Saturday : daily picture

Beautiful double rainbow over Wivenhoe Quay in Essex yesterday evening. @thismorning #clapforNHS #rainbows pic.twitter.com/2qCKE7FgCi

— Katrina Kerr (@KatrinaKerr25) May 1, 2020

someone found this on twitter & sent it to me...
incredible rainbow !

Holy Week : Saturday

In the online Guardian this morning I read an article by Mark Rice Oxley giving several links to items of hope amid this pandemic... 

you might enjoy this link below which offers beautiful images of blossom:

https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/features/blossom-watch

Interested in reading about  the hope of celebrating both Passover & Easter through video links / streaming etc ? ...then  look at  Johnathan Freedlands article in the Guardian ...

Hope for New Year

almond tree we planted 3 or 4 years ago

“A Vision”
By Wendell Berry

If we will have the wisdom to survive,
to stand like slow-growing trees
on a ruined place, renewing, enriching it,
if we will make our seasons
welcome here,
asking not too much of earth or heaven,
then a long time after we are dead
the lives our lives prepare will live
here, their houses strongly placed
upon the valley sides, fields and gardens
rich in the windows. The river will run
clear, as we never know it,
and over it, birdsong like a canopy.
On the levels of the hills will be
green meadows, stock bells in noon shade.
On the steeps where greed and ignorance cut down
the old forest, an old forest will stand,
its rich leaf-fall drifting on its roots.
The veins of forgotten springs will have opened.
Families will be singing in the fields.
In their voices they will hear a music
risen out of the ground. They will take
nothing from the ground they will not return,
whatever the grief at parting. Memory,
native to this valley, will spread over it
like a grove, and memory will grow
into legend, legend into song, song
into sacrament. The abundance of this place,
the songs of its people and its birds,
will be health and wisdom and indwelling
light. This is no paradisal dream.
Its hardship is its possibility.

                                                                     

2 trees planted by our predecessors...

"Father Forgive them; they do not know what they are doing." St Luke 23 v 33

In the light of recent events in Paris I realise that, sadly, I could continue to paint a whole series like this painting, with a changing range of events throughout the world surrounding the cross...

...but maybe you will notice at least one sign of hope given in this painting ? 

I also noted the significant signs of hope & solidarity given by people in Paris, after the traumatic attacks on ordinary people...

• ...those who offered hospitality to random survivors needing somewhere to stay overnight...
• ...the young man who brought out his piano, played some of Lennon's peace music...
• ...all those who just turned up at the hospital to donate blood for the wounded...
• ...and, of course the array of flowers, candles & prayers...

 & crowds gathering for a vigil in Trafalgar Square, even in the pouring rain 

• February 2016 : Ive just found this website on Forgiveness:  click link below ...

http://theforgivenessproject.com/stories/desmond-tutu-south-africa/

Signs of Hope

Its been snowing heavily, but just outside my studio window I see the snowdrops have multiplied...

 Apparently the Snowdrop is a symbol of hope, discovered after the Crimean War, growing out of the mud & chaos, and adopted as a symbol in a similar way to that of the poppies after later wars.

 So, after all the recent tragedies, I began looking for signs of hope, especially in the news where so often chaos & tragedy take the headlines...

• There was an article about Syrian refugees being given hospitality in Jordan;
• Bishop Libby Lane's Consecration opening a doorway for the future;
• & Muslim neighbours helping Christians whose homes & churches were being burnt down...

just to mention a few...

• and over the years there appears to be a growing sense of oneness with people in far off places when there is a terrible tragedy...an instinctive feeling of solidarity.

• Whenever there is joy & hope in the recovery of a health worker I also remember the remarkable doctor who saved Nigeria from the outbreak of Ebola, even though she died as a result. A really tragic death, yet her son could later write of discovering hope through the realization of what she had achieved:

"I wonder how one individual has so much connection with so many people.
 So, it's like we shared her with everybody which is special."

read the whole story here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-29696011

• Then I discovered this article about the unassuming, ordinary neighbours of refugees in Jordan  http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2015/30-january/news/world/syrian-refugees-find-compassion-in-jordan

Not only has this country with far fewer resources than ours welcomed so many thousands into their midst, but they have opened up their schools by creating double shifts.

• in mid-January ordinary people miles away in Niger rushed to help their neighbours whilst a mob was burning churches & homes: " While the mobs were preoccupied with the destruction they inflicted on the front part of the house... the pastor's Muslim neighbours rushed through the back door to save whatever property that they could spare. "They helped to save the pastor's property while the crazy mob was burning everything," http://www.christiantoday.com/article/muslim.neighbours.helped.pastor.during.niger.attacks/47117.htm
• And then for a joyful historic breakthrough in the UK as the first female bishop is consecrated in the Anglican Church in England 

 click this link below:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-30974547


What, I wonder, have you noticed as a sign of hope ?

New Life from the ashes?

I cannot remember how long ago I began a painting expressing my anger about all the violence in Syria and then added more angry daubs when further outrages happened in Nigeria, Pakistan, Iraq, Gaza, Sri Lanka, & Paris. Its a real mess. And yet one day when I turned it upside down I was surprised to discover recognizable shapes emerging, and decided to enhance the outlines a little to see what would happen...resulting in an abstract group of faces in one corner.
This has been a prayer painting with much anger and deep sadness. A cry of 'Where on earth is God in all this ?

And then I think of all the really positive things people have been doing: those who have been involved in giving aid or working with refugees despite the risks. Its too easy to be overwhelmed and depressed by all the evil, and not notice the love around. What about Medicins sans frontiers working in war torn areas, and all those who have gone to West Africa to work among Ebola victims ?

The ground outside my studio was totally waterlogged; a dark mess of decaying leaves and ashes. But then suddenly, with a little sunshine, a few thin green shoots have appeared, topped with the first snowdrops

a reminder to notice all the little signs of new life and hope.