good morning and welcome to the dinery garden on this saturday morning the 10th of july it's a saturday morning so we're here with clemmy and the piglets at breakfast time this is a very musical weekend our choir have gone off to sing a concert on the romney marsh where the music festival jam on the marsh is using the medieval churches of romney marsh for their music and tonight the choir will be singing a program which includes bernstein's trichester psalms in the wonderful church of saint leonard's at highs next weekend on saturday night the girls of the choir will be giving their concept summer concert here and we'll publish details of that uh during this week so that you can see and if you're near come along to that concert and enjoy the live music of the girls choir yesterday girls and boys as you may have seen um united in a song for football coming home which they sang with great excitement in the cathedral itself and of course that the whole of the the nation uh or england is is uh alive with expectation for tomorrow evening it will be a great party uh and uh certainly we shall be giving staff a great deal of license on monday morning when uh they recover from whatever happens on sunday night uh then possibly even if there's great festivity the prime minister might promise a bank holiday the monday after but all sorts of things are in the air at the moment but look out for the music because that will be a very enjoyable aspect of next weekend as we begin to come to the end of the year for the choir themselves as as the schools break so let's begin our prayers on this particular morning and we are welcoming you wherever you are in the world to say morning prayer with us o lord open our lips and our mouth shall proclaim your praise may christ the true the only light banish all darkness from our hearts and minds 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 forever the night has passed and the day lies open before us let us pray with one heart and mind thus 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 psalm this morning on the 10th morning of the month is psalm 50 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 the mighty tempest stares about him [Music] 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 his judge hear o 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 folds 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 refused to be disciplined and have cast my words behind you when you saw a thief you made friends with him and 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 honours me and to those who keep my way will i show the salvation of god so we turn to the gospel of saint matthew to take up where we left off yesterday you remember that jesus is in the outer temple courtyard and he is not only surrounded by the crowds but of those who in one sense or another are in authority either religious authorities or state authorities and yesterday we had questions of him cleverly framed to try and and and make him accused by the people of perhaps being a roman collaborator or something of that sort when they offered him uh the the question or asked him the question is it lawful to pay taxes to caesar to the emperor and he answered them by asking them about the coin and the inscription on it well today those were pharisees and herodians supporting supporting the the tetrarchy of king herod and today we come to another set of of people to begin with and then another set of people and then jesus's final question to them so two questions from them to him and one question back think of a debate going on which is irritating to jesus but he has to counter it and getting in the way of his teaching of the people and bringing them good news so we're starting at chapter 22 of st matthew and beginning at verse 23. the same day sadducees came to him who say that there is no resurrection and they asked him a question saying teacher moses said if a man dies having no children his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother now there were seven brothers among us the first married and died and having no offspring left his wife to his brother so too the second and third down to the seventh after them all the woman died now in the resurrection of the seven whose wife will she be for they all had her as a wife but jesus answered them you are wrong because you know neither the scriptures nor the power of god for in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are like angels in heaven and as for the resurrection of the dead have you not read what was said to you by god i am the god of abraham and the god of isaac and the god of jacob he is not the god of the dead but of the living and when the crowd heard it they were astonished at his teaching but when the pharisees heard that he had silenced the sadducees they gathered together and one of them a lawyer asked jesus a question to test him teacher which is the great commandment in the law and jesus said to him you shall love the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind this is the great and first commandment and the second is like it you shall love your neighbor as yourself on these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets now while the pharisees were gathered together jesus asked them a question saying what do you think about the christ whose son is he they said to him the son of david he said to them how is it then that david in the spirit calls him lord saying the lord said to my lord sit at my right hand until i put your enemies under your feet if then david calls him lord how is he his son and no one was able to answer him a word nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions it's the end of the hostile debate of perfectly ridiculous questions being contrived and answered particularly the one from the sadducees who poured scorn on any idea of an afterlife not so the pharisees as we know from the argument with the sun in the sanhedrin at the trial of st paul but uh at that point um the pharisees are at this point and the pharisees and the sadducees and the herodians and the scribes are all one and the three questions that come one from the other are are not really theological debate questions they're trick questions to try and show that jesus was a rabble rouser a false teacher someone who was stirring up trouble for the authorities all of these things in the temple courtyard getting in the way of the teaching of jesus and also the capacity for him to make it a house of prayer for all nations all those things going on in those questions but they're important questions as they're asked matthew though shapes them somewhat differently and particularly the last question if you read that the market account of of that in the temple courtyard you'll find that the scribe who comes up to ask that question is asking a serious question and afterwards he compliments jesus on his answer for it is a strictly orthodox answer according to the law given in the old testament as we call it jesus has said the first commandment you must love the lord your god with all your heart with all your cell with all your mind with all your strength in some of the the evangelists and the second is like it only this love your neighbor as yourself in two great commandments he brings together commandments towards god and commandments to towards the whole of humanity in our dealings with the whole of humanity who are our neighbors and we can just quarry into that in so many of the evangelists but here is jesus giving as far as possible straight answers to trick questions and then he turns the thing round and begins to ask a question of them and he takes a piece of prophecy from the psalm the lord said to my lord sit at my right hand until i make your enemies your footstool if the christ is merely shall we say the son of david then how is it that david calls him lord and they're bamboozled by this and at the same time jesus has already spoken about god being a god of the living all time is present time to the creator so that i am the god of abraham i am the god of isaac i am the god of jacob spoken to moses in the present tense about those who in human terms were dead jesus says he is a god of the living he speaks in the present tense of the patriarchs in speaking to moses speaks in the the present tense in the quotation from the psalms and the inspiration of david the psalmist all of those things taking not only the concepts of human society and human behavior but also of the divine context in which all that is surrounding us in eternity the teaching that's being given is teaching of a very different sort from the kind of teaching that the crowds have had before and it confounds the trick questions and the deviousness of what's going on with the authorities in trying to get to a point where they can just snuff out this troublesome teacher in their midst and the violence is all around him and coming very near well let's look at this day as we always do and see on the 10th of july some of the things which have happened in the past first of all just a a simple fact in 1962 telstar telstar 1 was launched and live telecommunications across the atlantic ocean were possible a beginning seems a long time ago now and almost an obvious thing that we can have television prick pictures and telecommunications anywhere we like but here was a huge step forward in the early 1960s but let's go to some people who've had this as a year's mind or the day of their birth in the past let's start in 1509 with john calvin such an important person in the reformation with a particular kind of teaching and also his taking over of the city of geneva and setting out government there according to his principles so that geneva became a sign of a particular kind of response to the gospel and a particular type of teaching it always makes me wonder and the diversity of response to the teaching given that just after calvin died sin francis de sal who was born in 1567 calvin died in 1564. when saint francis de sal uh became important as a priesthood a teacher he was made bishop of geneva but at that time it was still so much under the calvinist government very strictly protestant government that the catholic bishops in francis de sal had to live 20 miles away at annecy now what i would say is that no no two people could be more different than john calvin and francis de sal i've got here the little book introduction to the devout life of saint francis de sal and it's been a spiritual companion of the best sort for me and i think would never not be on my shelves um but it's written for laypeople and particularly he he he names them whether they're imaginary or not most are women and she's writing about how the devout life isn't something for monks and nuns in monasteries necessarily it's it's rather like john keyboard the trivial round the common task will furnish all we need to ask or the vest before we need not bid for cloisters sell our neighbor and our work farewell nor strive to wind ourselves too high for sinful man beneath the sky the trivial round the common task will furnish all we need to ask well no better place to read about that than in the wonderful writing illustrative with pictures of flowers and fruitfulness in human life and it would be lovely to read lots of of that this morning but i'm just drawing the comparison between the the the type of person that de sal was and his best uh phrase for me was whoever preaches with love preaches effectively and that's relevant on every page of his introduction to the devout life perfect love casts out all fear well then let's go on and uh go to um 1686 when on this day john fell the bishop of oxford and had been dean of christchurch oxford died he had been brought up in in the the tradition of the church of england but in 1648 because he had fought on the side of the royalists as a young man he everything was taken away from him and he had to go and live still in oxford but outside the university compass because that was in other hands now once the civil war was over and great damage was done to oxford at that time but but john fell was living with his brother-in-law who was called thomas willis which is the same name as my father but this there's no connection and uh he and two friends went on through this commonwealth years in a house opposite merton college where he continued illegally to celebrate the sacraments of the church of england and to say its offices and then at the end of the civil war he was received back and became dean of christchurch and his monumental energy at re-establishing everything both in cathedral and in in the the university colleges he became vice chancellor of the university and again rather like calvin or francis desal it would be too much to talk too much about john fell but he's known for a piece of humorous forgiveness best of all because although he was a disciplinarian in setting things right again he actually had uh here's our little tickle tummy chap um uh he actually was quite forgiving of of students there was one particular person who was called tom brown nothing to do with the one in dr arnold's book but tom brown had committed some felony and was about to be expelled from the university of oxford and fell said i will forgive you if you can translate here and now the 32nd epigram of the latin poet marshall and that began known amote sabidi and the tom brown who clearly was a scholar as well translated that in words that have become utterly famous i do not love thee dr fell the reason why i cannot tell but this alone i know full well i do not love thee dr fell and dr phil laughed and forgave him his transgression for that piece of scholarship i have no idea what happened to tom brown but we do know that that fell was also instrumental in the building of the sheldonian theater and also the formation of the oxford university press he was a great scholar himself and translated so many things from the latin and greek uh and uh say we give thanks for his energy the same time today this is the birth date in uh uh 1871 of marcel proust the french writer i think he was my sister's favorite writer her volumes and she had the three volumes of the penguin edition of proust and in each of those editions she's put at the beginning the day she started reading that and the date she completed it and so on over many years but proust's way of describing things and evoking atmospheres became to her hugely important and um when i think of of course i always think of these these are my old ones of the the chateau and windus versions with the lovely little drawings on the front and also translated by uh ck scotland grief and ck scott mancreef had a way of being poetic in english which sometimes was paraphrasing a little bit what was going on in french and even the title um of of of the the whole sequence which at first didn't please proust and in in then when he he read it and bruce english was good enough to read it in in the scotland mancreef he realized what moncrief was doing giving some kind of atmosphere and ethos to things by using that you he called it not not in in search of time past but a remembrance of things passed and when you have that of course you're instantly in the shakespeare sonnet went to the sessions of sweet silent thought i summon up remembrance of things past and that kind of musing when memories come is absolutely crucial to all the thousands of characters and the thousands of scenes in those volumes of post which uh scotland grief translated and we give thanks for that it's been translated again but i'm i'll i'll stay with the scotland grief because that's exactly the one that i remembered but let's just read in montreal's translation the most famous passage of all because it's it's that that uh gives us the flavor and do you remember how he says in as he before he begins his descriptions of comrade how he suddenly remembered it many years had elapsed during which nothing of comrade saved what was comprised in the siesta and the drama of my going to bed that had any existence for me when one day in winter as i came home my mother seeing that i was cold offered me some tea i think i didn't normally take i declined it first and then for no particular reason changed my mind she sent out for one of those short plump little cakes called petite madeleine which look as though they had been molded in the fluted scallop of a pilgrim shell and soon mechanically weary after a dull day with the prospect of a depressing morrow i raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which i had soaked a morsel of the cake and no sooner had the warm liquid and the crumbs with it touched my palate then a shudder ran through my whole body and i stopped intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place an exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses but individual detached with no suggestion of its origin well you'll know that experience from time to time in a scent of a flower or a taste of something or a phrase of music or a scene you find yourself in it's a deja vu which has been prompted and it shows what a storehouse of memories our body mind and spirits are and they can be awakened at a moment's notice from 50 years ago 60 years ago and in my case 70 years ago and i'm not expecting them and you'll recognize this but from quest from that moment onwards flowed a stream of words and reminiscences building up that that picture which he gave which so entranced my sister and so many others and it's good to to to think of the gifts which god has given us in order to to have that kind of memory so we are reflecting on the way the scriptures affect us with so many different scenes and we give thanks for all of that in our capacity to imagine to dream to have visions of what was and what is and to make it present tense and to have intention for the future not knowing what kind of experiences of that sort the creator has in store for us for surely the creation is a wonderful storehouse of beautiful things and also sometimes painful memories because sometimes those experiences that sense gives us painful memories and then two we have to offer them in our prayers and give thanks for the way in which we have come on from that and saint francis de sales um is very insistent in his serious call to the the introduction to the devout life going on to william law and the introduction to the devout life he's very serious about the fact that we always need a companion or a friend to put us right in some way or another someone who knows us quite well others can do it but if there's a friend and this he says to the lay people he's talking to then it needn't be a priestly confessor but it just needs someone to give you balance in your own life and and and say look you're taking that too seriously you're not taking that seriously enough and trusted friends are another gift of the creation so let's on this day say our prayers and give thanks for all those manifold memories and also different things which have happened in history and some like the launch of telstar have meant that we can be together right across the world and give those references to each other in that way oops i'm sorry i've startled you uh say our prayers together then on this day at this musical weekend and give thanks for the gift of music as always in these foundations and pray for our own cathedral choirs both as they come to the end of their term but also sing in another church tonight in the diocese in leonard's highs but also here in the cathedral because with our different musical resources we can keep music going wherever and next weekend will be a chance to celebrate all of that particularly in the girls concert so today we are praying on the 10th of july in the anglican communion for the diocese of cubette in the province of the episcopal church of south sudan in the eastern barrel gazal province and we pray for justin our archbishop for rose bishop of dover for tim bishop at lambeth and the chaplains this time of the westbridge area dinery these are those who give ministry to organizations which are in the compass of that area and there are many of them so we pray for them bring your own prayers and intentions we continue to pray for the desperate heat and fires in the western part of the united states and and uh still all of that in california with with with fire and all kinds of dangers there so we remember our friends there and you will have thoughts and and intentions for people all over the world here's the comic for the last time this one for this week of the fifth sunday after trinity almighty and everlasting god by whose spirit the whole body of the church is governed and sanctified hear our prayer which we offer for all your faithful people that in their vocation and ministry each may serve you in holiness and truth to the glory of your name through our lord and savior jesus christ amen so we say together in whatever language we like to use 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 on this rather still morning here in england [Music] so [Music] [Music] so so [Music] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so [Music] so the peace of god which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of god and if 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 so you've had your breakfast and you're rather peaceful today nice bird song no noise outside school's all gone and the precinct's rather quiet claim you will like that too all right do you want a little bit as well hey we're all very calm this morning a bit different from last week i think the calm weather makes you calm [Music] think we could stay here all day couldn't we all right it's drier for you now as well not so muddy you've still got little muddy feet but the grass will soon get rid of that so it's a really lovely burn song here his own tune i didn't chew on my chassis okay hey don't do that little trotters oh sorry i don't think you're going to let me stop the matching spell will begin in a minute then we'll have to stop hey [Music] [Music] i think it must be something in this makes you like chewing on the cloth so you