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Word from Wormingford

12 June 2015

Ronald Blythe compares and contrasts the faith of two public figures

TRINITARIAN days. Very cold. I think of poor Bishop Heber. I say poor, because they sent him off to convert India, instead of leaving him in an English country living, which he would have much preferred. But saints can't be choosers. "Holy, holy, holy," we sing. Sudden winds and brief showers are our lot. Between them, I tie up fallen roses: John Clare and Duke of Wellington. The latter was once accosted by a woman in the street with, "Mr Smith, I believe."

"Madam, if you believe that, you will believe anything."

I have always believed that to carve the Trinity was an act of great daring. But a medieval sculptor did as much at Blythburgh, my favourite Suffolk church, a masterpiece that dominates the marshes. High up on the eastern gable sits God with his Son on his lap, and the Holy Spirit, a dove, on his head. There it reigns, the Trinity, beyond Reformation or later interpretations. At its feet, the River Blyth makes its way to the North Sea. It is "Holy, holy, holy" every mile. Gulls scream above it.

Benjamin Britten once sent me there to seek permission to hold a concert in the church. Mr Smith, the Vicar, was puzzled.

"Is it a band?"

"Sort of."

I went with Yehudi Menuhin to try the church for sound. It was perfect. He stood on the chancel step, and the angelic notes went up to the angelic listeners in the roof. There is sung evensong once a month, which is worth a long drive. Very beautiful and holy, holy, holy.

The readings for Trinity Sunday could not be more contrasting. One concerns a furtive, nervous, enquiring faith, that of a public figure, Nicodemus; the other reveals a confident, declaring faith - that of John the Baptist. One is about a person who is prudent about what he is coming to believe, and who, because of his position, does not wish to be identified with the latest messianic craze, and who, in Jesus's own words, was a true teacher, and not someone likely to disturb the peace of Jerusalem.

The Roman peace, of course. The occupying army tolerated the strangest religions, though not if they disturbed this peace. Nicodemus, as a member of the Jews' Grand Council, and a Pharisee, or arch-conservative, would not do this. So he went his own radical way - but by night. He lacked all imagination, and when Jesus told him that he must be born again, he asked about wombs, etc. This strange teacher's captivating language and metaphor muddled his lawyer's brain.

"You ought not to be astonished by it," he was told. "The wind blows where it wills. You hear the sound of it, but you don't know where it comes from, or where it goes." So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit, which is the living breath of Christ. House-shaking, mind-shaking, and accompanied by those tongues of fire which turned into bishops' mitres, the third person of Trinity Sunday appeared among us.

The last reference to the remarkable Nicodemus is when he organised the funeral of Jesus, giving up his own fine tomb in the process. He covered the poor mangled body with rich spices, dressed it in fine linen, and set a rock at the entrance to keep out the animals. We still have flowers at funerals to cover the decay.

That all these things should run through my head as I tie up fallen roses in an English garden is odd.

I look up Reginald Heber. Dead at 43; a poet who was overworked by the Church. Destroyed, like so many, by the Raj.

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