Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

Trust: A Message of Christmas

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He came to earth in a  splash of energy

And gentleness and humility.

 

That homeless baby in the barn

Would be the lynchpin on which history would ever after turn

Who would have thought it?

 

But perhaps those attuned to God’s way of surprises would not be surprised.

 

He was already at the centre of all things, connecting all things.

* * *

Augustus Caesar issued a decree which brought him to Bethlehem,

The oppressions of colonialism and conquest brought the Messiah exactly where he was meant to be, the place prophesied eight hundred years before his birth by the Prophet Micah.

 

And he was already redeeming all things. The shame of unwed motherhood; the powerlessness of poverty.

 

He was born among animals in a barn, animals enjoying the sweetness of life, animals he created, animals precious to him.

For he created all things, and in him all things hold together

Including stars in the sky, of which a new one heralded his birth

 

Drawing astronomers to him.

And drawing him to the attention of an angry King

As angelic song drew shepherds to him.

 

An Emperor, a King, scholars, shepherds, angels, animals, stars, an unwed mother

All things in heaven and earth connected

By a homeless baby

The still point on which the world still turns. The powerful centre. The only true power.

The One who makes connections.

* * *

And there is no end to the wisdom, the crystal glints of the Message that birth brings.

 

To me, today, it says,

“Fear not, trust me, I will make a way.”

 

The baby lay gentle in the barn

And God arranges for new stars, angelic song, wise visitors with needed finances for his sustenance in the swiftly-coming exile, shepherds to underline the anointing and reassure his parents.

 

“Trust me in your dilemmas,” the baby still says,

 

“I will make a way. I will show it to you.”

Happy Christmas everyone.

There will be “the essence of dogness” in Heaven: C.S. Lewis

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Jake, my collie, in a buttercup meadow.

‘And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!”’ (Rev 5:13).

Every creature! Wow! Not only will we ourselves be healed, restored, and lost in the ecstasy of contemplating God and the Lamb, but every creature in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and in the sea will join us.

We shall be healed, and all the sad, abused, dumbly suffering animals of all history will be healed with us.

We will stand, and sing together.

I have loved animals all my life, and have always had as many of them as my family would permit. A couple of years ago, we had 9 pets (I live on an acre and a half in deep country, in Garsington, Oxfordshire)–rabbits, ducks, chickens, and a dog.

But decades of pet ownership do not leave one guilt free. There is the dog I could have walked more, the dog we had to give away when we left America, the rabbit who died of myxomatosis, the duck mauled by the fox on the one night we forget to put her in her shed, the hen eaten by the fox on the one night we forgot to lock the coop.

And as for the beloved pets who have died, the pets I have had to give away—I hope I will see them in heaven, for I imagine—but what do I know?–heaven will not be quite complete without dogs
The feisty C.S. Lewis was a slave to the dog of Mrs. Moore, his friend’s mother with whom he eccentrically lived. His brother, Warnie sardonically comments on the great things Jack might have achieved if he were not always trotting off to get meat from the butcher’s for the dog, or to walk him, or take him to the vet.

When a grieving dog-owner asked him if we would be re-united with our pets in heaven, Lewis did not let his lack of acquaintance with that undiscovered country prevent him from having opinions about it. “No,” he said, “not our dogs.” However, he said, there would be, in heaven, “the essence of dogness.”

I hope he’s right about the Platonic essence of Dogness in heaven. Surely he is.

But though there is nothing in Scripture about the resurrection of the dogs, I would love to believe that my dogs past and present will be there in heaven. Oh, please, Lord, let it be.

I particularly want to be reunited with my wonderful dog, Jake, whom I got from a rescue, as I have got every dog we have ever owned (or will own). He fell fast in love with me on the day we brought him home 4 years ago, and has been my constant shadow, sleeping at the foot of our bed, following me everywhere even to the bathroom, constantly repositioning himself to keep a vigilant eye on me. Though what an active collie and a sedentary writer could have in common is probably one of the mysteries of the universe!!

So tell me, do you viscerally believe you will be reunited with your pets in heaven?

The Power of Praise, Even in the Animal Kingdom

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hoefnagel oprheus charming the animals

“Orpheus Charming the Animals”Jacob Hoefnagel ( credit ) 

 

I keep learning and forgetting and learning again the spiritual power of praise and gratitude—eucharisteo.

It’s one of those spiritual practices that unleashes disproportionate power—like prayer, or the power of love.

Why it even works in the animal kingdom.

Several feisty horses live in the field behind my garden.  Many villagers bring them apples and carrots, and stroke them. But I have not grown up with horses, and while I enjoy looking at them, and love the placid, gentle, almost bovine look in their eyes, I do not voluntarily pet  them. I consider my small delicate hands, and their long mouths and enormous teeth, and the disproportion alarms me.

Well, as I cross their field on my walks across country footpaths, the horses come up to me, snorting, snuffling me to see if I have brought them crunchy treats. If I have a water bottle, they go for it, assuming it’s a treat for them. They surround me, I freeze, and they come closer, putting their noses into the red hood of my coat, as if it’s a nosebag! Talk about up close and personal!

I have called Roy on my mobile to come and rescue me, the horses trying to get hold of the mobile, and have then just stood there frozen, waiting, snuffled by horses, because if I moved, they followed me.

And then I took to avoiding the field behind our orchard, the natural gateway to field after field with public footpaths through them. Garsington has more public footpaths through fields than any other Oxfordshire village!

* * *

Well, this week, the horses came, majestic and determined, with their characteristic snort. “He sayeth among the trumpets, Ha, Ha.” (Job 39:25.)

I decided not to give way to fear, because they probably smell it. All animals instinctively seek dominance, and to assert a pecking order (the bullying primate behaviour which Frank Schaeffer sees in conservative Christians who insist on male headship and female submission. Okay, digression over 🙂

And so this week, instead of turning around as the horses trot towards me from every corner of the field, or saying, in a somewhat quavery voice any horse worth its salt could hear through, “Nice horse, good horse, let me go,” I decided to genuinely praise the God who made them.

And so I stroked that long, long nose, as long as my arm, and said aloud, gingerly at first, but gaining conviction, “Lord, I praise you for this beautiful horse. I praise you for its tranquil, dreamy eyes. I praise you for its strong body. I praise you for its (oops, over-) friendly temperament.”

And as I stroked, and praised, I genuinely began to calm down, and to see the beauty of that huge, gentle plaintive-eyed horse, and it too  began to calm down, and—hallelujah!!–let me go on my way without following me.

Wow, he had realized that I wasn’t afraid, that I had grown to like him. He had sensed that I was calm, and so did not feel the need to bully me by following me, in his snorty Ha-Ha way.

The music of Orpheus was meant to calm the animals. Well, apparently, so is the music of praise to their creator.