Lectionary poem

While struggling with the gospel reading for next Sunday I wrote the following poem...

Adultery (Matthew 5:27)

Jesus said,

It is not the sweaty consummation,

writhing: energy to ecstasy

that is most destructive.

Much worse are the mental

unconsummated fantasies

that override commitment

and undermine reality.

That give imagined passion

the motivation and power:

dreaming driving drawing draining

relationships in the real world.

What can compete with the unbridled unreality

of obsession that leads to a madness of dislocation?

“Blest are the pure in heart”

I wonder what they will make of it on Sunday?

Teaching an old dog new tricks

I have been singing all my life. In church in choirs or in the bath I have not been afraid to lift up my voice and sing. In small congregations I have given a lead by belting out the tune at full volume to help others sing along. In the choir I sang the bass line and was able to keep the line not least because I was always beside someone else singing the same notes.
But over the last few months things have changed. I joined the amateur dramatics and I have had to start again. For a start in the chorus you don't stand with the other basses - you are all mixed up on the stage so you have to try and keep your notes and listen out for others singing the same as you are whilst hearing mostly those singing  something totally different.
There is the times when members of the chorus come forward with a one liner solo. I was expecting to stand at the back of stage and grunt but no! I have two one liner solos to sing! There will be 400 people who have paid money for this! My previous experience hasn't really prepared me for this.
So yesterday I went for my first ever singing lesson. I learnt about warming up, how to stand, how to breathe and how to recognise my natural range and some tricks for trying to extend it. If only I had done this years ago I might have been on stage at La Scala by now - no perhaps not. But after that half hour I felt more confident and better equipped to do what I thought would just be a fuinl leisure time activity. So it is never too late to learn.... I hope.

Guilt

Now as a green activist, in my own small way, I have been trying to cut my carbon footprint. This week though I went to a meeting near London and to get there and back I flew. I didn't want to fly, and I didn't enjoy the flight but I had to do it because it was cheaper by a long way and it took much less time, allowing me to meet other commitments in my diary.

But I am left feeling guilty.
The system is stacked against making use of the railways. Getting a proper, European standard, high speed rail link from London to Scotland is decades away, since there are nimbys all along the route who will fight its development along every mile of the proposed track! And this is what we need for it would beat the pants off flying every time!
So this is a modern moral dilemma. Should I feel guilty? Should I plan better so that I allow for the extra time taken when not flying?
Does it matter? The flight is going to go anyway with or without me on board. Can I offset my carbon by doing something else? Perhaps I should put a new shrub or tree in the garden for each flight I take. Though that would  make me feel good would it actually do anything. Do any of these offsetting schemes actually work or are they elaborate scams to make you feel better.
No answers as usual but lots of questions to ponder. Perhaps as Christians we do the guilt thing more than most!