A Memorial for Prince Philip at St James the Less, Litchfield April 2021

St James the Less, Litchfield memorial to Price Philip

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, died on Friday 9th April 2021, aged 99. His death provoked an outpouring of sorrow across the country, flags were flown at half-mast and church bells tolled. He had been a steadfast figure in everyone's lifetime, and as the news spread, there were many spontaneous acts of remembrance and respect including small memorials in local churches such as that at St James the Less, Litchfield. 

Stockbridge Gardens Open for the Church 2020

Stockbridge Parish Magazine July 2020 

Stockbridge opens its gardens for the Church each year, with the east and west ends taking it in turns.  Tea can be taken on the lawn in front of the church.  The event, which is organised by David Barnes, raises substantial funds. In 2020 it was the turn of the east end to open their gardens.

Sadly, this year the gardens could not be opened to the public because of the virus restrictions, but everyone who's gardens should have been shown was happy to have them photographed, and some of the photos appeared in the July issue of the Parish Magazine.

A complete set of photos can be found here:

Becky Ferris - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPiQDoj

Jill Ferris - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPiWUiV

Tony and Carole Cullen - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPiXaL3 

Hugh and Margaretha Northam - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPiR85r

Briar Phillips and Mikey O’Neil - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPjWj6R

Stephen and Karin Taylor - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPjWtLs

Pamela Marples - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPjWUxr

Neil and Sarah Romain - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPosVZX 

Di Maxwell - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPoy82q

Marjorie Rose - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPoqx43 

Robin and Chrissie - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPoA1V4 

Kim and Frances - https://www.flickr.com/gp/herry/i92LoN 

Herry Lawford - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPoAHnr

Allotments - https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPouBHW 

 

Is the Church of England Intent on Killing Off the Parish Church?

The importance of our parish churches to their communities seems to be under attack in several ways but particularly, though shortfalls in funding. 

The issue has been brought into the open by an article in the Church Times by Rev'd Stephen Trott on 10th July 2020. He argues that the decision of the Synod in the 1970's to 'centralise' the funding of parish churches has lead to a withering of the centrality of the parish church in the life of the community in favour of the diocese. 

The explanation of what has been happening cames a great surprise to many who had scarcely appreciated the danger, and it might have remained of minority interest before the issue was taken up by Canon Giles Fraser in a fine piece in the Daily Telegraph:

This, in turn, was followed up in a more explicit piece by Giles Fraser in Unheard on 6th August in which he argues that: 'The ancient institution has been asset-stripped by an expanding bureaucracy of management-speak types'

Finally, Jason Goodwin has spoken up strongly for the parish churches in a powerful piece below

Ignore parishes at your peril

St Carantoc built one as instructed by a dove. Another was raised at the spot where St Wulstan’s faithful oxen drawing his funeral bier stopped. They were built in places where people thought miracles had happened, or were blessed by spirits or where holy water bubbled out of the earth, in wastes and on pagan shrines, by the sea and by rivers, in the hills and on the plain. They were constructed where people congregated, in villages and towns and, eventually, in the heart of industrial cities.

Saints built them, sinners built them; improvers and committees; barons and crusaders; wool merchants and kings. In Christchurch, Dorset, the final timber was dropped into place by a stranger supposed to be the Lord himself. They were built for the people of Britian. They are the glory of our island: our parish churches.

In consequence, a lot of us took their closure in the spring as an affront. For the first time since the general papal interdict placed on King John in 1208, our parish churches were shut at Easter. We have had plagues, invasion scares, civil war: but at Whitsun, the churches were all closed too. Time was when the priest stayed with his flock and the church was a place of refuge and support. Instead we were enjoined to phone in or watch on Zoom.

I duly watched the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Easter address. My attention slipped as he went on but my wandering eye fell on no memorials to the dead, nor watched the play of coloured light on stone. The Archbishop was in his kitchen and I was at home. Every now and then, his sermon was interrupted by a video and, after a cut-away to a talking head, I noticed that someone appeared to have sneaked in to take a Magimix from the kitchen counter.

It struck me that an archbishop who thinks his kitchen is as good a place to preach from as Canterbury Cathedral may possibly think too much of his own gifts and too little of what has been bequeathed over the centuries. Churches serve believers and non-believers at various stages of their lives: at funerals (which were banned), or holy days (see above) and on Sundays (closed). Churches are places of withdrawal, for prayer and private worship – until they’re shut down.

I suspect the Church of England views parish churches as a burden and a nuisance. The diocesan bureaucrats would rather do the things the rest of us have no idea they do, such as providing strategic oversight of a growing mission area where energised parishes cluster around a resourcing church. Renewed, released, rejuvenated!

It will come crashing around their ears, like the tables of the moneylenders in the temple. The higher-ups ignore parishes at their peril. As they set about polishing their inclusivity templates, like buffoons in a Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera, people of faith and of no faith, people looking for something and people looking for escape, to connect with the landscape, or reconnect with their past are criss-crossing the land.

They are going to the woods and the wastes, the wells and the holy places, to the churches and chapels built by their forbears. I think it may be their experience that endures long after the corporate mission statements have been forgotten. You can lock up the parish church and turn the awkward and ungainly people away, but our churches are never quite empty, even when there is nobody in them.

Jason Goodwin

Many articles later - mostly about Bishop Dakin and the Winchester Diocese - but this piece by Giles Fraser in UnHeard shows how far we've now come from the church we all grew up with 

PS I have played a very small part in this debate by raising an idea in the Daily Telegraph that arises from the arrangement that exists at my church as the result of a benefactor deciding to adopt an ancient solution to the problem of funding the parish priest. It appears that this solution has since been discussed with approval at higher levels within the clergy. 

Return to Journal Index

Return to William Tyndale - the Translator of the Bible 

Return to The King James' Bible and the Book of Common Player

 

Stockbridge in the Age of the Coronavirus - July 2020

The story began far away on 4th January 2020 when the WHO tweeted that there was a cluster of pneumonia-like cases of unknown cause in Wuhan. On 9th January the Chinese Authorities determined that the outbreak was caused by a novel coronavirus, named later by the WHO as Covid-19. On 21st January WHO tweeted that there was evidence of human-to-human transmission and the first two cases in the UK were publicised on 31st January. By 9th March, there had been 100.000 confirmed cases globally and the WHO categorised the virus as a pandemic.

In the UK, our inaction has been well documented, but on 23rd March the government, at last, ordered us all to 'stay at home'. The Lockdown, as it became known, lasted until 13 May when some easing was allowed and further on 14th June, when all non-essential shops were allowed to reopen. On 4th July, pubs and restaurants could again welcome customers, though under strict conditions. The Lockdown, therefore, lasted 51 days or almost two months.

The town responded to the Lockdown magnificently. A plan called 'Help for Stockbridge', written by Roger Tym and David Roberts, divided Stockbridge up into 12 sections while Chantal Halle recruited volunteers who were then assigned to each section*, Particularly vulnerable people were identified and leaflets distributed offering help, with a named 'buddy's' email and telephone number and list of what could be given. Listed services provided were shopping, prescription pick-up and drop off, posting letters and friendly chats to help with people feeling too isolated and alone. Counselling services from Ali Deveral were also offered for those who were struggling with Lockdown, together with medical assistance in case of emergencies from Emma Montgomery, a nurse.

Chantal Halle

As the group developed, they were offered the use of the kitchens at Stockbridge Primary School by Emma Jefferies, the head, and free lunches were cooked by the school chef, Shawn, and delivered to vulnerable residents as requested until the children started to return at the beginning of June.  

Emma Jefferies and Shaun

Thereafter, some of the traders stepped in and Prego, Thyme & Tides and Robinson's donated lunches at a very low price (£2.50 per lunch for Thyme & Tides and Prego and cost price from Robinson's for their fresh-frozen meals). Vishnu at the Co-Op also offered free baked goods when he had deliveries available. Chantal Halle prepared Robinson's meals with some vegetables and the buddies picked them up and distributed them.  On Mondays and Fridays, various volunteers cooked, and again the buddies picked up from their houses and distributed them.  There was no charge for the lunches, but donations were welcomed and given. Thanks are also due to Cllr. Andrew Gibson of HCC and  Imogen Colley and David Gleave of TVBC for grants.

And some of us were lucky enough to be on Liz Cox's list for her delicious lemon drizzle cakes that she would normally have sold in the Community Market (which has fortunately now re-opened).

Iain hemmings and Ollie at Thyme & Tides

Mandy at Prego

John Robinson's 

Vishnu at the Co-Op

There have been no deaths in Stockbridge from the virus, although some have fallen ill and and strictly isolated themselves, before recovering.

Stockbridge was strangely quiet throughout Lockdown, and even now has not recovered to its usual busy state. The government guidelines have become beset by mixed messages so that people aren't really sure what they can and can't do, but the wearing masks has become mandatory and the shops have been assiduous in making themselves as secure as they can, with one-way systems and hand sanitizers and in the case of Beccy's the greengrocer, allowing ordering only from outside the shop.

Beccy's

The Parish Magazine of July 2020 included these two pieces, thanking those who had provided help and food to those unable to get out:

The gardens at the east end of the town were to have been open for the Church in July, but had to remain unvisited. I did, however, manage to visit them and a photo of each of the gardens was included in the Parish Magazine. 

The latest development (29th  July) has been the introduction of barriers along the High St to allow better social distancing, particularly outside the main food shops where people tended to gather. 

And, slowly, the churches are reopening with small numbers allowed inside, and no singing. Sadly, however, the bells can't yet be rung. It will be a significant day in the town's history when they can.

*The list of volunteers includes:

Sarah Burnfield

Jesse and Chantal

Sarah Couch'

Robert Eastwood

Jean Farnam

Felicia Green

Richard Guterbock

Bea Halle

Paul Kidd 

Jennifer Kidd

Sarah Madden

Becky Marcantonatos

Emma Montgomery 

Claire McLaughlan

Karen Malim

Tony Molyneux

Miki Nadal

Ollie Payne

Diane Shirley

Deborah Smart

Madeleine Smart

Tallulah Smart

Emma Smythe

Diana Tym

Anno Webley

Dilys Wilde

Catherine Williams

Andrea Zanthi

 See also 'A Brief History of Plagues' 

Thoughts of Others on Social Distancing and Lockdown 

 

 

King James' Bible and the Book of Common Player

The King James' Bible at Litchfield

Having attended a meditation on the life of William Tyndale at Bossington Church recently, I have become even more aware of the place of the King James' Bible in our culture. And when last week I attended an otherwise lovely carol service at St Katherine Cree Church in the City, I was saddened to hear the beautiful and time-honoured phrases in the lessons replaced with modern English.

I realise of course that I have been conditioned to hear the King James' version of the Bible over the past 70 years. Like many of my friends, I have attended school services since the age of five of six and since going regularly to my church at Litchfield for the last thirty years I am steeped both in King James and the Book of Common Prayer and have never heard any other. I love their cadences and phrasing. Any variation, however well-meaning, is a small psychic shock, akin to changing the words of a Beatles song.

The words used at church services make up the major party of the liturgy of worship and as such are imbued with deep significance and energy. It's not fanciful to imagine the words imprinted into the fabric of churches where they have been intoned without change for the past 400 years.  I am afraid that I agree with those who ascribe a fall-off in attendance at traditional church services to the lessening of the use of such glorious language.

See also - Litchfield Church - St Cecilia's Prayer 

See also - William Tyndale - the Translator of the Bible

William Tyndale - the Translator of the Bible

The Authorised Version of King James' Bible, published in 1611, was translated from the Latin and Hebrew by six committees of scholars, and remains, with some later amendments, the most authoritative text of the Bible as far as the Anglican Church is concerned.

However, the original translation of the Bible into English from Latin and Hebrew was undertaken by William Tyndale, who produced the first printed translation of the New Testament in 1526 while being sought and harassed by both the Church and Henry VIII in the form of Sir Thomas More, Cardinal Wolsey and Thomas Cromwell. Any translation into the vernacular was regarded as heresy, and in particular, Tyndale's translation further aggravated the Church by choosing to translate the Greek 'ekklesia' as 'congregation' rather than 'Church' and 'presbyteros' as 'elder' instead of 'priest'. Working in secrecy in Antwerp, he made over 5000 revisions to the New Testament in the 1534 edition, which became 'the glory of his life's work'. The King James' translators left most of his work (said to be 93%) untouched - though, of course, not the two examples above. He also translated the first five books of the Old Testament (the Pentateuch) including Genesis and Deuteronomy, but while working on the rest in 1536 he was betrayed and executed.

Melvyn Bragg has written a useful short biography of Tyndale, and he concludes:

Genius Discarded

Yet in this country, the King James Bible has been allowed to fade away over the past few decades. While Shakespeare and all his Elizabethan and Jacobean pageant of language is played, filmed, televised and read more and more and in the original without dissent, it was decided that Tyndale was too complicated! This has proved to be a dreadful mistake, We have discarded a genius and are every day poorer for it. I see it as no accident that Anglican congregations have fallen away since the King James Bible was abandoned.

The Anglican Church has more or less outlawed then King James Version. It pops up now and again but with far less regularity and authority that it deserves. Why not have Tyndale / King James services in every church and every school on the first week of every month. For non-Christians, it would be a feast of language, adventure and argument,. For all who listened it would be to hear and understand the deepest spring of our cultural history through the mind of a unique genius; William Tyndale.

Melvyn Bragg - William Tyndale Postscript

There is also a film of Tyndale's life made in 1986 called 'God's Outlaw'

See also: The King James Bible and the Book of Common Prayer

Favourite Churches - Sherborne Abbey

I was fortunate enough to be able to visit Sherborne Abbey twice and marvel at its beauty while staying with Charlie Skipwith at Chetnole. We had both been there before - for the funeral of Rosie Jenks in 2005.

It is probably the most beautiful church in England. There are a few photos here

Litchfield Flower Festival 2019

Over the weekend of 28th - 30th June 2019 a remarkable Flower Festival was held at St James the Less, Litchfield that included tableaux of the history of the church and its congregation. On entering the porch one saw that it had been filled with small displays showing the church's links with the surrounding estate while the cool inside had been beautifully decorated with flowers by members of the congregation, and looked and smelled wonderful. Sylvia Haymes, who was the prime mover of the Festival, has written a guide to the church and the floral displays as one walked arond the church.

The principal decoration was of the Saxon font, while below were photographs of various people known to have been baptized in it including members of the Wills family, and Herry shortly after his birth in Litchfield in 1945.

The Saxon font decorated by Katie Wills. 

In addition to the floral decorations, there was a tableau of historical photographs and cuttings and displays of photographs of the estate from the air as well as of the railway station when it was still in use, as well as its later restoration.

The photo tableau

The altar and chancel were given over to a display of photos of weddings known to have taken place at the church, including Herry's mother's wedding to her first husband, Arthur Luxmoore in 1935 and Hazel and John Kay's wedding in 2018. Sylvia Haymes's wedding dress was also on display.

A further tableau and an explanatory monograph were given over to the Book of Common Prayer, as all services at St James the Less are taken from it.

The Book of Common Prater

Mark Christian, the vicar, wrote a brief history of the church, drawing on the work of Hamilton Lloyd, the previous vicar, who had organised a Flower Festival in 1991 and had published a short monograph to go with it. Sylvia also drew on her musical connections to organise short concerts in the church on Saturday and Sunday afternoons as well as gathering the choir for Sunday's Evensong.

Outside the churchyard had been close-cropped under its sheltering trees.

The Festival closed on Sunday evening with a beautiful Evensong taken by the vicar, Mark Christian, before a full congregation.

Flower arranging credits: Liz Lyne (porch)  Katie Wills (font) Joyce Mills (Cottage Garden) Jenny Lister (lectern) Jane Woolnough (altar pedestal, windowsills and screen,) Jean Sharpe (War Memorial plaque and pew ends). The Book of Common Prayer window, hanging wreaths and Advent Crowns (and anything else) - Sylvia Haymes, (the crowns with help from Sarah Acworth). 

For more photos, click here

For the family's links with Litchfield, click here 

Stockbridge Gardens Open for the NGS 2019

The grass garden at Old Swan House

The National Gardens Scheme began in 1927 as a means of raising money for district nurses, by persuading private garden owners to open their gardens to the public in return for a small donation. In 2018 over 3500 gardens nationally opened at least once a year and enough money was raised for the NGS to be the principal donor to the nursing charities, Macmillan and Marie Curie, Hospice UK and the Queen's Nursing Institute, and it has recently begun supporting Horatio's Garden (which was started at the spinal injury unit in Salisbury and has now built gardens in seven such units nationally). Last year the NGS gave over £3m with Hampshire raising the most funds of all counties.

The Old Rectory

Persuaded by the redoubtable Patricia Elkington, the then area organiser for this part of Hampshire (now Kate Cann), Stockbridge began opening some of its gardens for the NGS in 2009 at the same time as Penny and Sandy Burnfield at Terstan in Longstock. The original openings were of Kim and Frances Candler's garden at Shepherd's House, Sally Milligan at Trout Cottage, Mary Matthews at Little Wyke and Pamela Marples at Waterlow. Robin Colenso and Chrissie Quayle at The Old Rectory joined in 2013 and Herry Lawford at Old Swan House in 2015. This year Becky Ferris at West View, London Road is opening for the first time in August (Sunday 4th - 10 to 4) and Wednesday 7th - 1.30 - 4.30) while Kim and Frances Candler are taking a sabbatical.

The four gardens in the High St open as a group on Thursday 13th and Sunday 16th June (2-5) on a single ticket (£7) with tea being taken on the Church lawn (and the tea proceeds going to the church).
Additionally, Herry Lawford opens Old Swan House each Tuesday in July (2-5 - £4).

The garden owners hope that many will come to their gardens this year and will be most grateful for your donations to the NGS.  

John Kay 1936 - 2019

Hazel and John at Litchfield

John was a most interesting man; born to schoolteachers in China, as a child he was interned by the Japanese for three years in Shanghai. After school, he joined the navy and flew from aircraft carriers. A clever man and a fine natural mathematician, he later joined IBM where his coding skills were greatly appreciated.  A lover of classical music, he had a fine singing voice, as I knew well, since we usually sat together at church at Litchfield, when he could always be relied on to lead us through the trickier psalms. 

Sylvia Haymes, who among other things plays the organ at Litchfield, gave this lovely eulogy at his funeral at All  Hallows, Whitchurch, on 7th March 2019:

John was a dear man and a wonderfully integrated combination of opposites. He was vague, particularly about trivial aspects of life that some might give much attention to – what to take on holiday, for instance – but he was also astute and determined about things he thought important: Hazel, Mathematics, the liturgy, friendship, beekeeping and, of course, music.

He loved music and had not only a fine voice but also a fine appreciation of good music: he loved stirring hymn tunes and choral music as part of the liturgy.  I think he had a feeling for the poetry of the earlier hymns and he certainly loved the cadences of the King James Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. It was always a treat to hear him read from the Bible in his distinctive brown-bear voice. Despite all this natural ability and discernment, he didn’t, latterly, find sight-reading music easy (as he often said) but he could still pick up – or make up - a bass part with the best of them.  He could also find his way through the pointing of the psalms – a virtue not accorded to many.

John was a clever man but never arrogant. He enjoyed solving puzzles and mathematical problems. Conversations with him were always rewarding and you never quite knew where they would lead.  He had a unique perspective and a fund of stories which enriched the discourse. He would really listen.  I think that he also had that gift of making the person he was talking to feel that they were clever too. One friend who cannot be here today said that talking to John at parties was something she always enjoyed.

Church services were important to him, as were those in the congregation – many of us here today count ourselves as friends.  He was acutely aware of the presence of spirituality in places where worship was sincere and Christian love apparent.  To see John, smiling as he came through the doorway, gave you the idea that all was right with the world: he was happy and at home in his local churches: All Hallows, St Mary’s, Tufton and St James the Less, Litchfield all benefitted from his voice in their pews. However, I think he also appreciated the grander scale of things in the cathedral at Winchester and he and Hazel went for several years to the beautiful and uplifting services held each summer in Edington Priory with professional singers and players.  In other situations he might, at times, be inattentive, but watching him listening in church, particularly if Hazel was preaching, there was no doubt that he was fully engaged.  He was, of course, so proud of her: ‘Wonderful! Wonderful!’ he would say of her sermons.

Although they lived in separate houses for so many years, it was, and is, impossible for many of us to think of John without Hazel. They might have been separated by a wall but there was no doubt that they were together. ‘Hazy’ was his anchor and his pride and joy. (There is a pleasing irony in the name as she is unfailingly clear although John might not always be so.) The sheer happiness of their wedding day is something that those lucky enough to be there – and there were many – will never forget. John naturally inspired love and affection but he was especially lucky and blessed to have found Hazel.  Love, true friendship, travel and the million little incidents that make up daily life could be shared.  Towards the end of his life, her care and devotion were almost super-human.  Perhaps most significantly, she thoroughly understood him.  One of my favourite instances of this was her observation - apropos the remarkable array of vacuum cleaners lined up against the wall - that John liked to have one of each sort.

He achieved this good and full life despite his life-long struggle with deep depression.  Recently he seemed to shed the cloud, finding some sort of equilibrium even in the midst of his trials.  As Hazel says, ’he never complained’.  Quite simply: he was happy.

There is a lot that I have left out: the bee-keeping, for instance (he was known to some locally as ‘The Bee Man’ and I know Mark Christian learnt a lot from him) I have no details of the allotment, apart from being grateful for an excellent crown of rhubarb that with typical generosity, he gave me. There is nothing here about John’s family, his working life and his early internment as a child in the Japanese camp to mention just a few aspects. I don’t understand enough about them to begin to give an accurate picture: others will be much more competent.  However, I do know that John had a stature and a presence that made me proud to know him.  

As I said, he was a dear man. I am glad, as are so many other friends, to have such happy memories: we have been enriched by his life and are profoundly grateful for it

John was buried at Litchfield. 

Thomas Miller Carol Service 2018 and the City

Thomas Miller Carol Service at St Katerine Cree Church

The Thomas Miller Carol Service was held at St Katerine Cree Church on 11th December 2018 and was attended by many of the present staff as well as a number of retirees.

The City has changed much since last year as vast offices go up. Here are a few photos showing the scale of the new buildings.

The view from our office at 90 Fenchurch St. The building on the right is where our old building once stood. 

The Gherkin and the Aviva Building on St Mary Axe.

The Willis Building and Lloyd's

Lime St with the 'Walkie-Talkie' building at the end

Art and What it Means to Me

Turner

Reflecting on having visited three local art exhibitions this week, I thought to put down what I think about art.




First, my credentials in talking about this at all: I am not an artist, although I have been a photographer since my 20s and have long had an interest in gardening and garden design.

I studied History of Art under Graham Drew at Winchester and loved it. Since then I have visited many of the world's great galleries - some many times for different exhibitions - including in the UK the National Gallery, the National Portrait Gallery, the Tate, the Tate Modern, the Royal Academy, the Wallace Collection, the Saatchi, the V&A, and many smaller galleries such as the Tate St Ives as well as exhibitions such as the St Laurent / Pierre Berge collection put on by Christies. Abroad, I know the Louvre, the Chagall and Matisse Museums in Nice, the Prado, the Ufizzi, Topkai, MOMA, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, the National Palace Museum of Taiwan, the National Museum and the Palace Museum, Beijing, MOMAT (the Museum of Modern art, Tokyo) and the Miho Museum near Kyoto.

My interest in art comes fundamentally from its ability to induce a feeling of transcendence, of awe, of reverence, of amazement, of significance. William James in 'The Varieties of Religious Experience' wrote: “Our normal waking consciousness… is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different… No account of the universe in its totality can be final which leaves these other forms of consciousness quite disregarded.”

Viginia Woolf expressed it thus: ...'behind the cotton wool is hidden a pattern; that we — I mean all human beings — are connected with this; that the whole world is a work of art; that we are parts of the work of art. Hamlet or a Beethoven quartet is the truth about this vast mass that we call the world. But there is no Shakespeare, there is no Beethoven; certainly and emphatically there is no God; we are the words; we are the music; we are the thing itself'.

Or as Saul Bellow put it in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech “Only art penetrates.. the seeming realities of this world”

I love and look for this glorious penetration, this heightening of consciousness, this revelation and this significance. I don't often find it.

“The dark second-floor apartment of the house in Market Square was shot through each day by the naked heat of summer: the silence of the shimmering streaks of air, the squares of brightness dreaming their intense dreams on the floor.” - Bruno Schultz

I realise that my somewhat over-blown thoughts above are not really appropriate to deal with 'everyday' art - the kind sold in local galleries and hung hopefully in church halls - and it's somewhat unfair to hold that kind of art to the standards of the old and recent masters (although I wish I would ove meet someone who lived for their art and at least aspired to that standard).

To help me with this, and thanks to Maria Popova (again), I recently discovered Henry Miller's 'To Paint Is To Love Again', which he reads in its entirety here. One passage has been especially useful:

'To paint is to love again. It’s only when we look with eyes of love that we see as the painter sees. His is a love, moreover, which is free of possessiveness. What the painter sees he is duty-bound to share. Usually he makes us see and feel what ordinarily we ignore or are immune to. His manner of approaching the world tells us, in effect, that nothing is vile or hideous, nothing is stale, flat and unpalatable unless it be our own power of vision. To see is not merely to look. One must look-see. See into and around'.

I will henceforth adopt such a kindly and love-infused eye for the art that I see around me every day, while keeping the works of the masters always as a bath of pure joy.