good morning and welcome on this saturday morning march the 13th to the deanery garden at canterbury cathedral welcome to morning prayer wherever you are in the world and bring your own concerns to these prayers this is a solemn day in england because we're remembering the brutal murder of sarah everard and continuing to pray for her family with all our love and affection for them and surrounding their memories of sarah as they describe this wonderful young lady and we're also joining our prayers and intentions with all those who wanted to keep vigil on clapham common and in other areas for the intention that our streets shall be safer for women walking alone and for everyone and that of course has been prohibited because of the restrictions of the lockdown that we're engaged in at the moment but it doesn't prevent us lighting a candle later in the evening as we shall do at our evening prayer and also remembering by our own silences that intention as well as the the pain of the family of sarah after this incident we've come together on saturday morning as is our custom and rhythm is everything and so we've come here into this enclosure which is covered at the moment because as most of you will know the chickens and birds the duck and the the uh guinea fowl have to be kept both enclosed and covered during this we hope final period of the avian flu so they're having their own lockdown it's a windy morning and you may hear the the flapping of the coverings which are so necessary for the chickens we've come out actually they're next door to uh winston and the three boy piglets as they have their breakfast but i'll just let the birds out to have their breakfast so that we get a sense of saturday morning life beginning in the regular way here we are come on we hope very much that these lock down restrictions here for the birds will end soon in the same way that they're beginning to ease a little for us and to be a wonderful thing to receive back at even song this afternoon the boy choristers of the choir to join the men in a full coral even song so let's begin our prayers on this day oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise hear our voice o lord according to your faithful love according to your judgments give us life blessed are you god of compassion and mercy to you be praise and glory forever in the darkness of our sin your light breaks forth like the dawn and your healing springs up for deliverance as we rejoice in the gift of your saving help sustain us with your bountiful spirit and open our lips to sing your 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 as 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 on this 13th morning of the month part of psalm 68 it's a wonderful psalm it's a long psalm so we'll use two sections of that sound let god arise and let his enemies be scattered let those that hate him flee before him as the smoke vanishes so may they vanish away as wax melts at the fire so let the wicked perish at the presence of god but let the righteous be glad and rejoice before god let them make merry with gladness sing to god sing praises to his name exalt him who rides upon the clouds the lord is his name rejoice before him father of the fatherless defender of widows god in his holy habitation god gives the solitary a home and brings forth prisoners to songs of welcome but the rebellious inhabit a burning desert oh god when you went forth before your people when you marched through the wilderness the earth shook and the heavens dropped down rain at the presence of god the lord of sinai at the presence of god the god of israel you sent down a gracious reign o god you refreshed your inheritance when it was weary your people came to dwell there blessed be the lord who bears our burdens day by day for god is our salvation god is for us the god of our salvation god is the lord who can deliver from death sing to god you kingdoms of the earth make music in praise of the lord he rides on the ancient heaven of heavens and sends forth his voice a mighty voice ascribe power to god whose splendor is over israel whose power is above the clouds how terrible is god in his holy sanctuary the god of israel who gives power and strength to his people blessed be god so we turn once more to the gospel of saint john the fourth gospel and we completed chapter eight yesterday so today we begin chapter nine at verse one and i'm reading from verses 1 to 17 as jesus passed by he saw a man blind from birth and his disciples asked him rabbi who sinned this man or his parents that he was born blind jesus answered it was not this man sinned or his parents but that the works of god might be displayed in him we must work the works of him who sent me while it is day night is coming when no one can work as long as i am in the world i am the light of the world and having said these things he spat on the ground and made mud with the saliva and then he anointed the man's eyes with the mud and said to him go and wash in the pool of siloam which means scent say the man went and washed and came back seeing the neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying it's not this the man who used to sit and beg some said it is he others said no but she is like him the man kept saying i am the man so they said to him then how were your eyes opened he answered the man called jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me go to siloam and wash so i went and washed and received my sight they said to him where is he he said i do not know so they brought to the pharisees the man who had formerly been blind now it was a sabbath day when jesus made the mud and opened his eyes so the pharisees again asked him how he had received his sight and he said to them he put mud on my eyes and i washed and i see some of the pharisees said this man is not from god for he does not keep the sabbath but others said but how can a man who is a sinner do such signs and there was a division among them so they said again to the blind man what do you say about him since he has opened your eyes he said he is a prophet some interesting things to think about that passage first of all as it continues from where we were jesus is still in jerusalem he had walked out of the temple out of the violence of the authorities and those who supported them picking up stones to kill him and hid himself if we see this as a continuation of yesterday though we do now have the disciples with jesus and chapter eight has given us a sense of jesus being alone the evangelist is conveying pictures in all kinds of ways so the whereabouts of jesus is quite clear because of the pool of siloam but when this happened and whether it was continuous from before who can tell however we do have the area that it seems jesus was in from the steps of the temple the hill in the ancient city of david descended very steeply down eventually to the watergate and in the time of david himself the the wall of the city left the pool of siloam outside now it was in jesus's time it was enclosed in the lower city by another wall through which you exited the city by the watergate and walked down into the kidron valley but the pool of siloam which was clearly a large freshwater pool with an architecture around it built in the greek times of the hasmonean dynasty of of uh herod but had been there constantly and was fed by an underground covered in in stone uh aqueduct really own an under underneath one a a funnel which king hezekiah had built from the spring a plentiful intermittent spring of fresh water the spring of gaijon which was nearby and the king in old testament days hezekiah had actually covered it and hidden it and made that underground channel for the water to flow to the pool of siloam because here was a fresh water source for the citizens of jerusalem but he hadn't wanted any besieging armies to have that fresh water source and so it was covered in jesus's time though by the time it got to the pool and later it was an open pool and a fresh water pool a good source of water and jesus says to the man go and wash when he's made the mud and anointed his eyes go and wash and he did and came back seeing obedient to the command he came back seeing and then of course he is surrounded by those who are saying is this not the man that used to sit and beg and always has he was blind and some say no no it's just someone like him and others said no he must he is the man and the man says in simple words in greek echo amy i am emphasis on the ego i it's just the words that jesus has said yesterday before abraham was ego amy i am those two words preface all the illustrations of himself and his vocation which jesus is giving us now in this part of john's gospel and the one at the the beginning of well about 11 verses or so into into chapter chapter eight was i am the light of the world echo amy and then in this passage again jesus will say that while i am in the world i am the light of the world here is the man saying the same words amy he is now a witness to the light of the world all unknowing but notice too that in the conversation that jesus has with his disciples before the healing takes place that the disciples looking and pointing out the blind man whom probably they'd passed many times says to jesus who sinned this man or his parents in order that he was born blind there was in their mind somehow a connection between sinful behavior and this kind of of of life that the blind man was having to lead and jesus says forget all that that has nothing to do with the case he was born blind that the works of god might be made known through him and then he says to the disciples we must work the works of him who sent me that we encompasses them they like the man are becoming the light of the world and we'll we will see as the chapter unfolds the way in which jesus uses blindness in completely different ways that physical sight has nothing to do with the concept of blindness that he will develop in front of the pharisees who are blind to the message that he is trying to give them but for the moment the important thing to realize is that the present tense again enfolds us we must work the works of him who sent me the god whom he is sharing with us the creator's power the gift of the spirit which he is gradually unfolding in order that that divine gift and perception would have nothing to do with physical attributes but all to do with mental and spiritual attributes which can then be used physically to demonstrate that power and that insight which carries us not just here in the finite area of earth but also through into the infinite dimension and gifts of the kingdom of heaven this is jesus's vocation and in trying to get that over he has really upset the authorities to such a degree that now they are violently opposed to him and the atmosphere in jerusalem is a brutal one not no longer just an argument it's a time when they reach for stones to stone people who are blasphemous teaching god in a way they cannot understand or cannot see we had the same thing with the word for knowing in the eighth chapter for two greek verbs are being used and one of them is about knowing by what you experience and observe physically and the other one is about knowing through reflection and intuition and that can be a long time developing and be added to bit by bit and both are translated no in our english versions but but jesus plays with the words and when he's talking about the pharisees he's using one of them and then when he's talking about his own knowledge of god he is using another the one that dwells on long reflection and intuition and the desire then to give that light which is developed in his consciousness of his own vocation which he's wanting to share with us to give that as a gift to us so in this passage he says again i am the light of the world while i am in the world i am the light of the world echo amy i am everything present tense and this morning we rejoice that we too can work the works of the one who sent the son of man the emblem of our humanity to give us divine gifts which will open the kingdom of heaven to us to day by day and give us the vocation to open it to others body mind and spirit in whatever ways we can so as we think about that let's think a little bit about this day it's a day as i said of reflection and of intention perhaps the most important thing to remember is that it is the anniversary of the killing of 16 children aged between five and six and their school teacher in a school in dunblane in 1996 and at the end of that the one who had shot them thomas hamilton turned the gun on himself for the people of dunblane and for all of us when i mentioned that name that incident is unforgettable there was a great vigil of prayer held there and on mothering sunday sunday which followed and tomorrow is mothering sunday here the queen and princess anne in 1996 attended a service in dunblane cathedral in memory of those infants who were killed again so brutally and the intention was that the regulation for those who held guns was going to be very strict indeed for that kind of laxness was allowed thomas hamilton to have weapons four handguns that his mind could not cope with and so we remember all that with huge sadness on this day of further reflection with another intention that the streets should be safe for the vulnerable and particularly for women walking alone at this time and the responsibility of us all to make sure that that intention goes forward well there are other things which happened on this particular day and i'm thinking of the sense of hezekiah covering up the the spring of gaijon because of sieges of the city of jerusalem it's strange to be in a city which is besieged i've only been in that situation once and that was in the city of juba in the south of the sudan now the nation of south sudan and that was in the breakdown of the peace of addis ababa and i found myself having to be flown in in a particular way because of course sieges can now be helped by the the way in which airplanes can still go in and out but when you find yourself in a city which is besieged it is a strange experience i'd been there in juba before when it was a safe thing to to walk outside and go outside i didn't mean outside of the house but outside of the city to be in the cathedral in a way but juba had known sieges in all sorts of ways and there is that sense of restriction and also a violence around and thank god the uh the the nation of south sudan now is governing its own affairs and we pray for them on this particular day but this is a day in 1884 when the siege of khartoum began and the british general charles gordon found himself there and would not leave the citizens he sent out by river all those whom he could but there was still an egyptian garrison with him and also the citizens of khartoum themselves and he stayed with them right to the end the siege ended on january 26 1885 so a little less than a year later and two days later a relief arrived too late but we remember that historic incident and i thought of it often standing on the riverbank in khartoum and looking up that river and wondered what would have been in his thoughts gordon was a very very devout christian person and his bible was always with him and we remember him i've been talking about the geography of jerusalem at the time of jesus we remember how he in a period when when he wasn't being used in china or in in um in the sudan how he had been in jerusalem and announced that he had found the real tomb which had been mistaken and that site of general gordon's tomb is still there the garden tomb where people go and whether or not it's the real tomb it's certainly a place where one can reflect and grow more knowledge about one's own vocation by being beside this place which gordon felt was very like what was being described when joseph of arimathea's tomb is described in the gospels so we think of all that and remember how we too learn things in different ways by observation and by experience or by reflection and intuition gradually coming upon us and we do both all the time and deserve to do both when we're thinking about our vocation and knowing it or seeing how it develops and reflecting on it so on these days some very important things happened and one can think in terms of how travel extended that in 1926 alan cobham landed at croydon aerodrome after a 16 000 mile flight to cape town and back to establish a commercial air route across africa he'd been a member of the royal flying corps in the in world war one and became a test pilot for de havillands and we give thanks for that another area of safety was that in 1935 a compulsory test for all drivers was introduced it began as a voluntary one but a few months later it became a compulsory one and the driving test of course is established firmly as a way in which drivers must pass their test and cease to be learners with someone driving with them in order to drive safely on the streets safety being everything there are some interesting things in terms of how history develops as well 1873 on this day eight football clubs met to agree to form the scottish football association so we give thanks for that and the memory of the cold war on this day in 1961 the spy case that the old daily opened three men and two women were sent to prison for 25 years but the spy leaks to to the ussr as it then was was blamed on lacks security at the admiralty once again intention at the end of something which has in some way gone wrong and caused danger on this day in 1639 harvard college was named after the clergyman john harvard and now harvard of course is one of the most important universities in the world 1881 tsar alexander ii who had freed the surfs was assassinated and the result was that his son who took over became even more determined to stamp out any kind of opposition to his reign so alexander himself had had a liberal and an open-hearted policy and violence ensued so let me talk also about the year 2013 for on this day the archbishop of buenos aires was elected pope and we give enormous thanks for that he took the name of francis and the first pope to do so so he is francis the first and we've had calls to give thanks for his courage in the days of last week as he visited iraq for the first time as a pope going to iraq and going as far as the birthplace of abraham ur of the khaldi's and also celebrating mass with the persecuted christians and the christians who had suffered so much violence in iraq so we asked god to bless the ministry of pope francis and i could go on 2012 on this day the encyclopedia britannica said that they would no longer publish the printed version everything from now on would be online and of course we know that because we have the way in which we look up britannica is easily in our pocket these days rather than the enormous quantities of material we used to have to carry around or go to a library to find out okay lastly the novelist hugh walpole was born on this day in 1884 hugh walpole was at school here for two years as a king scholar at our king school our cathedral school and he left his library to kings at the end of his life he was a tremendously popular novelist in the 20s and 30s not so much read now and there are lots of books that we can name and especially the harry's chronicles which are sort of historic series of chronicles he even wrote scenarios for hollywood films david copperfield for example but his novel which which i remember best well i would i suppose is called the cathedral it's one of the the most compulsive stories about cathedrals that have been written and at the beginning he includes a quotation a musical quotation from debussy to express the power of the character of the cathedral and it's the cathedral building itself really which is the character over arching the book it's nothing like trollope it actually is quite a dark novel and it deals with the conflict between a grand archdeacon who thinks that he archdeacon adam brandon is in charge of the whole show and for his own glory and his downfall comes in his quarrel which is worked out throughout the book with a new canon who comes called canon ronda uh and uh dean sampson a gentle figure who appears from time to time and the bishop and a really ancient bishop living at the palace miles away i think the cathedral used is durham really um because walpole went on to durham to school from here his father had become a cannon now and so this it's a researched book it took him a long time to read but the downfall of archdeacon brandon and what happens to his poor family is compulsive reading and so i don't know if it's still in print but it's it's worth getting that one side of how a cathedral can can be okay let's uh let's say our prayers and go back to the intentions for today we're praying today in the diocese of of i'm sorry we're praying today in the anglican communion and i was looking at this and thinking this is apt for the diocese of our wheel in the province of the episcopal church of south sudan it's in the northern barrio ghazal province of that church for which we pray pray for the bishop there and all the people of that particular diocese are real and then we pray for justin our archbishop and for rose bishop of dover and for tim bishop at lambeth for our diocesan synod which is meeting virtually today and for the elam valley group of churches for their parish priest jane weeks and for stephen dougall and deb scobee in their scobel in their ministry there and the readers and all the schools of the elim valley group that's uh elim itself a cries postling liminge paddlesworth stanford denton and wharton a lovely area of this diocese you will all have your own particular intentions we name as one of our intentions this morning denise garrett who is joining her to the end of her life after a very swift illness and we pray for all her family and give thanks for the her character and the service she has given and the the love she's given and we also um pray for all our volunteers and and the people who work in our cathedral church on this day so bring your own intentions and prayers to this collect which we use for the last time today the colleague for the third sunday meant almighty god whose most dear son jesus christ went not up to joy but first he suffered pain and entered not into glory before he was crucified mercifully grant that we walking in the way of the cross may find it to be none other than the way of life and peace through jesus christ our are men so together in our own languages we say the prayer our savior taught us 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 moment of silence now for our own prayers christ give you grace to grow in holiness to deny yourself take up your cross daily and follow him 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 amen hello oh