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The Flyer
The Thurston & Ixworth Flyer
Established 2018
Copy deadlines:
May edition:
15/04/19
June edition: 15/05/19
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Thurston, Ixworth and Bardwell
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Contents
From the Dean’s Desk
I knew it was a
conversation I
eventually needed
to have, but I
was dreading it.
We came from
opposite sides
of an argument
which affected me
personally, and I
Joe Hawes
feared harsh words
when we came face to face. the Church is made up of ordinary
human beings, like anywhere else, and
we Christians are as prone to take
up standpoints against each other as
any other organisation. Perhaps even
more so, because what we deal in are
ultimate questions: Life, death, eternity
and the love of God, the dignity of the
individual, collective responsibility,
creation and our place in it, how
human society should order itself:
who’s in, and should anyone be out?
In the event, it was an encounter
of grace and dignity; I experienced
something I could relate to and
understand. I hope the other party
felt the same. Our conversation left
me feeling different, and as if I had
received a gift. When I feel God has
been at work there is a sense of
heightened emotion; someone once
called it ‘the heart strangely warmed’. I long for reconciliation in the Church,
no more divisions, the preparedness
to accept each other’s difference
with respect and appreciate diversity.
Maybe then we would be able to
speak with greater authority into a
fractured political and social context.
We human beings are instinctively
tribal; we are more comfortable
in the company of those we know
think and feel like we do. It takes a
risk to encounter the otherness of
someone else without hostility or
putting up barriers from behind which
we can lob grenades of anger and
incomprehension.
More than enough of that is being
seen in the entrenched positions
around Brexit, and politicians are
rightly deeply concerned about the
public loss of confi dence in those who
govern us. But the same divisions are
evident from protesters in Parliament
Square; it seems that none of us are
exempt from the temptation to climb
into our bunkers.
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16
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If only the Church were immune from
this, but of course it isn’t, because
We are in the middle of Lent, the
season before Easter. Many think of
Lent as a time to give up booze and
chocolate before a good Easter binge,
but I’m more interested in giving up
the things which harden the arteries of
my soul; things like my prejudices and
mistrust of people I don’t understand,
the ways I react out of fear and
misunderstanding. I long to be able
to let go of them, not because I’ve
stopped believing passionately in
what I hold dear, but because I know
instinctively that I can only grow
deeper from an open encounter with
those who are most unlike me, as I
think I did from that meeting I had
been dreading.
At the cross on Good Friday we can lay
down all those burdens we no longer
need to carry, and walk away in hope
of an Easter bright with forgiveness
and renewal.
Joe Hawes
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accounts@fl yeronline.co.uk
newsdesk@fl yeronline.co.uk
jon@fl yerpress.co.uk
© The Thurston & Ixworth Flyer 2018. Views and opinions mentioned are not necessarily those of
the editor or proprietor and no responsibility will be taken for the accuracy of information contained
herein. For further information on advertising in the Flyer, please call 01284 592491 or email:
newsdesk@fl yeronline.co.uk Editor: Steve Powell. Sub Editor: Chris Nind. Proprietor: Steve Powell
All advert layouts & design are property of The Thurston & Ixworth Flyer. The standard charge for
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