Between

Friday, 17 January 2025

'The Way': Exhibition viewing evening

We had a very well-attended exhibition viewing evening tonight at St Andrew's Wickford for Steve Whittle's 'The Way' exhibition. Steve was interviewed and gave some fascinating insights into his career and work. We covered some of the same ground that we covered in our interview for ArtWay. The interview covers Steve's fascinating career and the range of work he undertakes, including his primary focus on collage.

'The Way', an exhibition by Steve Whittle at St Andrew's Wickford (11 London Road, Wickford, Essex SS12 0AN) from 11 January to 18 April 2025. This artist, based in Westcliff-on-Sea based, uses collage to create Stations of the Cross & a range of other scenes, both religious and landscape. St Andrew’s is usually open: Sat 9am-12.30pm; Sun 9.30am-12 noon; Mon 2-3.45pm; Tue 1-4.30pm; Wed 10am-12 noon; Fri 10am-1pm.

‘The main medium I use is collage and over many years I have developed the technique which can be seen in many of the pictures in this exhibition.’

The primary subject matter in Steve Whittle's work is colour, which has been the major theme. The work is often produced in series and is unified by the similar images and combinations of colours that are used. Each picture can therefore be viewed as a component of a group or seen as an individual piece.

The medium Whittle uses is collage and over many years he has developed the technique which can be seen in many of the pictures in this exhibition. Firstly, the paper, which is acid free, is prepared with several coats of acrylic paint in the appropriate colour and the torn paper collage is applied to this surface with acrylic glue in as many layers as necessary to get the correct colour combinations. When the picture is complete it is then coated with UVS varnish.

‘The Way’ includes a series of Stations of the Cross, plus other crucifixion and resurrection images.

The Spring 2025 programme for Unveiled, our fortnightly Friday night arts and performance event at St Andrew’s Church (7.00 – 9.00 pm, 11 London Road, Wickford, Essex SS12 0AN), began tonight:

Spring Programme 2025

31 January (7.00 pm) – ‘Four Essex Trios’. An evening of poems and photographs with Jonathan Evens exploring thin places and sacred spaces in Essex, including Bradwell, Broomfield, Pleshey, and Runwell.
14 February (7.00 pm) – An evening with the Ladygate Scribblers. Hear poetry and prose from a longestablished Wickford-based writers group.
28 February (7.30 pm) – Open Mic Night. Everybody is welcome to come along & play, read, sing or just spectate. See you there for a great evening of live performance!
14 March (7.00 pm) – Simon Law in concert. Simon has fronted the rock bands Fresh Claim, Sea Stone and Intransit, as well as being a founder of Plankton Records and becoming an Anglican Vicar. This will be his final concert for us before retirement.
28 March (7.30 pm) – Dave Crawford & friends in concert. Popular local musician, Dave Crawford writes engaging/melodic songs in Americana/ Alt-Rock/IndieFolk. He has performed at the Leigh Folk Festival, Pin Drop Sessions, & Music for Mind together with Kev Butler. This will be Dave’s third concert at Unveiled. We have also enjoyed his powerful vocals & guitar at our Open Mic Nights.
11 April (7.30 pm) – Tim Almond in concert. ‘Around the World in 60 Minutes’ featuring songs and stories from Kenya, Ethiopia, Malawi, Ecuador and Bangladesh.

See http://wickfordandrunwellparish.org.uk/whats-on.html and https://basildondeanery.co.uk/index.php/news/ for more information.

These events do not require tickets (just turn up on the night). There will be a retiring collection to cover artist and church costs.

Our churches are places to enjoy cultural programmes including concerts and exhibitions as well as being places to see art and architecture.

St Andrews Church in Wickford provides regular art, culture and heritage events and we are looking to develop this further. We think that to do so will benefit the Town by bringing more people to the Town Centre. As part of a Feasibility Study exploring what might be possible that is funded by UKFSP Feasibility Fund, we are asking people locally to share what art, culture and heritage activities they are interested in and what they are looking for.

We would be very grateful if you could complete the survey and tell others about it. The survey can be found at https://forms.gle/dmPH7uzAafuAqLzDA. We are keen that as many people in and around Wickford complete the survey as possible.

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11:59 - Psalm 115 - To Thy Holy Name.

Wednesday, 15 January 2025

Prayer: Away from others and in secret

Here's the sermon that I shared at St Andrew's Wickford this morning:

When Jesus prayed on this occasion, he went to a dark, deserted place (Mark 1.29-39). When he taught his disciples about prayer, he taught them to pray in secret with the door closed so they couldn’t be seen by others (Matthew 6.5-6).

While there is a place for public prayer, personal prayer is not for public consumption as it is something that happens directly between ourselves and God. In addition, as we see in this story of Jesus’ ministry, it is personal prayer undertaken in secret, hidden places that is what fuels public ministry.

Jesus knew that he could not carry out his public ministry without time spent in private prayer, that is why he gets up early in the morning and goes to a quiet place away from others in order to pray. It is not important that we imitate Jesus in the specifics of when and where he prays but it is important that we prioritise prayer in the way that he does and find our own times for private prayer as well as finding our own hidden, secret places in which to pray.

So, reflect for a moment on the times and places where you are able to pray.

A saying that has come to us from the Desert Fathers and Mothers, hermits, monks and nuns who lived mainly in the Scetes desert of Egypt beginning around the third century AD, is this: ‘Stay in your cell. Your cell will teach you everything’. The idea is that being in conversation with God through prayer will teach us everything we need to know. For this reason, when he was interviewed once by Radio 4 and was asked which wilderness he would go to for Lent if he could be taken anywhere in world, the Archbishop of York replied that he would stay in his own living room. The location for our prayer is not the main point (although quiet and privacy will help); instead, the point is the quality and depth of our prayer.

From the mid-1920s onwards, Evelyn Underhill became highly-regarded as a retreat conductor and an influential spiritual director. Much of her ministry was undertaken at our own Diocesan Retreat House in Pleshey.

In her book on The Fruits of The Spirit, she wrote, in relation to retreats, about Jesus’ injunction to shut the door and pray in secret:

“Christ, who so seldom gave detailed instruction about anything, did give some detailed instruction of that … recollection which is the essential condition of real prayer, real communion with God.

"When you pray, go into a room by yourself - and shut the door." I think we can almost see the smile with which He said those three words, and those three words define what we have to try to do. Anyone can retire into a quiet place and have a thoroughly unquiet time in it - but that is not … the shutting of the door …

Shut the door. It is an extraordinarily difficult thing to do. Nearly everyone pulls it to and leaves it slightly ajar so that a whistling draught comes in from the outer world, with reminders of all the worries, interests, conflicts, joys and sorrows of daily life.

But Christ said shut and He meant shut. A complete barrier deliberately set up, with you on one side alone with God and everything else without exception on the other side. The voice of God is very gentle; we cannot hear it if we let other voices compete. It is no use at all to enter that room, that inner sanctuary, clutching the daily paper, the reports of all the societies you support, your engagement book and a large bundle of personal correspondence. All these must be left outside.

The object … is not intercession or self-exploration, but such communion with Him as shall afterwards make you more powerful in intercession; such self loss in Him as shall heal your wounds by new contact with His life and love.”

Jesus’ words were addressed to ordinary people going about their everyday lives, so his call to shut the door when praying was for each time we pray. Seeking the opportunity of being alone with God and attending to God in order that we may do His will better in our everyday lives was intended by Jesus as a regular experience. The distractions Evelyn Underhill notes are with us each time we pray. We need to face them each time we pray. Jesus said, ‘whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.’ Our reward will be, as Evelyn Underhill wrote, ‘real communion with God.’

So, reflect again for a moment on the times and places where you are able to genuinely shut the door and be in quiet and in peace as you pray.

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Lavine Hudson - Create In Me.

Sunday, 12 January 2025

Windows on the world (501)

Chelmsford, 2024

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Scott Stapp - Higher Power.

Immersed in the story

Here's the sermon I shared at St Mary’s Runwell this morning:

The favourite Christmas story of the Archbishop of York concerns a two-year-old called Miriam at a church on the edge of Chichester where he was then parish priest.

The red brick rectangular church seated about 80 and was full to overflowing for the Christmas Day service. As every space was taken, the crib scene had been placed under the altar. During the service Miriam wandered into the sanctuary and stood for a while observing the nativity scene. It was a large nativity set and so the characters in the scene were about the same size as the two-year-old. After observing the scene for a while, Miriam carefully climbed in under the altar making her way around the characters to sit in a space within the crib scene where she then remained for the rest of the service.

What she did was essentially an acted parable to the congregation because she became part of the story. That is what happens – it is what we are doing – when we become Christians. In other words, for many of us, it is what is going on when we are baptised.

Baptism is our immersion in the Christian story; a story which begins with God’s creation of the universe and life on earth. It continues with our rebellion as human beings. Our saying to God that we know who we are and what we need to do and, therefore, will go ahead and do our own thing. We all live with the consequences of that right now.

But in the story which the Bible tells, God does not leave us simply to do our own thing. First, he chooses the people of Israel and through his special relationship with them seeks to call all people back to their true identity and purpose and then he sends his own Son, Jesus, to reach out in rescue and return us to him. He does this so that each one of us can find our identity and purpose in God and play our part in bringing the kingdom of God in full on earth as it is in heaven.

When Jesus was baptised, he was saying that he would immerse himself in this story and play his special, unique part within it (Luke 3. 15 – 17, 21 – 22). As he made that commitment, God the Father affirmed him in his identity and purpose by saying, “You are my own dear Son. I am pleased with you.”

As we do what Miriam did and enter the story, then we are also affirmed by God in just the same way. St Paul writes in Romans 8. 14 – 17 that:

“Those who are led by God's Spirit are God's children. For the Spirit that God has given you does not make you slaves and cause you to be afraid; instead, the Spirit makes you God's children, and by the Spirit's power we cry out to God, “Father! my Father!” God's Spirit joins himself to our spirits to declare that we are God's children. Since we are his children, we will possess the blessings he keeps for his people, and we will also possess with Christ what God has kept for him; for if we share Christ's suffering, we will also share his glory.”

What he is saying is that as we enter the story we are adopted by God as his children and become brothers and sisters of Jesus, co-heirs with him of all he possesses.

You may remember the wonderful words of Philippians 2. 6 – 11 which say that Jesus gave up the equality he had with God the Father in heaven in order to be born as a human being, living and dying as our servant in order to save us:

“For this reason God raised him to the highest place above
and gave him the name that is greater than any other name.
And so, in honour of the name of Jesus
all beings in heaven, on earth, and in the world below
will fall on their knees,
and all will openly proclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.”

That same glory, St Paul says, is shared with us as we enter the story, join the family of God and play our part with the story. The incredible message of Christianity is that our rightful identity as human beings is that of being God’s own dear children with whom he is greatly pleased.

How do we play our part? That all depends on our coming to know the story and what happens within it. New Testament scholar Tom Wright has described Holy Scripture as being like a five-act play containing the first four acts in full (i.e. 1. Creation, 2. Fall, 3. Israel, 4. Jesus). “The writing of the New Testament,” he says, “would then form the first scene in the fifth act, and would simultaneously give hints (Romans 8, 1 Corinthians 15, parts of the Apocalypse) of how the play is supposed to end ... The church would then live under the 'authority' of the extant story, being required to offer an improvisatory performance of the final act as it leads up to and anticipates the intended conclusion ... the task of Act 5 ... is to reflect on, draw out, and implement the significance of the first four Acts, more specifically, of Act 4 in the light of Acts 1-3 ... Faithful improvisation in the present time requires patient and careful puzzling over what has gone before, including the attempt to understand what the nature of the claims made in, and for, the fourth Act really amount to.”

So, we start by looking at what we know of the story to date – the things God has done in and through Israel, Jesus and the Church – and we also look at the hints we have about the way the story will end with the coming in full of the kingdom of God on earth as in heaven. Then we say to ourselves, ‘What is it that people do in this story? How do they act and behave? And then we start to do and say similar things, as we have the opportunity. As Christians we are never given a script which has all our lines and actions printed on it. Instead, we have to improvise our part on the basis of what we know of the story so far, on the basis of the example provided by those who have lived in the story before, and on the basis of the opportunities provided in the places where we are and among the people that we know.

Living in the Christian story, therefore, is a challenge – something we should know anyway from looking at the life and death of Jesus – but it comes with the affirmation that we are part of God’s family; his dearly loved children, brothers and sisters of and co-heirs with Jesus himself. When we know this, we can relax because whatever happens to us we are accepted, forgiven, loved and gifted by the God who created all things and who will bring all things to their rightful end.

When we do that, we are like Miriam climbing in under the altar to become part of the crib scene. When we do that, we become part of God’s story which makes us his children and gives us identity, purpose and meaning. May it be so for each one of us. Amen.

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Iona - Edge Of The World.

Saturday, 11 January 2025

Five Trios

'Five Trios' is a series of poems on thin places and sacred spaces in the Diocese of Chelmsford. The five poems in the series are:

The poems have been published by Amethyst Review and International Times.

The series draws inspiration from T.S. Eliot's 'Four Quartets' and, in common, with the 'Thin Places and Sacred Spaces' anthology reflects on the experience of feeling the touch of eternity in art, nature, silence, or sacred architecture. The ‘thin place’ is a Celtic term, originally indicating a specific geographical location where the veil between heaven and earth seems exceptionally thin or lifted altogether. Barking, Bradwell, Broomfield, Pleshey and Runwell are all places in the Diocese of Chelmsford where I have had that experience and where heaven and earth, past, present and future seem to be intermingled.

'Barking' is about St Margaret’s Barking and Barking Abbey and draws on my time as a curate at St Margaret's. My other posts about St Margaret's Barking can be found here, here, here, and here. See also here and here.

'Bradwell' is a celebration of the history of the Chapel of St Peter-on-the-Wall, the Othona Community, and of pilgrimage to those places. My previous posts about Bradwell and the Othona Community can be found here and here.

Broomfield in Essex became a village of artists following the arrival of Revd John Rutherford in 1930. His daughter, the artist Rosemary Rutherford, also moved with them and made the vicarage a base for her artwork including paintings and stained glass. Then, Gwynneth Holt and Thomas Bayliss Huxley-Jones moved to Broomfield in 1949 where they shared a large studio in their garden and both achieved high personal success. 'Broomfield' reviews their stories, work, legacy and motivations. For more on the artists of Broomfield, all of whom are commemorated there with blue plaques, see here, here, here, here and here.

'Pleshey' celebrates the Diocesan Retreat House at Pleshey in Essex and the legacy of Evelyn Underhill as a retreat director. My posts about Pleshey can be found here and my posts about Evelyn Underhill here. My poem can also be found on the Diocesan Retreat House website here.

'Runwell' takes the reader on a visit to St Mary's Runwell, while also reflecting on the spirituality of the space plus its history and legends. This poem has also been included in the Amethyst Press anthology, 'Thin Places and Sacred Spaces',

I am giving a reading of the five poems accompanied by photographs at St Andrew's Wickford on Friday 31 January at 7.00 pm and am also giving a talk at St Mary with St Leonard Broomfield about two of the Broomfield artists on Saturday 8 February at 2.00 pm.

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Billy Bragg - A13, Trunk Road To The Sea.

ArtWay: Interview with Steve Whittle

My latest interview for ArtWay is with Steve Whittle, whose exhibition at St Andrew's Wickford opens next week. The interview covers Steve's fascinating career and the range of work he undertakes, including his primary focus on collage. See below for more about Steve and his exhibition at St Andrew's.

ArtWay.eu has been hailed "a jewel in the crown of work in Christianity and the arts," and having come under the custodianship of the Kirby Laing Centre, the much-loved publication is entering an exciting new chapter in its story with the launch of a new website in September.

Since its founding, ArtWay has published a rich library of materials and resources for scholars, artists, art enthusiasts and congregations concerned about linking art and faith. Founded by Marleen Hengelaar-Rookmaaker in 2009, ArtWay's significance is reflected in its designation as UNESCO digital heritage material in the Netherlands.

In the video above, the ArtWay team recounts the history of this much-loved resource and looks ahead to an exciting future for ArtWay.

Back in 2018, I interviewed ArtWay founder Marleen Hengelaar-Rookmaaker for Artlyst on the legacy of ArtWay itself. I have written frequently for the site with a recent piece being an interview with British artist Hannah Rose Thomas, who is also an author, human rights activist and a UNESCO PhD Scholar at the University of Glasgow.

My visual meditations for ArtWay include work by María Inés Aguirre, Giampaolo Babetto, Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, Alexander de Cadenet, Christopher Clack, Marlene Dumas, Terry Ffyffe, Jake Flood, Antoni Gaudi, Nicola Green, Maciej Hoffman, Gwen John, Lakwena Maciver, S. Billie Mandle, Giacomo Manzù, Sidney Nolan, Michael Pendry, Maurice Novarina, Regan O'Callaghan, Ana Maria Pacheco, John Piper, Nicola Ravenscroft, Albert Servaes, Henry Sh elton, Anna Sikorska, Alan Stewart, Jan Toorop, Andrew Vessey, Edmund de Waal and Sane Wadu.

My Church of the Month reports include: All Saints Parish Church, Tudeley, Aylesford Priory, Canterbury Cathedral, Chapel of St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, Hem, Chelmsford Cathedral, Churches in Little Walsi ngham, Coventry Cathedral, Église de Saint-Paul à Grange-Canal, Eton College Chapel, Lumen, Metz Cathedral, Notre Dame du Léman, Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce, Plateau d’Assy,R omont, Sint Martinuskerk Latem, St Aidan of Lindisfarne, St Alban Romford, St. Andrew Bobola Polish RC Church, St. Margaret’s Church, Ditchling, and Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft, St Mary the Virgin, Downe, St Michael and All Angels Berwick and St Pa ul Goodmayes, as well as earlier reports of visits to sites associated with Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, Marc Chagall, Jean Cocteau, Antoni Gaudi and Hen r i Matisse.

Blogs for ArtWay include: Congruity and controversy: exploring issues for contemporary commissions; Ervin Bossanyi: A vision for unity and harmony; Georges Rouault and André Girard: Crucifixion and Resurrection, Penitence and Life Anew; Photographing Religious Practice; Spirituality and/in Modern Art; and The Spirituality of the Artist-Clown.

Interviews for ArtWay include: Matthew Askey, Paul Chandler and Brian Whelan, Sophie Hacker, Peter Koenig, David Miller, Belinda Scarlett and Hannah Rose Thomas.

I have also reviewed: Art and the Church: A Fractious Embrace, Kempe: The Life, Art and Legacy of Charles Eamer Kempe and Jazz, Blues, and Spirituals for ArtWay.

Other of my writings for ArtWay can be found here.

‘The main medium I use is collage and over many years I have developed the technique which can be seen in many of the pictures in this exhibition.’

View the exhibition and hear Steve speak about his work at ‘Unveiled’, the arts & performance evening at St Andrew’s Wickford, Friday 17 January, 7.00 pm.

The primary subject matter in Steve Whittle's work is colour, which has been the major theme. The work is often produced in series and is unified by the similar images and combinations of colours that are used. Each picture can therefore be viewed as a component of a group or seen as an individual piece.

The medium Whittle uses is collage and over many years he has developed the technique which can be seen in many of the pictures in this exhibition. Firstly, the paper, which is acid free, is prepared with several coats of acrylic paint in the appropriate colour and the torn paper collage is applied to this surface with acrylic glue in as many layers as necessary to get the correct colour combinations. When the picture is complete it is then coated with UVS varnish.

‘The Way’ includes a series of Stations of the Cross, plus other crucifixion and resurrection images.

The Spring 2025 programme for Unveiled, our fortnightly Friday night arts and performance event at St Andrew’s Church (7.00 – 9.00 pm, 11 London Road, Wickford, Essex SS12 0AN), begins with the exhibition viewing evening for 'The Way' by Steve Whittle:

Spring Programme 2025

17 January (7.00 pm) – ‘The Way’ exhibition viewing evening. Meet artist Steve Whittle, see his exhibition & hear him interviewed. This artist, based in Westcliff-onSea based, uses collage to create Stations of the Cross & a range of other scenes, both religious and landscape.
31 January (7.00 pm) – ‘Four Essex Trios’. An evening of poems and photographs with Jonathan Evens exploring thin places and sacred spaces in Essex, including Bradwell, Broomfield, Pleshey, and Runwell.
14 February (7.00 pm) – An evening with the Ladygate Scribblers. Hear poetry and prose from a longestablished Wickford-based writers group.
28 February (7.30 pm) – Open Mic Night. Everybody is welcome to come along & play, read, sing or just spectate. See you there for a great evening of live performance!
14 March (7.00 pm) – Simon Law in concert. Simon has fronted the rock bands Fresh Claim, Sea Stone and Intransit, as well as being a founder of Plankton Records and becoming an Anglican Vicar. This will be his final concert for us before retirement.
28 March (7.30 pm) – Dave Crawford & friends in concert. Popular local musician, Dave Crawford writes engaging/melodic songs in Americana/ Alt-Rock/IndieFolk. He has performed at the Leigh Folk Festival, Pin Drop Sessions, & Music for Mind together with Kev Butler. This will be Dave’s third concert at Unveiled. We have also enjoyed his powerful vocals & guitar at our Open Mic Nights.
11 April (7.30 pm) – Tim Almond in concert. ‘Around the World in 60 Minutes’ featuring songs and stories from Kenya, Ethiopia, Malawi, Ecuador and Bangladesh.

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Dave Crawford - Revelations.

International Times: Barking

My latest poem to be published by International Times is entitled 'Barking' and is about St Margaret’s Barking and Barking Abbey.

It has come to be written because one of the responses to my 'Four Essex Trios' series of poems was a suggestion from the Bishop of Chelmsford that I also write a poem for the Barking Episcopal Area of the Diocese of Chelmsford. This is that poem and it expands the series to become 'Five Trios'.

'Four Essex Trios' is a series of poems on thin places and sacred spaces in Essex. The four poems in the series are:

The poems have been published by Amethyst Review and International Times.

'Bradwell' is a celebration of the history of the Chapel of St Peter-on-the-Wall, the Othona Community, and of pilgrimage to those places. My previous posts about Bradwell and the Othona Community can be found here and here.

Broomfield in Essex became a village of artists following the arrival of Revd John Rutherford in 1930. His daughter, the artist Rosemary Rutherford, also moved with them and made the vicarage a base for her artwork including paintings and stained glass. Then, Gwynneth Holt and Thomas Bayliss Huxley-Jones moved to Broomfield in 1949 where they shared a large studio in their garden and both achieved high personal success. 'Broomfield' reviews their stories, work, legacy and motivations. For more on the artists of Broomfield, all of whom are commemorated there with blue plaques, see here, here, here, here and here.

'Pleshey' celebrates the Diocesan Retreat House at Pleshey in Essex and the legacy of Evelyn Underhill as a retreat director. My posts about Pleshey can be found here and my posts about Evelyn Underhill here. My poem can also be found on the Diocesan Retreat House website here.

'Runwell' takes the reader on a visit to St Mary's Runwell, while also reflecting on the spirituality of the space plus its history and legends. This poem has been included in the Amethyst Press anthology, 'Thin Places and Sacred Spaces',

My other posts about St Margaret's Barking can be found here, here, here, and here. See also here and here.

The series draws inspiration from T.S. Eliot's 'Four Quartets' and, in common, with the 'Thin Places and Sacred Spaces' anthology reflects on the experience of feeling the touch of eternity in art, nature, silence, or sacred architecture. The ‘thin place’ is a Celtic term, originally indicating a specific geographical location where the veil between heaven and earth seems exceptionally thin or lifted altogether. Bradwell, Broomfield, Pleshey and Runwell are all places in Essex where I have had that experience and where heaven and earth, past, present and future seem to be intermingled.

My earlier pieces for IT are an interview with the poet Chris Emery, an interview with Jago Cooper, Director of the the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, plus reviews of: albums by Joy Oladokun and Michael Kiwanaku; Nolan's Africa by Andrew Turley; Mavis Staples in concert at Union Chapel; T Bone Burnett's 'The Other Side' and Peter Case live in Leytonstone; Helaine Blumenfeld's Together exhibition, What Is and Might Be and then Otherwise by David Miller; 'Giacometti in Paris' by Michael Peppiatt, the first Pissabed Prophet album - 'Zany in parts, moving in others, you’ll be hard pressed to find a more unusual, inspired & profound album this year. ‘Pissabed Prophet’ will thrill, intrigue, amuse & inspire' - and 'Religion and Contemporary Art: A Curious Accord', a book which derives from a 2017 symposium organised by the Association of Scholars of Christianity in the History of Art.

Several of my short stories have been published by IT including three about Nicola Ravenscroft's EarthAngel sculptures (then called mudcubs), which we exhibited at St Andrew's Wickford in 2022. The first story in the series is 'The Mudcubs and the O Zone holes'. The second is 'The Mudcubs and the Clean-Up King', and the third is 'The mudcubs and the Wall'. My other short stories to have been published by International Times are 'The Black Rain', a story about the impact of violence in our media, 'The New Dark Ages', a story about principles and understandings that are gradually fading away from our modern societies, and 'The curious glasses', a story based on the butterfly effect.

IT have also published a poem, The ABC of creativity, which covers attention, beginning and creation, 'Broomfield'.

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Tom Yates - Love Comes Well Armed.