Thursday. I'm away today but my blog is home.
I was interested to see that Canadian music icon, Bruce Cockburn, received an honorary doctor of divinity at a convocation this year at Queen's University in Kingston. Bruce must be getting long-in-the-tooth because he is now a member of the Order of Canada and has been granted no less than five honorary doctorates.
We have seen Cockburn in concert a number of times over the years, beginning in our university days. We have always appreciated his intelligent lyrics and his impressive guitar work.
In the 1970's he made very open statements about his new-found Christian faith. On the liner notes of one album he offers his thanks for the biblical book of psalms. While his spirituality has seemed more general in recent years he has continued to care about the state of the planet and of those human beings who live each day in poverty and fear. Remember the controversy over his song If I Had a Rocket Launcher back in the eighties? It was an expression of his outrage at the death and destruction he saw firsthand in Central America.
Do I have a favourite Cockburn song? It might be All the Diamonds.
All the diamonds in this world
That mean anything to me
Are conjured up by wind and sunlight
Sparkling on the sea
I ran aground in a harbour town
Lost the taste for being free
Thank God He sent some gull-chased ship
To carry me to sea
Two thousand years and half a world away
Dying trees still grow greener when you pray
Silver scales flash bright and fade
In reeds along the shore
Like a pearl in sea of liquid jade
His ship comes shining
Like a crystal swan in a sky of suns
His ship comes shining.
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