Sharing some thoughts

Desmond Tutu tells the story of a light bulb that shone brightly and proudly. He says how it began to strut about arrogantly, quite unmindful of how . . . it could shine so brilliantly, and thinking that it was all due to its own merit and skill." One day the light bulb was taken out of the socket and placed on a table. "Try as hard as it could, the light bulb could give no light and brilliance. . .” Each one of us has the opportunity to shine as lights in the world. Each one of us can do good, can begin in small ways to make a difference in the world – a difference for good. Anne Frank, the young Jewish girl who wrote a diary whilst hiding from the Germans in Amsterdam in the war, wrote, ‘How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world’. We all have a challenge of building a better world, and each of us are given gifts to help us do that. It may be through our giving in money or time, it may be in prayer, it may be in action, mo...

There’s a rather nice true story about a volunteer tutor was asked to visit a nine-year-old in a large hospital. She took the boy's name and room number and was told by the boy's teacher that they were studying nouns and adverbs in class. It wasn't until the tutor got to the boy's room that she realised the boy was a patient in the hospital's burn unit. No one had prepared her to find a nine-year-old so horribly burned and in such great pain. Though she wanted to, she felt she couldn't just turn and leave, so she gathered her courage and entered the room. "Hi, I'm the hospital teacher," she stammered. "Your teacher asked me to help you with nouns and adverbs." And, clumsily, she launched into the lesson. The next morning a nurse called the tutor. "What did you do to that boy?" The tutor immediately began a tearful apology, but the nurse interrupted her."No, no, no. You don't understand. We've been very worried about...

A newly married sailor was informed by the navy that he was going to be stationed for a year a long way from home on a remote island in the Pacific. A few days after he got there he really began to miss his new wife, so he wrote a letter. ‘My love’ he wrote, ‘we are going to be apart for a very long time. Already I am missing you and there’s not much to do here in the evenings. Besides that, I have to tell you that we’re constantly surrounded by young attractive native girls. Do you think I should get a hobby of some kind so I will not be tempted?’ So his wife sent him back a harmonica saying, ‘That’s a good idea, to avoid any possibility of you straying, I think you should learn to play this’... Eventually his tour of duty came to an end and he rushed back to his wife. ‘Darling’ he said, ‘I can’t wait to see you for a cuddle !’ Before allowing him a cuddle or certainly a kiss, she said, ‘First show me whether you learnt the harmonica !’ Waiting around for something can be really diffi...

This week again we have heard of more casualties in the war in Afghanistan – Iraq also seems far from stable and throughout the world many other conflicts are raging. Today we offer thoughts and prayers for those involved in conflict today as well as those in the past… There are a number of purposes of Remembrance Sunday with the primary one obviously being to remember – to remember those who have lost their lives in war, and those who have suffered terribly whether because of an injury or illness sustained themselves, or because of the loss of a loved one. Remembering is one of the most powerful emotions we have – often we forget things we want to remember and remember things we would rather not ! Sometimes memory is selective – for example I remember the score when Cardiff Blues beat the Ospreys recently, but don’t remember the score against Leinster from last week !! But today, more seriously, remembering is important. Today we think of the sacrifices made by so many people in confl...