Just Follow Your Nose

After we were rescued by Moses the motor cyclist, “the roar of his triumph could be heard throughout the land”, the next major snag we ran into on the road that day occurred just after first lunch when we attempted to get through some roadworks, which, according to a warning sign, had closed the road ahead.  Now normally cyclists can ignore such signs, as they can usually dismount and circumnavigate the obstacle. So, undaunted we rode past the sign and on down the road until we came to the said obstacle.  A group of men were resurfacing the road; the total width of the road.  We came to a halt and asked the guy who appeared to be in charge if we could walk round the obstacle on the grass verge carrying our bikes.  This seemed to us a reasonable request but it turned out he was your average Jobsworth and he said “no!” rather emphatically.  We attempted to reason with him – “We will keep well clear of the tar mate.  We’ll hold our breath so we don’t die from inhaling the fumes.  Come on mate, it’s only a few yards”, etc, etc, but all to no avail.  Well I suppose we could have rushed him, but his work mates looked quite burly and, on the whole, we are all law-abiding citizens so grudgingly, muttering obscenities of various kinds, which mainly involved masturbation, we turned around and headed back on ourselves.  Eventually we came to a fork in the road and took it hoping that we could get around the problem, at which point the trusted Garmin went nuts and, after a few minutes, when it recognised we were off target, gave up the ghost entirely.

Now having spent most of my cycling career without such modern sophistication I felt it was my duty to take control of the situation and so I confidently announced, “Don’t worry lads, I have a great sense of direction, I just follow my nose, you follow me and we’ll be fine!”  By the looks on the faces of the others they did not share my optimism nor did they have much faith in the fact that I could produce the goods.  Nose, however large and impressive as mine is, could not possibly match up to modern technology.  Despite the fact that “pride cometh before a fall”, today my confidence was rewarded with success and I was vindicated, for we rode on for about ten minutes in the direction that I suggested and then Sam announced, with some relief, “Hey, guys, are back en route, the Garmin has picked us up!” I didn’t say anything, I just slipped away from the front of the pack, took up my accustomed position at the rear, bathed in a warm sense of self-congratulation: well after all when you know you are right you don’t have to boast about it do you?

Well once that little bit of excitement was out of the way I started to think about my prayer life; not so much the liturgical side of it but more the personal aspect.  I got to thinking how I often use a simple Biblical verse when attempting to consider myself before God; it goes rather like this –

“Be still and know that I am God” – There is a reality, which is personal and loving, which is beyond my feeble ego and its small conception of reality.

“Be still and know that I am” – The nearest any of us can legitimately get to naming the divine mystery.  God was, is and will be.

“Be still and know” – This knowledge is gained in stillness, it is not strictly speaking empirical knowledge, although I would claim that it is an objective reality, it actually exists, it is just that it is a different, an intuitive form of knowledge.

“Be still” – The time to stop thinking has come.  Stop trying to make sense of anything and let the mind be still.  This is where concentration on breathing can be a great help. A conscious focus on an activity we just normally take for granted enabling our busy mind to quieten.

“Be” – This induced stillness leads to just being but being with intent.  It is rather like the angler who is waiting for the movement of the rod tip, so I wait to see if anything will happen, through attaining a sense of being rather than doing and, like the angler, sometimes a fish gets caught and sometimes nothing.  Either result is fine, for it is the unexpecting and unpredictable nature of angling which makes it exciting and keeps the angler returning to the river bank: for the contemplative a sense that I am, and I am in the presence of another who is, can be enough: but sometimes a moment of intense enlightenment occurs, we cannot force it, there is no magical formula, it comes purely as God’s gracious gift and in God’s time.

So, I guess what I was considering that day perhaps could be seen as the spiritual equivalent of “following you nose”. Hopefully it keeps you on track as the adventure of life opens up before you.

 

Finding The Middle Way

We got away from Clun in good time on the sixth leg of our journey, and were in fact on the road by 8.30am.  There was some serious climbing for the first couple of hours, but never more than 100 feet at any one time, and so nothing like the earlier climbs on our route.  The main difficulty was that it began to rain heavily just at the point where we were descending into more rolling terrain.  On light weight road bikes, the kind of tyres we use this made descending at any speed quite hazardous.  At one point we sheltered in the forecourt of a redundant garage and waited for the worst of the rain to pass.

After a couple of hours riding, the route flattened out considerably and the going was quite easy, it was the sheer distance that was the main challenge on this leg: we were due to do around eighty miles that day.  Undistracted by the improving weather, with my mind not on painful legs, I was once more able to give myself over to thinking about and recalling my spiritual development and in particular why I moved from Evangelical Nonconformity to Anglicanism.

This quite radical change in churchmanship had been a gradual one.  My mother was an Anglican of somewhat Anglo-Catholic taste, for my father the Trade Union was his church and so although he influenced my political views, he had little or no influence on my developing theological views.  I started my spiritual journey as a Nonconformist for geographical reasons rather than theological reasons – the local Congregational Church was just up the road from where I lived in Thornton Heath, whilst getting to the Anglican Church involved crossing a busy main road.  I found faith in an Evangelical Nonconformist tradition but my later development in the faith took me in the more Catholic direction in the Church of England.  I struggled with the whole idea of a “Quiet Time” (spending time each day with your Bible and God) which was the main Evangelical means of having a private prayer life.  The Anglican Church also taught the importance of both public and private prayer, but what it offered was a more organised way of doing both.  When I say organised, I mean the liturgies were written down rather than being remembered.  Many a time when I preached in Nonconformist Chapels, I was told I could change anything I wanted to, unlike Anglicans they were not tied down to a written code of worship, but I soon realised that the reality was rather different, and woe betide anyone who departed from the accepted norm.  This being the case, or at least the case when I was much younger, it may well have changed, I thought that a well-considered and well-structured liturgy was to be preferred.  So, whilst still nominally a Nonconformist when my Lay preaching Ministry commenced, I started to use the English Prayer book more and more and found the daily offices of Morning and Evening Prayer useful as a structure of my own private devotions even though they were actually meant to be used for corporate worship.  Also, when asked to conduct a Communion Service in a Nonconformist Chapel when I was Lay Preacher, I tended to turn to the Prayer Book Prayer of Consecration for my inspiration.  Again, I don’t think this went down too well which from a historical point of view I guess is not too surprising.

The other major influence which caused me to change Traditions occurred during my Theological Studies at The London School of Theology (known as The London Bible College in my student days).  Dr Tony Lane taught “Historic Theology” and I came to the realisation that the Church had existed for a considerable time, in fact the majority of its history, prior to the Reformation.  As an amateur theologian I had steeped myself in the writings of the Reformers and English Puritans and virtually ignored any of the earlier periods or for that matter the modern theologians.  During Dr Lane’s lectures, which I found fascinating and illuminating, I was forced to open my mind to the writings of Early Church Fathers and also the great Medieval Theologians.  I ended up feeling that Nonconformity had two main weaknesses: first, it was relatively modern, second, it was a reaction against something i.e. Roman Catholicism.  The Anglican Church, which I came to see as a Reformed Catholic Church, with its attempt to be “The Middle Way” between the excesses of Puritanism and Roman Catholicism, began to appeal more and more to my intellect as well as my aesthetic taste.  So, some short time after gaining my Theology Degree I joined the Church of England, was Confirmed and became a card-carrying Anglican.

Thoughts of “the Middle Way” came to an abrupt halt when we had to cross a particularly busy road in order to get to a country lane which formed the next quiet part of our route.  As a group we sat on our bikes and the traffic thundered past with no signs of a gap until a motor cyclist, seeing our dilemma, slowed down and came to a halt, thus holding up all the traffic in order to let us cross safely to the other side.  I don’t know who he was or what his name might be but from now on I will call him Moses.  Not as dramatic as the safe crossing of the Red Sea by the Israelites but often I have experienced such minor miracles in spontaneous acts of random kindness.  So, thank you Moses, “what you do for the least of my brethren…” etc.

Pride Goeth Before a Fall

We made very good time from second lunch to the foot of the dreaded Pentre Hodre which is approached via very narrow country lanes.  I detected an air of apprehension if not downright panic among the group as we sped along and contemplated what was just ahead of us.  Now whether it was an unconscious defence at work or some kind of Freudian slip I know not, but what I do know is that I shot right past the right-hand turn that would take me to the foot of the monster climb.  I hadn’t gone far before I realised that the others had turned off and so I turned around, rode the few couple of yards back and then turned left.  Because the turn is a sharp one and therefore you have to slow down to take it, there is no opportunity to get a run at the hill.  The first section is very steep indeed, probably around 20%.  Now I don’t know if it was the fact that I was faced with the reality of the climb, which seemed even worse than I had remembered from 2013, but as soon as I turned left, I felt the urgent need to pee.  So, I got off my bike and watched the others struggling off into the far distance whilst I watered the hedge.  To add insult to injury it began to rain, so I put on my waterproof jacket.  I had no chance of managing the first part of the climb from a standing start and so I started to trudge up the hill pushing my bike.  At times progress was so slow that my speedometer was not registering anything.  It stopped raining just as I reached a part of the climb which I had half a chance of riding up due to the gradient easing a little, so I took off my waterproof, mounted my bike and began to pedal.  It started to rain again, so I stopped, dismounted and put my waterproof back on.  I remounted and continued up the climb.  Soon after this I was passed by a tractor the driver of which had a child perched on his lap who was pretending to steer the tractor; well at least I think she was pretending, as due to the narrowness of the lane there was not much room for error. As they passed the driver commented on the state of the weather.  I grunted a reply.  Shortly after my meeting with the tractor the gradient increased sharply causing me to get off and walk once more.

The last part of the climb I was able, due to the gradient easing off at bit, to mount my bike and so I was at least on the bike when I caught up with the others waiting for me at the top of the climb.  I was greeted by congratulations that I had made it.  I didn’t like to let on that I had walked up at least part of this monster of a hill.  Whether they guessed that or not and were just being kind to the old man I known not. It’s an exhausting climb either on a bike or off it, but the view at the top is spectacular even when the weather is inclement.

The great view was a little way from the actual summit and so there was a little more climbing to do, but it was very gentle and eventually gave way to a steep descent into the village of Clun. Just as we reached the outskirts of Clun we came upon a shallow stream with a ford in the road. I think we must have come a different way into the village in 2013 because I didn’t remember the ford at all. Just in front of the ford was a large warning sign announcing to would be travellers to beware as the road through the stream was very slippery. Ollie entered first without stopping to read the sign, got about halfway across and, when the initial momentum of his speedy entrance was slowed by the water pressure, his bike went spectacularly from under him and he ended up in the drink. Scott, who had stopped on the bank and was filming the crossing started bellowing with laughter. Sam entered next, a little more tentatively, only to suffer the same fate. I was the third to arrive and having seen the downfall of Ollie and Sam decided not to tempt fate or the dubious superstition which claims “third time lucky”.  I screeched to a halt and stopped just in time. Deciding to learn by the experience of my two soggy compatriots, I read the notice and proceeded with great care on foot pushing my bike. About halfway across I slipped but managed to stay upright thus maintaining my dignity albeit with very wet feet. When I got across, I found Scott, still laughing like a drain, on the other side of the stream. When he finally composed himself, he asked with a grin, “Didn’t you guys see the bridge?” Sure enough a few yards from the ford was a bridge.

In various states of disarray, we rode into Clun and found a pub and had a couple of beers whilst we waited for Julia and Jo to join us. We were also joined by the Mr and Mrs Bowtell, members of COGS congregation, who have a house in Clun and divide their time between it and their other house in Tadworth. They had also joined us two years previously.  Having supped the local brew and dried out a bit we made our way to the local YHA where we were booked in for the night.

Where’s the Flags and Bunting?

As I rode on that day, between first and second lunch, I continued to muse about the importance, in symbolic terms, of that which is expressed in so much visual art or enacted in dance.  My conclusion was that the archetype at the centre of our being, which I would call the reflection of God or the indwelling Christ, is drawing us towards an inner unity at the heart of our personality, i.e. the coming together, often towards the end of life, of the various aspects which circle around this central unifying core of our psyche.  When we attain a high degree of integration, I feel that we can be confident that our soul has been made.  This I believe happens through an interaction of internal archetypal aspects which we are innately born with and our personal experience of the outer world.  The soul thus made is a much larger entity than the feeble ego, which, like St Peter traversing the waves, seeks to walk on the watery depths of the unconscious.

All of these thoughts came to an abrupt end went our little group reached the picturesque village of Brampton Bryan and found second lunch already laid out for us in the back of Big Cav (Man shall not live by Philosophical thoughts alone).  Two things struck me as significant about Brampton Bryan, one factual, the other one of several fantasies we as a group indulged in whilst on the road.  The factual, which is quite a wonder, is an ancient yew hedge across the road from where we were eating lunch.  It would be worth visiting the village just to see this natural feature.  The fantasy involved a woman walking her dog.  Two years previously we had arrived for second lunch at the same spot around the same time of day as we did on this trip.  Whilst we were tucking into lunch, we noticed a woman walking her dog, Ollie, Julia and I recognised her from 2013 and we got chatting to her.  She for her part recognised us and actually remembered one of the charities we had been riding for on the earlier occasion.  The fantasy bit came after we had finished our conversation and she had continued her walk.  We played around with the idea that our visit to the village was the most exciting thing that had happened there since the last time we rode through and news of our second coming would by now be all around the village.  All rather egotistical I guess and a typical townie view of village life.  Any way we had a laugh but decided that it would be politic not to mention our presupposition on rural excitement to the woman as she returned from her walk and past us by with a cheery wave.  The fact that the village did not turned out with bunting and flags to cheer us on I guess well and truly debunked our fantasy; shame!

After Second lunch we set off knowing that after some pleasant and easy riding we would face one of the major challenges of the whole trip: climbing the notorious Pentre Hodre Hill.  En route we passed through Mortimer’s Cross, the site of a significant battle in the War of the Roses.  One interesting phenomenon occurred just before the commencement of this battle, an engagement which would eventually lead to the end of that particular Civil War.  At dawn a meteorological phenomenon known as “parhelion” occurred.  This is an optical illusion which causes the viewers to see three suns rising.  This phenomenon had a twin effect on 2^nd February 1461 – firstly, it frightened the troops out of their wits (“I fouled my armour”, Monty Python’s “Holy Grail”): secondly, Edward of York took advantage of this and managed to convince his troops that this apparition represented the Holy Trinity and they could therefore be confident that God was on their side.  Well whether or not God was taking sides that day I don’t know, but the ruse did the trick and Edward’s side won and Edward later used this figure as his emblem “Sun in Splendour”.  Now that folks I would suggest is a very positive use of fantasy and of a rather different order to our collective imaginings re village life in Brampton Bryan.  If nothing else it shows the importance of using our imagination when encountering the natural phenomena of the world about us and frees us from the sterile narrowness of empirical thinking.  After all a cloud when we encounter it and watch it move across the sky is much more that a load of water vapour, and a mountain glowing in the glory of an autumn sunset is much more that just a lump of granite.

Unfortunately, as we set off replete and refuelled from second lunch, I realised such poetic musing will not in fact get me up Pentre Hodre Hill, that will involve something far more basic: muscle power, and I was far from confident that my ageing muscles would be up to the task.