The Second Sunday of Lockdown

Returning from a break in Suffolk we settled into a daily routine each day begun with Morning Prayer. 

 I woke in the early hours of Sunday morning sleepless, restless, agitated. It occurred to me that these were typical symptoms experienced by addicts denied their fix. I recognise a certain amount of habit in my past churchgoing practice.  Perhaps we have all become a little stale and stuck in our ways. Our enforced abstinence could be a blessing in disguise.

 The pattern of the day we planned was not unlike the week before. In the morning thanks to BBC Radio 4 we were able to join in worship from Wesley's Chapel; followed by a front room service led by the Archbishop of York.

 Again we found time to reflect as we took our hours exercise around local lanes and green ways.

 There were sardine sandwiches for lunch, our deliberate choice.  Since we live by the river, bread and fishes have a particular resonance.  It feels as if one is never far from Galilee in the Broads National Park.  In church I might receive Communion without concern for the hungry. Not so today. The question comes, "‘Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?" (John 6.5) Christian Aid and Brot fur die Welt came to my mind, with a soundtrack provided by the hymn, "Bread for the world in mercy broken".

Reflecting on our  The First Sunday of Lockdown what had been lacking was any thought of sharing. At supper two of us had chewed thoughtfully on a morsel of bread and sipping some wine. We had remembering Jesus around table with more than enough food.  Responding to his "Do this" would require something more of a sacrifice.

 Inspired by the example of a 14th Century widow, Katherine de Norwich (See Carole Hill's Women and Religion in Late Medieval Norwich. Boydell and Brewer 2010) who "daily supplied thirteen paupers with bread and herrings"(p125); we concluded that feeding the hungry was not an optional extra. Before chewing on our bread and sipping wine at supper on the 2nd Sunday of Lockdown, we resolved to take some responsibility for feeding the hungry.


Feeding the hungry is one of the Seven Works of  Mercy 


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