St. Mary's June 2017 Magazine

From The Vicarage June 2017
Just back from Scotland and our annual spring jaunt, not to Kintyre this
time but Galloway, in the south west corner, where the world's most
handsome cattle, belted Galloways, graze, and Gavin Maxwell, of otter
fame, hailed.
We were staying in an ancient house on the Maxwell estate, much
reduced these days, and history lies thickly there. The Maxwells go back
centuries, but long before they arrived, St Ninian, the apostle to this part
of the world, landed in the fourth century and brought Christianity to the
Picts, some two hundred years before his more famous colleague St
Columba, did the same for the peoples of the north. You can walk down
to the sea where St Ninian made landfall today through fields of
bluebells, and visit the cave where he settled (although I have to say as
caves go it's nothing special). But even earlier than that, not far from our
house, are the Drumtroddan Stones, erected by a Bronze Age tribe long
before Christianity arrived. It is also a wonderfully remote place, and on a
clear night, as owls flit by moonlight, you can easily imagine yourself
almost out of time, standing where ancient tribes, and Picts, and monks
and Maxwells once trod. I love those moments where you feel suddenly
disconnected for the present and reconnected to history. It happens
quite often in church, for those of us who are fortunate to inhabit a space
long hallowed by our forefathers and foremothers. Not only does it
remind us that we fit into a longer story than that of our own CVs, it also
reminds us that the dramas and excitements and misadventures of our
civic life - the pitch and toss of elections and their outcomes - are passing
things, important, but belonging, like us, to a grander narrative. I think our
faith encourages us to take the longer view, to seek a wider perspective
than the present moment, in which the God-given and inalienable
dignity of all people, of whatever background, creed, or political
conviction, can be readily recognised and upheld.
Yours in Christ,
Fr Richard.
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