good morning and welcome to the denery Garden at Canterbury Cathedral on this morning of Thursday the 10th of June we're here this morning in the perb garden and also it's a garden where we grow flowers for our own enjoyment and for cutting sometimes to bring into the house and you're looking this morning at the first flowering of the lupins which give us a multitude of colors there are a strong plant and grow well here and they will flower for some time so we're enjoying them together and they're surrounded with their edges of lovely green box with lilies that are coming up and delphiniums that will begin to flower very soon and this marks the passage from spring into summer flowering where surrounded also by the herbs so I get a a lovely scent of herbs in the garden here behind me and the fountain is a place where birds come down to drink and even bath wherever you are in the world feel welcome but I wanted to begin this morning with our friends in Canada we've been very aware of quietly praying for them but we've received several messages to say could we would pray in our garden congregation for them and I'm I'm going to let Canadian voices ask for this Prayer by reading just one or two messages they have taken it random from people in our garden congregation who are asking for prayer and I'll start with the uh very Reverend Ken Gray with whom we've had contact before retired priest in Cam Loops in British Columbia and he has said I thought you should be aware of events in the Canadian church and especially in my home community of Cam noops 25 unmarked Graves of children who died at the local Roman Catholic residential school were recently confirmed which has thrown our city our Province and our country into shock and emotional chaos the effect on the church and the secular indigenous Community is huge so many Old Wounds have been opened again I can say that certainly every Canadian who joins the garden congregation is aware and hurting while I present this as information and certainly not in any way an obligation you do seem kindly interested in the situations of your congregation well Ken of course we all are and I speak for the human world let me just mention also a letter from Janet Lindstrom from Ontario and she says would would you please add a prayer for my country of Canada in this distressing time of finding the graves of 215 indigenous children pray that we can find a way through this thank you well all that we can do in these terrible situations of inexplicable human mistakes cruelty deliberate hurt I'm talking now about situations right across the world which every nation has in their history and we represent a a a sway of humanity and you know how we explore both those areas in our history and now of light and shade and we've been doing that a great deal at the moment but today our hearts are standing beside our friends in Canada so please know that your message Mees about this tragic situation are heard by us right across the world and all we can do in our humanity is to stand in prayer and heart and mind beside you and also physically to make intentions for good in our own communities so that all that has happened in the past might might be something that has been not not only something to grieve over but something of good intention for the days to come and the breaking down of barriers within our cultures and our Humanity thank you for your messages our prayers continue of course and we'll do so in the cathedral silently and in our garden congregation as we go through these days and see them with you so this is a day of annular Eclipse when uh for us in England um at the moment the the sky is cloudy but there's good hope that by 11:15 which is about the time that the moon will cover 20% of the light of the sun here the farther north one goes the more of the sun gets covered and probably the best place to see it is in the Arctic and Northern Canada and maybe we could see that in the northern hemisphere as the way in which Darkness sometimes seem to be overcoming the light but the light will be restored and shine in full Glory when the annular eclipse is over it also gives us perspective because these are planetary happenings in The Wider sphere of creation and the sun and the moon and the stars are so much part of our p that we give thanks for that total creation just as we come down to give thanks for the diversity of the loopin this morning as we watch them let's say our prayers on this day 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 you 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 and 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 for 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 oh God set our hearts on fire with love for you now and forever amen our Psalm on this 10th day of the month is Psalm 50 and we say some of that Psalm now the Lord the most Mighty God has spoken and called the world from the rising of the sun to its setting out of Zion perfect in Beauty God shines forth our God comes and will not keep silence consuming fire goes out before him and a mighty Tempest stirs about him he calls the heaven above and the Earth that he may judge his people gather to me my faithful who have sealed my Covenant with sacrifice let the heavens declare his righteousness for God himself is Judge hear oh my people and I will speak I will testify against you o Israel for I am God your God I will not reprove you for your sacrifices for your burnt offerings are always before me I will take no bull out of your house nor he goat out of your foes for all the beasts of the forest are mine the cattle Upon A Thousand Hills I know every bird of the mountains and the insect of the field is mine if I were hungry I would not tell you for the whole world is mine and all that fills it do you think I eat the Flesh of bulls or drink the blood of goats offer to God a sacrifice of Thanksgiving and fulfill your vows to God most high call upon me in the day of trouble I will deliver you and you shall honor me but to the wicked says God why do you recite my statutes and take my Covenant upon your lips since you refuse to be disciplined and have cast my words behind you when you saw a thief you made friends with him and you threw in your lot with adulterers you have loosed your lips for evil and harnessed your tongue to deceit you sit and speak evil of your brother you slander your own Mother's Son these things have you done and should I keep silence did you think that I am even such a one as yourself but no I must reprove you and set before your eyes the things that you have done you that forget god consider this well lest I tear you apart and there is none to deliver you whoever offers me the sacrifice of Thanksgiving honors me and those who keep my way I will show the salvation of God I was thinking as I read the messages from Canada that Dolores from Canada asked if there were little napsack pieces from the scripture that might help in their situation well in fact that Psalm of light and shade and those who say sentences of intent from the scriptures but in their heart are in a very different place and the way in which we offer sacrifices of Thanksgiving is one of those that I would recommend taking a sentence or two from because it has the glory of the light but also the shade there and the way in which God reproves Humanity uh for the kind of Deeds that are very much hidden in shade and need to be brought into the light so there will be other things tol lores and we'll be back in touch over that with you but I would say Psalm 50 is a wonderful psalm for us to be reading on this morning so now let's go to our lesson from St Matthew's gospel and uh we are in chapter 15 and you'll remember that Jesus has been surrounded not only by crowds whom he is helping and healing and using every spare moment that he has in that way but also has been criticized by those who've come with authority to interpret the law and to challenge him they've come from Jerusalem and at the end of this Matthew puts the little journey of Jesus away from his own people it's a story taken from Mark and Mark's sequence is slightly different but in essence this is the same story verse 21 of chapter 15 and Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Ty and sidon and behold a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying have mercy on me oh Lord son of David my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon but Jesus did not answer her a word and his disciples came and begged him saying send her away for she is crying out after us and Jesus answered I was sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel but she came and knelt before him saying Lord help me and Jesus answered it is not righteous to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs she said yes Lord yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table and Jesus answered her oh woman great is your face be it done for you as you desire and her daughter was healed instantly it's an extraordinary story but it is a crucial story in Jesus's own development of ministry and we see it unfolding in his silences in his words in his fairly serious bter with the woman and the way in which once again the disciples are there to say could you just remove this problem from us send send her away let's think first of all where Jesus is and where the disciples find themselves because they will be feeling very strange to be there in the area of Ty and sidon they've walked well out of Galilee now they're at the Mediterranean Coast in the Roman province of cyof phenicia and uh I think Mark says of cofen woman Matthew uses the old language of a Canaanite woman which is what that that area was was called in Old Testament times and the people that Matthew is writing for would would would know that but she is a foreigner someone from a completely different culture and Jesus doesn't answer Her Cry Oh Lord son of David my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon have mercy on me those are words we're used to hearing son of David and have mercy on me but not from foreigners should we say from people from a completely different culture and until now in Mark's gospel it's evident that Jesus's vocation was to his own people here suddenly the seed pod opens and a different flower of the anointed one's vocation emerges for in this brief conversation with the syyro phenician woman and the Fai that he recognizes kneeling in front of him which he he himself tries to set aside saying but my vocation is with the lost sheep of the House of Israel and she a answering the and we we have no idea what tone this this conversation was said in what we do know is that her answer even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table whatever you think of those who aren't of the House of Israel we need your help we need your nourishment we need this gift that you are bringing to humanity we need you have mercy on us save us and the title son of David anchoring him yes in his own community in all that prophecy and salm that we speak about but opening up that vocation I think to Jesus himself in a way where suddenly light floods onto him and and and in inside his vocation everything opens up and then the same kind of necessary receptivity of faith is there in the woman so he says to her oh woman great is your faith be it done for you as you desire and her daughter was healed instantly it truly is the most wonderful moment and it will now carry on in Matthew's gospel as it does in Mark's gospel in a a a different way so that gradually the Ministry of the Savior as his arms are spread on Calvary is a Ministry for the whole world the whole of humanity breaking down barriers and binding us together in healing salvation and the commission to encourage each other and share that good news we've no name for what Matthew calls the Canaanite woman in these foreign towns where the disciples seem to be feeling uncomfortable we we see once again that Jesus will not send people away and the disciples are constantly saying this is a lonely place and the evening's drawing on and it's as if you know time for work is done send them away and then once again here we are with send her away she's crying after us they're saying she's a nuisance and she's not of our culture that's implied and then Jesus who has deliberately stepped outside his own culture because he's had this really conflicting conversation with those who represent the law from Jerusalem and here he is near Ty and ziden in this area and light Dawns in a particular way we shall see that unfold as it does in all the evangelists in different ways as they tell the story well let's think on this morning as I say of light and shade and annular Eclipse which some will enjoy um as far as the United Kingdom is concerned I think you have to go right up the ores and shetlands to to uh be looking at the the most of the eclipse that you could possibly have here you'd have to go right up into the Arctic Circle to find more than that and to find the absolute annular Eclipse where it's only a ring of light because the whole of the sun will be darkened there we shalln't see that we shall see 20% some of you will see more and if you're coming from Canada you will see more but on this day we remember that Prince Phillip was born in 1921 this would have been his H 100th birthday and there is a a great sadness in our hearts that we weren't able to celebrate that with her majesty the queen and Prince philli and the royal family his death on April the 9th called forth an enormous Rush of affection for the queen and the royal family and also uh of Thanksgiving for all that Prince Phillip accomplished with his enormous um skills in in explaining how we should care for the planet and we've we've been through so many of those in our prayers after April the 9th those those themes of his life remembering that he was born on coru as a prince of Greece and a prince of Denmark but in Exile and the first years of his life were really difficult ones for himself and his family so that in that way we remember the whole of the compass of his life but pray most of all today for Queen Elizabeth still grieving the death of her husband for so long her strength and stay as she said and we remember with Thanksgiving what would have been his H hundredth birthday today well apart from that we've got some interesting dates and uh one of them is the fact that in 1865 vogner's Great opera Tristan and isala was performed for the first time and Vagner called it a music drama I suppose that the most famous song in that Opera is lius tood and that to hear that uh even if you simply Google it to hear that is is showing the the depth of color in humanity that Vagner could show in in his operas for what he called a music drama based on the legend of Tristan and his old becomes for us one of the most important German operas of the 19th century and one that is well-loved and the way in which he uses notes to draw his pictures of different human situations still is a complete Wonder orchestral tones with huge orchestras and also using the human voice over that in great softness and then opening out in to glory and passion well Vagner we remember but on this day also in 1926 Anton gudi died the um U Catalan architect whose work was mostly done in Barcelona and when I say his name of course all our minds go to the image of his great church Sagrada Familia the Church of the Holy family in Barcelona which is still not quite finished but coming towards completion and the imagination that he poured into that church and when you go there your your mind and Imagination and your eyes uh and also you you're you're seeing things which call you out of yourself in creativity is so great that every little corner is is filled with that intention so that that huge church has become a witness not only to him but also to creative Faith so we give thanks for that too and then on this day uh in 1934 Frederick Deus the composer died English composer but lived most of his life in France and his music also uses tones almost like an artist uses a a brush in order to create moods he always said the most calming thing and the most beautiful thing was the memory of something after it had happened and he tried to create that we think of him in his years of blindness and almost paralysis and we also think of the way in which Eric fenby was able as a young man to go and be his eyes and ears and hands continuing to write music for him and that is all set out in a film by Ken Russell one of his black and white films I I think it was probably the second one he did after Elgar and that too is a a strong image of the way in which one human being can help another but if I think of delus well I think of lovely things like the um on hearing the first cucko in Spring and uh a summer night on the river is beautiful things which uh just bring in musical terms memory of this time of year with everything looking good and the cookoo's journey the cooko is almost ready to go home now the little rhyme what is it the cucko comes in April he sings his song in may he Che ches tune in the middle of June and then he flies away so the Journey of of animals and birds as they and fish um as they go around recently on the BBC we've had the story of lovely uh elephants going into the um forest in China on a 500 km journey in a line and it looks as though they're set SE in for a new place to be all generations of elephants and uh the loveliest clip is of them having a sleep in the forest you can find that on BBC News it's a really really lovely thing to see but it does show you how when there's no place for the habitat of someone they will they will journey and these elephants are journeying in the same way that birds fly and Whales swim for places to breed and then to go elsewhere well the cucko comes here to breed breed in other people's nests and uh that's how they're remembered but the the song of the cuckoo is best reflected by deuses on hearing the first cucko in Spring and then lastly in 1911 s Terence rattigan the playright was born rattigan was very famous as a playright for the 30s and uh 40s and 50s the one the pl those that I remember most of all is the Winslow boy which I think we remember seeing in the Old Vic just down behind waterl station uh when it was recreated but also the Browning version and and both of those of course are wonderful black and white films the Winslow boy and the Browning version but we remember the in the theater Roy in hey Market in 19 in 2011 um the the the play flare path being brought back and that too captures the essence of the second world war ratigan went out of fashion when John Osborne's um look back in anger type of play but he's now back in fashion and taking his own place rather like the lupins different styles go out of fashion and come back in but he was in the end kned for his his capacity as a playwright which is a lovely thing and we give thanks for the way in which ratigan used plays to draw pictures and delus and Vagner used uh um music to draw pictures and GOI used architecture to draw pictures of the diversity of human it and that would I imagine in terms of creativity count is what Psalm 50 calls a sacrifice of Thanksgiving sometimes born in pain and that Psalm is worth reading all the way through uh as a a psalm for today again so let's say our prayers on this particular day and give thanks for the creativity of humanity but also it's its capacity for Supreme evil as well as wonderful good and the intentions of those who looking at what is capable of ask for Grace to encourage one another in prayer as we do for the citizens of Canada on this day of eclipse that light may once again Shine for them in intention while we don't forget in any of our Nations the sins of the past so we're saying the prayer for today bring your own prayers from across the world as we use the collect oh God the strength of all who put their trust in you mercifully accept our prayers and because through the weakness of our mortal nature we can do no good thing without you grant us the help of your grace that in the keeping of your Commandments we may please you both in will and deed through Jesus Christ Our Lord amen so as we come to say the prayer Our Savior taught us we remember in our Anglican communion today the dasis of upper South Carolina the Episcopal Church uh Province 4 and the community there pray for Justin our Archbishop for Rose Bishop of DOA for Tim Bishop at Lambeth and at the same time for the parishes of the area Deery of thanet right down to the coast and as I say we'll start naming those uh in a few days time so let's say the prayer Our Savior taught us in whatever way you like to say it in whichever language 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 amen moment of silence now for our own prayers on this day [Music] [Music] [Music] the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and Minds in the knowledge and love of God into 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 amen [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music]