Still Around

 I dreamed I was going to take communion out to an old lady, only I couldn't find any of the gear, nor could I remember the time I'd set for the visit or even where she lived. As I explained to the person who was there with me, "When I made the appointment I didn't think I'd still be around to carry it out.."

At one point a very large Roman Catholic priest put in an appearance. He was wearing full vestments. I heard him begin a sermon about a woman with a man's name whom nobody loved, not even her parents.  "Ah, I thought, "Now there's a real priest."

The Honour Of God

 A clip from Beckett asked to be viewed.

Thomas Beckett (played by Richard Burton) and Henry II (played by Peter O'Toole) were friends. Beckett was also Henry's fixer. He fixed Henry's private life for him (arranging booze-ups, pimping girls etc) and then as Chancellor fixed the economy. Lastly Henry had a brainwave and thought he'd make Beckett Archbishop of Canterbury and have him fix the Church. No man can serve two masters and Beckett's loyalties switched...

And he began to assert the rights and authority of the Church against the authority of the State.

They became enemies.

Beckett goes into exile. They meet to parley on a beach in Normandy (the film location is the beach below Alnwick castle in Northumberland.) Henry wants Beckett back as his friend and fixer. Beckett says only if the king will accept the division of powers.

Then this piece of dialogue takes place (I quote from memory)

Henry: Did you ever love me?

Thomas: Yes, insofar as I am capable of love.

Henry: Did you then start to love God?

Thomas: I started to love the honour of God.

What a majestic and compelling phrase: The Honour of God. How very medieval (and chilly). How very mid 20th century too. God may not be lovable. He may not even exist. But his authority- which will inevitably clash with that of the state- is worth standing up for- even if it is no more than an idea or ideal...

...  worth dying for too, as Thomas goes on to demonstrate.

In the mid 20th century- a time when the power of the state was never greater and belief in God never feebler- the memory of this man Beckett came bubbling up through the collective unconscious to confront us. Jean Anouilh wrote a play about him, so did T.S Eliot (Murder in the Cathedral).and the Anouilh play was adapted into the Burton/O'Toole movie. These are two very good plays and one very good movie. Such things do not come about by accident .


 The martyrdom of Thomas Beckett, medieval mural, Brookland church, Romney Marsh

P.S. It has been pointed out to me that the beach is at Bamburgh, not Alnwick. Alnwick doesn't even have a beach.