Author: The inner gardener

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RIP Nigel

This is Nigel sitting ‘like a human’ in his least flattering pose.

Nigel’s early life is shrouded in mystery, but his two spells at the pet rescue center and subsequent three months under the sofa suggest that it was troubled. But once finally settled in the bosom of the family during Covid, he relaxed had started to enjoy the good life. Nigel would sit on our laps when we rested and show us the importance of being still, taking one day at a time and not worrying and fretting over many things. He was the glue that held the family together and we will miss him dearly. Here follow some of the words we said at his graveside.

Nigel, you were the best cat. We will miss you for:

The way that you use to sit like a human,
clean between your toes,
and leave a dent in the sofa.

The way you would eat anything and everything,
howl for food an hour before dinner time,
and angrily turn around your bowl so we couldn’t reach to put the biscuits in.

The way you stole our sleep by kneading at our hair,
crying to be let out at 3am,
and then hiding under the table.

The way you dozed away the summer under the rosemary bush,
chirped at insects as you chased them,
and never posed a threat to bird or mouse.

The way you weed on the bathroom mat,
on piles of clothes,
and unguarded shoes.

The way you pooed next to your litter tray, so we stepped on it in the dark,
enjoyed the smells of smelly boots and dirty clothes,
and didn’t waste much time on grooming your coat.

The way you got the cat next-door to defend your territory for you,
snuggled deep into us,
and were a warm scarf around our necks.

The way you licked the cutlery in the dishwasher,
pretended you hadn’t been fed,
and helped mother with her yoga.

The way you drank water from pot plant drip-trays,
from the algae-choked pond,
and, if all you had was the water in your bowl, how you spilt it.

The way you came running at the sound of a scraped bowl,
the crack of an egg,
or the smell of tuna.

RIP Nigel, May 2011-November 2025

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Expectations, reality, meaning: Christ the King 2025

I was treated to this beautiful moon on my birthday a couple of weeks ago.

This is a reflection on Jeremiah 23.1-6; Psalm 46; Colossians 1.11-20; and Luke 23.33-43

Have you ever had the experience of a holiday not quite living up to your expectations? We once took a family trip to Vietnam. The idea was to teach English to children in an orphanage, as a way to try and justify a week spent visiting temples in Cambodia. We had great expectations of the holiday. As well as enjoying seeing somewhere new, we expected that the family would bond over doing something worthwhile together and that the experience would help the children to appreciate their own lives in Switzerland a little more. We wrote lesson plans, packed the suncream, and prepared ourselves as best we could. The reality on the ground, however, did not remotely meet our expectations. I don’t think the orphans learnt much English; before long one of my own children refused to participate, and, as well as genuinely fearing for our lives at various points, we all got sick. Reflecting back on the holiday, while our expectations were not met and on one level it was a disaster, it has given us a store of family anecdotes and was a good way to experience a lower income country far from resorts and hotels with stars. When I asked my son last week how it had benefitted him, he said ‘you can never progress in life unless you undergo intense suffering’.

Today we are celebrating ‘Christ the King,’ and our lectionary readings follow this pattern of high expectations that are then not met, followed by an interpretation that provides meaning.

We start with Psalm 46, which paints a picture of a God who is almighty, all powerful, whose voice can make the earth melt, who brings desolations on the earth, but who also makes wars cease. A God who is exalted among the nations and in the earth. This is a powerful God, who is actively and very obviously involved in the affairs of human beings. Then we had the passage from Jeremiah, which promises restoration of the nation of Israel and kings who are good shepherds, under whose rule the people will live in security, peace and comfort.

In putting these two texts together, we build up an expectation of a powerful God who is in control of history, who will act decisively and obviously to restore his people, and who will raise up kings to lead the people into a place of peace and safety. Isn’t this what we all want, for ourselves and for our world? A powerful God who acts to right wrongs, end wars and generally fix things?

Layered on top of this, with the imagery of Jesus the good shepherd, we can’t help but give these verses a further, messianic interpretation – that it is King Jesus who will powerfully restore his people and lead them to a place of fruitfulness, comfort and peace.

In Luke’s account of the crucifixion, however, expectations collide violently with reality. Despite his humble beginnings, Jesus had shown his power in healings and miracles. The crowds had come to believe that he was their messiah, and they, as well as the disciples, believed that as the messiah, the ‘annointed one’, he would take his rightful place as King of the Jews. Yet instead of a show of force, of the voice-melting-the-earth variety, he entered Jerusalem on a humble donkey. Instead of breaking bows and shattering spears, he allowed himself to be pierced and wounded. The nation of Israel was not restored under a reign of prosperity and peace on his watch, and the ambiguous sign placed over the cross – the king of the Jews – begs the question about what this kingship really means. At face value, expectations were not met and it is easy to understand the crowds’ angry response to the captured Jesus who failed to stand up to the Roman oppressors. They were deeply disappointed in a man who had demonstrated the potential for enormous power but failed to use it according to their expectations.

We come to our final passage from the letter to the Colossians to try and find some sort of meaning in all this, to see things from a divine perspective. And here it might help to make the distinction between the expectations put upon Jesus as King of the Jews and the concept of Christ the king – the theme of our service today.

For a King of the Jews, crucifixion was a total failure, while for Christ the King, it is understood as a history-defining moment in which God reconciled to himself all things, on earth and in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross. This takes apparent total failure and reinterprets it as ultimate success.

This limited human being, Jesus, is described as the image of the invisible God. What could be seen by human eyes had a more profound meaning that can only be seen by the eyes of faith. Jesus had no intention of going along with human expectations that would limit him to being the King of the Jews. As Christ the king he had cosmic significance encompassing the very creation of all things, visible and invisible, being before all things and holding all things together.

But is this just a form of denial, trying to put a positive spin on a disastrous turn of events? I actually think it’s quite the opposite, this contrast between the images of the crucified and cosmic Christ helps us to engage with the terrible reality and then push through it to find a deeper meaning. Believing in the cosmic Christ does not detract from the horror of the cross, which we remember regularly through our liturgy and worship.

So what does all this mean for us here and now, with our disappointments, confusion and fears for the future? We were led to expect that our children and grandchildren would lead the relatively safe, comfortable lives that we have been living. But this seems less and less likely with every passing day. You don’t need me to list the poly-crises affecting our societies and the broader environment. How can we find meaning in all this? The systems that have allowed us to enjoy so much prosperity have also driven many other people deeper into poverty and have caused terrible damage to the natural world. It is probably a necessary thing that such systems fall apart.

Humanity has known enormous change throughout the millennia, and while the changes facing us now are arguably of a different scale entirely, in Christ we can trust that God has even this time of unravelling in his hands. The letter to the Colossians tells us that in Christ all things were created, that they were created through him and for him. While the world sustains and nurtures us and the rest of the beings on this planet, it, and the rest of the universe, were created through and for Christ. There is a bigger picture here that transcends the crises we in our fallenness are bringing upon ourselves and our planet in this time.

We also read that Christ himself is before all things, and that in him all things hold together. Again, there is this sense that all creation has its origin in the heart of God and is still held there. We are then reminded of the cross, that place of God’s ultimate identification with our pain and suffering that is also the place of ultimate reconciliation between God and even the very worst that humanity has to offer.

And so while we want a God who fixes our problems, what we get is a God who prefers to show vulnerability and who refuses to use power to dominate and control. A God who gives us a genuine opportunity for repentance and transformation.

While we want a happy ending in the here and now, God let his body be destroyed, knowing that something deeper would come of it.

While we want concrete hope, Christ calls us, his disciples, to participate in the healing of our world without any guarantees that our efforts to care for the environment, work for peace or any number of other good intentions will have any lasting impact to life on planet earth… but, we make these efforts because Christ calls us to. We do what we can for the sake of His kingdom, and then leave it God to give our efforts ultimate meaning.

And in our own lives, when our expectations are dashed and we start to feel overwhelmed by circumstances, I invite us to remember this passage from Colossians and to ask this invisible God to help us know deep within us that He is holding all things together. May we entrust our lives and the life of all beings on this planet into this divine embrace that spans all of time and all of space, knowing that in Christ God has made peace with all things, on earth and in heaven, by the blood of his cross.

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Blood Over Bright Haven

A fine harvest of Jerusalem artichokes, and what I didn’t find will be a gift to the next tenders of my garden (whether they like it or not!)

It is a fact, that for me to live, something else must die – even if it is only the death of a carrot, ripped out of the ground before it has a chance to produce seeds and generate more life. This is a simple example, but what about the deaths we aren’t generally confronted with, but without which our way of life would be impossible? I’m thinking in particular of the impact on people and planet of our consumeristic lifestyles.

In her brilliant book Blood Over Bright Haven, M. L. Wang confronts this issue, as well as the interconnected issues of feminism, racism and colonialism. The story is set in a fantasy world led by an intellectual elite of mages, whose work is defined and justified by religious precepts handed down since the foundation of the society. The main character, Sciona, is the first woman to enter the corridors of magical power. What she discovers there is more than she had bargained for, and her commitment to truth sets her on a path with no happy ending.

Although worth reading for the story itself, this book is even more significant for the way it makes you think and draw your own parallels. It articulates the challenges we are facing at this time in history in a stark and powerful way, bringing into focus what we prefer not to think about. She is not gentle with her readers, and some might think she pushes too far, but I think she exaggerates to make a valid point.

The story doesn’t resolve the issues raised, but I love the way it honestly addresses the challenges and consequences of ‘lifting the veil’ on what’s really going on. My favourite quote: Sciona was proof that hope didn’t have to mean living to the end of the story.

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The storm

It was a lovely surprise to discover this beautiful Michaelmas daisy blooming in a hidden corner of my garden a few weeks ago.

A couple of weeks ago, there was a very violent storm. High winds swept through my garden and seemed to have made their entrance principally through the gateway, which I suppose isn’t unreasonable. Over the gate, I had constructed an archway and planted a honeysuckle – six years on, the honeysuckle has enthusiastically grown up and over the arch with a series of thick stems wrapped around the, unfortunately, none too robust structure. When the strong winds blew, the weight of the honeysuckle was just too much and the whole thing collapsed. The sight of the jumble of stems and bits of metal pole was so discouraging – how was I ever going to disentangle the honeysuckle from the archway? Would I be able to repair it? Would the honeysuckle survive? I soon realised that the only answer was some serious pruning. Not only were the stems wrapped throughout the structure, but they were extremely tightly attached – so tightly that it was difficult to cut through the stems without damaging the metal structure beneath. After an extended period of careful cutting and untangling, I managed to release the archway and rebuild it with duck tape (what would I do without it? – Mend things properly?!) I then took the remaining 20% of the honeysuckle and rethreaded it through the archway. A silver lining was the fun of feeding the discarded branches into the shredder and returning them to the garden as mulch.

A number of lessons could be drawn from this experience, but what comes to my mind are the verses at the beginning of Hebrews 12, and in particular: Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us.

Recently I have feeling a bit like the broken archway, collapsed under the weight of the overgrown honeysuckle. My mind is totally preoccupied, my body is tense and aching, and my spirit seems to have checked out for the time being. And as for the great crowd of witnesses, these might just be the sparrows and bluetits crowding around our birdfeeder, apparently without a care in the world. What is going on with me?

Perhaps now that the winds of change in their various forms are blowing through my life, they are exposing the extent of the ‘weight and sin that clings so closely’ rather like the tightly-bound honeysuckle. ‘Sin’ is a word with all sorts of unhelpful connotations, but essentially it describes anything that separates us from God – anything that pushes us away from that place of awareness of our deep connection with the Divine. All those times when I feel bad about myself and how I show up in the world are fertile ground for the ‘bad spirit’ that Ignatius of Loyola spoke of to drag me down.

Rather than talk of the bad spirit, I prefer to blame my darker moods on the patterns that seem to be hardwired into my being – the default ways of interpreting my place in reality that served as a survival strategy at one point in time, but which are now well past their sell-by date. These ways of responding need to be pruned away, and that job might be easier if I can lessen their grip on me – perhaps by taking them a little less seriously?

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Poinsettia aren’t just for Christmas, they’re for life

This is what happens if you keep repotting your Christmas poinsettia each year.

As previously mentioned, I am moving back to the UK in May next year (I lobbied for this date, so that I could see one last Swiss spring). Working in my garden today, I pondered the fact that I still plan to prune and feed my fruit bushes, even though I won’t get to eat their fruit.

At first, I wondered whether it was out of generosity for the people who will be living here next, but for all I know they might raze my garden to the ground and replace it with astroturf. Then I wondered whether it might be out of concern for the birds or other animals who might enjoy the fruit? While I think there might be some truth in both of these propositions, the most honest answer is probably that I will do it out of a sense of responsibility. But to whom or to what do I feel responsible?

I have had the amazing privilege of creating this garden from scratch, which brings a different quality to the relationship than I have had with other gardens I have tended. I think I have an almost maternal feeling towards this garden. My son has, on more than one occasion, pointed out to me that he didn’t ask to be born, and similarly the fruit bushes didn’t ask to be planted in my garden. I feel a draw to care for them irrespective of whether I will benefit from their fruit next year or not. Just as with my son, while I give my fruit bushes all the love and attention that I can, at some point I have to let go and let nature take its course.

I think a similar dynamic is playing out with pot plants that have overstayed their welcome. Kind souls tend to give me poinsettia for Christmas, which are just lovely with their red and green leaves, but I am now left with several ancient specimens. The problem is that I am not willing to put in the work to prepare them for Christmas, but I do keep repotting them because I can’t bring myself to put something I have been entrusted onto the compost heap while it is still healthy (see the giant specimen in the photo above). What is worse, when I accidentally knock a piece off, the stem ‘bleeds’ a white fluid, and I feel duty bound to put the detached limb into water and let it grow roots, somehow atoning for the sin of breaking it off… but this only exacerbates the problem.

All the life in my garden is sacred, but I feel a special connection with the plants I have deliberately put there. I owe them something, we are bound together. Of course, God is in everything, but I am more able to see him in some things than others. My fruit bushes are a far more effective sacrament to me than the weeds I just cleared from the path or the slug threatening my newly planted lambs’ lettuce. Perhaps my sense of responsibility towards my garden is part of how I reverence God in all things?

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Woodlice, aubergines and empathy

This aubergine closely resembles the ones I write about below.

My daughter recently queried a statistic she read in a fundraising magazine: 17% of the Swiss population have been subject to racial discrimination. She wondered whether a more helpful statistic might be to know what proportion of the Swiss BAME population has been subject to racial discrimination, but as I pointed out to her, we tend to only really care about what happens to people when we can identify with them ourselves. If the charity in question wants to raise money from the average, probably white, Swiss person, it needs to articulate the problem from the perspective of the Swiss population as a whole.

I thought back to this discussion the other day when I was harvesting two small, sorry-looking aubergines. As previously mentioned, the slugs have had a bumper year in my garden, and these pathetic specimens were not spared. The slugs had eaten their way right through them, creating tunnels for the convenience of other insects looking for a home. I took out my knife and started to cut out the eaten parts in order to salvage what I could of the remaining flesh. I displaced a woodlouse from the first aubergine, but didn’t think much of it. When I cut into the second aubergine, however, I discovered a whole woodlouse family with a few tiny woodlice. I felt absolutely dreadful, I had not only destroyed their home but also broken up the family. I made a pathetic attempt to reunite them as I put the remains carefully in the compost heap.

I know this probably sounds absurd, but I identified strongly with the woodlouse mother and her care for her offspring. I realise that this is anthropomorphism taken to an extreme, but I’m a sensitive soul, and it’s how I felt.

Who is my neighbour?

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The Nicene creed

Homemade pasta: last week’s mandatory fun!

I was recently asked to write something about what in the Nicene creed inspired me to care for creation. This is what I came up with (video version available on Facebook)

What strikes me as I read through the Nicene creed are the words ‘maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen’, and in particular, the word ‘unseen’. At first glance, this looks like a catch-all word for things that aren’t visible, maybe the supernatural, but for me it evokes a sense of awe and wonder.

What we see and perceive with the rest of our senses is just the tip of the iceberg. Walk through a forest in the autumn and you’ll find mushrooms, but these are a tiny part of the whole organism, the fruiting bodies that pop up above the surface at an opportune moment, while hidden beneath the ground is a vast fungal network connecting plants and trees through their roots, continuously exchanging resources and information.

This time of year is graced by the beautiful colours of autumn leaves as they return their strength to the tree and prepare to fall. These changing colours are due to the staged decomposition of different light-capturing molecules in the leaf: the green chlorophyll decomposing more rapidly than the yellow and orange coloured molecules, and then the sugars trapped in the leaves are changed into red pigments. This unseen process gives the glorious pallet of fiery colours, which brings us such joy.

And within the cells of our own bodies, there is incredible intricacy at the molecular level – finely-tuned mechanisms that allow us to breathe, digest and fight off infections. We are fearfully and wonderfully made.

I recently watched a film which powerfully juxtaposed stunning images of strange, alien and beautiful creatures, previously hidden unseen in the deep sea, with footage of the indiscriminate destruction of their habitat, by mining companies looking for mineral deposits. I found it devastating.

My sense of wonder at the unseen mysteries of creation motivates me to do what I can to preserve our common home. My efforts are small and unimpressive, and may not make much difference in the long run, but I chose to do what I can and to trust the bigger picture into the hands of God the father, maker of heaven and earth, of all things, seen and unseen.

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A lament

These tiny jewels from my garden are actually wild tomatoes from South America!

I am facilitating the Deep Waters course from Green Christian this autumn. This week we are invited to write a lament, this is mine:

One hot, dry summer I dig in my garden.
The earth is rock hard, resisting the pressure of my spade
So dry, a web of cracks has formed
The water from my can disappears down gullies.
I loosen a clump and divide it
Like opening a geode, I uncover a worm curled up upon itself
This servant of life, whose toil renews the earth
Hides from sight, in a bid to survive
The violence of our folly.

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Psalm 139

This was the gorgeous view I saw from the window during my retreat. With much gratitude to my hosts.

I recently spent a week away in silence, seeking to clear my head and find my way back to an awareness of God after a particularly intense period. I am grateful to have had the time to do this and the gift of somewhere beautiful to stay.

In prayer, I had a rare experience of deep peace; I felt safe, held and nurtured, I felt like my inner being was resting within the womb of God. I later reflected on Psalm 139:13-15 and saw my inner being in a process of still being formed:

God keeps forming my inward parts,
She knits me together in her womb.
My frame is not hidden from her
As I am being made in secret,
Intricately woven in the depths of my being.

I believe that this total intimacy with the divine is true for all of us, whether we feel it or not, God holds all things within herself – yes God lives in us, but it is also true that we live in God in whom we ‘live and move and have our being’ (Acts 17:28). Not just human beings, but all the other beings, and even all matter, dwell within God and thus are sacred and deserving of our deepest respect and love.

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Prayers for the second Sunday in Creationtide

The slugs have enjoyed nibbling on these, but have not made it through the skin. The two in the middle were well camouflaged, hence their size, and have now been pickled.

I wrote these prayers for our service today (7th September), the readings were Philemon and Luke 14:25-33.

Generous God, we thank you for the gifts you shower upon us. For the late-summer fruitfulness of fields and gardens, for friendships, and for the life you breathe into us. Most of all, we thank you for filling and surrounding us with your love. As we share our lives in Christ, may we, as a community here and with all your people, live out the truth of that reality. Give us hearts full of love and hands ready to act for the good of the people we meet in our daily lives and of all of your creation. Give us grace to trust that there is enough, and to live accordingly.

Subversive God, we thank you for the example of Paul, who saw through the values and norms of his society to the deeper truths of your kingdom. Give us the vision to see through our society’s respectable veneer, to uncover those values and norms which are driving the destruction of this beautiful world you created. Give us courage to face up to our part in this and wisdom to know how to be and act differently.

Demanding God, in Christ you showed us that discipleship means carrying the cross and letting go of our lives. We offer up to you our one wild and precious life, trusting that you have planted our deepest desires within us. May we live our lives to the full and for your greater glory, whatever that might mean at this stage of our lives.

Confusing God, there is so much about this life that we struggle to understand and you refuse to give us easy answers. Even the light of the world, Jesus, spoke in riddles that still confound us. Help us to hold our explanations lightly and to trust you deeply. For all those situations where there seems to be no answer, and where we cannot see a way forward, we still pray in faith for your kingdom to come. We lift up before you the situations in Sudan, DRC, Gaza, Haiti, Ukraine and so many other troubled places in your world.

God of hope, we pray for societies where confidence in the status quo is being lost and where things are starting to unravel. May your people choose a courageous path of radical love that points to a deeper hope in you and to a future that can be built on the solid foundation of the self-giving love of a crucified God.

Redeeming God, we lift to you the bruised and broken parts of our personal lives, of our church, and of all of creation. Just as Christ rose from the dead, we trust that you will bring new life from the devastation of our mistakes. We cannot know how or even when, but we entrust that hope of new life into your wide embrace.