The Spiritual Solace of a Waterfall

 

                                                     Buttermilk Falls -- April 4 2025 -- Ruth Mundy 

With what deep murmurs through time’s silent stealth

Doth thy transparent, cool, and wat’ry wealth

Here flowing fall,

And chide, and call,

As if his liquid, loose retinue stay’d

Ling’ring, and were of this steep place afraid;

The common pass

Where, clear as glass,

All must descend

Not to an end,

But quicken’d by this deep and rocky grave,

Rise to a longer course more bright and brave.

Dear stream! dear bank! where often I

Have sat, and pleased my pensive eye ;
Why, since each drop of thy quick store
Runs thither whence it flow’d before,
Should poor souls fear a shade or night,
Who came—sure—from a sea of light?
Or, since those drops are all sent back
So sure to Thee that none doth lack,
Why should frail flesh doubt any more
That what God takes He’ll not restore?

 from Water-fall by 17th century mystical Welsh Anglican poet Henry Vaughan. 

In Christian theology, "kairos" refers to God's appointed or opportune time, a specific moment or season for action, conversion, and transformation, distinct from the linear flow of time (chronos).  

But let justice roll down like water
    and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. Amos 5:24 NRSVue 

Yesterday we paddled for the first time in 2025, along a stretch of the Salmon River north of Napanee. Getting out in a canoe or kayak is definitely a seasonal lift for us although the large number of trees along the banks downed by the ice storm was sobering. Nearly all of them, mostly maples, had buds on them which made the loss more poignant somehow. 

On our trip home we made a stop at Buttermilk Falls because we knew that the significant precipitation of the past week would likely mean they were roaring, and they were. It's impossible to describe the sonic cocoon one enters into next to a waterfall or, even better, behind one. Everything else is pushed into the background and a kairos moment unfolds. We agreed that this was an "I-thou" experience, to borrow a term about relationship from theologian Martin Buber. Waterfalls can feel like living entities -- "thou" rather than "it" and we have been blessed with numerous experiences through the years, a couple of them unnerving.

When we lived in Northern Ontario we paddled the Sand River in Algoma, with the portage around Lady Evelyn Falls so close to the lip that the spray rises by the sign. Probably our best experiences of various falls were in Iceland where a new cascade was visible around every curve of the highway, all of them fed by glaciers. As Canadians we have visited Niagara Falls on a number of occasions and I once took a visiting Israeli guide named Carmy there -- he was astounded. 

Two years ago we finally visited Ein Gedi in the Judean wilderness of Israel, the place where the fugitive David hid from the pursuing King Saul. Was this simply a remote hideout with a good source of water or was there some solace from the sight and sound? When Jesus went into the wilderness to prepare for his ministry was there a similar watercourse for sustenance? 

I'm just happy that it occurred to us to make the detour yesterday on our return drive and as geezers we can do as we please! 

Can we describe a relationship with a waterfall as spiritual or even religious? You've probably guessed my answer. 

                                                

                                                                   Ruth at Ein Gedi, April 2023

16th C Religion as a Blood Sport

 

The second season of Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light is available to view and some reviewers suggest that it is even better than the excellent first series. They are both based on the Man Booker prize-winning novels by the late, great Hilary Mantel. It's hard to imagine a series not being worthwhile when both Mark Rylance (Thomas Cromwell) and Damien Lewis (Henry VIII) are central characters. 

We've started this second season and there is a scene in episode two, titled Obedience, where Cromwell visits Shaftesbury Abbey to meet with a nun named Dorothea, the daughter of Cardinal Wolsey. Needless to say, supposedly celibate priests with offspring isn't in the RC acceptable practices manual but it happened. Cromwell also speaks with Abbess Elizabeth Zouche (above) who was one of the most powerful background persons in England at the time, heading an immensely wealthy convent. Both of these women are actual historical figures although these meetings are speculative. 

Religion was pervasive in every aspect of life in the 16th century yet hypocrisy and viciousness, including murder and execution, was rampant. 

At this time Henry was the proto-typical Orange Menace, complete with ginger hair, breaking with the Roman Catholic Church in order to marry again, and again, and again... As his consolidation of the role as head of the new Church of England (Anglican) progressed he dissolved the monasteries and convents with trumped up (couldn't resist) charges of sedition and corruption so that he could plunder their holdings, including lands. 

Shaftesbury Abbey was one of the many religious complexes not only emptied of wealth and occupants but physically destroyed. There is a historic site today but it is situated amidst the ruins. In 2019 the dissolution document from the 1530s was discovered with Abbess Zouche's signature. She received a huge pension for acquiesing and managed to keep her head on her shoulders. . 

This episode of The Mirror and the Light is dramatic, in a quiet way, for reasons I won't share in the event you watch. As with many of the other episodes it provides insight into a tumultous era that was God-haunted and brutal.

An acclaimed novel on the influence of women in convents, often the "spares" in wealthy families who can't be married off, is Matrix by Lauren Groff. Another is Hild by Nicola Griffith. Both are worthwhile reading.  

Bringing in the Sheaves and the Simpsons?

Bringing in the sheaves,

Bringing in the sheaves,

We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves (repeat & repeat & repeat)

How many movies and television shows depicted earnest Christians of an earlier day in their little churches warbling one of what were apparently the only two hymns they knew. These olden days hymns were Amazing Grace and Bringing in the Sheaves, although only the first verse for the former and the chorus for the latter. Sheaves made it into multiple episodes of Little House on the Prairie (not surprising) but also the Simpsons and Two and a Half Men. I was impressed to see that it  is also in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2. 

Today's psalm reading is 126 with the heading A Harvest of Joy. I may have known that this was the inspiration for Bringing in the Sheaves but I had forgotten. A quick check reveals that it didn't make it into Voices United but it wasn't in the old Blue Hymnary either. When I read the lyrics I can appreciate why.

Nostalgia and corniness aside, this psalm that could be an antidote to the seemingly joyless realities of the moment. These are uncertain times for Canadians as our American neighbour, our "best friend whether we want them to be or not" has stabbed us in the back, led by their lunatic president. We are also dealing with "wars and the rumours of wars" and a global climate emergency. To put it in theological terms, it all sucks, or so it seems.  

While circumstances may feel like a nightmare at times we are invited to trust that God is with us and will restore our fortunes. This may be a tall order but pessimism and despair really aren't attractive options. Our Creator and Redeemer will give us good dreams, replacing our tears with laughter. Could we laugh at the surreal imposition of tariffs on a small island off the south coast of Australia populated only by penguins? 

My apologies if I have planted an ear worm for your day...bringing in the sheaves...

When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion,

    we were like those who dream.  

Then our mouth was filled with laughter
    and our tongue with shouts of joy;
then it was said among the nations,
    “The Lord has done great things for them.”
 The Lord has done great things for us,
    and we rejoiced.

 Restore our fortunes, O Lord,
  like the watercourses in the Negeb.
 May those who sow in tears
    reap with shouts of joy.
 Those who go out weeping,
    bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
    carrying their sheaves.

Psalm 126 NRSVue

The Paris Express & the Annunciation?

 

I enjoy the novels of Emma Donoghue although they can be harrowing. Her breakthrough novel was Room and others I've read such as The Pull of the Stars and Haven certainly create high drama. She is an excellent writer, so I made sure I was on the library list for The Paris Express and lots of people are waiting eagerly behind me.

 I'm about 100 pages along and I'm pleasantly surprised that one of the passengers on this 19th century French train is the American artist Henry Tanner. Henry Ossawa Tanner was a person of colour, called a mulatto in that day, although I didn't know this until The Paris Express. Black artists such as Tanner, novelist James Baldwin, and singer Josephine Baker made their way to France where there was less discrimination and greater opportunity to thrive. There is currently an exhibition in Paris featuring several of them, including these three. 

I've enjoyed Tanner's detailed and evocative biblical paintings for decades and used them as sermon illustrations a number of times. His depiction of The Annunciation, the angel Gabriel appearing to Mary,  is a meaningful antidote to the more formalized images from Medieval and Renaissance art. 

Tanner shows up early in The Paris Express which is based on historic events including a train wreck in Paris in 1895. Since I know that he survived (if he was actually on that train) I'm anticipating how Donoghue ensures his well-being!

The Disciples See Christ Walking on the Water (1907; oil on canvas) by Henry Ossawa Tanner.

                                             The Banjo Lesson (1893; oil on canvas) by Henry Ossawa Tanner. 

                                                                      (There are no banjos in the Bible!)

Carbon Pricing R.I.P

Tomorrow a group of us will join at Trenton United Church for our third and final session on Laudato Si: On Care for our Common Home. In 2015 Pope Francis issued this encyclical that is entirely devoted to addressing the global climate crisis, inviting Christians and all others of good will and faith to cherish and protect the Earth.   

This papal position paper was released about six months before the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris and is still the most comprehensive statement on the subject from a religious standpoint. The timing may have been intentional, a faith statement to offer moral and ethical perspectives on the subject.

 That climate summit called COP21 produced an agreement signed by 196 countries and gave hope for a turning point in international action. According to the UN website: 

The agreement aims to keep global temperature rise to well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase even further, to 1.5 degrees Celsius. To achieve these ambitious goals the Agreement sets in place provisions for enhanced cooperation among nations on climate change mitigation, including through market-based approaches, such as carbon pricing.

Canada was a signatory to the Paris Agreement and eventually introduced carbon pricing, often called a carbon tax, to require emitters to pay.The idea was to use both a carrot and stick to get the biggest offenders to find solutions for carbon emissions that are giving the planet a fever. Carbon pricing has always been contentious and even though the federal government gave rebates to most individuals Canadians to offset the cost it has been a constant target of naysayers.

Now it is gone. Today the federal government under new Prime Minister Mark Carney  fulfilled his promise to "axe the tax", to use the slogan of another political leader. Ending the program is calculated to change the narrative in the current federal election race and it seems to have worked. Fuel prices have already dropped so lots of people will be thrilled. 

No alternative has been proposed by the Liberals who are hanging on to power by a thread while the Conservatives continue to act as though climate change doesn't exist. It's hard not to be cynical about politics in general and I am dismayed that climate action has all but disappeared as an issue during this election. The former Environment Minister has been banished to another portfolio and we really don't know what it expected from his successor, should the Liberals be reelected. 

Ten years ago Pope Francis understood that the crisis we face is urgent and that it presents both a threat and an opportunity. Laudato Si offers a big picture that politicians won't grasp because they fear the consequences or are motivated by greed. Where did we all put that moral compass? Are we counting on an ailing pope, political cartoonists, and the ghost of the  Green Party past to keep us on course? 

Tomorrow I will share with the group this quote from Laudato Si that asks a compelling question: 

We need to strengthen the conviction that we are one single human family. We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and environmental. What need does the earth have of us?

There is Room For All on Transgender Day of Visibility

 

There is room for all in the shadow of God's wing.

There is room for all,sheltered in God's love.

And I rejoice and sing, "My refuge and my rock in whom I trust."

There is room for all, there is room for all. 

More Voices 62, inspired by Psalm 91

From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we no longer know him in that way.

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have come into being!

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation;

2 Corinthians 5:16-18 NRSVue  (from Lent 4 epistle reading)

This is Transgender Day of Visibility and we have to wonder how transgender persons feel in a time when they are being told that they should not be visible or respected in places where they had made progress.

In the United States Trump has led the way on the "only two genders' front and institutions have been threatened because they upheld LGBTQ2S+ recognition. Some of them have capitulated and others have been forced to comply with new legislation, including libraries. There have been purges in the military as well.  

In an interview back in January Canadian Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, a man who aspires to be Prime Minister, said  he is only aware of two genders — male and female — and that the government should leave questions of gender identity alone. When he was then asked whether he would request that the U.S. to recognize the gender-neutral “X” marker available on Canadian passports, he didn't answer the question and talked about the cost of living instead. This is not the leadership I expect from a PM. 

There are transgender persons in our congregation and I sense that they feel part of our community of faith. They are involved in a number of aspects of church life. We are largely an older bunch yet the acceptance on the part of seniors who certainly didn't grow up with any conversation about transgender persons seems genuine. For a lot of us this has required repentance and conversion. We have recognized that we had biases that were not consistent with the gospel and often cruel. We have changed our hearts and minds because we follow Jesus whose acceptance went far beyond cultural norms. 

Welcoming congregations as places of sanctuary for LGBTQ2S+ persons are essential. In Canada transgender persons are about .33% of the population yet are often demonized as predators and a general threat to public safety. At times this borders on hysteria. They are far more likely to be subjects of violence and discrimination and, not surprisingly, have a higher than average percentage who struggle with mental health issues and suicidal thoughts. 

There is too much "fine print" Christianity that proclaims acceptance for all only to make the circle so small that many are excluded. As Christians we can take the lead in modelling wider acceptance rather than reinforcing stereotypes and rejecting God's children. Every day we can ask how there is "room for all." 

Beyond "Us & Them"

 

Yale professors Timothy Snyder, Marci Shore, Jason Stanley

Yale University in the United States is one of the most prestigious academic institutions in the world -- what academic wouldn't want to teach there? It turns out that three professors are fleeing to the hinterlands of Toronto. Okay, the U of T isn't exactly a backwater. In fact, it is also a highly rated university but these three profs will be leaving their country and higher paying jobs in order to teach in a democracy. 

If that sounds extreme, Dr. Jason Stanley,  a professor of philosophy is convinced that the Trump regime is in the process of an autocratic takeover and creating a far-right regime. He sees that universities, including Columbia, have been threatened with the withdrawal of hundreds of millions of dollars in funding if they don't capitulate to the Trump administration's demands. In Columbia's case this is supposedly over allowing anti-Semitic behaviour on campus when, chillingly, a number of Trump's minions are anti-Jewish. 

This is more than uninformed alarmism on Stanley's part. He is the author of How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them. He and his colleagues will be joining the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy with a goal of making it "a world centre of democracy in these emergency times.", as Stanley puts it. 

What comes to mind listening to Stanley's chilling rationale? First of all, the "double-speak" of George Orwell's novel 1984 (written in 1949). Then there is the picture of Canada as a haven from a fascist, misogynistic theocracy in Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale (published 40 years ago.) 

I've also been thinking alot about The Plot Against America,  a novel by Philip Roth.It is an alternative history in which Franklin Roosevelt is defeated by Charles Lindbergh in the presidential election of 1940. Lindbergh was openly anti-Jewish and in this story he quickly moves to first marginalize, then persecute Jews, with help from the wealthy, including Henry Ford. 

There is an excellent HBO television series with the same title and earlier this year we watched if for a second time. The promises of making the country great again, isolationism, and upholding supposedly white Christian values are all there, from a novel written 20 years ago.

We can hope for more of a "brain drain" heading northward by Americans who understand that freedom of expression and upholding democratic values are worth cherishing. We can also pray that a day will come when they feel safe in returning.