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Unknown unknowns and friendly homes.

  I was last on the Isle of Tiree 26 years ago when I sat on a beach on its west coast watching the sun going down. We caught a ferry the next day onto the next chapter of our lives.   This was a curacy in Glasgow and our girls starting school and nursery.   Just over an hour ago I was on Tiree again for all of ten minutes as part of a round flight from Oban via Coll too, all part of a wonderful birthday present from the family. Like most of you the intervening 26 years have been full and rich , challenging and transformative.   As I look back though what strikes me is all that I simply did not know was going to happen: places, people, experiences and lessons that I did not know that I did not know.   Obviously we are aware that there is much we do not know (we certainly should be!). What catches us off guard though is the utterly unexpected, things we had not considered or were even aware of, and especially people that we didn’t know existed. On the fligh...
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Unconsidered Momentum

  There are some phrases which just stick in your mind after you first hear them and ‘unconsidered momentum’ was one of those for me.   I was with a small group of folk who all had a lot of experience in trying to initiate and encourage change and growth in churches in Scotland and we were there to journey together for two days and learn from one another. It is an interesting phrase, as it implies there is movement, there is even forward movement, but it is not the kind of movement that is necessarily a healthy one.     It represents continuing on a path out of habit, rather than intentional choice, or evaluating whether it is still necessary or beneficial.   Particularly it doesn’t take into account whether goals have changed, or the context has changed which gave rise to the practice in the first place. Covid was an interesting time as suddenly we were forced to stop a lot of things in our personal and communal lives which we did out of habit. ...
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The hopes of children and invention of new colours

  On a dark cold winter night as I left the Leisure Centre just before closing time I noticed them ...suspended in the foyer, the stars that primary school children had made expressing their Christmas wishes and hopes for 2026.    A surprising number asked for peace in the world and to see more of their family.   And then there was this one which included the following:   I hope Oban gets a Macdonalds I hope that more colours are invented I hope the everyone has a merry Christmas I hope that the women in Sudan are okay. What wonderful young human beings,  able to express the joy and hopes of childhood whilst being aware that all is not well with our world.  It's been a crazy roller coaster ride in the month since these stars were put up and it is easy to despair for humanity and our future.  We are reminded though by George Herbert; And for all this, nature is never spent;      There lives the dearest freshness d...
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Friendship and the Unspectacular

  I’m just back from a day with my pal Richard on, in his terms, a ‘cheeky wee Corbett’ (a Corbett is   a hill between 2,500-2,999feet) near Crianlarich.   Beinn nan Imirean can’t actually be seen from the road and is surrounded by much higher peaks both close by but also on the wider horizon, as we were to discover.     It was a bit of a slog as the ground was rough and paths were few and sketchy but as we climbed slowly out of the frosty and frozen Glen Dochart with it’s -6 degrees C temperature and low lying cloud this was more than compensated for by the wonderful views that opened up in the clear winter sunshine.   Finally from the top we had a good panoramic view over many miles and could indulge in one of our favourite mountain top past times…identifying all the hills we could see, Richard’s knowledge   being much more extensive than mine, since he has climbed far more of them. As 2026 opens up I want to share a few take aways from this...
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Lambing Snows and Holy Week

  (photo courtesy of Abi Bull, Isle of Skye) Lambing snow is the name given to an early spring snowfall that can catch some of the wee lambs out who are born at the start of the season.   Farmers have to watch out for this and, given care and shelter, the lambs are usually able to survive.   It coincides too with the images of daffodils emerging through a covering of late snow,   a similar sign of hope and new life in a forbidding and even hostile environment. Nevertheless there is something beautiful of this setting of fragile life against the rawness of nature, something that speaks to the heart of the human condition and the poignancy of it all.   I write this on a Good Friday which is set in a global context of much uncertainty and even fear and desperation.    The centuries old story that we are taken back to again and again by the turning of the season, of a God who died for a suffering and broken world, seems to have more resonance than ever. ...
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Re-enchantment

  The magical wonder of snow can be lost by a couple of degrees warming turning the white falling flakes into dismal rain.    It is precisely the same elements of moisture and air, humidity and wind, yet the shifting of the one variant of temperature creates a totally different outcome.  I have only managed three snow days in the mountains this winter, due to a combination of mostly busy diaries and a very unpredictable weather which meant days set aside for a climb would sometimes be literally a washout.  Ina and I did have a good summitting of the Cobbler with the spikes on our boots giving us the grip we needed in the the last snow of the season, and I felt again the sheer wonder of walking in crisp, hard snow as the world fell away around us. It looks like it's gone for the year now though and we have to wait 9 months probably to get out onto the white stuff again.  The hills just look wet and sodden now and most uninspiring... and yet...they are exactl...
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Love in Lent

  Now and again (actually very occasionally)Valentines Day falls on Ash Wednesday     This is one of those years and it got me thinking that, although at first glance the two may seem totally unrelated, actually Valentines Day can help us observe Lent in the right spirit.   Valentine's Day celebrates the love one person has for another and although this can range from a schoolboy crush to the mature love of a long married couple there is a common theme.   The 'secret' identity of the giver of the Valentine Card not only adds an air of mystery and excitement, but it also, if properly observed, means that it is offered expecting nothing in return.   At heart it is altruistic.  We usually approach Lent as a season when we give things up, a time of sacrifice and penance as we walk with Jesus on the road to Jerusalem and his death for us.  It is in foregoing some of our normal habits and luxuries that we become more conscious of what...
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