wanting to chat, telling me news about herself and her horrid sister neither of which I had any interest in.
I probably had two of these chats, and then logged off whenever I saw her Hi, and tried to stay logged off, to prevent them (and other chats from schoolmates I barely remember).
So I suggested to her: No chats, send messages. Thinking she had nothing conceivable to message me about. I was wrong. Messages now came, twice a day, asking for advice, full of chatty details.
Finally, the reason for this stalking emerged. She hopes to get her son into Oxford Brookes. And no doubt, if a friendship had been struck up, I would be corralled to help with numerous details. Already enquiries about visas and admissions. I am neither a government nor a university. It’s amazing how many people from India ask me about admissions to Oxford. Hey, I just about got myself in!!
Relationships with all take and no give are not of God. There is something dark, and almost demonic about them, reminiscent of the thief who comes to steal and kill and destroy, vs. the Christ who comes to give life.
I thought of one relationship in which I am the taker. I will repent, and make sure I give something.
So, while it is good for the soul to have at least one relationship in which one is the giver (so a wise man who mentored me once said) in general, healthy relationships involve give and take, and one should avoid relationships in which the other wants to steal your time, attention, resources, power, influence etc.
And never ever enter a relationship with anyone else solely or mainly for what you can get.

Les Vacances de Monsier Hulot by Jacques Tati.

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Our family watched this on Wednesday evening. Irene, 11, who watched it with a big grin, and the frequent observation “It’s just like Charlie Chaplin.” The rest of us were less enamoured.

Zoe and Roy were irritated and bored, and kept saying, “Let’s turn it off,” “Let’s not throw away good time after bad.” Zoe–“It’s not improving my French.”

I was intensely irritated at first, not having read Bosley Crowther’s review, “There is really no story to the picture.”

It was slapstick, the point being to empathize with the inevitable misadventures of a well-meaning, courteous, accident-prone gent. The characters were all stereotypes, which added to the merriment.

I couldn’t help laughing at the snooty proprietors and waiters. It reminded me why I hate to stay in family-owned pensiones.  And the hearty English woman.

It took me a while to get into the slapstick humour, though by the movie’s end, I was laughing as heartily as Irene, while Roy and Zoe were still tolerating it

An interesting Society of Authors party

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A writers’ party, or even an Oxford Uni party is as stimulating, refreshing and motivating for me as a complete break. Came back from today’s Society of Author’s party at Freud’s and started writing.

An interesting Society of Authors party at Freuds, a beautiful converted church on Walton Street.

Talked to Sharon Dogar, villianness of the week after her book on Anne Frank “Annexed” has caused outrage, Geraldine McCaughrean, whose 151 books my children loved, Mari Prichard, (widow of Humphrey Carpenter, “Mr. Majeika”), poet BernardDonoghue, whose wife Heather taught me Middle English at Somerville. Buzz! And now to write!

Asked Geraldine McCaughrean, who has written 151 children’s books what her schedule was. She said, settling down to writing was never a problem for her. Being a good wife and mother was. Remembering to pick up her children for instance.
Amen

Cosmopolitan Oxford

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One of the things I so enjoy about Oxford is how cosmopolitan it is.

Our cleaners are Brazilian, Kenyan and Zimbabawean. I take French conversation classes with a South African doctor and a New Zealander. My small group which meets together to have dinner every two weeks, has Norwegians in it, and had Mexicans.
There are people I know in church from Macedonia, Romania, Italy, France, Pakistan.
My children have classmates whose parents came from South Africa, China, Nigeria.
 I have both American and English friends whom I talk to daily or weekly. I enjoy dealing with people from three or four races on a daily basis.
The population of Oxford is 151,000. It is probably the most cosmopolitan city of 151,000 people in the entire world.

The Stong Taste of Money and Other Tastes

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We had lunch a couple of weeks ago with three other Indian couples.

They were saying that it is fatal to let your children work part-time during A levels and University, because once they get “the taste of money” they lose interest in the slow drag and deferred gratification of study.

We were amused. We never really had “the taste of money” until mid-life. Roy’s an academic and I write, which means we were comfortably middle class.

Then, we founded a small publishing 3 years ago, and were stunned to discover that we were actually good at business. And enjoyed it.

And found that the taste of money can be as ruinous for people in their forties as in their teens and twenties. We were no longer content with the salary cap of being in a profession. We enjoyed the world opening out in exotic travel, Norway, New Zealand, Europe, Europe. Enjoyed the massive new conservatory the business paid for.

“Taste and see that the Lord is Good.”

The one thing, however, that we are determined about is that we should never substitute the taste of money for the sweetness of spiritual tastes, or intellectual or creative or artistic tastes. Or the taste for nature. Or people. Or friendship.

Brutal Economics and Hope for those who Behaved Very Badly

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The Parable of the Talents

Okay, let us not doubt the goodness of the King of the Kingdom. The rewards are, always are, disproportionate! Ten cities given to the one faithful with ten minas. That is the reward of successful stewardship and entrepreneurship

However, the consequences of failure are brutal.  ‘Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. 29For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him.

I, personally, have squandered a talent which was given to me, and it is now taken away and given to someone who was faithful with theirs.

Is it final, Lord? Will it never be returned to me?

I believe it will be, because nothing is impossible with God. God loves restoring the repentant. If you see, the unfaithful servant is defiant and unrepentant.

The Gospel is about nothing more strongly than Hope. Hope even for those who have behaved very badly.

Peter, commits the ultimate betrayal of friendship, not once but three times, by denying he even knew his beautiful friend.

And he is restored, because his friend knows he loves him.

So, for those of us who have blown it, if we love Christ, there is always hope for restoration.

Restoration of the dreadful years the locusts have eaten.

Love is a COMMAND while peace is a gift

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Interesting, Jesus gives us peace as a gift. “Peace I give you, my peace I leave with you.”

He gives us joy as a gift (I have told you these things so that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be full.)

The spectacular gifts are just that, gifts. Tongues, healing, prophecy, teaching, leading.

But the most excellent way, the one thing we are commanded to do, is just that —a command. It is how we are to behave.

And that is LOVE.

What a right-brain word. And so Paul, who I think is both right and left-brained, spells it out for the left-brained.

Love is
Patient

kind

it does not envy

it does not boast

it is not proud

it is not rude

it is not self-seeking

it is not easily angered

it keeps no record of wrongs.

It does not delight in evil

but rejoices in the truth.

Oh Jesus, I read this, and feel overwhelmed.

How does one develop this love. Two ways.

One schools oneself (in the workshop of family, first of all) to be patient, and kind, not proud, not rude, not self-seeking, not easily angered, forgiving.

And then, as with anything in the kingdom, we ask for the spirit of  love.

Romans 5. The love of God is shed into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.

So to ask for the Holy Spirit, a prayer Jesus tells us is always answered, is to ask for love.

Also, once the root of the Holy Spirit is firmly planted in our hearts, love is an inevitable fruit.

Come Holy Spirit

Faith grows through testing

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Everything, whether the purity of gold, the tensile strength of steel, the strength of friendship, the power of blow-out preventers in underwater drilling equipment, is stronger and better for testing.

Faith is one of our greatest tools and strengths as we live our life in this world.

And so, one should not be sad that it is strengthened through testing.

I have 2 desires, one a strong one, which have not been granted for a long time.

And as I persevere in asking, faith will grow and be strengthened.

And the prize, the stronger faith, is worth the suffering as I wait for the answer to my prayers.