In difficult times, our simplistic answers stop working. What is life all about? What big story am I part of?
Category: Story
As the lockdown drags on in Melbourne, gratitude just gets harder. Suffering becomes a kind of blindness as we are turned in on ourselves. But could suffering be an ironic teacher that knocks us out of our limited ways of seeing the world? Could gratitude be a way forward?
The Kingdom of God is like this:
It’s a cool, clear morning in late summer. The sun hasn’t quite managed to peek over the eastern lake, and the workers wrap themselves closely in their cloaks and grumble. It’s just another day selling their labour for a measly pittance, just about enough to keep body and soul together. Just enough to make it worth being out of bed before the sun is, and to be standing around waiting here….
What I learned about suffering from the story of Jonah and his whale.
I stood at the worryingly quiet tube station with my borrowed briefcase, and a perplexed expression on my face. What on earth was doing here? And what was I going to do now? Aristotle says to start the story in media res – in the middle of things. That’s fair enough advice, but perhaps it […]
Alister Pate 