Milking the recession???

Unlike the UK government, the Irish are tackling the recession by trying to reduce government spending. This means there's more Irish cheese on the market because there's less money to keep it in storage to produce "mature" cheese.
With the Irish and UK market having an oversupply of cheese there's been downwards pressure on the farm milk price.
Add to that the increase in the dairy herd on New Zealand's south island and the reduction in demand for dairy products from China.
That all adds together to mean that farm prices are down to between 20-24p a litre at a time when costs are going up. Complying with NVZs (Nitrate Vulnerable Zone regulations) are increasing expenditure for dairy farmers.
Experts say that the situation should sort itself out in the next 6 to 8 months as more UK producers give up the struggle or decide that investing for the future isn't worthwhile. Whether in the future we'll have the capacity to produce the milk we need is another matter. But we can always get powdered from New Zealand.
And the price of milk at the supermarkets? Tesco and Sainsbury are both currently charging 86p for 2 pints. That's the equivalent of just under 76p per litre!

An insult to farmers

That was what the NFU called the government proposals for sharing the cost of animal disease control between the livesttock industry and the government. I can understand why.
The proposals work on the basis that if the industry has to pay a greater share of the costs to keep itself free of disease, that this will provide an incentive to farmers. This is insulting to farmers for many reasons.

1. Farmers already have substantial costs to bear from disease. The compensation for Foot and Mothh, bird flu or TB only meets a small part of the costs. Increasing costs for farmers wont increase motivation
2. Farmers aren't in the business just for the money! If they werre they would be doing something else! Most farmers have a genuine concern for the welfare of their animals
3. A lot of disease controls are not in farmers hands - they're in government hands. Foot and Mouth (except when it leaks from a Government laboratory) is an imported disease. Farmers have no control of border crossings or scrutiny of portss and airports. That's in government hands.

Yes, you can ... Yes, You can... Yes, You can...

I spent Sunday morning at the National Weddings Exhibition. The photo is of colleagues on the stand.
I had lots of conversations with brides to be, grooms to be, mother-in laws.... Most of what I was saying was "Yes, you can."

• To the couple who wanted to get married in the church the bride's father had been part of, the answer was "Yes, you can."
• To the couple getting married abroad but talking about a church blessing when they come back, the answer was "Yes, you can." And when told that one of them had been married and divorced, the answer was still "Yes, you can."
• For the couple where one is an Anglican and the other a semi-lapsed Roman Catholic wanting to know if they can get married in a CofE Church, the answer is "Yes, you can" - and you can ask that the Roman Catholic priest can be part of the ceremony too.
• Can we get married at 5.00pm? "Yes, you can."
• Can we have modern music? "Yes, you can."
• We're not sure if we believe in God or any particular church, can we get married? "Yes, you can."
  

It was great joy for the couples. What worries me is how the Church has got itself into a situation where people assume the answer will be "No, you can't"

And if you want to check what you can do then www.yourchurchwedding.org will tell you

Reading the signs

What does a blue arrow point to? In Portugal yellow arrows show the way to Santiago de Compostela - blue ones to Fatima . So if you were in Portugal and saw a blue arrow like the photo you could be pretty well certain that to follow it you would end up at Fatima.

BUT, if you followed this blue arrow you would end up in a mess. It doesn't point to Fatima. It's just down the road from here. I took the photo when I was walking the dogs. It points to a water main in need of attention.

It's sometimes to easy to look at signs an assume that we know what they mean.

Next to the land rover is...

...the guide who took us round Porto Santo. We had the half day "off road" tour seeing the sites of this small island just north of Madeira.
The guide's name was Carina Jesus.
She was knowledgeable, intelligent, fun...
I found myself comparing her to the narrow, judgemental "Jesus" of some churches.
I'm sure the Jesus of the gospels was more like Carina, even if he did n't drive a landrover!

Power Cut?

"Has there been a power cut?" that was the question asked by practically every worshipper as they arrived for worship on Sunday.

There hadn't been a power cut. It was Candlemas when, according to the Churchwarden's diary, the candles that would be used in the coming year should be blessed.

So we started the service in the morning gloom. We thought about light that brings hope and the possibility of seeing a way through life. We heard the account of the child Jesus, recognised by Simeon as the light of the world.

We blessed the Easter candle, used in baptism services and prayed that we might be faithful to our baptismal call to be lights in the world.

We blessed the communion table candles. Candles were first used in Christian worship when the church went underground (literally) to the catacombs and we remembered Christians persecuted for their faith today. In some traditions one of the communion table candles is called the "epistle" candle, the other the "gospel". I never can remember which is which, but they remind us that scripture is a light for us.

We light a candle from the Diocesan Assembly and were reminded that we are part of something bigger than the small group gathered that morning.

And we heard some words from a book by Lesslie Newbigin. They're so good that I think they're worth repeating here.
"I think that a very good and valid symbol of our mission is to be found in an experience with which those of us who have lived in India are familiar. When we have to go to a distant village in our pastoral duty we try to start very early in the morning, so we do not have to walk in the heat of the day. And it sometimes happens that we have to set off in total darkness; perhaps we are going towards the west so that there is no light in the sky and everything is dark. But as we go, a party of people travelling the opposite way comes to meet us. There will be at least a faint light on their faces. If we stop and ask them: "Where does the light come from?", they will simply ask us to turn round (do the U-turn - repent) and look towards the east. A new day is dawning, and the light we saw was just its faint reflection in the faces of those going that way. They did not posses the light; it was a light given to them. The church is that company which, going the opposite way to the majority, facing not from life towards death, but from death towards life, is given already the first glow of the light of a new day. It is that light that is the witness" (Mission in Christ's Way World Council of Churches p21)

250 years ago

It's 250 years since the birth of Robert Burns. In Wichenford we had a Burns supper to celebrate. It helps that the curate is Scottish.

Why should the Church remember Burns? He was a drunkard and a womaniser and left a string of illegitimate children across the country.

But as well as that he was a thorn in the side of the Church of that time. He had recognised the hypocrisy of an organisation that was concerned about respectability rather than faith. His poems "Holy Willie's Prayer" and "The address to the unco guid" lambaste the two-facedness of the Church. "The Cotter's Saturday Night" tells a story of a real faith that doesn't need the Church.


There's a story (I read it on the internet so it must be true!) that at one time the local church had a notice on it saying,

"All are welcome here with the EXCEPTION of Robert Burns."

Underneath was Burn's reply,

"He who wrote this wrote it well, but the same shall be writ on the gates of hell."

The Church in every age does well to listen to the criticism of Burn's. Are we interested in faith or respectability?

Swords into ploughshares and ploughshares into swords

At today's plough Sunday service, Sarah Brush reminded us that the bible uses the image of swords into ploughshares and vice versa. Changing circumstances require change.
Members of the congregation had been given pipe-cleaners and were invited first to shape them into something that represented current (agricultural) reality. Then they were to shape them into something representing future hopes.
So What did we get?


This young farmer had hopes of a large ring, not that she she said that she wants a husband - just the jewellery!!













She would like to be rich. She says she's looking for a rich farmer to marry. The way things have been with agriculture over recent years, that might be somewhat optimistic!












His future is to include a spanner



















and hers a beer glass.









As for Lionel, as the "oldest young farmer in town" his pipe-cleaner was shaped into a Zimmer frame. But he's still smiling. It must be the company

Quotable quotes

My sabbatical, now sadly coming to an end, has included a lot of reading and among all I have read have been some real gems. Here’s one of them.

“Why are so many Christians so obnoxious and mean spirited? It seems like Christianity’s mostly about being judgemental, narrow-minded, and having an infuriatingly condescending attitude towards anyone who isn’t a Christian. Christians are so busy being smug about being Christian that they forget to be kind.”

That quote is from “Penguins, Pain and the whole Shebang” by John Shore, quoted by John Drane in his book “After Mcdonaldisation”. I must say that I have met a number of Christians are who are not smug obnoxious and mean spirited, but (at the risk of being judgemental) I have met a number who are.

This blog is not a turkey!

But I gather some folk have ended on this page while looking for a game of getting the turkey across the farmyard. I'd hate you to be disappointed, so it's at http://www.ukturkeys.co.uk/fun-stuff/gobbler/
Enjoy but it is addictive!