good morning and welcome to canterbury cathedral on this rainy monday morning of june the 8th we've sought shelter with tiger who's having his breakfast this morning so that we can be undercover to speak to you and say our morning prayers we shall be remembering places in the world in all their needs not only the fighting of coronavirus and and all the situations of of lockdown and decisions which governments have to make but also societies which need healing and we remember them as we see the pictures of all kinds of different situations in our newest bulletins this is a time to reflect on that and to say our prayers oh lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise visit us with your salvation and sustain us with your gracious spirit this is a day in our calendar when we remember bishop thomas ken and so i'm going to use as an opening hymn his mourning hymn awake my soul and with the sun thy daily stage of duty run shake off dull sloths and joyful rise to pay thy morning sacrifice redeem thy misspent time that's past live this day as if to thy last improve thy talent with due care for the great day thy self prepare let all thy converse be sincere by conscience as the noon day clear think how all seeing god thy ways and all thy secret thoughts surveys awake awake ye heavenly choir may your devotion me inspire that i like you my age may spend like you may on my god attend praise god from whom all blessings flow praise him all creatures here below praise him above ye heavenly host praise father son and holy ghost the night is past 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 our son this morning on the eighth morning of the month is psalm 40. i waited patiently for the lord he inclined to me and heard my cry he brought me out of the roaring pit out of the mire and clay he set my feet upon a rock and made my footing sure he has put a new song in my mouth a song of praise to our god many shall see and fear and put their trust in the lord blessed is the one who trusts in the lord who does not turn to the proud that follow a lie great are the wonders you have done o lord my god how great your design for us there is none that can be compared with you if i were to proclaim them and tell of them they would be more than i am able to express sacrifice and offering you do not desire but my ears you have opened burnt offering and sacrifice for sin you have not required then said i lo i come in the scroll of the book it is written of me that i should do your will o my god i delight to do it your law is within my heart i have declared your righteousness in the great congregation behold i did not restrain my lips and that o lord you know your righteousness i have not hidden in my heart i have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation i have not concealed your loving kindness and truth from the great congregation do not withhold your compassion from me o lord let your love and your faithfulness always preserve me though i am poor and needy the lord cares for me for you are my helper and my deliverer oh my god make no delay so we turn back on this monday morning to the reading of the gospel of saint luke which we left off on saturday as yesterday we celebrated trinity sunday today we begin again at chapter 10 and at verse 25. and behold a lawyer stood up to put jesus to the test saying teacher what shall i do to inherit eternal life jesus said to him what is written in the law how do you read it and the lawyer answered you shall love the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and your neighbor as yourself and jesus said to him you have answered correctly do this and you will live but the lawyer desiring to justify himself said to jesus and who is my neighbor jesus replied a man was going down from jerusalem to jericho and he fell among thieves who stripped him and beat him and departed leaving him half dead now by chance a priest was going down that road and when he saw him he passed by on the other side so likewise a levite when he came to the place and saw him passed by on the other side a samaritan as he journeyed came to where he was and when he saw him he had compassion he went to him and bound up his wounds pouring on oil and wine and then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him and the next day he took out two dinari and gave them to the innkeeper saying take care of him and whatever more you spend i will repay you when i come back which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among thieves and the lawyer said the one who showed him mercy and jesus said to him go and do likewise see how obliquely jesus answers the lawyer's question he answers it with a story found only in saint luke's gospel beautifully told by saint luke and wonderfully crafted like a words picture by jesus himself as he stands amongst the crowds of course the picture is being given to the lawyer who's asked the question but it's simply the opportunity for jesus to paint that picture in words to all the crowds around him and also to the disciples listening to and at the end he asks the definite question of the lawyer so who do you think was the one who proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among thieves and the lawyer has to answer honestly the one who showed him mercy jesus doesn't say yes that's right and it must have cost something for the lawyer to say that because the samaritans were hated by galileans and judeans and they had as little as possible to do with them they were foreigners in a great way and here is the lawyer having to admit that it's the foreigner who has done what the priest and the levite for whatever reason had failed to do i've heard so many explanations about the priest and the levite about their liturgical duties and on their way to jerusalem would have made themselves unclean by touching anything of blood which the man clearly had blood all over him from the way he'd been treated by the thieves and the oil and the wine that the samaritan had to pour onto his wounds they in a sense don't matter though passed by on the other side has grown into our vocabulary as a picture of not really wanting to take responsibility for what's going on but the samaritan does owe so much more uses his own time his own resources his own connections with the innkeeper to make the promise and all of those things and jesus places that picture in front of the lawyer but then he does say something very definite to the lawyer when the lawyer says i suppose it was the one who showed him mercy he says go and do likewise the picture was for the crowds the picture is for us parables don't just admit a one meaning they are there for us to reflect upon for a lifetime to read again and again in every human situation and this one is very much for now this morning for us in our world and for societies communities individuals right across the world go and do likewise show mercy to those whom you can help whatever it costs in your time and resources and susceptibilities to thinking should i really be helping that one who knows this is also the day in 1889 when the jesuit priest poet gerard manny hopkins died of typhoid in dublin and on this day there's a particular poem of his not so well known that comes to mind he wrote as if in the words of christ to him whoever thought with love of me or even did for my sake some good deed i will appear looking such charity and kind compassion at his life's last need that he will out of hand and heartily repent he sinned and all his sins be freed we remember that hopkins parents who had just got there across the irish sea and to dublin just got there before their son died and he whispered to them three times i'm so happy i'm so happy i'm so happy in one of his poems the record of the deutschland that is that startling sentence about his own vocation i did say yes those were earlier days and his poetry tells us not only of his perception of the beauty of creation and the way in which christ is found in it and god shows himself to it but also of the pain that sometimes vocations cost but here at the end he delivers up his life and his vocation to the one who came looking such charity and kind compassion and freeing him from all his sins and is able to say the words i'm so happy i am so happy i'm so happy to his parents who gave him life when i was a boy of about 12 the english teacher gave us two poems to see and compare it was a poem each poem was about the selling of a line of poplar trees or aspens and the first poem i remember was by william cooper the 18th century poet and it began my poplars are gone farewell to the shade and the whispering sound of the cool colonnade and the second by hopkins about his distress at the chopping down of his beloved poplar trees is aspen's at binzi by the river and that poem went my aspen's deer whose airy cages quelled quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun all felled felled are all felled oh if we but knew what we do when we hack and rack the growing green after comers cannot guess the beauty being one of my congregation here when we had savagely polished the great and ancient willow tree in the deanery front garden so that it would grow up more strongly put a card in my front door which said after cam comers cannot guess the beauty bean and i had to go and explain to her that the the beauty would restore itself and the polarizing would help the willow to be strong in its lower branches when i was a boy of 12 it was the cooper i liked because of its rhymes and its easy rhythms now i see the quality of the hopkins and the pictures that with his new forms of writing poetry just for himself because nothing was published in his lifetime his new forms how they explore christ in creation vocation human pain human loneliness all those things and i give thanks for him and the influence he's had on me over the years and how he has helped my vocation on this his years mind this is a time when all of us need to reread jesus's poetic word picture of the good samaritan it will hit us obliquely and we will be asking and at the moment who is my neighbor we shall be asking it in societies and communities across the world we shall be asking it as nations we shall be asking it as individuals and it's a question we ought to ask daily and jesus will hold again before us that story and as we see that story we shall explore our own vocation and jesus will say to us who proved neighbor to this one in the story and as we answer the one who showed mercy he will say to us with great compassion and being there to support us in all that we do he will say go and do likewise however hard it is however much time it takes go and do likewise for if you turn the parable round it is christ who is the bleeding one on the roadside who needs our help for him helping another we are helping him in the perfection of his humanity and in so doing his compassion flows over us let's say our prayers perhaps i should have said there is the most wonderful chagall window which explores this parable it's in the union church pontantico hills sleepy hollow on the rockefeller estate commissioned there in memory of someone but you can find it on the website there and see how chagall in a few lines paints with enormous compassion this question which jesus asks and the answer which we are asked to give so let's say our prayers um today we remember the diocese of new jersey in the episcopal church of the united states and for william stokes the bishop there and his people the diocese of the amazon in brazil and for bishop marines santos basotto there and his people and the diocese of jabalpur in north india and prem chand singh the bishop there and his people pray for justin our archbishop for rose bishop of dover tim bishop at lambeth and for the parish today in this diocese of borton under bleen very near to canterbury and pray for jean burroughs in her ministry there and all her people so we say the prayer for this week and then the prayer commemorating thomas ken almighty and everlasting god you have given us your servants grace by the confession of a true faith to acknowledge the glory of the eternal trinity and in the power of the divine majesty to worship the unity keep us steadfast in this faith that we may ever more be defended from all adversities through jesus christ our lord amen o god from whom all blessings flow by whose providence we are kept and by whose grace we are directed help us through the example of your servant thomas ken faithfully to keep your word humbly to accept adversity and steadfastly to worship you through jesus christ our lord amen so as we come to save the our father together we pray for all those whom we know to need our prayers either because we know and love them or because we have seen them in communities across the world and would want to pray for them and their healing on this particular day and we say together in whatever language and in whichever way you would like the prayer our savior taught us our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name thy kingdom come i 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 amen so in a moment of silence we make our own prayers for this day unto god's most gracious mercy and protection we commit you the lord bless you and keep you the lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you the lord lift up the light of his countenance upon you and give you his peace and the blessing of god almighty the father the son and the holy spirit be upon you and upon those whom you love and would pray for today and always amen