“Thou hast made me endless, such is thy pleasure. This frail vessel thou emptiest again and again, and fillest it ever with fresh life. 

This little flute of a reed thou hast carried over hills and dales, and hast breathed through it melodies eternally new. 

At the immortal touch of thy hands my little heart loses its limits in joy and gives birth to utterance ineffable. 

Thy infinite gifts come to me only on these very small hands of mine. Ages pass, and still thou pourest, and still there is room to fill.” 


Rabindranath Tagore.

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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.

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