I've only taken one history course in my entire life. This is an embarrassing admission for someone who likes to learn and encourages the same in others. Hence when I first started to read Captain Corelli's Mandolin (CCM) and encountered the author's (Louis de Bernières ) dedication I knew I was in for trouble. He states unequivocally his disdain for Fascism and in particular it's notable luminaries during the time of the Second World War. There was a certain edge in his brief comments which made me somewhat ashamed that my knowledge of European history started with William the Conqueror, the Battle of Hastings and ended with King John and his Magna Carta.

I was immediately and pleasantly surprised with de Bernières' fluid and captivating writing style. All of my historical and academic insecurities instantly evaporated with the folksy rendering of rural family life on the Grecian isle of Cephallonia. The characters were developed slowly and very naturally. Each chapter (at least the opening ones) read like a well integrated short story. I was enthralled by the subtle application of humour to the otherwise ordinary and pedestrian life of a widowed home spun doctor and his only child.

Continue reading "Captain Corelli's Mandolin Book Review"

Pilgrims

A road to travel
A path to tread
A race to run
The hope of a new vista
Shimmering on the horizon
Sometimes waning, oftimes vanishing
Always burning

Outcasts, Clowns, Beggars, Minstrels,
Not worthy of worldly honour
Heat of the day, and cold of night
The fear of failure
A quest
A dream
A home
A rest

I wrote this piece of poetry in 1979 to celebrate the life of our first born son, David, who just entered into his fourth decade. It was more of a consecration of his life to a tradition of others who had gone on before us. My prayer was, and still is, that he would "follow in their train".

When he was in the house, he asked them, "What were you arguing about on the road?" But they kept quiet because on the way they had argued about who was the greatest. Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, "If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all." Mark 9:33-35

Jesus called them together and said, "You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." Mark 10:42-45

Jesus replied, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me. John 12:23-26

Continue reading "Humility and Service"

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

II Corinthians 4:16-18

Aging is a natural and yet undesirable process. This is especially true for those of us in the West, where the youthful body is not merely admired, but deified. The things we do and the money we spend in order to stay "shapely and slim" and to avoid the inevitable. Extra weight is the dreaded enemy. We diet, we exercise and religiously count those kilocalories as if they were as valuable as Krugerrands.

Independent of our age, our body type, or general physical condition, every human bears or is burdened with a weight which is unseen. For some it may be as simple be one's family name. Consider for a minute the expectation on the ice rink of any child whose father happens to have the surname Gretzky. How could someone with the name Kennedy, Bush or Clinton not have aspirations for power and politics? What was expected of my sister, born into a family of seven sports crazed brothers? Could she have become anything other than an athlete extraordinaire?
Continue reading " The Weight of Glory* Revisited "

And he said, Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.

Job 1:21

The measure of our humanity comes not in the daily continuum and routine of life, but rather at the rare extremities of our existence; when time and eternity join hands. When all that we had assumed was under our control and normal, comes suddenly and unexpectantly undone.

Ten years ago, to the day, many of us faced one such singularity. The daily life of one of our brightest blobs of creativity and curiosity came careening to a halt. Full stop. We had hardly got to know him. We had assumed that his life was part of our normalcy and would drag us through the low spots with some spark of unorthodox genius. Art has a way of doing that.

We had a choice to make. It was forced upon us. Continue on with "life" wallowing in our normalcy and regretting what should have been. Or face the reality of life in Him and carry on, serving each other and the rest of humanity with joy, thankfulness and courage.

I was inspired today, not by reflecting on the precious life of him who has fallen asleep in Jesus, but rather by the words of another fellow pilgrim, who is seeking another dose of reality:

Dad, these have been the best ten years of my life

Many people like to blog daily. Most blog weekly. And a few monthly. Just in case you thought I had died, I am announcing to the world, that I blog at least annually. That's not too bad if one looks at life from an astronomical time frame

Leap years are known have been known to blog only once every four years. U.S. presidents have a similar sentiment.

Solar eclipses, brilliant and spectacular, blog only twice per year. However you have to be at the right place and the right time to actually view them! I've only seen two posts, living in the old city of York. Once in 1970, the other in the summer of 1999
Other astronomical events can be much more delayed. I went out one night with my two sons to watch the passing of a (totally unspectacular) show of light from Halley's comet. That was in 1986. By the time it comes again, my grand-daughter, Camille, born in late 2005 will be 56!

Continue reading "Dilatory Comets and Comings"

Everyone loves Camille. Now that's an understatement. It's not hard to understand why.

Regardez!

I just finished reading Stargirl, which is ostensibly a junior high girls book. Brilliant! Magic! Inspiring! Heartwarming! I can't really think of a one word superlative to express the lingering impression this short novel made on my being. All I know is that Stargirl is a never-put-down kind of book which can be easily digested while waiting in airport for your next flight. Your emotions will be tugged at with each passing section. Brace yourself for the crisis its and denouement.

I loved this book. As a matter of fact I love Stargirl. There is something about the drama which made my angioplastied heart and soul very much resonate with the story line. Perhaps it is because each of us at some point knew of a Stargirl. More to the point, it is because some of us deep down are Stargirls or would very much like to be.

Of course Stargirl is a mythical person. She's Peter Pan. She's Forrest Gump. She's Linus. She's a hundred other characters from the Who's Who of Idealists, who in due time meet the real cruel world and are inevitably injured by it.

Though the book's spirituality is cast at times in a Buddhist light, Stargirl is for me a type of Christ: with one large difference. Jesus is a real person and a true idealist who conquered sin and evil and as such, has enabled us all to be Stargirls.

Just spent 2 full weeks in Europe. Excellent trip with excellent company.
Photos and pictures to follow.

I've got to figure out how I might fetch the old MT stuff.

Yesterday at LBC we had a visitor at our time of worship and remembrance of the Lord Jesus from the U.S.A. She is a visiting scholar at the Pontifical Institute for Mediaeval Studies.
In the course of our conversation, she mentioned her historical connections with
Believers Chapel in Dallas Texas as well as her friendship with the late S. Lewis Johnson.

Dr. Johnson fell asleep in Jesus early last year after a long career as a scholar and Bible teacher. He was for many a great example of connecting theology with practice. His life and ministry have helped me immensely and so I recommend his teaching to a whole army of would be citizens of the Quist Nation.

For decades his messages have been recorded on audio cassette tape and broadcast on the radio. They are also available free of charge by calling the Tape Ministry office (+1.972.239.1836) and asking for a catalogue. And of course they have been digitized and made available on the web!

Check out these sample URLS for some sweet Southern listening:
Who was Christ
Basic Bible Doctrine

There's a whole boat load of messages where those came from.

Earlier today I chatted with a young Frenchman who had no awareness of Vimy Ridge nor the role that Canadians played in the liberation of France in WWI. Perhaps that would be true if I would ask the average Canadian today. I'm sure my knowledge of such historical minutiae was all but absent in my youth. In fact my last formal course in history was in 1968 when I was bogged down with remembering the details of William the Conqueror and the Battle of Hastings.

That all changed last year when I had the privilege of visiting Vimy Ridge myself. I travelled with some displaced Canadians who live in Ghent Belgium, a stones throw from the north of France. Let's forget about the details and history lessons and get right to the point. Every Canadian should have one and only place to visit for their Identity pilgrimage. No it's not Niagra Falls. It's not even the Hockey Hall of Fame. And horrors... it's not even Ottawa, the Nations captital. It's Vimy Ridge. In particular it's the Vimy Memorial, a little piece of Canada in the north of France. This monument tries to capture in marble, concrete and with the sculptors skill, the sacrifice of so many in what was to become, our finest hour and the event that galvanized an entire young nation.
Continue reading "There be giants in the land"

Greetings gentle readers. I am still here and rest assured, have been reading all your happy blog entries. The Quist Nation is alive and well eventhough most of Toronto believes they are Greek. (After watching all of the Euro2004 playoffs, in particular the Greek teams 1-0 technique, I have been reminded once again why football is a game of futility. Witness that Greece won the final with the amazing statistic of one corner kick, one shot on net and one goal).

My bicyclehas been a true friend for well over 10 years. Each day from April to October I've been commuting to and from UofT. 10 kilometers each way. Loads and loads of fun and loads and loads of TTC tokens saved. In recent days I've found slight chest pains about 10 minutes into the journey. Oh oh! Looks like angina, feels like angina. Only the doctor knows for sure. I'll be making an appointment real soon now.
Continue reading "Heart Beat..."

Last weekend I enjoyed an overnight honeymoon with my bride in Stratford Ontario Canada. We experienced the comedic Shakespearian love story A Midsummer Night's Dream. I highly recommend the event. [ By that I mean marriage followed by love, romance and loads and loads (TM) of honeymoons. This was our 26th. ] This production was a visual and sensual extravaganza with the ethereal spiritual world of nymphs and satyrs cast as Brazilian aboriginies in the Amazon rain forest. The bungee cords and trapeze props helped to give a real feel of levity and flight. I'd never seen or read the play before but that was not an issue. It's a simple love story with the standard mixture of envy, hurt, confusion and a hilarious resolution. The spirit world puts the humans in their place by reminding them that life should not be taken too seriously. Like all good comedies, the end is what we all want and are waiting for. The lovers find themselves married and enjoying the first hours of their honeymoon. Do you get the sense of recursion in this story?

In a few hours I'm booked for a MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) scan of my lower back. I'm hoping that somehow this diagnostic procedure will unveil some silver bullet that will solve (or at least dramatically reduce) my lower back problem. I'm a skeptic at heart but there remains a thread of optimism in my being. But true to Ontario form it will be a few weeks until the results are handed over to my GP. So... I'll call you don't call me.

But maybe my pain is silver lining rather than a bullet. If. for example, I take my own advice and heed to the sage instructions as found in The Practice of the Presence of God, by brother Lawrence, I will learn that enduring pain is a great privilege!

Perspective is therefore important, both in love (don't take yourself too seriously and enjoy the wife/spouse of your youth) and in pain. The Lord Jesus was caused to suffer pain and loss in order to make Him the perfect captain of our salvation Hebrews 2:9-13.

Do I hear an AMEN from the ether?

I've never seen Xena the Warrior Princess. But I can imagine the idea of an Amazon slaying dragons and whatever other masculine form comes her way. The idea of a strong woman who by the sword, engages in war to beat up evil strangers, ugly enough to become gargoyles is a noble one. On the other hand it is ironic that someone whose name means "hospitality to strangers" would make a very poor bed and breakfast hostess. Xenia is the greek word for hosptitality.

But here's an idea deserving of consideration:

Hospitality is Revolutionary!

Do you want defeat your enemy? Invite him out for a coffee. Throw away those weapons of mass destruction and take up the dish towel, broom and dust pan. Do you want to Win friends and influence people? Pull out the cot and fluff up those pillows. Do you want crush the dark forces of evil and injustice? Offer up some Bran Flakes to a stranger... Culinary skills are not necessarily a pre-requiste for hospitality.


Continue reading "Xenia and Warfare"

I'm somewhat cynical when it comes to the writing of new books; especially in the field of Christian theology, both academic and practical. If one is going to write a book, surely one would want to be breaking some new ground, or at least standing on the shoulders of giants and making a few new comments.

But alas, folk write books for the modern readers as if they are breaking new ground or providing a novel insight into some age old ideas. The good old book said it best:

"Of the writing of books there is no end" Ecclesiates 12:12

"There is nothing new under the sun" Ecclesiates 1:9

"Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written." John 21:25
Continue reading "Looking for Something Good to Read?"