Thank you for joining me for the six week Pilgrim course focussing on the Eucharist.

Today I would like to share with you a few lines from a beautiful poem by Elizabeth Barrett-Browning called Aurora Leigh:

Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes;
The rest sit round it, and pluck blackberries,
And daub their natural faces unaware
More and more, from the first similitude.

If we open our hearts, the world is full of God’s love and presence. Take some time to reflect on where you’ve found God in your day. His presence is often in the ordinary things of life, which become extraordinary when we recognise that God’s love is all around us.

George Herbert’s poem called Prayer (1) continues the idea of ‘heaven in ordinary’, while looking at the act of prayer:

Prayer the church's banquet, angel's age,
God's breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth
Engine against th' Almighty, sinner's tow'r,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six-days world transposing in an hour,
A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;
Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
Exalted manna, gladness of the best,
Heaven in ordinary, man well drest,
The milky way, the bird of Paradise,
Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,
The land of spices; something understood.

Prayer is the ‘soul in paraphrase’ because when we pray we put into words the often deep and complex emotions surging through our soul. It is part of our journey towards God. Consider what prayer means to you.

Perhaps prayer could be the theme for my next series of Reflections. Please let me know what you think.

With blessings

Rev Rona