E NEWS 3 SEPTEMBER 2023
Fei has been having a well-earned rest this last week, I am pleased to be able to take the service this Sunday while Fei indulges in sitting in a pew.
This week I welcomed the first lambs on our Wairarapa land. I gave my daughter naming rights; her first suggestions were Chops and Shanks. I rejected these and so after a number of unsuitable names we settled on Magnolia and Reginald. Big names for two small lambs to grow into. Lambs, for me, herald the arrival of Spring, being a famer’s son from the South. For our young ram, Argyle, it has heralded fatherhood. Not that he took any particular interest in his offspring. Rachel, their mother, is much more attentive – this is her third season of Motherhood.
This Sunday we see two themes. ‘The first Sunday of Creation’ and ‘Father’s Day’. Special focus on Father’s Day has been lost in recent years due to the competing claims of the day. So this year I will have a primary focus on fathers in the service.
In the wider community we have the end of the parliamentary term, with elections coming up next month. One thing that I have been finding irritating is the question reporters seem to be fixated on: “what is in the policy for you?” It might be a reflection of my age, it might be a reflection of my faith, but the question seems wrong. I recall that John F. Kennedy asked a different question: “Ask not what your country can do for you, but rather what can you do for your country.” It was a political slogan but it is one that has stuck with me as it moves the focus from me to others. It is not just what is good for me in the short term but what is good for all in the long term. So this election I will be asking what is in this policy for the good of creation/the planet, not what is good for me.
There, you have just read my ‘Creation 1’ mini sermon for 2023. My Father’s Day reflection will be a bit longer!
Ross Scott
You can read the full E-news here: https://mailchi.mp/67c5aa36396f/this-weeks-newsletter-from-st-andrews-on-the-terrace-9395307
