Today we remember Thomas Ken, the seventeenth-century British bishop and hymn-writer most famous for writing the hymn commonly known as “The Doxology”, a hymn much-loved to many people and which has had a recent revival in a lot of churches. I’ve based today’s poem around some of the lines of that hymn, in memory ofContinue reading “Doxology (For Thomas Ken)”
Tag Archives: grace
Common Prayer: A Sonnet for Thomas Cranmer
Even as a picture graven or painted is but a dead representation of the thing itself, and is without life, or any manner of moving; so be the works of all unfaithful persons before God. They do appear to be lively works, and indeed they be but dead, not availing to the eternal life. (ThomasContinue reading “Common Prayer: A Sonnet for Thomas Cranmer”
Qui Habitat Part 5 (Fifth Sunday of Lent)
Today’s poem continues my series for the Sundays of Lent, due to finish next week with Palm Sunday. Each poem draws on the psalm and the Gospel reading for the day, as well as some of the other set readings where appropriate. You can find the readings that it based upon here. Qui Habitat PartContinue reading “Qui Habitat Part 5 (Fifth Sunday of Lent)”
Safety
Many of the poems that I write here come out of my struggles with mental illness. This poem, I hope, is a testament to the power of writing to help us order our inner turmoil and offer it up as a kind of prayer, refined by the process of writing. Safety The threats you cannotContinue reading “Safety”
Grace, eight or nine years old
Samuel the priest, leading Israel through a process of repentance and then seeing them defeating their old enemies the Philistines, set up a stone monument where they had been victorious and named it “Ebenezer”, meaning “Stone of Help”, declaring that “Thus far the Lord has helped us.” In the midst of our busy and oftenContinue reading “Grace, eight or nine years old”
The Consolations of Writing 