Recently my wife Anna took upon herself clerical duties for our church. Good for her as she loves a bit of trouble shooting mixed with a skeleton key for nosing around. It also means that I get to hear about church production motifs and the like, most of which fly a good orbits’ distance over my head, but some of which I think I might have some wisdom to drop kick around. And a few days ago I got wind of an absolute blinder.
Like your local church is likely experiencing, we at Shrewsbury are finding our worship ranks to be blooming in numbers and names which I try but often fail to remember as I encounter them, each and all. To this end my Priest, Fr Stephen had issued a request for book listings to help seekers of the Lord in both the immediate and transcendent nature of the church. Perhaps because I am an author, or perhaps because she wanted to include me in something at my level, Anna asked what books I would suggest.
Now we were talking.
‘So what do you think?’ she asked and I began to smile and nod. ‘You can’t just say, The Lord of the Rings,’ she added then and my smile disappeared like Frodo as he began to realise that he was going to actually have to throw away the Ring and not just keep it while whinging about how thin the veil of reality was becoming betwix him and the Dark Lord. There followed a pause.
‘So… what do you think?’ she tried again and I made a face of deep consideration. A complete lie which she saw through, because we have been together for fifteen years and she knows full well that I either do or do not; I never consider, despite the pantomime of my visage.
‘The Silmarillion then,’ I told her and felt pretty clever about myself. It was on.
‘So not The Bible?’ she responded and I considered it. She was being clever herself now and good for her.
‘So to be clear,’ I started, ‘you are suggesting just releasing them into The Bible like some unprepared roam about theology? Would you put someone who had never gone racing into a Formula 1 car? Would you send them to Mordor without prior fellowship? Where does this end?’
‘I don’t know what that means.’
‘Well I do and Lord of the Rings is a very good answer. Everyone at church makes positive noises when I make them talk about it again.’
Now she was considering. The tables had turned.
‘Anything else, other books?’ she asked after a pleasant silence.
‘Well, The Hobbit is maybe more minor like a b-side or an EP but I wouldn’t say no to anyone who wanted.’
‘Okay. So not The Orthodox Church or Religion of the Apostles? You really liked those.’
‘Yes I did and I am not throwing shade on anyone, but The Two Towers has that dialogue between Faramir and Frodo where all the prior, immediate and transcendent elements come together over a natter.’
‘And that’s what you’re suggesting that seekers of Christ’s Kingdom go to?’
‘It works for me. You have to read all the words before that scene though or the context will be all auto-didact and wibbly. You might as well direct them to reformed theology in that case.’
‘Or they could watch the films?’
‘Ooh, I don’t know about that.’
‘But they probably have already.’
‘Yes, and again not throwing shade at the production, but they did some pretty serious reforming to Faramir in those.’
‘So…’ Anna started again. ‘To be clear for my report to Fr, you recommend anything not vaguely reformed, even if it is tied to Tolkein? Bearing in mind, John, that he was Catholic.’
The tables turned again. Curse those tables.
‘Let’s not complicate matters further,’ I said magnanimously in the end. ‘We all know that Tolkein was grafted from Orthodox. You might as well say that the sun doesn’t shine. Don’t try and gaslight me.’ That last bit was less magnanimous. I might have apologised.
‘And that’s your answer?’
I shrugged.
‘You could just write YouTube, which is where the seekers already are anyway.’
Anna considered that.
‘I’m glad I asked,’ she said. I might have smiled.
‘And I’m here to help in what way I have the talent to.’
‘I’ll make sure that Fr Stephen knows that.’
‘One ring to rule them all my love. Bring on the harvest.’
JW Bowe