anglican focus

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Birds

Homilies & Addresses The Rev'd Robert Paget blessing a dog during the Season of Creation Homilies & Addresses

Season of Creation sermon: “Today we give thanks for our animals”

“Francis challenged the idea that the world and all living things were just commodities to be exploited. He saw them as inheritors, along with us of the kingdom of heaven. It’s not always easy to see the same kinship with nature that Francis saw, especially when you’re being pursued along the footpath by an aggressive magpie,” says The Rev’d Robert Paget from St Paul’s, Samford

"Even in my suburban courtyard, I am enthralled by the song of the grey butcherbird, the antics of a pair of magpie-larks in my birdbath and, if very lucky, the visit of a tawny frogmouth to spend the day in my tree" (Marilyn Wright)
Features

“The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it”

“Birds often give me solace, including a wedge-tailed eagle after the violent death of a cousin; encouragement from black cockatoos at the closing of a Kairos Outside prison ministry weekend; affirmation from bulbuls outside my house in Dodoma after my arrival and upon my departure,” says Marilyn Wright from St Bartholomew’s, Mt Gravatt, as the Season of Creation continues

Features

“Consider the birds of the air”

“In the hands of the Biblical authors, the seemingly ordinary, like birds, takes on greater meaning when you consider the rich symbolism. Researching this symbolism goes beyond partaking in idle academic curiosity, for it is only by understanding the Bible’s symbolism that we can really hope to engage with it and have any contextual understanding of what the Bible authors were trying to tell us,” says The Rev’d Selina McMahon