Hope you all enjoyed the big day today – of course some of us had to work as usual (Walking Tours were still happening while you lot slouched in front of the TV – grumble, grumble…)

In honour of Kate and Wills (I’m sure they’ll be thrilled!), I’m posting a few vaguely Royal Wedding-related musings that formed my Thought For The Day on Radio Ulster this week.  Enjoy!

Where were you on 29th July 1981?  As the next Big Royal Wedding approaches, we’re all talking about what we were doing at the time of the last one.  I remember it perfectly: I was six, it was a lovely hot day, and we got to have wheelie bin races down our street.  That’s my one memory: not the royal wedding, not the dress or the vows or the crowds, not the history-making that was unfolding on the TV screen. My only memory is that for our street party, everyone brought out their shiny brand-new black plastic wheelie bins, which had just been delivered to our street, and we spent the day playing wheelie-bin dodgems, wheelie-bin races, how-many-people-can-you-fit-inside-a-wheelie-bin, and any number of other health-and-safety-defying, wheelie-bin related amusements.  We had a great day – but it’s just possible that my six-year-old self was not fully switched on to the importance of the day.  And now my thirty-six year old self can only remember that one silly detail about that historic date.

Memory is a funny thing sometimes.  Why can I remember the bin races, and all sorts of daft details from my childhood – theme tunes of Dangermouse, the title of every Doctor Who story – but forget the name of the person who just introduced themselves to me thirty seconds ago?  Why can I remember every word of Kylie Minogue’s ‘I should be so lucky’, but forget every word of my First Aid training?  My earliest memory – of sitting watching clothes spin in the washing machine – why did it stick, when every other event of the first 3 years of my life is forgotten?

Sometimes we’re stuck with the random things our minds and memories latch onto.  But sometimes something is so important, so personal, so true, that we choose to remember it.  We write notes, or diaries, or leave post-its on the fridge, or – most importantly – keep telling the story.  Have you noticed that the incidents you remember most clearly are the things you have told other people about? When you dine out on a story, telling it to one friend after another, the details and the memory stick.  We even tend to start stories like that by saying “I’ll never forget it-”

We’ve just passed through the season of Easter, and that’s exactly what we’ve been doing – retelling the story so that we remember it, because it’s important.  Every year we recount the details – Judas’ kiss, the moment of choice in the garden of Gethsemane, the horrors of the trial and crucifixion, the blossoming, breathless hope of Easter morning.  We tell it and re-tell it because when all else fades, when all else passes, this is what I choose to remember: that Jesus lived, and died, and rose again.  Something too good to be forgotten.

No matter whether I’m stamping around the place as Titanic Quarter Chaplain, Dock Walk leader, or Titanic Walking Tour guide, it seems that everything I do these days involves walking.  Which has two direct results:  1 – my legs are all trim and toned; and 2 – I’m starting to really, truly believe that walking is the best thing.

I’m not the only one who thinks so – I was reading an article in one of Susan’s ‘wimmin magazines’ recently (all blokes read them, let’s be honest) which was advocating walking as the healthiest, happiest way to spend your leisure time.  It’s good for you (much better than jogging – think of your knees!), clears the mind, helps you slow down, benefits your health, promotes mindfulness and a healthy perspective on the day.  So it’s good common-sense – and I think it’s good God-sense too.

When I think of some of the highlights of this past month, they all involve tramping along in some way.  My first-ever Titanic Walking Tour was something a bit special – a lovely group that bonded and chatted really naturally as we walked along through the TQ (walking is a natural way to meet and chat with people without feeling pressured or awkward).  My last-minute reading of Thomas Merton’s Seven Storey Mountain, the night before the last Dock Book Group, was achieved by listening to the audiobook version on headphones while walking around the still, dark streets near my house  (walking is a great way to get some time on your own).

I can think of moments during Titanic Walking Tours when the delight on peoples’ faces was plain to see, as we uncover, far from the beaten track, a track or trace or foundation left from Titanic’s day (walking is a great way to properly explore an area and appreciate your surroundings).  And our weekly Dock Walks have become, for me and Susan, a true and very profound expression of church – commissioning Karen while looking out over the TQ, or listening to the Emmeus Road story while trekking a long stretch of straight road beneath the cranes, or celebrating Easter Day in the open air… (walking is a great way to worship a great God in the great outdoors).

In some ways I’m so grateful that The Dock didn’t have a building to begin with. ‘Walking church’ evolved gradually over the last year out of necessity, but has become something very precious in the process.  Many people feel closest to God out in the open air, in the midst of creation – but when churches meet to worship, our gatherings almost always happen indoors, behind stone walls, with the beauty of the world shown only as pictures on a screen.  It’s great to be back outside! – it worked for the disciples, for the early church, for the first Christian pilgrims and many of the saints – time we rediscovered it.

Easter Sunday is the ultimate day of Good News.  So today I’d like to share a couple of links to Good News stories that caught my eye over the last wee while.

The first is a Good News story for Northern Ireland – a little reminder (and we do need them from time to time) of just how much has changed over the last decade, and how we are living in a vastly more hopeful era.  Check it out here.

The second is a really sweet story involving a letter to God, a little girl, and the Archbishop of Canterbury – you can read it here.

The third is a brilliant video by Rend Collective Experiment (if you haven’t heard of them check out their wholeheartedly-recommended album here), telling the Christian story – and especially the Easter story – in a simple, fresh but very moving way:

Happy Easter!

I am absolutely utterly convinced that this ‘Shared Medley’ living is the way life is meant to be.  I’ve had the best week!

I’ve connected with Holy Week services in my own denomination (Church of Ireland) and also in a new Shared Medley context (St Oliver Plunkett’s Parish in West Belfast).  I’ve enjoyed being up front preaching; I’ve enjoyed being a congregation member in the pews; I’ve loved following the Holy Week narrative through Wordlive.  I’ve met people for coffee in places which are almost becoming like a familiar second home (like the fab coffee lounge in the TQ Premier Inn) and in places that are brand-new (like the swish new Public Records Office, now located in the Titanic Quarter – pictures below).

I’ve met old and new faces.  I’ve talked Dock with tourists, priests, chaplains, businessmen, sailors, lawyers, directors and students.  I started Wednesday by broadcasting live to (an enthralled?) nation on Radio Ulster.  I started today with a coffee with co-Chaplain Karen, to remind me that I’m not on my own any more. I had a fantastic day today as a Titanic Walking Tour guide (including, in this afternoon’s tour, the great honour of leading the biggest-ever group to turn up for a Titanic Walking Tour – 45 of them! – pictured right)  In short I am out of my comfort zone, doing things and meeting people and taking chances and making contacts that never would’ve crossed my path if I’d stayed in the safe confines of my own denomination and community – and it is the best thing ever!

Today I want to leave you with a striking story told in Fr Martin’s sermon from the service I attended at St Oliver Plunkett’s.  Its a story he first heard on last week’s Sunday Sequence (and if you’re reading this before Easter Day, you can still hear the story on iPlayer here – it’s from 5:50-10:15 in the programme), from a new book called The Band Played On, looking at the eight extraordinary musicians on board the Titanic who chose to sacrifice their own lives and continue playing right until the fateful moment when the ship sank.  Eyewitness reports recall that they played uplifting, lively music to keep spirits up during the frantic evacuation of the lifeboats, before concluding with the hymn Nearer My God To Thee in the ship’s final moments.

The incredible message for The Dock is that this band was the very definition of the ‘Shared Medley’ – composed of a mixture of Catholics, Congregationalists, Anglicans and Methodists.  The impact that their sacrifice and service made on the survivors was one of the first stories to emerge in the papers in the days following the tragedy, and was never forgotten.  (Even today, Nearer My God To Thee is often first and foremost associated with the Titanic.)  They did something profound, heroic and immensely powerful.  And they did it from a shared basis – not letting any of their differences of background or denomination get in the way of the important, beautiful thing they were doing.

What a challenge.