RATTLESNAKES

Some walks look promising on the OS map and turn out not to deliver. Others look potentially dull, and because of the time of year or the weather or the arrival of the unexpected are wonderful. The stroll from Barnack to Bainton today is one of those. Now pastoral, now sylvan, with the temperature already in the twenties just after nine o’clock and the crops shimmering in the heat haze, I’m delighted by the butterflies dancing around me as I walk the oft right-angling path.

Christopher, our priest at Welland Fosse, recently introduced a session on intercessory prayer with a George Herbert sonnet. Sometimes I find Herbert difficult, but this is marvellous – you probably know it…

 Prayer the Churches banquet, Angels 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’Almightie, sinners towre,

Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,

The six daies – world transposing in an houre

A kinde of tune, which all things heare and fear;

 

Softnesse, and peace, and joy, and love, and blisse,

Exalted Manna, gladnesse of the best,

Heaven in ordinarie, man well drest,

The milkie may, the bird of Paradise,

Church-bels beyond the starres heard, the souls bloud,

The land of spices; something understood.

Reversed thunder’ – wow! - such an astoundingly modern thing. Feel those commas. Countless people have fed off the poem’s resounding, meaning-rich phrases. The pay off line became the title for a long running Radio 4 programme which, going out just before midnight on a Sunday, has been one of the more innovative pieces of religious/spiritual broadcasting over the years IMO. The hook for today’s walk is without question: ‘Heaven in ordinarie…’, because the mile or so into Bainton points up the mystic beauty of small and usually unconsidered things - the perfection of a creamy-white convolvulus flower, the insect-like tops of a field of fast-ripening barley, the cool respite offered by a woodland

glade. The unfairly maligned R.C.Zaehner’s classic book on mysticism goes large on Wordsworth. I don’t know where Mr. Daffodil’s nature-ecstasy sits with the Church of England, so laden with earth-bound doctrine and practice, synods and PCCs, genuflection and processions, sometimes so short on wonder, but it’s where my faith begins and ends, and has done since childhood. Everything else that’s theory-laden hangs around it, like a set of clothes. In that sense maybe I am a ‘a man well drest’.  Apparently Herbert was a dapper sort of chap. What jumps out of the sonnet for you?

The name of the village of Bainton also carries mystical associations, though spurious. The composer Edgar Bainton wasn’t born in the village, had nothing to do with it subsequently, and went off to Australia for the second half of his career, but his most famous choral work, regularly cropping up in posh Anglican evensongs is ‘And I saw a new heaven’.

Isn’t the making and handing down of ‘art’ a strange thing?  Bainton was celebrated in his day, particularly when he was young, but his music isn’t much played now - his good friend Rutland Boughton (there’s a first name for you!) even less so. They both wrote music with a generous, dramatic sweep, and Boughton even founded a Glastonbury Festival which ran for a score of years until the mid-twenties (the nineteen twenties!) before the Eavis’s were ever newsworthy. Boughton’s intellectual landscape was wide-ranging and peculiarly of its time, encompassing Arthurian legend and the Communist Party. These composers’ output was as great as anyone’s, and technically assured. Yet now they’re scarcely remembered - except in Bainton’s case for one celebrated church anthem. Weird. And for someone like me whose career has consisted in dithering around the edges of the media, it’s both humbling and strangely consoling. Their technical ‘chops’ were on a different planet to mine.

I visit St. Mary’s church, but don’t take in much, except that it’s open and I’m glad to be there. I do see an A4 report on its fabric loitering by the desk near the door. The summary at its conclusion is: ‘The church is in need of a lot of tlc’ and a second look around me confirms the assessment.

There’s been discussion at General Synod and in the pages of the Church Times about the need to create ‘10,000 lay-led churches’. Leaving aside that this is a hugely ambitious target, and that as someone about to embark on certification as a diocesan ‘lay worship leader’ some church bureaucrat somewhere might in future identify me as one of the ten thousand called to lead, this begs so many questions about the relationship between clergy, laity and the C. of E. What happens to the fabric of the St. Mary’s of this world in the meantime? Is being ‘mission-shaped’ the alpha and omega of ‘doing church’? Secular society may be making their choice not to listen. (Mission Praise 651…)

I move on through the sunshine to the hamlet of Ashton (the third village of that name I’ve encountered on the Big Walk). Ashton is a single straight lane. The first house I come to, restored to pristine condition amidst extensive grounds, is called ‘First House’. Now this may be an ancient name for all I know, but with the property looking as expensive as it does, is my mild harrumph justified? Unimpeachable in the truth of its geographical position (except that if you were coming the other way it could equally well be entitled ‘Last House’) am I crabby to suggest the name implies ‘I look down on him because…’ cf. Messrs. Barker, Corbett and Cleese in ‘The Frost Report’?  What do the people who live in the humbler cottages along the lane think? Do they tug their forelocks as they pass?

From Ashton I go torpeling. The Torpel Way is named after Sir Roger de Torpel, the remains of whose Manor I eventually come to at the end of the straight road which leads into Helpston. There were many Sir Rogers (hard not to avoid a smirk), and one of them built a great deer park, which the Crown in the person of Henry VIII eventually decided should become its own. On the other hand the Torpels probably owed their estate to the Crown in the first place, so one can’t shed too many tears. Read an entertaining and present-tense child-friendly account of all things Torpel at http://langdyke.org.uk

St. Botolph’s Helpston is closed. This is the place where John Clare was born and so I can eat my sandwiches beside his multi-flowered memorial in the churchyard. Another day I could visit the museum in Helpston’s Woodgate: it sounds like an hour or so well spent. On the memorial stone by my feet the John Clare Society declares that ‘A poet is born, not made’. I think this is probably true, but puzzle how it can be so. Determinism sits uncomfortably with a sixties’ education.

On from the village towards Helpston Heath, and then by tracks zig-zagging to Ufford where the White Hart welcomes the parched, weary traveller with a ginger beer in its commodious bar. The church of St. Andrew is conserved, and very tidily too. It stands on a promontory, looking towards the distant, invisible sea from its height of forty odd metres, and above a settlement so precise and delicate. Nothing jars, nothing is out of place in Ufford. Certainly not at The Hall, which the National Trust had to sell on, because the cost of refurbishment was too great. Whoever owns it now has done a bang-up job. What an extraordinary thing to live in such a house – I’m presuming the internals must be as pristine as the outside. I’m tickled to see that the organ in St. Andrew’s, small and baroque, was the third ever made by the late Ken Tickell from Northampton. His work has graced many places of worship.

Next Monday is the day the British press have christened ‘Freedom Day’ when, begone dull care, we shall all be allowed to cast our masks aside to hug and kiss, and order drinks at the bar unhindered by unwelcome social disapproval. Except that the risk of catching the Virus remains astonishingly high, even though we may not now die from it because of the amazing science that has been done. (As I write this, the daily count of infections is hovering around 50,000.) Except that the P.M. is self-isolating again after his new Health Secretary has tested positive. Except that the whole world is watching stupefied as the UK conducts a massive experiment on its own population. And the Church? Where is the Church on this?

As throughout the pandemic, we are quiet, even in the person of Her Majesty, who one would have thought might have passed on some word of wisdom and common sense to her subjects. Whereas all we have is Prince Charles, allowing it to be known that he’d rather die than wear a mask. (Not his words, but you know that’s what he means, and he’s had the Virus already, so that’s OK then…) No word from Justin that I’ve heard or that has been printed.  We do not know what to say, and we are ourselves divided between those who wish to throw caution to the wind in worship and those like me who are just simply windy. There are those, and I hope their voices do not become too strident, who see the continued taking of anti-Covid precautions as a lack of faith. But surely, we should never, ever, score points from each other as Christians because we think we have greater faith than another? That way lies the country religion of Texas, and handling rattlesnakes. The theme of this blog has been ‘Better Together’. The resonances of ‘being together’ now provoke fear and grief among many. We are bereft, desperate for reassurance, craving a real sharing of the Peace, the sense that we really are One Body, experiencing the Eucharist as half a meal. Are we all Catholics now? Or are we all Evangelicals, for whom sometimes, communion seems a necessary evil interrupting high-handed praise and worship? No. Better together. Better in colour. Better believe it.

Torpels and corbels:  14 km. 4.7 hrs. 26 degrees. No stiles. Ten gates. One bridge. Three churches (one conserved).  Like flowers and bugs and you and me, is the Virus part of God’s creation?  How does this relate to the Muslim’s ‘Insha’allah’?

 A prayer for our time:

 O Lord, increase our faith

Strengthen us and confirm us

In thy true faith.

Endue us with wisdom

Charity, chastity and patience.

In all our adversities

Sweet Jesus say amen.

Amen.

 Henry Loosemore ( died 1670).

 

 

ON THE LEVEL

 (Sounds like the ghosted autobiography of a National Hunt jockey).

There’s something going on at Sutton church, but I can’t quite make out what. A lady is carrying what could be a large yoga mat into St. Michael’s, and she looks healthy and glowing like a yoga teacher person should, so I think maybe that’s it, but then someone else arrives with a couple of armchairs, so maybe not. A posh jumble sale? But that doesn’t seem plausible for a Thursday morning in July. Another woman is busy on her mobile: something or someone hasn’t turned up.  Usually I’d go and ask, as Yorkshire and England fast bowler turned cricket pundit Fred Trueman very often did, ‘what’s going off owt ther’ but it’s too early in the day for casual curiosity from an incomer.

 It might seem like groundhog day to be back in Sutton yet again, and indeed even at nine a.m. the day has a steamy, dreamy listless heat to it. Soon I’m at the field with the cows again, but this time they’re enjoying breakfast on the far distant side: the direct route down to the Nene is unimpeded. I tramp through the long grass beside the river towards Wansford railway bridge, watched by the fishermen on the opposite bank.  I’m probably breaching their peace. They’ve come for total undisturbed tranquillity, and here I am swishing and stumbling noisily through the undergrowth. A footbridge takes me over the river. A coach load of primary children are being rounded up in the forecourt, but there are no signs of imminent train arrivals. I hope their day isn’t going to go wrong.  I looked up the Nene Valley Railway the other day, to see what motive power they retain. Many years ago, walking the Nene Way, I remember being astonished at the number and variety of discarded locomotives they kept at Wansford. Now the number seems much reduced, though from looking at the website their craftsmen and women have clearly reconstructed and restored a huge amount of stock destined for heritage homes elsewhere.

I walk the field to Stibbington, whose St. John the Baptist church I very nearly missed from these peregrinations. The territory of Ely and Peterborough dioceses gets very confused round here. The church is flanked by gracious houses: The Old Rectory, and The Old Castle Farmhouse. There’s also a Hall and a Manor. It should be a very peaceful place, but the truth is that no peace is to be had here: the noise from the adjacent A1 is very intrusive.

Retracing my steps to Wansford, this time I follow the railway on the path I failed to find on a previous occasion until I can right-angle away to cross one half of the Nene beside a weir, walking on through thigh-high grass to Water Newton, whose St. Remigius’ church eventually shows on the far side of the river’s other branch. There’s great domestic beauty about Water Newton’s riverside; gracious houses with lawns sloping to the water, a Mill, and picturesque cottages beyond. I have to walk round the village to the church and am disappointed to find its south side covered in scaffolding with entrance impossible. Hard hats must be worn, ear defenders deployed.

One of the things I’ll do when this Walk is complete is to count the Saints’ dedications from the churches I’ve visited around Peterborough Diocese. There are tons of St. Mary’s, and lots of St. Peter’s, but I don’t think we’ve had a Remigius yet. He’s perfectly suited as the patron saint of Water Newton. The Latin word remigius means rower, so is just right for a riverside church, particularly when that church sits in a Roman town (Durobrivae) where evidence has been found of Christian worship reaching back into the fourth century AD. For Christians, brought up with images of the Sea of Galilee, and the fisher-disciples rowing Jesus across it through days of sun and storm, the name has additional resonance. Even more than that, a remigius might have worked in a galley, and therefore been a slave, so the name also carries the connotation of being a servant of Christ. Some folk see a link to the word remedium - hence overtones of healing - but maybe that’s a bit of a philological stretch, though this nuance adds suitable lustre and bottom to the c.v. of a saint-bishop. The historical Remigius was a young nobleman who became Bishop of Reims at the age of 21, convertiing Clovis, King of the Franks, and baptising him somewhere around 496 A.D.

At this point in today’s walk, I had it in mind to cross the A1 and stroll on down to Elton, which is a village you pass on the left if you’re driving from Northampton to Peterborough. In Water Newton a fingerpost points across a narrow field from the now sparsely-trafficked remains of the Great North Road  (complete with old milestones showing the distances from Stamford and London) to the fifties’ by-passing dual carriageway. I follow the path to a gap in the hedge and find myself within a foot or so of thundering traffic. The OS tells me there’s a continuing path slightly offset on the other side, but to reach it, I’d have to scale the armco barrier and risk my life avoiding the northbound traffic.  Inwardly seething, I decline the challenge, and re-group. 

I can understand why no pasaran.  This is an ancient bit of dualled road, built in gentler times when avoiding HGVs might have been easier than it is now, and one could have crossed without doing an imitation of Usain Bolt. Had it been constructed more recently, no doubt underpasses for badgers, toads and even humans would have been provided.  The scandal is that the approaching footpath and its sign, beckoning the wayfarer on to destruction, have been left in place. Nul points, Cambridgeshire County Council, and come to think of it, nul points for the citizens of Water Newton too.

(Later I recollect what I’d already dimly perceived: that in fact Elton is superfluous to my current requirements, lovely village though it is - and possessed of a useful hostelry for lunchtime refuelling. It’s one of the churches in the Stilton Benefice, which is Ely’s patch. As I say, the borders get tangled in these parts.)

In the course of all these walks at present, its hard not to dwell on the current situation, with a government which as far as I can see, has plumbed new depths in telling its people half-truths and downright lies, sometimes but not invariably because it believes that’s what’s best for us. Some of the time however, it seems simply to be acting to preserve its grip on power. Has the Church shown itself as sufficiently distanced from such strategies, and offering a distinctive alternative? Insofar as we speak – when we speak - with a confused babble of voices, perhaps yes. Insofar as our voices are increasingly unheard, perhaps no.  Are we a truthful Church?  As I’ve said before, just asking…

I return to Sutton by a zigzag route, avoiding the paths and lanes I’ve used before. The highlight is a short section along a largely undisturbed part of Ermine Street, where the old road still sits six or seven foot above the surrounding fields, its ditches swathed in bushes. I bet every inch has been metal-detectored by the Nighthawks, the thrill of the chase, the promise of riches and fame.

Back in Sutton, through the open church door, I solve the mystery. What’s going on is furniture-repairing, either as a class, or possibly for profit. This is good. For whatever reason, provided it's moral and legal, use the church and get with the people. That’s service. That’s evangelism.

                                                            Ermine Street near Sutton

Rowlocks on a trireme: 11 km. 3.5 hrs. 21 degrees C.  Two churches. Three stiles. Eighteen gates. Five bridges. Butterfly season (Sue and I saw a grizzled skipper in Wakerley Woods the other day, but nothing so exotic here – not that I could identify anyway). Confusion among the paths of ‘Nene Park’ – what the OS suggests doesn’t always seem to be matched on the ground.

 Lord

I’m so fed up with football.

I like the game

And believe that like everything else

It’s a gift from you -

A recreation –

A celebration of the marvellous human body.

And yes, sometimes I even find beauty there

In a long pass or in elegant footwork .

What I can’t stand is the idolatry

The substitution of sport for faith

The worship of human talent

Rather than an acknowledgement of the Creator.

Help us explain the true meanings of

Redemption and salvation

To those who don’t recognise you.

Amen.

 

 

REPRISE

Once upon a time part of my recording work was to produce ‘sound-alikes’ of well-known pop/rock tunes. Before a session with one of my favourite singers (let’s call him ‘Mick’) who was especially good at early rock n’roll and ‘rat pack’ swing, I used to brief the sound engineer: ‘Make sure you’re well organised. He will be.  We may get his best take first time round, if not it’ll be Take 2, and after that he’ll just be bored...’

The first section of today’s walk is a ‘Take 2’ of last week’s wander along the Nene from Sutton.  As I park up, there’s serious gardening going on opposite the church, and judging from the bleeps and burps emerging from a car that’s stationary by the church wall, its occupant is resting between appointments by playing an absorbing game of ‘Psycho-killer’ on his I-phone.

The now familiar walk back towards Wansford of course seems shorter than the first iteration – one of those strange phenomena which I suppose are a subset of ‘time passes more quickly as you get older’. I enjoy it slightly more too - because I’m watching my feet very slightly less? – the rat is learning the maze!  But noticeably, even in a week, some things have changed.   Here an oak branch has crashed down across the path, rather inexplicably because it doesn’t seem rotten, and there haven’t been any recent unusually high winds. There I see fresh earthworks. Mr. Mole and his pals have been busy. A plank across a boggy section has been removed. I’d noticed it was a bit wonky last week. Maybe a warden thought there was a health and safety issue, and wet feet were preferable to a broken ankle.

It interests me how unobservant or forgetful I can be – particularly when it comes to reading text, including Scripture. You’d think at my time of life every inch of the Gospels would be thoroughly explored territory, and that like ‘Mick’ I too would be bored after the umpteenth re-reading…but it’s not so.  I notice things I’ve not seen before. Different nuances of inflection read themselves into the dialogue. New puzzles present themselves. Occasionally I’ll come across a whole section I’d swear wasn’t there before. It can be even worse in my episodic readings of mildly academic history books. I’ll read a few pages, confident this is text that’s new to me, and then come across some small familiar detail which makes me realise I’ve already ‘read’ this section. The words have just passed straight through my brain and out the other side. Is it just me, or do you find this too?  Please say you do…

Before I get to Wansford, I cross the A47 with care (and some difficulty) and yomp up the drive towards Sacrewell Farm. It seems to be a thriving business. You can camp, and members of a local sixth form are doing so. There are country crafts to learn, including blacksmithing. A poster illustrating this is displayed on the verge of the tarmac, an earnest middle aged lady being taught by a plentifully black-bearded chap who was perhaps an early member of ZZ Top. I imagine there’s tea and coffee on offer in

the café, but it’s a quarter to four and the farm closes to the public at the top of the hour, so I eschew temptation and press on till I reach the working farm buildings at which point the metalling gives way to a field path. 

There are a couple of scratch-head moments along the way. Why is that portaloo set up in the middle of nowhere beside a large plot of newly-harrowed earth, just next to a large cart which appears to have a large number of spring onions ready to plant? (Sue later opines that these may have been baby leeks destined to obtain full adulthood in the field).

And why is a large open sided iron canister secured with blue plastic ties hanging twelve feet up in that tree?  Bats? (I’m rather mindful of the needs of bats at the moment: at home we have dusk and dawn visits scheduled with the ecologists to see whether/how many/what sort of bats we have roosting in the crevices of our outbuildings).

I guess there was a once a monastic foundation at Southorpe. Or a ‘lost’ village.  Or a one-time Big House.  The OS map marks fishponds to the south, and the field by the road is full of unusually varied and prominent lumps and bumps. Since Ermine Street runs through Southorpe, I suppose it’s even possible that some of those contours might be very ancient in origin. We were asking ourselves the other day what the name of Ermine Street means. Wikipedia suggests that it may be a reference to a tribe called the ‘Earningas’ who had their stamping grounds around modern day Royston. On today’s walk I cross the line of the Roman road a number of times. Just south of Southorpe its ditches are very obvious in the Paddock nature reserve, which is so ‘wilded’ that entry is currently more or less impossible – but then there’s no parking provision here, and it sits beside a straight, modern lane along which I now have to walk, dodging speedy commuter traffic. To their credit, many of the motorists acknowledge my presence by giving me a wide berth and a cheery wave as I take to the (overgrown) verge. I wonder if during the pandemic there’s been an improvement in driver behaviour in this respect?  Earlier on in the blog I noted that there were often problems, but post-Covid perhaps drivers are more used to sharing road space with walkers and (especially) cyclists. Or maybe it’s all just good Rutland manners.

Eventually, after a long slog along the metal, I turn off onto another lane towards Upton, which is accurately named – it’s very definitely oop, at the beginning of a ridge which at Castor is locally known as ‘The Hanglands’. There’s something apparently not right at Upton. Entering the village/hamlet, one is greeted by a sign which requests the viewer not to let ‘The Highwaymen’ take away their road. On the sparsely used village noticeboard, the familiar Kitchener image is subscribed by a caption which suggests that Upton needs me. In Church Walk there are a couple of modern-ish houses which are unoccupied, one of which veers towards the derelict. The thatch on the cottages might be approaching the end of its life. There’s a vague smell of drains. The little church of St. John the Baptist is away across a field, a chapel of ease for Castor, with a single eucharist per month as its worship-power. Maybe the Milton Estate is finding upkeep of its resources a financial stretch – though that’s a very tentative thought. What I subsequently learn is that the Council wants to close one of the two roads into the village (the one which runs directly and conveniently from the A47) because the ‘A’ road is about to be dualled and they’d like to avoid building a roundabout which would both interrupt the traffic flow and incur high costs.

It’s wrong to read too much into a single visit on a particular day – I may be importing a pre-set emotion from my own psyche, but certainly Upton was giving off a disturbing aura on this occasion. On the other hand, if you want to know more about the place, please go to https://www.thearchive.org.uk   (Chapter 14) where there’s a very good, full description of the village’s buildings and history. On my way back towards the car, I’m particularly intrigued to pass ‘Model Farm’ which dates to 1685. What’s the story there? Where the lane drops down to Lower Lodge Farm, close to the trunk road, an embarrassed man is trying to re-start the noisiest quad-bike in the world. I’m more interested in the fact that on the lane’s tarmac, there’s still even now a discernible bump in the road, like that left by the level crossing of a defunct railway. It’s Ermine Street again, once busy with travellers moving supplies to the north country for the garrison in York or packing up to return home in the hope of shoring up the imperial regime. They were everywhere, those Romans. I’ve never believed the low population estimates for Britain in their time, all that farming, industry and administration.

                                                                  Model Farm Upton

I enter Sutton by the same route as on the previous walk, past the new (or heavily restored?) cream stone of the Georgian pile at its eastern limit, along the grassy verge, peering down over the railway bridge to the green depths of the old cutting, smiling at the rabbits playing on the lawns. Familiarity can so easily slip into the neglected commonplace, don’t you think, despite our wishes that it shouldn’t be so? Habituation is apparently programmed into our human character. Though we may thus be provided a rest our from relentless scanning of the horizon for threats and danger, we stop properly looking altogether, and so cease to understand.

 Fossils in the gravel:  13.5 km.  3.5 hrs. Dry but mostly cloudy with only occasional glimpses of sun. 16 degrees. Three stiles. Ten gates. Three bridges. One church. Sore hips from too much road walking.

 Lord

My attention span…

I get bored

So quickly

When I’m worshipping

Or supposed to be.

It’s frightening to think

You must have access

To my random thoughts

(Otherwise how does silent prayer work?)

 

How do you feel about this boredom?

Do you say:

‘Well, it’s difficult

And why should it be easy?’

Or do you tut and shake your head

As I would in a similar circumstance

(If I was teaching someone…)

 

Or is it (dare I say it)

That we have made worship

Tedious and human-centred?

A place for parading

Our cleverness

A medium for displaying

Our power

A vector for achieving influence

By our own stratagems.

 

Is my prayer and worship

Best displayed

In my inarticulate and instant

Intake of breath

At the beauty of a flower

The grace of a deer

The love that wells up

Among my family?

Is it enough?

 

Lord, as so often

I don’t know.

Please forgive me where I fail

And help me find ways

To make my relationship with you

More constant and active.

Amen.