From Rev'd Louise

Monthly reflection

October 2025 Autumn

I often approach autumn with mixed feelings. Of all our seasons, it is the season that most prompts me to look both backwards and forwards, and for me it is a season that prompts both thankfulness and an awareness that for many autumn is a time of increasing anxiety.

Some of my earliest memories of autumn include picking mushrooms from the fields in the early morning before the overnight mist lifted, before going home to eat them for breakfast. And memories of scuffing through fallen leaves, or picking fruits and berries from woods and hedgerows, together with smells of jam and chutney making. For me, autumn still includes looking back with thankfulness over the summer’s garden harvest (including both what we will eat, and provision of food and shelter for wildlife for the months ahead) and looking forward, sometimes with trepidation, to the list of tasks to try to complete before winter sets in. And as I feel myself beginning to long for the time when daylight hours begin to lengthen rather than shorten, I am aware that for many the approaching darker and colder days bring anxieties about finances or health.

In the church calendar too, autumn is time for looking both backwards and forwards. Harvest encourages us to look back with thankfulness for God’s generous provision, and forwards to how we can honour and cherish the world that sustains us. All Souls’ encourages us to look back in gratitude for all those who are no longer with us but have lit our lives with love, and forwards to the eternal home with him that God offers to all. Remembrance encourages us to look back in sorrow for lives lost in conflict and in the service of others, and forwards in hope to God’s vision of a world where conflict and injustice are no more.

But Christianity teaches us to do more than simply look. Christianity also teaches us to work to become part of the future we long to see. As Christianity teaches us to look forward with hope to a time when God's ways are known on earth, when all conflicts cease and all creation flourishes, so Christianity invites us to look backwards to discern the impact that we, individually and collectively, have on the world around us. And Christianity invites us to commit ourselves to do all that we can to end all that harms, and to promote all that brings about flourishing.

So my prayer for all of us this month is that we would each know, or know afresh, God’s love and goodness towards us, and would each long to share that love and goodness with all.

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September 2025 Deeply rooted

Two news stories have caught my attention recently. One is the various accounts about ‘autumn coming early,’ and the experts’ response. The other is accounts about the impact of solar farms on agriculture. Both of these caught my attention because as I reflected on them, I also found myself reflecting on my faith.

I’m sure most of us will have noticed ‘signs of autumn;’ trees dropping their leaves, blackberries ripe, or even mostly over, and so on. In the vicarage garden, we have a very mixed picture. Some plants, like runner beans, chard, chillies and tomatoes, are producing the best harvest we’ve had since we came to Bradwell. Others, like rhubarb, raspberries and blackberries, are doing poorly or finishing early. Experts are saying that what we are seeing is not an ‘early autumn,’ (autumn changes are triggered by changes in daylight length) but is the result of plants being stressed by the very hot and dry spring and summer we’ve had. But what really resonated with me was their comment that the plants that have coped best with this year’s challenging weather are those that are deep rooted.

I am reminded of the many passages in the Bible urging hearers to be ‘rooted’ in God’s love. From Psalm 1, saying that those who ‘delight’ in the ways of God are like trees rooted by streams of water, never withering and continually bearing fruit, through to many passages in the letters written by the apostle St Paul to early Christian churches. For example, in Colossians chapter 2 and in Ephesians chapter 3, Paul urges believers to let their ‘roots’ grow deeply down into the love of Christ, so that they may be filled with the ‘fulness of God,’ and God may work through their lives. And throughout Christian history there are countless examples – maybe, like me, you’ve seen some of them – of people who have a deep faith showing strength and resilience in times of difficulty, and being able to offer support to others experiencing burdens of many kinds.

But what about the solar farms? Well, there has been a lot of research showing that crops produce higher yields when grown under solar panels, but the latest that caught my attention was research from France showing that grape yields increase by between 30% and 60% when vines are grown under solar panels. And I found myself reflecting that, just as crops benefit from shade and shelter, we all have times too when, however deep our roots, we need shelter and protection. And again, the Bible urges us to seek the protection we need ‘under the shadow of God’s wings,’ The Bible is full of imagery of God as protector and safe space.

So my prayer for all of us this month is that, however we understand God, we might each seek to live our lives deeply rooted in love, finding the protection and care that we need ourselves, and being able to ‘bear fruit’ by offering love and care to others.

August 2025 What if....?

Recently we drove through a place that we might have lived at, and it triggered for me my occasional musing about the apparently random path that life can take. At such times, I find myself asking questions such as, What if we had chosen that house rather than the one we did? What if we had pursued that job rather than the one we did? And so on.

There will be times in life for most of us when those ‘what if..?’ questions can be a source of great pain and distress, such as when we face bereavement or tragedy for ourselves or our loved ones. And at such times we may well all need the support and reassurance of others. But there may well be other times when we simply look back and wonder what our life might have been like if we had made different choices, if we had followed a different path.

I have heard it suggested that most people only make a small handful of big choices and decisions in life. Things like: What sort of person do I want to be? What values do I want to shape my life around? All of our other, smaller, choices tend to flow from those big choices we have made. One of my big choices has been the choice to try to ‘tread lightly’ though this life, trying to cherish all life and trying, as far as I can, to avoid doing harm to any.

Christianity often describes our life as a journey where, as we travel through life, we make decisions about the route we should take. One view, among a range of Christian views, describes our life as like a route on a map that God has already marked out for us. This view says that we follow the route through life that God has chosen for us, with only a limited ability to change that route. Another view describes God’s influence in our life as being more like a compass than a map. Every time we face a choice or a decision, we can reflect on what we know of God’s values, and we can either choose whatever we believe will bring us closer to God, or we can choose another path. But even ir we choose a path that takes us further from God, we can always choose to turn back towards him next time we have a choice to make. This view believes that because God made us, we all have within us a ‘compass’ that points to God, and at every moment in our lives we can choose whether or not we want to follow where that ‘compass’ points.

So my prayer for all of us this month is that we would each become more aware of the choices we do make, and more aware of the choices we are able to make. And whatever we believe, or don’t believe, about God, my prayer is that we would each choose to follow his values of kindness and justice and care for all.