David Chillingworth

Commandment fifth, as in bible, thou shalt not kill, ends any argument about guns. 7/7

The old lady rest contentedly beside Heidi, the cook spaniel, where the facebook caption says, making friends, no language barrier. The story behind that picture is of a daughter take her elderly mother from desert on the black sea back to Edinburgh, but they ended up in Dublin, where one of my friend has taking them into her home. Now it's all about getting the Visa.

So begins another day of visits by political leaders of Moscow and Ukraine. Maybe a slight pulling back but the stakes are still very high. The three words War in Europe dread in my heart I think in my time trenches and all the conflict, refugees trying to get ways to safety. Human cost and tragedies on all sides. Any sensible person would pray let’s not come to that.

Let me tell you about the rich, they’re different from you and me, that’s Gatsby begins its stories. Different they certainly are, a report just published tells us that a new billionaire has being created everyday of the pandemic, the wealth of the 10 richest people, that’s the likes of Elon Mask, Jeff Bezos, has doubled to 1.2 trillion dollars, while 160 million people have being pushed into poverty. Some called Windfall tax to readdress the balance, the sort of Robin Hood response.

Over the weekend we saw two very different scenes, each making statement about how the future may be. On Sunday morning, was the annual active remembrance at Cenotaph, with members of royal family although her majesty the queen could not attend. The dignified ceremony recognises year after year the horrors of war, bearing witness of so many ways to suffering and loss, but it does so with calmed dignity with affirms hope for the future, and reaffirms aspiration to peace, meanwhile COP26 came to an untidy end in Glasgow, there was an agreement, as much as some could live with but far less than many hoped for. The issue, of course, are huge for climate crisis already changing our world in so many ways, rising sea level, extreme weather events, rising temperatures, all over the world, migrants struggle to move to places where they can have a better life, shortage of water, crop failures, produce political instability.

Cup26, the global conference on climate change will begin in Glasgow, the the feeling is growing, this is the single most important issue which the world’s community faces, but the successive meetings tells us a story of dashed hopes and disappointment, of target just won’t ambitious enough, and the inabilities to hold these nations to their commitments.

Jared Smith, don't forget his name. Sometimes feelings which are inexpressively painful spell over into the news in ways which are surprising. Jared Smith is a 20 years old, one of 13 American marines who died in the bomb in Afghanistan airport in the final stage of evacuation. Various news outlet reported that visit as US president Biden met with the marine's families, nothing strange about that, but it was a visit that didn't go very well for a surprising reason. Jo Biden has often seen as survivor, his wife and daughter were killed in car accident 1972, his son died in cancer in 2015. It wasn't surprising on the visit to a family who lost their son in a terrible way, president Biden was reflect on his own loss. This hurt family that wasn't the time, they want the whole attention but found him too absorbed in his own feelings.

Covid has changes lives of all of us, constrains what we can do, anxiety, and for too many, painful bereavement. We tend to focus on figures and statistic, including of course very hopeful vaccination figures, but we need to hear the voice of lived experience of people, and not just in our relatively hopeful context. I was fortunate to travel a lot as a church leader, I have friends and contacts in many places, and I listen to their voices from Brazil, where there has been 10 million cases nearly half million dead, a friend says, "it's sad to hear as increasing pace, the people we know including friends relatives are dying because of the virus" another in South Africa said "We used to hear figures, and now we know names".

In this Easter, we dare to hope that a newer brighter future beginning to beacon beyond the pandemic. Each of us always link spring time, fresh flower, brighter days, spiritually, it's a spring time of hope. Hoping death defeated, and evil overcome. I guess, for most of us, it'd be enough to just get back to some kind of normal, freedom to move around for family friends to socialise, to go on holiday. But even if we're not yet aware of it, the trauma of pandemic, have brought fundamental changes to our society, we all suffered, but prices have been paid more by some than others. The elderly, the poor more than the rich.

"My name is Patrick, I'm a sinner, a simple country person, and least of all believers, and I'm looked down upon by many." These are the words of St Patrick himself opening of his confessions, his statement of faith.