On Saturday morning, I arrived early at Keswick bus station. It was cold and windy and raining. I was hungry, and thankfully the supermarket had just opened. But though the supermarket was opened at 7:00 the inside café part didn’t open until 8:00. I didn’t fancy waiting outside in the cold for the next bus. Which wasn’t until 8:55.
So, I asked a member of staff if I could sit in the café until it opened. They said no I couldn’t. There was one solitary pie on the hot stand. When I went to pay for it, I was told I couldn’t have it because it was last night’s stock. Doh! I was pretty miffed.
The week before, I visited the Church of England church in Southport. My experience there was that it couldn’t have been less welcoming. I thought no one wanted to engage with me. And what if I was the next person wanting to be saved? I was pretty miffed. So much so, I was going to fire off a letter of complaint.
I’ve recently been re-reading “The Little Flowers of St Francis of Assisi”. In Chapter 8, St Francis asks brother Leo wherein is perfect joy. The answer is surprising. He asks brother Leo to imagine a scenario of great adversity… of being wet and cold and hungry and then being rejected from their next place of accommodation. But not only rejected, beaten with clubs until their skin bled.
St Francis says if they could face that adversity with patience, joy, and charity – therein is perfect joy. In so doing, I believe St Francis was trying to live by example what he had learned from Jesus. Jesus didn’t curse anyone, He didn’t hate anyone, not even the people who persecuted Him. And what greater adversity could there be than that of an innocent person being crucified?
So, I ask myself what can I learn form this story of St Francis? I think the answer is clearly to try to respond to situations with patience and love in my heart. Had I done this at the supermarket? No! Had I done this at the Anglican Church? No! I kind of failed both tests.
But that’s OK.
In the movie “The Scent of a Woman”, someone says she is scared to try to dance the tango because they may get tangled up. The Al Pacino character says not to worry because if you get tangled up, you just tango on. I think it is the same thing if you’re a Christian. I tango on.
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