Salisbury, London, Köln - Monday, 25 July 2011

Steak and Mushroom Pie

A Day Lost


I get up early to pack, and then go out to find some breakfast.  I am hoping that the pastry shop off the Market Square will be open because I was eyeing their many pasties the other day, and wanted to have one before I left.  I am in luck, they are open, but with out seating.  So I buy a wonderful Steak and Mushroom Pie, and a black current juice and go sit on a park bench.  The pie is really good - lots of meat and mushrooms with a rich gravy - I'm a fan.  I walk around a bit considering an encore but decide against it.

I check out, and they hail a cab for me.  He whisks me off to the train station, and we talk about his holidays (Sierra Leone and Wales).  Fascinating.  This taxi driver has a more interesting life than most people - and socially responsible as well.  I'm impressed.

The train ride into London Waterloo is unremarkable, although there is an interesting woman who runs the concession cart.  She was there on the trip out, and here she is again (ginger ale and peanuts?) it must be what she does.  Again, the lands through which the track runs is a vibrant green (with the exception of a huge hog farm somewhere outside of Salisbury).  It is all remarkable clean and well kept.  As we make our way into London, I am fascinated with the skyline that is developing.  The "gerkin" is now surrounded by a "lipstick tube" an emerging glass pyramid, and other buildings all piled up on either side of the Thames right near the Tower.  I am reminded of La Defence in Paris, with its jumble of modern buildings.  I wonder how they will fare in time.  The British buildings just seem silly to me.  They grab attention, but for how long?  They quickly move past as we make our way into Waterloo station, and soon we are back into a Victorian-industrial esthetic.

I grab my bags and make my way down to the Bakerloo line, and go up to Paddington - it's rather quick today, and then onto an Express out to Heathrow.  I've made the day longer by doing this.  I could have taken the train from Salisbury to Woking, and then trained to Heathrow from there.  Next time, I shall know.  I've had good and bad moments at Heathrow - what will today bring?


Students!  Most of them are German (natürlich since I am checking in at Lufthansa) and in their early teens.  They are in a massive group, and each has to check in individually.  Bad for me - good education for them.  So it takes some time.

Then one is ushered into a world of "Duty Free".  I resist, only wanting to have a bit of lunch and a gate number.  Heathrow has the policy of witholding the gate number until "approximately 30 or 40 minutes prior to departure".  I have lunch at a place, hoping to replicate the morning pie, but no luck.  I have their version of a Cornish pastie, but it is not nearly as good.  There is a nice fruit salad as well, with a minimum of mellon.  Now I go and wait for a gate designation.  And I wait, and I wait.  At the last minute the gate is announced (15 minutes before take off) and the gate announced is 15 minutes away. Dash.

What I am looking forward to is flying over the Channel and seeing it from the air.  I am wrong, for all that I can see are clouds.  So I glance at a Die Welt article on Amy Winehouse, and there is a snack - a sort of apple cake and a drink all served with the utmost efficiency.  The burser for the flight has an odd English and German accent. He is equally not understandable in both languages.  As we approach Köln, the sky suddenly clears, and I am able to see the Rhine stretch from Köln down to Bonn as we make our way down and then back again to land at the airport.

We get off.  There is passport control!  What happened to the EU - ohne Grenzen and all of that.  It's quick, however.  The gates where we get off look amazingly like Tegel, until I continue on into a huge and modern airport.  It's built in the shape of a U, and I need to walk around almost it's entirety before getting to the S Bahn station.  It is a huge station and there are exactly two ticket machines for all these people - it takes some time, and the program is running slowly.  Lots of frustration on the part of travelers.  Finally I get a ticket and the train comes soon after.

I know that I am almost there when I spot the good Kaiser riding his horse at Heumarkt, and see the imposing romanesque profile of Groß Sankt Martinus.  I am anticipating having a good time looking at all this stuff, but first the hotel.  Arthur has recommended this place, the Domstern which is just a couple of blocks from the Hauptbanhof.  I make my way there - the reception is friendly, and the room is on the first floor with only an light-well window.  Oh well, it will be quiet and dark.  Perfect for sleeping, and not much else.

I do need some dinner.  I walk through the Hbf and come out just north of the Dom.  What a sight!  After Salisbury this seems to loom with a great deal of size and darkness.  Amazing scaffolding surrounds several points of the Dom, with a lot of work being done on the north tower.  But this is all for tomorrow.  I am hungry and tired, so I go to Gaffen am Dom, where the first question is Kölsch?  And the answer better be Ja! That with a Wienerschnitzle and a salad makes for a perfect evening.  They also have Vanilla Eis mit Rötegrutze but I will save that for later.  I leave this huge beerhall with notions of flopping into my bed.

P.S.  I just attempted to spell check this, and clicked on the spell check icon.  It was a sea of yellow.  I am in Germany.  My English is "wrong".  Please forgive any mis-spellings.

Salisbury, Sunday, 24 July 2011

Conflux - a study of the contrasts of sacredness


I am sleeping fitfully, and happily so - relaxation has begun.  There is, however, a sense of being prepared to meet and do for the choir.  This I find to be fulfilling and meaningful, but it does require effort and energy.  I get up early in order to have a little something to eat prior to liturgy, so I pop into Café Nero and have a toasted sandwich (quite good actually) and a Cafe Americano.  In walks one of our younger choir members, so we share a table and I take some time to get to know her better.  Her whole life is in front of her and it is a delight to hear her plans and her dreams.  She will do quite well, I think.  We walk together over to the Cathedral Close.  Even at this early hour, the tourists are beginning to wend their way to the close.  Gangs of kids from Spain, France, Germany, other parts of England, and the United States.  I wonder what they are thinking after listening to my young choir friend.

The Baptismal Font at Salisbury

It is to be a Baptism within the Eucharist, and another member of the congregation who is touring but not in the choir and I debate as to where we should sit.  The nave would allow us the opportunity to witness the baptism, and a seat in the quire would allow us to see the ceremonial of the Eucharist.  We choose the quire.

The baptism is dispersed throughout the Eucharistic liturgy.  The Presentation, Renunciations and Chrismation take place at the beginning of the Mass.  Normally, these rites take place appropriately at the doors of the Cathedral, but today an exception is made.  Then follows the Gloria, Collect and the Liturgy of the Word, with the altar party taking seats in the Presbytery.  The Gospel is read from the crossing, and the sermon was preached from the pulpit at the edge of the crossing - so this is all happening facing away from us - an interesting orientation for us.  Then there is a procession to the Font, with the congregation asked to join in the gathering.  We stay put, but crane our necks to see what is going on.  There, at the Font, we have the prayer over the water, the creed, and the actual baptism.  At the peace everyone returns to their places.  The Eucharist is celebrated and the communion is done, and after the communion we are back at the Baptism.  Here it is that the newly baptized are given their candles, and the blessings to all are given along with a sung dismissal.  Another interesting note, is that the color for Baptisms (as well as for Confirmation, and Ordination) is red - the color of the Holy Spirit - connecting these Sacraments visually.

Salisbury has a long nave, and I realized that it would be impossible to intimately see all that was about to happen.  Elements of the liturgy would be on my right, or my left, or right in front of me.  Some elements would be unseen, known only by voices and the responses in the bulletin.  I began to realize that this is really a more ideal situation for the worshiper, if they are sincere in seeing how life intersects with worship.  We have an unreal expectation when we desire to see everything immediately in front of us (and here I am not just talking about liturgy but of life as well).  Our culture wants to be immediate and proximate to all that life offers, but that is not possible.  Some stuff is both known, and unknown, and yet we become wise from experiencing it.  This worship allowed us to experience liturgy/life in a more real way - some elements sharply in focus, and others not.  In the cloister many St. Mark's people joined with me as we compared our observations and the knowledge that we had gained.  It was palpably electric as we shared ideas.

My friend and I go off to lunch.  I want to know more about her and her life.  She shares fully and asks questions in return.  It is, I think, a pastoral moment over stuffed mushrooms, a salad, and a spaghetti carbonara.

Concurrent with the conversation in the Cloister, there was a display of art throughout the cathedral and close by Sean Henry.  The show was "Conflux - A Union of the Sacred and the Anonymous' features over 20 sculptures of dramatically different scales."  His works, interspersed amongst the various holy people depicted on both wall and in niche seemed to make the point.  Rather than ramble on about this, I've included some examples:

Although on Saturday, I chose not to photograph these sculptures, my experience in the Liturgy compelled me to do so.  After taking the photographs and purchasing the requisite guide to the cathedral, I went back to the hotel to leave off my camera and rest a bit before returning to the cathedral for Evensong.

My seat at Evensong

Returning to the cathedral for Evensong, I sought out my friend and decided to sit with her in our "usual" place in the quire.  As I mounted the steps, the verger came over and said, "We'd like you to vest and to read."  So I followed her into the Vestry where they gave me a cassock, surplice and magnificent cope to wear (red in anticipation of St. James' Day).  The reading was from St. Mark 5:21-43 (Jairus' Daughter, and the Woman with the issue of blood - a rather long reading).  I enjoyed proclaiming the reading, since I was asked to do it in the Authorized Version (it's enjoying a 400th Anniversary) so the old English was a bit of a challenge.  One of the canons said I had given a "very thoughtful reading" of the text.  

After the service, there were photos, saying good-bye to the choir as they loaded a bus heading to Truro, their next gig.  One choir member asked me to bless them, so I boarded the bus and had a prayer, blessing, and dismissal.  I was sad to see them go on.

Dinner at Strada (Tomato Basil Salad and a Risotto with Scallops) then home.  What a day!

The cathedral spire from the Refectory

Salisbury, Saturday, 23 July 2011

Getting to know Sarum


I slept well, and luckily the hotel is very quiet.  There's no breakfast here, so I have to go out and find some, and end up at Nuggs, a restaurant nestled into a medieval building (1268).  Scrambled eggs, with lox, and toast, along with a side of baked beans, seemed to be in order for the morning.  Across the street in the square there is a market, and I wander around seeing what the produce looks like.  There are lovely strawberries, varieties of apples that I've never heard of, truffles and black truffle oil, gammon steaks (we would call it ham - is this related to the Spanish jamon, or the French jambon?  Anna will know, and I shall have to ask her.  There's a lot of everything that's offered here: electric cigarettes, underwear, an amazing country pastry place, old books, charities, and you name it.  I run into several choir members and enjoy a chat with them.

It's time for a coffee or something, so I find a lovely pastry shop for a tarte citron and a macchiato.  In my general wanderings I meander into St. Thomas  à Becket Church which has the most wonderful hammer-beam ceilings.  Women are getting ready for a wedding, putting flowers everywhere and making other preparations.

Later, after the wedding is over, changes are rung from the bell-tower for a good hour or so - such is the joy.  I make my way over to the Cathedral for the purpose of taking some pictures of the stonework.  The building is glowing a light ocher in the sunlight, and it is quite beautiful.  The limestone of the Western Front in reacting to the rain has dissolved some of the statuary  - you can spot the replacements. The ancient stuff, however, is quite nice.

In addition, an artist has added some modern polychrome sculpture of ordinary people that both contrasts and links to the ancient portrayals.  When I was in Seminary, the school was hoping to build a permanent chapel on the campus.  The collect of buildings had been designed by Klauder and Day, the Philadelphia firm responsible for the gothic buildings at Princeton.  The seminary was proposing to plop down a modern building by Helmuth, Obata + Kassabaum, a renowned modernist group.  Many didn't like the proposed building, but I defended it in an editorial in our campus magazine, Seminar.  I reasoned that we needed to have something of our time for our worship.

Rain spout on the Western Front at Salisbury

And here is the great dilemma with old buildings, such as this one.  The nineteenth century has a definite mark in the building - not with the art and architecture of that period, but with its neo-gothic additions or replacements.  The cathedral at Salisbury is spotted with many eras and many architectural hands.  I got to thinking about the Cathedral at Chartres, where one experiences a truly medieval building, with few additions

The Labyrinth at Chartres

The floor has not been modernized there, the chairs scrapping over the ancient labyrinth, and the sidewalls in the ambulatory untouched.  There have been additions, but they seem to be relegated to furniture and stuff.  At Salisbury, there is a feeling of openness to what ever time had to offer, while Chartres seems more circumspect and pristine.

Outer wall of the choir at Chartres

New Lectern at Chartres

Perhaps it is because of the liturgical conservatism that is inherent in the Roman Catholicism of Chartres, as opposed to a more experimental usage (the Elizabethan reforms, the Puritans, the repristinations and recovery of Sarum usage, and the Victorian and Oxford Movement aesthetics) in Anglicanism. Which did I like more? - hard to say - each is unique and that is, I think, the blessing.

Lunch at the Red Lion was a "jacket potato" (baked potato with a salad and a dressing for the potato of "Greenland prawns" and a mildly spicy "rose sauce."  A nap seemed ripe before I went back to the cathedral for Evensong, where I was privileged to read the First Lesson (I Kings 3:5-12 - Solomon's dream and prayer).  The choir sang marvelously, and we all chatted after at supper and later at a pub, where our table talked theology and culture.  It was a wonderful day.

The cloister at Salisbury

SFO - LHR, 21-22 July 2011

Just Getting There is Half the Battle


It is a bittersweet day.  I'm excited about my travel to England, but my heart is in my throat about Anna leaving for Kansas.  Thus we have arranged for a last breakfast at the diner nearby (a favorite of hers).  The conversation, however, isn't a usual good-bye conversation, but rather the usual attempt to try and figure ourselves and our family out, including all the laughs and sighs that that usually involves.  She is also picking up some furniture that we have stored for her, and then she will head down to my sister Bonnie's to pick up Grandma Terrass' rocker.  How odd that it will travel back to a place about 24 miles from whence it originally came.  Anna drops me off, and there are tears - but that was to be expected.  I look back and she is gone.  What a wonderful decade of togetherness it has been.

I check in, and it's between flights in that section of the terminal, so security is a breeze.  What to do with the time?  Walk.  Iced Tea. Wait in the lounge, but not for long - they load the plane an hour in advance. I'm seated next to a very handsome African-American woman, a performer.  I watch as she memorizes lyrics and I'm fascinated.  The meal is mediocre, but what am I expecting?  I sleep on and off, and my window gazing is curtailed by a very bossy family in the center section who keep grousing about the light, and then keep everyone around them awake playing games with their daughter.  Misanthropy!

We are early into London, at least 45 minutes early.  There's a bit of a line at passport control, but soon I've picked up my luggage, purchased an express train ticket, and am on my way to Paddington Station.  Once there I swipe my Oyster card, and am delighted to find that I have 30p left on it.  I load it up with a few pounds, making my way on the Tube a little less troublesome.  I head for the Bakerloo line, and am soon at Waterloo with a bunch of time on my hands.  My train to Salisbury isn't until 12:20.  I have breakfast, but avoid the Black Pudding.  Then I realize I can check my luggage and walk around a bit.

I decide to walk over to the London Eye and see if I could do that, but the lines are overly long.  The Hungerford and Jubilee Bridges, however beacon, so I take a long walk.  In the midst of the Jubilee Bridge I realize that I could have quickly gotten over to Tate Britain and popped into their Victorian Rooms, but I wasn't thinking ahead, and now the time was too short.  The walk along the bridge, which is a stunning piece of engineering, and the sights along the Embankment, are food enough.  I do visit one Church, St. John's, built by an architect unknown to me, and badly damaged during the blitz.  It was rather cheaply restored in the 50s, but I take some time, enjoy the paintings and rest.

Soon it is time for Salisbury - I board the train, have some "crisps" and a ginger ale and rest.  The countryside is beautiful.  There has been a bit of rain, so everything is quite green.  Once in Salisbury, I lug my luggage to my hotel, and on the way I am running into choir members right and left: Patrick and Melissa, Susan, Martha and others.  My hotel, City Lodge, is modest, but quiet and clean.  That's all I need.  I take an hour's nap, shower, and head over to the cathedral.  I shall speak more about the cathedral tomorrow.  I walk with Martha Smith as we enter the close and then the cathedral.  There is an evening Eucharist honoring St. Mary Magdalene.  The choir sings a Byrd mass quite wonderfully, and there is a good sermon.  The vestments are magnificent.  Dinner after in the refectory with all of the choir - quite wonderful.  Finally home to bed - I am quite tired

The Streets of Berkeley - 7 July 2011

Trolling for lunch - finding the Gospel

I had just finished a counseling session with a troubled individual and it was well past the lunch hour.  As I thought about where to go to lunch, someplace quiet, where I could rest and hide for a minute or two.  I decided that I needed to take a long walk and fine something different.  I walked down to Oxford Street, and then continued north to Center Street.  It was there that I would make a search for something new and different.  I did find a restaurant, Al Borz, a wonderful Persian restaurant that I shall visit again (Lamb shank with tomato broth, garbanzo and white beans, and fresh mint, cilantro [which I quickly discarded - tastes like soap] and basil - all very good.  This, however, is not the story.  

As I rounded the corner onto Center, I noticed two ACLU volunteers replete with clip boards, bright blue T shirts, and broad smiles.  I heard the first say, "blah, blah, blah, gay and lesbian rights..." which caught my attention.  As I moved on I caught the eye of the second volunteer.  She looked at me, slightly opened her mouth, gulped, and then averted her gaze.  I continued on, and then stopped, turned, and walked back to her.  She looked at me as I asked, "Were you afraid to talk to me?"  "Yes", she replied, "I just got reamed out by a preacher, who told me I was doing wrong."  We looked at each other for a second, and then I said, "I'm sorry about that.  I'm a gay man and a priest, and I really appreciate what you are doing here."  She dissolved into one of the biggest and broadest smiles I have ever seen.  She had been shaken up by the preacher man. "It wasn't very Christian," I said, and she agreed.  They were not asking for signatures but for money, so I gave a little donation.  

When I returned to see her, after lunch, we talked more about what she was doing, and I invited her to Saint Mark's.  "Be set for a surprise," I said, "not all churches are like what you have just experienced."  I asked her for her name, and she had remembered mine.  I thanked for the great work that she was doing, and as I left I turned to look to see that big, bright smile - her gift to me.

The Streets of Berkeley - Some weeks ago.

Suffer the Little Children

One of the things that I am going to miss is calling my daughter Anna on the phone, and arranging to meet her at A Musical Offering, a short distance from her office on campus, and my office at Saint Mark's Church. There over a decaf Americano and their wonderful Peruvian Corn Bread, and Anna's "tea to go" and some other goody, we would talk about our work, and lives, and her up-coming move to Kansas for a teaching stint at Kansas State University at Manhattan, Kansas.  We've enjoyed over a decade of proximity, full of Sunday night dinners (or "dinner with a dictionary", as Anna calls it) or breakfasts at the Cafe Royal in Albany, California.  Now times together will be few and far between.  I did however, have my opportunity.

As we parted, I began my walk down Bancroft Way (with no small amount of sadness), and Anna crossed the street, back onto the campus.  As I crossed the street that runs in front of Wesley House, pictured above, I noticed a group of 5 or 6 women with 2 or 3 kids each paralleling my walk down Bancroft and then crossing in the midst of traffic to land at my feet in front of Wesley House.  I nodded a greeting and moved on down the street.  As I passed, I heard a voice behind me say, "A blessing, Father?"  I turned around, and there were all the women and children gathered at the corner, waiting - looking at me for a blessing.  So hand upon pate, with small eyes looking up at me, I asked each their name, and blessed them - slowly and deliberately.

What a future stared up at me?!  And how many more sons and daughters are offered to us than we already have.  Blessed?  I hope they were, but it was I who was blessed by their presence - angels unaware!

Pablum or Meat - Museum Exhibitions

It always makes for a pleasant weekend when one of us suggests that we go to a museum.  We do share a common attitude in museum attendance, and one that I share with my daughter as well.  I found this out when Anna and I went to the Vatican Museum in 2000.  In the lobby, she sat me down and said, "Dad, I don't do museums with any body."  "Great!" I replied, "I'll meet you back here at 4:30."  And so it is with Arthur and me - we go our separate ways, bumping into each other occasionally and making comments.  Over the past two weekends, we went to see three separate exhibitions that interested us - wending our way separately and then sharing thoughts.

The first was the Splendors of Faith, Scars of Conquest Exhibition at the Oakland Museum of California.  The museum just reopened a couple of months ago, after an extensive rehabilitation project that was long over due.  When we went for the reopening, we both felt that the exhibitions at the museum had been "dumbed down", not layering the amount of information that could be available either on the piece or the artist or the event.  In this particular exhibition, whose title promises a great deal of content and historical analysis, there was precious little.  Some items were miss-identified or the explanations of the object revealed a woeful lack of understanding of Roman Catholic liturgy and symbology.  The culture upon which all of this religiosity was imposed was barely mentioned, and the accommodations that the Church made to native understandings was either ignored or unknown.  I expected that there would be a piece on Churrigueresque, but perhaps that was too late a development for this exhibition.  The long and the short of it is that the show didn't deliver what the title promised, and didn't talk about the culture that received these baroque wonders.  We left a bit disappointed.

The next visit was to the Palace of the Legion of Honor, where we went to see Pulp Fashion - the art of Isabelle de Borchgrave.  Friends had been raving about this show, in which the artist reproduces costume shown in paintings from various museums, including the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, in paper.  

After one is stunned by the craft of the works, little else is there.  Several pieces were said to be "inspired" by works at the Uffizi, or the Louvre, but the inspiration wasn't faithful to the original.  I wondered what the art was, other than a very careful craft.  Of more interest were various samples of fabric, tapestry, and lace from the museum's own fabric collection, along with a couple of pieces of furniture.  This was something with which I could relate.  These artifacts were true representatives of their time and art, rather than being an "inspiration" of what that art was like.  However, there were some fine curatorial comments, noting what the social function of a few articles of clothing - attempting to link this effort to the real.  It, however, was not enough.  We both met at the appointed time a place and confessed that we were a bit underwhelmed.  It was definitely time for lunch.

There was still time in the afternoon, so we headed over to the de Young.  There were two exhibitions going on there, The huge Balenciaga and Spain, which had just opened that day, and the wonderful Olmec: Colossal Masterworks of Ancient Mexico.  The Balenciaga exhibition, which would have served as a great foil to the Pulp Fashion show, was likely to be very crowded and could be enjoyed another day.  The Olmec show was just amazing, and we thoroughly enjoyed it.  Here was an exhibition of artifacts that entertained, and educated, giving the museum goer a real sense of this 15th Century BCE civilization.  There was a good audio guide, excellent notations at the showcases or at the objects themselves, a video on various aspects of the archeology and the artifacts, and a sense that there was some respectable scholarship involved in staging and documenting the exhibition.

Unlike the Pulp exhibition at the Legion, and the Faith exhibition in Oakland, one got the sense of really engaging with the human experience of another time and age.  Although there is still no reliable ability to translate Olmec inscriptions, the iconographers have done an excellent job of tying the human experience recorded in the artifacts themselves with the natural world around - the world of time, the world of animals, and the world of cult, that hoped to bridge all of the Olmec experience.  This was a direct connect, unlike the Spanish missionaries who interpreted their catholic culture in European models laid upon a native culture (which was not interpreted at all in the exhibition) and unlike the craft of the artist whose "meta art" of the clothing of portraiture actually put another layer between the viewer and the human experience documented in the paintings.  We both left fulfilled. I felt a sermon coming on.