'People of the Passion with a Vision for Abundant Life'

During January we had a positive spiritual experience of Sunday worship to help us focus on God who manifests himself to the world. Much of this focussed on the Feast of the Epiphany culminating in Candlemas on the first Sunday in February. At this point the liturgy of the Church pointed us towards Lent and our Lord's passion.

Some years ago Stephen Barton wrote an excellent book entitled 'People of the Passion' and he introduces his first chapter with a suggestion that 'learning to read the Bible well is learning to be surprised'. He is essentially saying that for Christians, reading the Bible during Lent can be a time of seeing things that perhaps we have not seen before. Lent is a time for giving things up, letting things go and taking time out. He states that if we do these things it may happen that, by travelling lighter, we may be led along new paths of faith and understanding in our discipleship of Christ and in our worship of God.