St John the Baptist Anglican Church, Bulimba

05/04/2026

Linda Mitchell

The morning light … the new Paschal candle alight … the joy rises within us as we celebrate the joy of Christ risen! Alleluia!!

04/04/2026

The morning light … the new Paschal candle alight … the joy rises within us as we celebrate the joy of Christ risen! Alleluia!!

04/04/2026

Easter 2026. What does resurrection mean … now?

What does resurrection mean? The answer to that question will depend, in part, on who YOU are, what is happening in your life and around you, and when you are living.

If you are living in around 33AD resurrection is a shocking thing. If you have been following Jesus for several years, or even just in the last few days, this is a shock. Your heart is still heavy with grief, your eyes red with tears, your head still throbbing with confusion. The one who you were following was brutally murdered! And now … now there are these stories that he has reappeared!?! Shocking. Confronting. Disturbing. Confusing.

Even more, when those stories turn into encounter, personally, as happened for you and hundreds of his followers, the shock turns to a kind of exhilaration which puts your head into a further spin. You start rethinking the things he did, the things he said, and pieces of an enormous puzzle start falling into place.

There is a compelling urge welling up inside you to do something, to tell someone, not only about the last thing that happened, that Jesus is risen. What you feel moved to tell people is all those things he said and did, and how God has been present and working in and through this bloke.

Go forward a few years, perhaps 20 years. What does resurrection mean to you, as you stand on a hill overlooking Athens. You are at a place where lots of new and strange ideas get shared and tested out. This foreigner, Paul, is weaving an interesting tale about his God. You can tell he is Jewish just from looking at him, so you know that when he says ‘God’ he means their idea that there is only one divine being. Sort of ‘Zeus without all the rest of the crowd on Mount Olympus’.

Paul spoils his interesting narrative though with an outrageous suggestion. This guy he was talking about was murdered by the Romans. We have seen a lot of that here too! They are a bloodthirsty lot! But Paul says that this Jesus came back from the dead??? Half the crowd scoffed at him and walked off. But you are intrigued. If this is true then it changes how we think. If changes how we consider both life and death. Resurrection is intriguing.

Jump across a longer time, into the second and third centuries. You are part of the Church meeting in secret. You hide your faith from those who are actively persecuting Christians. When you can, as often as you can, you gather privately with other members of the Church. You read the holy books and letters. You pray together. You weep together for those who have disappeared or been publicly executed since last time you met. And you remember that the one who you follow has conquered death, so the hideous death just around the corner for you is less terrifying. For you, resurrection is reassurance and hope.

One century on. That Roman Empire which sought to eradicate Christians has now absorbed the faith, made it their own, turned being a Christian into a civic expectation. You want to get ahead and get a job? You need to hold and believe all these things about Jesus. Resurrection is part of the package. There are preachers and teachers who dig deeper, but you just want to make the best way forward you can for yourself and your family in society. For you resurrection is a piece of the pattern and structure of your life in society.

Under the long years of Christendom that pedestrian view of resurrection, on the whole, prevailed. It wasn’t something to question or ponder too deeply, for most. It was part of the pattern of the year, and much to be longed for because it marked the end of all that enforced fasting and acts of extra penitence! The joy of resurrection in the middle-ages became both the joy of release from the darkness of Lent and the celebration of a high and holy day, with pageantry and feasting, to lift you out of the drudgery of everyday life. For you resurrection is a dramatic highlight, a glimmer of light in an otherwise, overall, grey life.

As western society emerged and was transformed through the Enlightenment, and all that followed, more prominent divergence also emerged. Was resurrection dogma which could never be questioned and had to be accepted without deviation, or was it the greatest example of the irrational and unbelievable tenets at the heart of Christianity? For some, mostly quietly because the dominant forces in most western societies were still officially Christian, the idea that someone came back from the dead was tucked away and loosely held. Emphasise the good words and inspiration this man offered, if you want to. But don’t push credulity too far by insisting on literal believe in the nonsensical! For some, resurrection became optional.

Easter 1915. In the trenches. Shells screamed overhead and exploded behind the lines, dismembering your mates who were lined up there. Last December, for Christmas, everything stopped. That was winter. No one was pushing too hard for anyone to fight. The diversion of exchanging a few simple presents and the hiatus in the battling were welcomed. That was then. Now it was spring, the time when generals send young men out to die. “What day is today? Is it Easter? Really? Pass me that ammunition and get yourselves ready, lads. The whistle is about to blow and over the top we go! No time to think about anything else. There are enemies to kill.” Resurrection is ignored.

Easter 1919, and again in 1946. In homes across the world families gathered around tables with empty places. Photographs on the walls and sideboards brought pain and tears as those who had not returned from war were there, in spirit, but their bodies were cold in the ground in places afar from home. Where is the joy of Easter for these people? There is the hope that what has been done will bring an end to the fighting. And yet it continues to erupt. The sacrifice brings connections to light between the story of Jesus and those who died, and those so maimed and damaged that their families didn’t really get them back. ‘There is no greater love than this, than to lay down one’s life for your friends.’ That brings some comfort in connection. But what of resurrection? There is perhaps some desperation in the hope that death is really transformed and those who have gone, all too soon, perhaps pointlessly, will be seen and known and loved again beyond the black edged photos on the mantlepiece. Resurrection has an edge of desperate hope, despite what IS, there is something more.

All of these impressions continue still. Resurrection and the celebration of Easter is shocking and confronting and confusing, still; resurrection is intriguing, still; resurrection is reassurance and hope, still; resurrection is a piece of the pattern and structure of life in society, still; resurrection is a dramatic highlight, a glimmer of light, still; resurrection, and Easter, are optional for many, still; resurrection is ignored, still; and resurrection has an edge of desperate hope, hope beyond pain of lived experience, still.

What does resurrection mean for us, now? Easter has rolled around again. How much of the things which were observed across 2000 years are still part of this Easter? Or could it be that there is an invitation to something more? Easter and the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection is all those things. And is also an invitation to us in each and every age to let light shine into who we are, where we are, now.

The celebration of each Easter should never be as simple as ‘here we are again’. We are each different people from 12 months ago. How does the light, and the shocking news, and the insistent invitation of Jesus transforming even death, especially death, touch you?

How has your appreciation of mortality been touched in the last 12 months, in your family and friends and even in yourself? Can the light shining lead to a deeper compassion and more insistent attention to be fully present, to care, to pay attention to relationships, to cherish one another?

How has your appreciation of what is truly important in life been touched in the last 12 months? Have your priorities been redirected towards peace and justice; opened up to altruism; infused with the awareness of the presence of God in yourself, in your family, in those you love and in those you find so hard to love?

Resurrection shocks and disturbs us still, Jesus confronts and invites and comforts us still, light pierces darkness still, shining across those years into our hearts and lives. Now. What will THIS celebration of Jesus’ resurrection, this day, this Easter, mean to you?

Amen.

Paul Mitchell.

04/04/2026

Preparing for new light! Preparing for new life! Preparing for JOY!

7.30pm tonight: Lighting of the New Fire, Renewal of Baptismal Vows, and First Eucharist of Easter.

7.30am Easter Day. Renewal of Baptismal Vows, and Eucharist celebrating Easter.

9.00am Easter Day. Celebration of Baptism and Welcoming to Holy Communion, Renewal of Baptismal Vows, and Eucharist celebrating Easter.

All welcome!!!

28/03/2026

Palm Sunday. 29 March 2026. What is it with all the shouting??

Palm Sunday was a noisy event. Start with thinking about the crowds gathering. There would have been a buzz. People often travelled on that road up and down the Mount of Olives. It is a great place from which to look across to the Old City. Today, as you look from the base of the valley, you see the tombs which have been there since ancient times, those Jewish people who were buried on the edge of the Temple, ready to be immediately close by to the Holy of Holies when the general resurrection came. Above those tombs looms the sheer walls of the Temple Mount. These walls support the platform on which the Temple, and other buildings, stood. That part of the view is almost unchanged in 2000 years.

Today the view, as your eyes lift higher, is dominated by the sheen of the light reflected on the gold-covered Dome of the Rock, the cupola sitting above the place where the Temple used to stand. That building covers the rock on which is thought to be the footprint of Mohammed, left there when he ascended to heaven during a night visit to Jerusalem.

That holy place, holy and sacred to Jews, Muslims and Christians, has its times of silence and peace, but at many times is also full of people and noise. The sound from the Temple Mount, and (on Sabbaths and holy days) the sound of the shofar, the ram’s horn (blown at times when we would ring bells), would have carried across to the other side of the valley, to the Mount of Olives, to the paths which led down from Bethany, into the valley, and up again to Jerusalem.

It was a place full of noise and activity and people. Palm Sunday would have been a noisy event as people gathered full of anticipation. “Hey, did you hear?! Jesus is here! Something is happening!! I heard he is coming down this way. I wonder what is going on?! I wonder how those in charge will deal with him?? Look! Up there! Someone is coming down the hill on a donkey!!”

The crowd surged. Perhaps the donkey brayed. People were so caught up in the moment that they threw their cloaks, the outer layers of their clothes, onto the road. An ancient version of ‘red-carpet’ treatment. ‘Let’s make a path which shows honour and respect!’ Enthusiastically the people stripped branches from the trees on the side of the road and waved them in the air.

Had this been in Australia we would be celebrating ‘Eucalyptus Sunday’. But in that part of the world the suggestion is that the trees were palms. Near the base of the hill the trees through which Jesus would have passed were olive groves, part of the Garden of Gethsemane. He would return there later in the week. On that visit there would be more shouting. On that visit the anticipation would be accompanied by nervous tension and fear. Today, though, passing through the noisy crowd, on a donkey, heading towards Jerusalem, the anticipation was infused with excitement and longing for this to be the moment when God brought about the longed-for change, disruption of the time of pain and separation, triumph over the oppressors, freedom to be the people who God calls us to be.

All that would come, but not in the ways expected by most of those in the crowd as they shouted and (most likely) sang, and tossed their clothes onto the path and waved the branches in their hands.

There is an expression about something being ‘all over bar the shouting’. It means that something is almost completed, just the final phase is to come. These people shouting may have thought that this was THE moment, the time when everything the people of God had been longing for over hundreds of years, would be completed. It would be, but, again, not in the ways they expected. The next time a crowd gathered, with Jesus present, and were shouting, the words on their lips were not ‘Hosanna’ but ‘Crucify!’

Shouting can easily become a distraction. This is a day which invites us, instead, into a deeper place of peaceful contemplation. On the lips of people in that crowd that day were titles and honours being offered to Jesus. Yet he never encouraged that attention on himself. He came to draw us into deeper relationship with God, to be able to speak the name of God with honour and depth and love.

I want to offer you a few thoughts about the name of God which we are invited to speak, a reflection to take with you into Holy Week, and beyond.

Sandra Thurman Caporale wrote these words. I have adapted them slightly and added a few notes of my own:

“There was a moment when Moses had the nerve to ask God what [God’s] name is. God was gracious enough to answer, and the name [God] gave is recorded in the original Hebrew as YHWH.

Over time we’ve arbitrarily added an “a” and an “e” in there to get YaHWeH, presumably because we have a preference for vowels. [And because the original Hebrew did not include the vowels in the text].

But scholars and Rabbi’s have noted that the letters YHWH represent breathing sounds, or aspirated consonants. When pronounced without intervening vowels, it actually sounds like breathing.

YH (inhale): WH (exhale).

So, a baby’s first cry, [a child’s] first breath, speaks the name of God.

A deep sigh calls [God’s] name – or a groan or gasp that is too heavy for mere words.

Even an atheist [Sandra suggests] would speak [God’s] name, unaware that their very breath is giving constant acknowledgment to God.

Likewise, a person leaves this earth with their last breath, when God’s name is no longer filing their lungs. [We breath God’s name at the last].

So, when I can’t utter anything else, is my cry calling out His name?

Being alive means I speak [God’s] name constantly.

So, is it heard the loudest when I’m the quietest?

In sadness, we breathe heavy sighs.

In joy, our lungs feel almost like they will burst.

In fear we hold our breath and have to be told to breathe slowly to help us calm down.

When we’re about to do something hard, we take a deep breath to find our courage.

When I think about it, breathing is giving [God] praise. Even in the hardest moments!

This is so beautiful [Sandra writes] and fills me with emotion every time I grasp the thought. God chose to [own] a name that we can’t help but speak every moment we’re alive.

All of us, always, everywhere.

Waking, sleeping, breathing, with the name of God on our lips.”



As we move beyond the noise and the shouting and the tumult of this day … breathe. Breathe God in and out. Let that breath fill and inspire and encourage you. Let that breath infuse you with compassion and forgiveness and love. Let that breath, that name, that presence of God in your lives, calm you and bring you to a place of peace and openness and hope.

The work of God continued that day, amidst the shouting on that first Palm Sunday. The work of God continues today. In us. Breathe. YHWH. Breathe.

Amen.

Paul Mitchell.

21/03/2026

Fifth Sunday in Lent. 22 March 2026. When is it too late?

Do you know the song ‘The court of King Caractacus’? “Oh, the ladies of the harem of the court of King Caractacus, are just passing by …” The song goes on, and on, and on, suggesting things that can be seen. Until the last verse:

“Now if you want to take some pictures
Of the fascinating witches
Who put the scintilating stiches in the britches
Of the boys who put the powder
On the noses on the faces of the ladies
Of the harem of the court of King Caractacus
You're too late because they've just passed by.”

When is it too late? When is the last chance? When are all our options exhausted and there are no more opportunities? Three of our readings today explore that thought.

In Ezekiel (37:1-14) the prophet is faced with a valley full of dry bones. The whole story is a dramatic metaphor. The people had become so desiccated in their relationship with God that they had dried up. They had lost their connection, their lifeblood, the living water which gave them life. The people were spiritually dead. They were dry and lost and had collapsed.

You may remember another song, an African-American spiritual, this one more likely to be sung in Sunday Schools, including the line: “dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones ...”. That scene described in Ezekiel 37 has inspired song writers and artists and many people who have delved into the question “what is God actually doing here?” The story is about the hope that life will come. It is the hope that even where life has seeped away and become so lost that it seems like all that now exists is dead and dry … life is possible.

I have mentioned before in sermons that this passage contains one of my favourite words in the original languages of the Bible. There is a word used here which only appears, in Greek, three times in our Bible. The first two times are in the Septuagint, a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek made in Alexandria in the centuries before Jesus came.This was the Bible which the early Church knew and used, more than the original Hebrew. The third time is in John’s gospel.

The word, in Greek, is ‘enephusesen’. It means more than just breathing.The ‘phusis’ in the middle of the word is about the essence of the person, their inner life, the core of who they are. That ‘phusis’ is breathed into another. Here, God breaths into the dead, dry bones … and life is returned!! The first time the word appears is in Genesis 2:7, when God breaths life, breaths God’s very self, into Adam, the first human being. The third time is in John 20:22. The disciples were in the upper room, paralysed by fear. The followers of Jesus, after his resurrection, were so scared that they could not see life continuing. Jesus came among them and breathed on them, breathed himself into them, giving them life.

The use of the same word is an opportunity to read those three stories together. Genesis and the life of God being breathed into humanity from the beginning; Ezekiel and the life of God being breathed into people who had wandered so far away from God that they were as good as dead; John and the life of God being breathed into the disciples who were so paralysed by fear that they could not see a future. God breathed God’s own life into them all. It was not too late. It is never too late for God to breathe life into us, even us, when we wander or when we are paralysed by fear.

In our reading today from Romans (8:6-11) Paul is giving one of his usual convoluted explanations of the difference it makes to us to have Jesus Christ in our lives. Paul weaves a rich tapestry of images. Sometimes I wish that he had been a little less clever and complex. Yet the language he uses and the ways he teases out each of our idiosyncrasies in our ways of relating to God does add to the overall picture splashed across an enormous canvas in his writings. Paul is saying, in essence, no matter how far we have wandered, no matter how far into the murk and mud of life we have descended, no matter how far away we have pushed ourselves from a life attuned with God, God can find us and raise us up.



To sink down into a life which does not listen to God, which actively opposes or disregards the life to which God calls us, is to wallow in a place which Paul calls here ‘the flesh’. Paul likes using word pictures which emphasise contrasts. ‘Once you were this … now you are that’. ‘To live like this is to die, to be lost … but now you are found’. ‘You have a choice, darkness or light. Choose the light!’

There are places where it might sound like Paul is saying that if we have crossed over a bridge too far then we are lost forever. But that is his poetic and dramatic turn of phrase. He is actually far more hopeful than that, because at the heart of the message of Jesus, as Paul knows, is the message of grace, the gift which transforms and lifts us up. Paul is saying, in this passage today, that even if we have every appearance of being dead, life is possible. Even if our rebellion from God, our refusal to walk in life-giving ways, has taken us down paths where we may feel completely lost … it is never too late. Even the hint of the glimmer of the hope of connection and reconnection with God is a lifeline. It is never too late. It is never too late to find life. Whatever we have done and been and however dark may seem the paths and mistakes and dissembling which have led us downward and distant from God, it is never, ever too late.

The strangest of the three readings is the gospel reading, the story of the raising of Lazarus (John 11:1-45). Especially in John’s gospel the narrative stories are always infused with meaning, rich in layers, metaphorical and allegorical and not to be treated as simply a statement of some event which is being recounted. In 2023 Sharon and I were in the Holy land and visited what is thought to be the tomb of Lazarus, a powerful experience among many powerful experiences there!

What actually happened then, there, for Lazarus? We cannot be sure. This story tells of the death of someone who was extremely close to Jesus. Yes, his disciples who travelled with him were close. Yet look at the various stories which speak about Mary and Martha and Lazarus of Bethany, and you get a glimpse of Jesus’ best friends, people he went and spent personal, intimate, significant time with.

Often we hear that Jesus was deeply moved by the pain in the lives of people he met. Here, once Jesus arrives near the tomb, when he is confronted by the raw grief, ripping with tears and sobs from someone who he loves, grief for another person who he also loves, Jesus weeps.

In the way the narrative is presented you could understand Jesus’ disciples murmuring “He waited until it was too late!” Martha responds to Jesus’ suggestion about removing the stone with those words which suggest ‘it is too late’. But, somehow, it was not too late. Lazarus is raised. Physical death was not the end of the story.

That gospel reading was long. 45 verses. A very long reading. But to make sense of it we need to read more. I am not going to do that now, but I hope you will. What happens next? At the end of the passage as we read it today many people started to believe because of the sign of the raising of Lazarus. It was more than just a piece of wonder-working by Jesus to get people’s attention. Underlying that all was the message that death, and life, are transformed by the way that God is working through this man. What happened next, though? The death of Jesus becomes more immediate and obvious.

Plots to kill him become more active. Jesus is anointed, by Mary (sister of Lazarus) in anticipation of his death and burial. The words Jesus speaks about what is coming and the actions he undertakes are more raw and confronting and raise the stakes of the journey he is on. Read on. Look at where the story goes. The story is for those who first read it, and for us also. It is never too late to be embracing the journey, to enter into a deep connection with the one whose life transforms death. The invitation to be immersed in this journey is the invitation of the story we read and share.

Where will the road lead? To the grave AND beyond. It is never too late to recognise that the tomb, the grave, the physical end is not the end of the story. Not for Lazarus. Not for Jesus. Not for us.

It is never too late, and that invitation startles and grips us. It is never too late, for God to breathe life, for God to embrace and accept, for God to transform. It is never too late. Hold onto that. With God, it is never too late.

Amen.

Paul Mitchell.

17/03/2026

15/03/2026

Fourth Sunday in Lent. 15 March 2026. Being blind.

We are all disabled in some way. We all lack some capacity. None of us has complete perfection, as if that were ever possible.

Some disabilities are physical. Among those disabilities, some are minor and able to be corrected or accommodations made (for example, by wearing glasses). Some are major and require the use of devices to help us to function (for example crutches or wheelchairs). Some disabilities affect our minds. Our capacity to think clearly, to function and to interact freely may be impaired in small ways or in significant ones. Mental and physical disabilities range from those which are barely noticeable through to those which require constant care.

Some disabilities are also the result of our life experience. What we have seen and heard and how our lives have been shaped has affected our expectations and our perspective in ways which disable us from being able to interact with others with completely open minds. Prejudice is a form of disability.

We are all disabled in some way. We all lack some capacity.

How do we become disabled? How do we come to a point where there is something lacking? In today’s gospel reading the question was posed, not by those who were in ongoing vigorous dispute with Jesus but by his disciples(!), about whether blindness was a result of sin. That question is in the opening verses of John 9, which were removed to make the reading shorter in the lectionary as we use it today. But those verses are an important part of the context. Take time to look up the full passage.

What causes blindness? There may be many reasons, including genetics and trauma. As the people of that time had no conception of genetics, they struggled to understand blindness and other forms of disability which had no obvious reason. The fact that the question was asked about sin was the result of poor teaching, poor interpretation of the world, poor theology, poor understanding. People projected outwards what they had been taught and the prejudices and ignorance which surrounded them.

As I was thinking of these things a Facebook meme popped up from an Italian friend of mine. It shows Jesus standing in front of a class of young people. Jesus starts a sentence and invites them to finish it. The sentence is “I was a stranger and you …” Clearly Jesus is trying to make a connection with Matthew 25. I was a stranger and you … welcomed me, fed me, visited me, cared for me, etc. In the meme the responses from the students are “I was a stranger and you … drowned me, beat me, killed me, attacked me, rained down bombs on me, etc!” Why would they say that?? Where would those responses come from? It is because of how strangers, foreigners are treated in so many places. What those young people saw, they repeated. What they heard people saying should happen to foreigners, they repeated. Prejudice is a learned disability. It is also a form of blindness.

The question ‘what caused this man’s blindness’ comes from a perspective of judging and condemning. There must be something wrong in that person for them to be like that!” is the thought. The same thought ripples through so many forms of prejudice.

What was Jesus’ response? He focussed on the person with the most obvious disability, and sought to relieve their affliction. He responded in love. Those who were judging both Jesus (for his actions) and the man ‘born blind’ were, themselves, blind, in ways perhaps more debilitating that the physical blindness which afflicted that person. How did Jesus respond to them? He also responded in love, seeking to open their eyes too.

Having our eyes opened, recognising things we have denied or which we have not seen before, being invited into a new perspective, is a form of healing of disability. That sort can be healed. Not all physical or mental disabilities can be altered radically or completely. Strategies for living with disability then become life patterns, focussed on being and becoming he best we can in the circumstances.

Prejudice can be healed though. Spiritual and attitudinal blindness can be healed.

It begins by having our eyes opened to a different perspective, on a situation or on people. In our first reading today, from 1 Samuel 16, we hear the story of the choosing of David. It is a complex story as it is a mix of the political situation of the day; long term expectations about how God has acted, should act and will act; rivalries and subterfuge and authority.

It is a glimpse into the way in which God’s choices are often not what or who we would choose. It is a reminder of the way people act and the way they see others and the attitudes which shape our expectations.

Samuel was sent by God, pushed and spurred on by God, to find a successor for Saul, who had gone so badly off track that he had forfeited his authority in the eyes of God. Samuel goes secretly, because what he was doing could easily be described as treason. Samuel also went with authority from God.

The family of Jesse were prominent, influential, recognised. They were upright citizens. From the descriptions the oldest sons would have been in the category of ‘most likely to succeed’. That is how the world looks. Still. Physical strength, physical beauty and apparent perfection are valued highly. Look at our media. Look at our magazines. Even today those characteristics are prized, as if such people were superior, more important, more valuable.

Who did God choose? The youngest, the smallest, the least of the brothers. Yes, it notes he was ‘ruddy, had beautiful eyes and was handsome’. That sounds like some explanation to suggest he might, just, have fitted the expected stereotype. But he was certainly the most surprising choice!

Think, for a moment, how this looked through the eyes of David’s older brothers? You may have in mind the story in Genesis of Joseph, another younger brother, and his prejudiced older siblings. What did David’s brothers see when they looked at their younger brother? Probably not someone who was in any way equal to them. They most likely saw someone inferior. Would that have changed? Would their eyes have been opened to see David in different ways? Did they ever get beyond their prejudice about little brother David?

The next chapter of 1 Samuel suggests that the older brothers still resented David and looked down on him. We don’t have enough of the ongoing story to know whether or not they ever got over their blindness. We can hope though, especially as the story continued, that they came to see him in a new way, that they overcame their narrowness, that they were able to lose the disability of prejudice.

We are all disabled in some way. We all lack some capacity.

Whenever Jesus encounters someone with a physical disability, and responds, the surrounding stories and the surrounding narrative always includes an invitation for those disabled in less obvious ways to be healed, for prejudice to be overturned.

As the focus in this passage from John 9 is about blindness, I hope a question we will each ask ourselves is “how is it that I am blind?” As in that story, we may need others to point out our blindness to us, though few of us enjoy such revelations! A part of that reflection may be to ask honestly, “How may I be treating or responding to someone in ways which say more about my own limitations than theirs, more about my own turmoil than theirs, more about what is in me than what is in them?”

God does not condemn us for our disability and for our prejudice. The approach is always love and seeking more light and, as the reading from Ephesians (5:8-14) invites us to discover, to live IN the light.

We are all disabled in some way. We all lack some capacity. Recognising that is a first step towards both compassion, understanding, healing and clear sight.

Amen.

Paul Mitchell.