Beyond the Night Sky - Music for Stephen Hawking

This is the music commissioned from composer Cheryl Frances-Hoad for Stephen Hawking's 75th Birthday. It's sung here by the choir of Gonville and Caius Cambridge, the college where he was a fellow for over 50 years. 

It was moving to see the familiar streets of central Cambridge crowded yesterday to say goodbye to one of the city's heroes. I lived in Cambridge for 14 years in the mid 1970's and the late 1990's and, throughout that time, Professor Stephen Hawking was a well known figure about the city. I remember the days when we used to hurry out of the evening service at Holy Trinity to get to the 8pm debate at Great Saint Mary's where he was an occasional attender, apparently interested in the intersection of science and religion though not a religious believer himself. 

I read with fascination A Brief History of Time and managed not to get completely lost until the chapter on string theory. He was somebody who made physics accessible and interesting. He inspired many through his humanity, doing small things globally to encourage young people to achieve their potential and championing the NHS and affordable, accessible university education, sometimes at cost to himself as when he turned down a knighthood.

It was impossible not to be moved by the power of his mind, by his courage and lack of self-regard and by his ability to communicate using a ready sense of humour - no mean feat through a synthesised voice. His timing was impeccable.

It seemed to me very apt that one of the readings chosen for his funeral was The Death of Socrates from Plato's Apology 40.  It was read by Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal and it reflects the courtesy of the atheist to the religious believer and vice versa so typified in Prof. Hawking's life.

'Let us reflect in another way, and we shall see that there is great reason to hope that death is a good; for one of two things — either death is a state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness, or, as men say, there is a change and migration of the soul from this world to another.

Now if you suppose that there is no consciousness, but a sleep like the sleep of him who is undisturbed even by dreams, death will be an unspeakable gain.

For if a person were to select the night in which his sleep was undisturbed even by dreams, and were to compare with this the other days and nights of his life, and then were to tell us how many days and nights he had passed in the course of his life better and more pleasantly than this one, I think that any man, I will not say a private man, but even the great king will not find many such days or nights, when compared with the others.

Now if death be of such a nature, I say that to die is gain; for eternity is then only a single night.

But if death is the journey to another place, and there, as men say, all the dead abide, what good, O my friends and judges, can be greater than this?.

What would not a man give if he might converse with Orpheus and Musaeus and Hesiod and Homer?

Nay, if this be true, let me die again and again...

Above all, I shall then be able to continue my search into true and false knowledge; as in this world, so also in the next.'

Translation Richard Jebb

This passage demonstrates respect for the view that there is no life beyond this life and explains why it is possible to be not just reconciled but inspired by this belief. It equally captures the joy of belief in opportunity and continued existence beyond this life so important in Christianity and other religions. And it presents us with freedom of choice.

A great life and a personality who 'broke boundaries with his mind' and boundaries not just in cosmology but of the limitations of divisions between human beings.

On Easter Monday

The first time I experienced a 'walk through Holy Week' was when I joined the Ichthyan Singers in Cambridge. The name of the choir was taken from the Greek word ἰχθύς (or ichthus) meaning fish. One of the symbols used by early Christians was the fish. The Greek word 'ichthus' is an acronym for 'Iesous Christos, Theou Hios, Soter', the transliterated Greek words meaning 'Jesus Christ, God's Son, Saviour'.

The choir sang the full range of church choral music from Palestrina, Bach and Tallis to Bairstow, Finzi, Howells and the blues! Each Holy Week we spent the eight days in one parish, singing all the services. This introduced me to the practice of journeying through the events of the last week of Jesus' life and, to some extent, experiencing the emotions they engender. It's an overwhelmingly powerful story of celebration, betrayal, misunderstanding, political intrigue, legal process, torture, crowd pressure, forgiveness, death, grief, astonishment, reconciliation and hope. Over the years I've continued to keep Holy Week with Christian communities as varied as a Roman Catholic seminary, a Maltese parish, four British cathedrals, churches on vast outer city estates and the deeply rural churches of North Yorkshire. For the past three years, worshipping as a Quaker, I have not kept Holy Week but have endeavoured to focus on recognising the experiences held within the story through weekly contemplation at Quaker Meeting, meditation with other Christians and people of prayer in our villages, and through daily silence and private meditation.

The purpose of this post is not to suggest that one way of marking the events of Jesus' death and resurrection is 'right' or 'better' than another. It is, rather, to try to express something of the impact of dwelling on them on everyday life.

It's undoubtedly true that the journey I embarked on with the Ichthyan Singers was the beginning of a life long practice of drawing strength and inspiration from the many layers of the stories in the Gospels. There is something about living, if only for a week each year, with the words of Jesus ringing in your ears and His, at times, puzzling actions at the forefront of your imagination that builds into a rich storehouse of imagery and thought resourcing you for everyday life. Facing death, bereavement, grief, pain, argument, betrayal and life's inevitable tragedies has been done through the lens of Jesus' story. Darkness, conflict, despair and death are very real and feel very much like endings but the events of Jesus' death and resurrection allow us to tangle with what life sends in the light of a broader context where death is experienced as the precursor of a renewed and different life. In particular, for me, the liturgy and poetry of Holy Week have been sources of inspiration and empowerment for nursing and for ministry with those facing terminal illness and the loss of loved ones.

However, it's also true that there is a danger in this concentrated form of remembering. For years I've been very aware of the way Christians tend to stuff Lent and Holy Week full of extra activity and extra talk of sin without there being a noticeable sense of renewal beyond the emotion of the activities themselves. For seven weeks of the year there is a psychologically heavy feel to the words and music of the churches. Sometimes this coincides well with the period just before the earth wakes up and trees and plants spring into bud; other years, when Easter is late, there is a dissonance between the sombre world of the desert prophets and the joyously emerging spring. Either way there can be a sense that the spiritual path you are invited to walk is not touching the real things of your life as much as it might. It's sometimes more like a soon-forgotten pilgrimage of good intentions rather than a slow dawning of renewed and sustained changes in behaviour.

Quakers look to experience divine life in the here and now, in our own lives this very day. To that extent, although there is no problem with remembering and celebrating texts and events that speak of how God inhabits death and life, the focus of our attention is on the ways God inhabits both the created order and the individual human spirit now, today. The desire is to see and hear where the Spirit is leading us. The themes of betrayal, death, resurrection and the indwelling of God are lived out in acts of truth-telling, justice, reconciliation and restored dignity only as we attend to the leadings of the Spirit of God within us every day. One of the conditions for this 'leading' is silence in which listening can happen. And one of the conditions for silence is a greater simplicity of life where everything is stripped back and the important begins to emerge.

Perhaps it's worth lingering over the meaning of some of Jesus' post resurrection words, and pondering how they shape us and our living?

'Do not hold on to me, but go.' Don't cling for safety to the familiar, even the familiar things of faith. Go to all without preference or favour?

'Peace be with you.' Be people of peace whatever the cost?

'Receive the Holy Spirit.' Search out and live by that of God within you?

'Tend my lambs, feed my sheep.' Work for the practical, physical well-being of all people and the distribution of the earth's resources so all can live? 

'Someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.'  Be willing for whatever God's Spirit directs you to?

Time to Take Action for Refugees

I didn't vote for the government we have in the UK. Since the General Election, we have quickly seen all too sobering evidence of the direction in which they want to move the country. I cannot support their attitude to border control and I note the fact that legislation is making it easier for human trafficking to flourish. Some of the stories I hear about the changes in benefits and the effect of the 'bedroom tax' demonstrate a bureaucratic disregard for the reality of living with poverty and disability while trying to access work and contribute through volunteering. 

I'm grateful to a friend and fellow blogger, Tim Sorrell, for drawing my attention to the words of Herman Melville, a nineteenth century poet and novelist who was, himself, no stranger to poverty and bankruptcy. He wrote 'Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms of the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well-warmed and well-fed.' This accurately sums up my view of the approach taken by the current government to a number of groups of people in this country and beyond its borders. 

But Melville's cri de coeur also resonates with personal challenge.

The news in the last week of people losing their lives while attempting to find refuge in Europe has shocked and upset many of us. How can we make a meaningful response? One way is the political path. Germany has set its face to welcome 800,000 refugees and migrants this year and friends report seeing posters saying 'welcome to refugees' in places like sports stadiums and bus stations. Britain, by contrast, has grudgingly taken 220 of the 4.1 million Syrians who have fled their country since the start of the current crisis. We have given Syria financial aid and sent a ship to the Mediterranean but these are not adequate solutions to a growing refugee situation. Contact your MP and speak to your local councillors. Is your town/city one that welcomes asylum seekers and refugees? Find out about and share the stories of refugees in your own area. Good places to start are car parks ('Can I wash your car?'), refuge tips and laundrettes where it's often possible to get into conversation with people who have recently come to the UK or who are in contact with those who have. Churches and Mosques often have asylum seekers and refugees in their congregations. As we have seen in the reaction to stories in the press this week, there is power in real life stories to shake us up, shame us and motivate us to begin to turn the culture of suspicion and fear around.

Refugee Action here has comprehensive information about volunteering, campaigning, donating and fundraising and can put you in touch with what's happening in your local area. 

A charity that I think is inspirational is Musicians Without Borders. Their strap-line is 'War Divides, Music Connects'. Their work allows people of different cultures to come together and share on an equal footing the joy of music making. Music is really powerful because, for the duration of performance, it dissolves the preconceived power relationships and allows for a deep psychological meeting place. You can find out about their work and join in here

In Memoriam John Taverner

The two twentieth century British composers who have had the most profound effect on me are William Mathias and John Taverner. So it was with great sadness that I read of the  death of Sir John, last week. The power of pieces like Ultimos Ritos, Apocalypse, the Celtic Requiem and Eis Thanaton to evoke that which is beyond, connecting us to the source of life, is remarkable. Taverner himself said, 'There is nothing easy about achieving simplicity' and his music is an embodiment of that simple truth. Deceptively effortless and somehow in time and tune with both the rolling spheres and the breath of the sleeping infant, it takes us to a place where the boundaries of self and the world beyond touch, through the exquisite use of finely disciplined sound, rhythm and timbre. He said that writing music became, for him, ultimately an act of prayer, something that brought him into the presence of God.

It was a poignant and remarkably apt co-incidence that Taverner's last public appearance was on a radio programme whose subject was the light that religious art throws on the experience of approaching death. Andrew Marr's Radio 4 programme Start the Week posed the question, 'Why is it that religious poetry and music are found to appeal to those who would not describe themselves as religious when they gaze on the spectre of their own mortality?' I listened because I was interested in the question. Afterwards, I was glad I had glimpsed, briefly, the wisdom of one whose music speaks of eternity and who was himself, unsuspected at the time, so close to death.

Often, in the hospice where I work, people who would not describe themselves as religious nevertheless find that the stories, poetry and language of religion give them a space in which they can dare (or sometimes bear) to explore what approaching death might mean. Music, too, can be more than a solace - a medium through which they can expand their vision and horizons, exploring what has held life together thus far and the thread that connects life to the possibility of something more than we sense in our bodies in the here and now. The piece which does this par excellence for me is Bach's chorale Come Sweet Death as performed by Accentus. In performance, the voices stretch each chord beyond, almost, what is tolerable -  the wait for the resolution of each dissonance brings you closer and closer to the place where the boundaries between what is known and what is unknown yet undeniably present blur...well you just have to listen for yourself really! The chorale is sung here by an un-named choir and is first performed straight through here

John Taverner's music has a similar kind of appeal, if that is the right word. It conveys us to places where it is not only possible but desirable to ask the ultimate questions about existence. And then it takes you further into the uncharted territory where, for odd moments, the boundaries between time and timelessness are blurred and you are brought to a place were you are almost no longer conscious of your own existence. It is this quality that marks him out as one of Britain's great composers and also which explains why he himself became frustrated with more conventional forms of music which he felt did not convey spiritual truth in this way.