good morning and welcome on this morning of tuesday the 27th of october welcome to the january garden at canterbury cathedral for our morning prayers the morning began with a gleam of sunrise which was very beautiful but now the rain has begun and i think it's going to be a gray and rainy days i'm sheltering here under the trees to say our morning prayers together accompanied by one of our pheasants but also accompanied here by monkey who uh is uh running around but hates the rain our black cat um it's his day really because this is international black cat day and so we'll think a little bit about that as we go through but it's it's a day when we've so many things to think about this is the day on which in the year 312 the emperor constantine received the vision of the cross and then put on all his soldiers and emblems the high row of uh jesus christ the the king of all and beyond that of course he himself like his mother helena became a christian and that transformed the the story of christian history on this day too in 1858 theodore roosevelt was born who became the 26th president of the united states and was a nobel peace prize winner but probably he's uh best known because the teddy bear was named after him and there are various stories about bears that go with him to to to suggest why but none of them is very convincing nevertheless that's why bears that our little toys are called teddy bears because of him but he was a serious thinker and there are two two of his quotes which are good to hear he said death is always and under all circumstances a tragedy for if it is not then it means that life itself has become one and then the only one who makes no mistakes is one who never does anything well that's a good quote to to think about this is the day that dylan thomas the poet was born in 1914 who used the dimension of radio for his words and under milk wood and a child's christmas in wales were triumphs of broadcasting words but also some of his poems set to songs have the dimension he spoke of one began and death shall have no dominion and the other began light breaks where no sun shines now here's monkey come back on black cat day he's rather wet and he won't like that at all and then lastly perhaps we remember that john cleese in 1939 was born one of those comedians who are able to make us laugh at ourselves in situations we've known and he's probably best known apart from monty python for 40 towers those short episodes of basil faulty and his wife sybil who kept a hotel and uh those have become classics of television comedy well here we are beginning on a rainy day our morning prayers oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise may christ the day star dawn in our hearts and triumph over the shades of night blessed are you creator of all to be praise and glory forever as your dawn renews the face of the earth bringing light and life to all creation may we rejoice in this day you have made as we wake refreshed from the depths of sleep open our eyes to behold your presence and strengthen our hands to do your will that the world may rejoice and give you praise blessed be god father son and holy spirit blessed be god forever the night has passed and the day lies open before us let us pray with one heart and mind does we rejoice in the gift of this new day so may the light of your presence o god set our hearts on fire with love for you now and forever amen so we say our morning psalm which on this 27th morning of the month is psalm 121 i lift up my eyes to the hills from where is my help to come my help comes from the lord the maker of heaven and earth he will not suffer your foot to stumble he who watches over you will not sleep behold he who keeps watch over israel shall neither slumber nor sleep the lord himself watches over you the lord is your shade at your right hand so that the sun shall not strike you by day neither the moon by night the lord shall keep you from all evil it is he who shall keep your soul the lord shall keep watch over your going out and your coming in from this time forth forevermore so we turn then to our continuing reading of this puzzling letter from paul to timothy and we spoke yesterday about the problems it gives us as seeming to be a much later letter and yet not seeming to have the atmosphere of paul's passion about it and we shall come much more into problems of that sort today and i'll pause in the middle when we come to that point beginning i'm starting at verse 18 of chapter one timothy my son these are the instructions that i am giving you i ask you to remember the words once spoken over you by the prophets and taking them to heart to fight like a good soldier with faith and a good conscience for your weapons some people have put conscience aside and wrecked their faith in consequence i mean men like hymenaeus and alexander whom i have handed over to satan to teach them not to be blasphemous my advice is that first of all there should be prayers offered for everyone petitions intercessions and thanksgiving and especially for sovereigns and others in authority so that we may be able to live religious and reverent lives in peace and quiet to do this is right and will please god our savior he wants everyone to be saved and reach full knowledge of the truth for there is only one god and there is only one mediator between god and humanity himself a human being christ jesus who sacrificed himself as a ransom for all he is the evidence of this sent at the appointed time and i have been named a herald and apostle of it and i'm telling the truth and no lie a teacher of the faith and the truth to the gentiles now i'm going to go on because i believe that lectionaries which cause us to read all the ways through the scriptures are important but the next section is a very conservative rendering of the habits of societies in those days and to us it's read as an historic reflection so here we are in every place then i want the men to lift their hands up reverently in prayer with no anger or argument similarly i direct that women are to bear are to wear suitable clothes and to be dressed quietly and modestly without braided hair or gold and jewelry or expensive clothes their adornment is to do the sort of good works that are proper for women who profess themselves to be religious during instruction a woman should be quiet and respectful i'm not giving permission for a woman to teach or to tell a man what to do a woman ought not to speak because adam was formed first and eve afterwards and it was not adam who was led astray but the woman who was led astray and fell into sin nevertheless she will be saved by childbearing provided she lives a modest life and is constant in faith and love and holiness i want to ask does that sound like paul the paul of the much earlier and absolutely certainly paul letter of the galatians 3 28 there is then no greek or jew no slave or free no male or female that christ is all and in all and that's the paul who by grace as he told his story over and over again became more and more radical in his thinking this letter is a long long time after that and is written by someone who is using bits and pieces of paul but he is speaking to a social situation which exists at that time and it's something historically that we can look back on this morning but we can also think of bits and pieces in this epistle like the part that came today so very important to us where we have clearly an early christian creed inserted and quoted and that becomes important as we see it it's generally written out in a way that shows it's a quotation and here is no exception and the rain is making the pages sticky but i think i do need it and so we'll try and find this particular piece again here we are so this is the bit there is only one god and there is only one mediator between god and humanity himself a human being christ jesus who sacrificed himself as a ransom for them all he is the evidence of this sent at the appointed time that is a very early creed and is written in most translations in inverted commons commas so that we will look at that as we looked yesterday at a sentence but there are strange things too here and that gives us cause to think that while we read this as an historic piece all the way through we do as we do with the psalms and take lovely sentences and think that came from there because the the bits and pieces of letters that were available to people writing at that time uh are so lost to us now that to get something like that so early like the christian hymn which paul quoted in philippians all of that gives us a sense of the faith of paul a radical faith building up and grace is everywhere that last section that we just read one would want to say okay where was lydia in all that the great leader of the philippian church who first welcomed paul and began to welcome christians into her home and where is priscilla wife of aquila who helped paul and the polis understand further all those things we have to think about but the history of our faith becomes the story of our faith and only we can tell our own story this is international storytelling day and it's also international audio-visual heritage day there aren't enough days in the year for everything to come together black cat day and international storytelling day and international uh world heritage of of audiovisual things day but all of that says that when we tell our story only we can know it but even then we're telling the truth as we see it and that means that we tell it in a particular way when my sister was alive and she was eight years older than i and died in november we used to have terrible arguments when we remembered the same story from years back and she would say it's it wasn't like that it was like this and i would say no it was like this and both of us utterly believed and we know that paul all the way through tells the gospel the radical gospel which changed him from the paul he was until unto the poor he became and we've seen that more and more as we've looked through not only the acts of the apostles but read through the letter to the philippians and quoting galatians this morning telling that story became everything it's the way the gospel is is given to one another we can only tell our own story everything else is hearsay as the lord chancellor says to streffen in i almost in gilbert's script when cheffin is saying um but chorus nature tells me that the the truth that phyllis must be mine and the the lord chancellor says oh but my boy that's not evidence that's hearsay that's uh uh something else no an affidavit from a thunderstorm from chorus nature would give me the evidence you can only tell your own story and sometimes it's complicated because it unfolds through life and not even the audio visual will tell everything when we look at those black white black and white films even we were looking at one of of archbishop william temple's enthronement yesterday then we don't know what the people are thinking around there if they told their story of that day it would be a little different but see how important it is to paul to tell again and again the story of the damascus road and the story of his seeing jesus christ in that occasion knowing him and receiving the authority to be his apostle all of that becomes crucial to us but it also encourages us to tell our own story and we give thanks for that on this day this storytelling day because it makes us brave when the situation may be quite unlike anything that we would want as this writer to the uh to timothy in the the epistle is is saying in that socially very conservative passage at the end nevertheless our story is our story this is a a day when as part of our story in 2004 uh having preached in boston we were present for the um boston red sox the baseball team to break an 86 year old curse and and win the the the great series of baseball for the first time and the processions through the streets and the joy of that occasion on october the 27th uh in 2004 as the rain poured down but the band's played is part of our story we happen to be there and at this time we give thanks for that you will be thinking a multitude of different things but the most important story is how our own faith through grace built up through the reading of the scriptures and the receiving of the sacrament but also breaking bread with each other and hearing each other's stories and facing situations with courage rather as we do as a human race during this pandemic so let's uh go on and say our morning prayers for those areas that we're praying for today and on this day we are praying for the diocese of rank in the south sudan and for joseph garang atem the bishop there and his people the diocese of daejeon in korea and moses you the primate there and his people and the diocese of kumai in uganda and edison irigay the bishop there and his people here in this diocese we pray for the parish of ramsgate st george at present vacant and pray for the community there and those who will choose a new priest so let's say as we bring our own intentions and prayers the special colleague for this day which is about reflecting on the scriptures thinking about them and mixing them with our own story today in this century now blessed lord who has caused all holy scriptures to be written for our learning grant that we may in such ways hear them read mark learn and inwardly digest them that by patience and comfort of your holy word we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life which you have given to us in your son our savior jesus christ amen moment of reflection as we say our own prayers but first we say together the prayer our savior taught us in whatever language we use our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom the power and the glory forever and ever are men and women of silence now for your own prayers the peace of god which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of god and of his son jesus christ our lord and the blessing of god almighty the father the son and the holy spirit be upon you upon those whom you love and those whom you would pray for today and always are men well our prayers are over but i wanted to reflect a little bit on black cats because it's their day too and we've ignored that a bit it was difficult to find anything about black cats in poetry and also in pictures if we have a cat calendar it's rare to get a black cat because their features don't really show up in a selfie i find that confucius said the hardest thing of all to is to find a black cat in a dark room especially if there is no cat and oscar wilde added to that religion is like a blind man looking in a black room for a black cat which isn't there and finding it well that i think is uh probably the best we could do except that there is this reflection on a black cat and those of you who would rather think about ginger cats or tabby cats or jellicle cats as we call them tuxedo cats i think they're called in america then uh switch off now but here's the reflection and this is a tribute to monkey here do you know that your ancient soul was worshipped as a god mummified beneath giant stone effigies that took thousands to build while you rest undisturbed in your dark hiding place a thousand treats to entertain you in their planned afterlife as you abided your time and waited do you recall the days of wizardry and witchcraft and spells is that perhaps of what you are thinking when apparently lost in such contented bliss as you lick your paws do you lose yourself in the amusement of whether to bring good fortune or ill to those who happen upon you as you wend your way to your next engagement or perhaps having cast off any specific mention by kipling elliot and a thousand other lesser beings the attention you choose to bestow is on your mind for whom content in thought you need only the sunshine to attend you with perhaps the odd affections of those you decide to befriend as you busy yourself with the serious matter of washing where even cleopatra's long dark trusses so beautifully sleek as your jet black fur the same jet black coach that clouds you as you prowl silently and deliberately through jungle foliage as you seek some helpless prey to entertain you for a while am i just an entertaining prey to you and your heart of a panzer and yet when the sun has lost its shine and you seek to rest that age-old soul and put away your seductive powers when tired of deciding fortunes for man or mouse alike do you mean to show the kitten that remains inside you as you knead my sweater and purr yourself off to a million lifetimes lived already that created such a beautiful complex and mysterious perfection of evolution well there's a tribute monkey and really you want to go inside from this rain