Thankfulness Arrives - After 63 Years!

Every weekday morning up to September 12th, 2015, or at least nearly every weekday morning throughout our then sixteen years of marriage, just before rising, I ask my sleeping wife in bed next to me: 

Would you like breakfast, dear? Or more realistically: Breakfast?

When she normally answers in the affirmative, often with a sleepy hum which tone I can interpret, I then utter a groan:

Doh! Another day to face! - As if such was another day on the battlefront, in prison, or attempting to teach, without much success, a class of rowdy and verbally abusive pupils while at the same time forbidden by law to keep a cane in my desk drawer, as many staff members did half a century earlier.  

No, it was none of these. Rather, as one self-employed and depending on my own initiative, and without a boss to tell me what to do, or to cover for me if anything goes pear-shaped, to set out to the street I'm currently working in to ensure that I return home that evening with enough cash in my bag to keep our stomachs full, to keep our bodies clothed, to keep a roof over us, and to satisfy all creditors.

A bowl of Malted Wheat for breakfast is ideal for both of us.

And so, a typical morning in the life of a window cleaner. Hoping for a smooth sail - or ride - whichever way you interpret, sometimes it won't be as I hoped. The bright sky allowing sunlight to stream through our bedroom window looks so inviting, thus, doubting the day's forecast. But soon, clouds gather and eventually, the heavens tip a heavy shower over our locality. Then the customer comes to the door with the announcement that she does not have her windows done during wet weather.

No payment coming from that house, then.

At another property, the front of the house had received a facelift with a sloping roof built beneath the two front bedroom windows. One way to reach them was to stand on the recently-wetted roof tiles and risk a slip and a fall to the ground - very much like the accident that occurred in September 1997, which was exactly what happened, fracturing my right shoulder and ribs, and also causing a small wound on the scalp which dyed the whole of my hair blood-red and puddled the concrete step where I landed. After five days in hospital, I had to take a further two months off work with my arm resting in a sling.

With further wrestling with the weather, it was business as usual. Whether we had rain, snow, fog, wind, or warm sunshine soaking my shirt with sweat, by the grace of God, I managed all 35 years of it. And this includes the unexpected - a client messing around whilst deliberately delaying payment or even giving me a bag full of pennies, losing customers due to the sale of their property, or being made redundant, a death of an elderly pensioner, or disputes - usually about payments - that can so unexpectedly arise. There was even one occasion when this thirty-year-old asked me to take a tight screw out of the wall of his property after struggling unsuccessfully with it. I climbed up his ladder and turned it without too much difficulty. But was he pleased? Rather, I became scum, a target for his expletives! Oh well, busting egos wasn't meant to be part of the job.

Then you wonder why I said back then, I have another day to face.

However, retirement wasn't all a sense of relief as I first anticipated. Rather, I was suddenly aware that I had just turned a page in my life book. More than that, a chapter ended and a new one begins. A chapter that is titled, 

A Pensioner.

A pensioner. Whenever I imagine a pensioner, I tend to visualise an elderly gentleman and grandfather with wrinkly skin and thinning white hair, stooping forward as he relies on the support of his walking stick, trembling as he slowly makes his way on his three legs. And now, I'm one - a pensioner. Yet this isn't a definition of a mere elderly gentleman. Rather, he is defined by his income - the money he receives to live on. The same money as a wage, salary, or even benefit, but this one with another name, the one which defines old age.

A pensioner I might be, simply because the income I receive is called a pension. But, thanks be to God, I bear no resemblance to the elderly gentleman I had described above. Instead, I could pass myself off as in my forties or fifties. I need to be. My current job is to love and look after my partially-disabled wife. Thus my need for regular exercise and sensible eating. I suppose there is no such thing as retirement in a true sense of the word, at least for the Christian. Rather, I merely changed jobs.

But this changing of jobs has brought a whole new dimension in my perception of life, and that is, to be thankful for each day God gives me. It's to be thankful for the appreciation of the finer things in life - the benefit to serve Christ in a way by giving to those in need, whether time, money or even both. And to appreciate God's mercy. And I'm talking here about the rollout of the vaccines for inoculating against the virus. 

Since I see the vaccine rollout as a wonderful act of God's mercy, I grieve when I hear about or read of some of the stuff put out by anti-vaxxers. I am aware of at least four people, all of them Christians, three of the four are women, one of them giving an almost convincing argument that this worldwide vaccination programme is the forerunner of the coming Antichrist, and therefore paving a way to receive the Mark of the Beast described in Revelation 13 - even though each jab has no resemblance to what is written in the Bible.

This kind of false news which anyone can write on Facebook can be frightfully convincing to anyone not fully acquainted with Holy Scripture. But the vision to get a vaccine out to combat Covid-19 as soon as possible was shared among middle-aged, professional women, rather than by men in suits.

Soon after the outbreak of the pandemic early in 2020, a 45-year old Cambridge graduate, Maddy McTernan, spent a night at her desk negotiating for contracts with firms such as Moderna, Novavax, Pfizer and AstraZeneca for millions of doses to be made and delivered to the UK before even one vial was produced. Sarah Gilbert, Teresa Lamb, Annette England, and Kate Bingham were the pioneers for the development of these vaccines which would, I hope, eventually free us from the grip of the pandemic.

And so, God's mercy works through these people and all the teams of scientists involved in developing such inoculations against the various strains of the pathogen. But instead of giving thanks and glory to God for such mercy shown, many, and Brexiteers in particular, began to act with aloofness against the EU, when a lack of proper coordination and fearmongering among its leaders has set the EU into a disadvantage when it comes to the vaccine rollout across the Continent.

As this arrogance begins to make itself felt, with Brexiteers going as far as laughing at Europe's misfortune, such statements appearing especially on Facebook, what I have found as a comforting rebuke, also on Facebook, is taken from Proverbs 24:17-18:

Do not gloat when the enemy falls; when they stumble, do not let your heart rejoice, or the LORD will see and disapprove and turn his wrath away from him.

The trouble is, English Brexiteers has acted arrogantly against Europe and gloated over its failures. And such evil attitudes are also found among Christians, who should know better. This can make it difficult to fellowship with them. It takes a greater effort of the Holy Spirit at work within to stay friends with them, to do them good and to show hospitality. But as long as this gloating is kept up, sooner or later the tables will be turned. Although God is God, and his thoughts are higher than our thoughts, and his ways than our ways, it still may not be too difficult to fathom out what might happen in the future.

And that, the EU vaccine rollout will eventually accelerate until the disease is brought under control, alongside a growing economy among member nations following the end of the pandemic. In turn, although Britain might, by then, have brought the virus under control, its economy might suffer as a result of the new trade tariffs affecting imports and exports of goods, along with the dispute affecting the borders with Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, and perhaps a further collapse of its interior economy in one way or another. And who can guarantee that The Troubles will never restart? Or be free from the threat of international terrorism? Indeed, with such fears, everything has always looked to be so fragile. 

And such fragility of emotions had reared its head again only this week when two presenters of BBC Breakfast, Naga Munchetty and Charlie Stayt, made a gag against Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick on the morning of Thursday, March 18th, 2021, regarding a British flag and a portrait of the Queen, both on display in his studio. I never watch these chat shows at all, as they tend to be a drag and boring, but I couldn't help take notice of the fuss surrounding this incident, right in the wake of the Meghan/Winfred scandal. Then, in today's edition of the Daily Mail, I read of Amanda Platell's tirade against the BBC as a whole for allowing these two to "lambaste" Jenrick.

The word "lambaste" is a pretty strong word to use for what was meant to be a lighthearted joke. But all this shows a fragile, eggshell culture of national insecurity. Platell goes on to say that there is no other country where its citizens poke fun or criticise the presence of its own flag.

Perhaps I can see what she means. Having visited both the USA and Australia, I saw that both take great pride in their flag. In the States, its Stars and Stripes flies from the flagstaff of every administrative building, while in Australia, the image of the Southern Cross Constellation with the British Union Jack at one corner reveals the pride the Aussies have in being one in the Commonwealth. I recall one morning when I stayed at a hostel at the Queensland resort of Hervey Bay, which is also the launching pad for ferries to nearby Frazer Island, the world's largest sandbank. It was here where I asked to cash a US$ Traveller's Cheque. I was almost to the point of being told off for daring to request for such transactions on the Queen's Birthday, which, Down Under, is a public holiday. Fortunately, I had my credit card at the time, which bailed me out from a sticky situation. Then my friends wonder why I'm sympathetic towards Republicanism!

It's so unfortunate that the English St George's Cross had been taken over by far-right extremists, who tend to fill football stadiums with their racist chanting against non-white players. Relegating black players to the level of monkeys is an insult as a direct result of Darwinism, itself having grown out of England's fertile soil.

Naga Munchetty

Being in such a state of mind on a national scale seems to have made any joke or comment against patriotism something of a threat to the nation's wellbeing, as did Meghan Markle's accusation of racism in the Royal Family. Just as Piers Morgan's loss of temper over that incident, so Munchetty's crack at Robert Jenrick's flag had rocked Amanda Platell's boat.

Perhaps 2 Chronicles 7:14 may provide a worthwhile piece of instruction for this sorrowful state of our nation: 

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

"My people" refers to the people of Israel who were under the reign of King Solomon. But this verse can be applied at present to the Church, itself a nation of born-again believers who are meant to be devoted to Jesus Christ. To my mind, the behaviour of some of these Christians, especially those who voted Leave, was and still is, appalling.  

Reading the Old Testament book of the prophet Daniel, chapter 9 and verses 4-19, provides an excellent template on what intercessory prayer for our nation should consist of. It is worth patterning our prayers to this template and with thanksgiving for God's goodness and mercy, bring our intercessory prayers to God with a sincere heart. 

A Shock at a Leisure Centre Cafe.

Last Sunday I was rather shocked as I walked into our Ascot Life Church service, which had just begun. For there was a massive hole of empty seats at the main centre row. As I took my place near the front, as I usually do, any worship meant to be offered to God was obscured by thoughts, troubling thoughts. And as such, I'll add some details about our church as a build-up to what had occurred on the very next day.

I realised that schools up and down the country had just broken up for the Easter break. Therefore colleges have broken up as well. Which means that many of the students from Royal Holloway, at the nearby town of Egham, who attend our services during term time would have gone home. This meant that during these college breaks, about three or four rows of empty seats, usually at the central section, are considered normal. But not last Sunday.

For greater clarification, I'll give a brief description of the seating arrangement at Ascot Life Church and how so many absent that particular Sunday has made quite an impact. The building where we meet is actually a restaurant located in the paddock buildings at the famous Royal Racecourse, where its interior has been cleared of all tables to make room for the seating. Since the length of the building is roughly aligned to the North-to-South points of the compass, the congregation faces south while the preacher and the music band members face north. Therefore, using theatre terminology, to anyone standing at the front will see three stalls of seating rows: The wide centre stalls and two narrower side stalls, the West stalls and the East stalls, both of these half the width of the centre arrangement and each separated by an aisle. 

How the Racecourse restaurant looks during the week!

The huge hole of empty seats was among the middle rows, with most who did arrive taking occupancy among the East and West stalls. That meant that the few sitting at the back had a full view of me as I sat at the second row from the front, a view which is normally obscured by people in between. I would not be exaggerating if I was to say that somewhere between thirty-three to fifty per cent of all regular attendees were absent that particular morning.

After the service, over some coffee and doughnuts, I asked someone standing nearby why such a high level of absentees. His explanation was that many were at "the wedding of the year" which took place the day before, near the Sussex resort of Brighton, and many had chosen to stay for the night. When I asked further who could have participated in such high ranking nuptials, the answer came back: Martha Collison.

Martha is one of two daughters, the other being Hannah, of Chris Collison and his wife Louise. Chris is one of our four Elders of Ascot Life Church. This makes our style of church leadership rather unusual. We don't have a senior pastor, a reverend, priest or even a bishop. Instead, we have four Elders, each of equal standing and therefore a likelihood of equally accountable to the Baptist Union. Chris Collison is a successful businessman who joined our church relatively recently when compared to when I joined, along with those who were already present before my arrival in 1990.

When it became clear that more were attending each Sunday morning than our original church building could cope with, Chris negotiated with the management of Ascot Racecourse during the latter half of 2012, into 2013. An agreement with the officials for a reduced annual fee allowed the hire of an upstairs site restaurant which capacity could hold double to what our original building could accommodate. Eventually, an experimental contract was set up by the Racecourse officials with Chris Collison, and on Sunday 13th April 2013, which is exactly six years to the day this blog was written, we had our first ever service at the new venue. On the same day, Ascot Baptist Church became Ascot Life Church, a new name taken from John 10:10, with its iconic symbol of a bird's eye view of the racecourse itself next to the logo.

It looks to all us members that the reward for a successful contract with the Racecourse officials was a promotion into Eldership. However, it was a known fact that the other three Elders had asked Chris to join the leadership team sometime before any negotiations with the Racecourse officials had ever got underway, which seems to be a good indication of Collison's business prowess rather than a spiritual one. However, that's not for me to say.

On Saturday, April 6th 2019, his daughter Martha married a fellow graduate, Michael Haywood. Maybe you have heard of the name Martha Collison sometime in the past. Indeed, she was a contestant of the 2014 BBC's Great British Bake-off. At seventeen years at the time, she was the youngest ever to take part in a contest which was broadcast across the nation, and being so young, won the heart of the nation. She managed to reach the quarter-final, and it was then when she was eliminated. However, one of the finalists, London builder Richard Burr, coined up the nuptials as "the wedding of the year," after turning up as an honoured guest, among other former Bake-off contestants, to the wedding venue. Martha's status as a celebrity remains endorsed by her published articles in various magazines as well as writing a couple of books on her expertise in baking, which were successfully published.

Cakes donated to Martha's Wedding Reception.

But the road to fame was not always plain sailing. It was during the fifth episode, aired on Wednesday 3rd September 2014, when she hit a blunder while making an apricot flan. Unfortunately, the juice from the fruit had percolated into the sponge base whilst in the oven, making the sponge soggy, when it should have been firm. This earned a critical assessment from the judges, along with that of lacking flavour. Poor Martha! She was visibly close to tears when she was interviewed afterwards, protesting on how could the judges be so severe after two hours of grafting over the worktop.

However, step in Amanda Platell of The Daily Mail. A childless divorcee from Australia, this ardent Brexiteer had a sharp word to say to Martha in a filler which appeared in the newspaper on Saturday 6th September 2014. She laid it on thickly when she lambasted the teenage student for shedding tears after a mere correction from the judges. "If people like her cannot take a bit of criticism without shedding tears, heaven helps us for the future of Britain," she wrote.

It's the same columnist who also wrote, The working classes of the past, no matter how poor, had enormous self-respect. Men wore suits and ties. Women scrubbed the doorsteps.

This echoed her predecessor, self-confessed atheist and former Daily Mail columnist Simon Heffer, who also wrote in a filler that no man can be referred to as a gentleman unless he wears a tie at all times whilst out, even on a Saturday afternoon. Indeed, both must have been cast from the same mould, despite that unlike Heffer, Platell is a regular church-goer. 

It was the next day, Monday, April 8th 2019, when an ordinary day's schedule as a retiree calling for my weekly swim at the revamped Leisure Centre, about ten minutes from home on the bicycle. It was lane swimming at the Competition Pool, a weekly therapeutic session lasting between 75-80 minutes as part of the post-op cardiac rehabilitation program recommended by the GP. It was after the swim, when I was dressed and calling at the cafe outlet which displayed delicious calorie-inducing cakes and tempting Kit-Kat bars which takes a good dollop of will power for a hungry stomach to resist, where I ordered my usual cappuccino while complaining that these tempting food items will undo all my efforts in calorie burn. Her reply was that these items are purposely displayed in order to motivate me to return to the gym!

As I sat alone in a newly refurbished cafe, with nothing more than a paper cup of frothy coffee in front of me, my attention was caught by a group of individuals sitting around a nearby table. It was a small group of mentally handicapped adults along with their supervisors. One of them, a young and rather good-looking patient arose and sat at a nearby table by himself. He looked toward me. I cracked a smile. He got rather excited and grinned from ear to ear, holding up his thumb. As I could see, he was happy. 

Then I heard a slight wail uttered by another patient, a female with curly salt-and-pepper hair, giving me an impression that she was in her forties, possibly even in her fifties, but has a mental age of a two-year-old. Her head was stooped over a plate of salad she was slowly eating. Connecting her lips to the food were several strings of saliva.

I had to turn away with a feeling of revulsion, obliterating my appetite and shutting out any desire for the coffee, still mainly unconsumed. All the others who sat with her were immune from such feelings of revulsion, both supervisors and patients alike, but I was aware that at any restaurant I would have been put off my meal, let alone sharing the table. Yet I could not help turn and fix my eyes on her, the sense of disgust having an overwhelming power over me. She became a magnet for my attention.

Then I began to think of her eternal state. Where would she go after her death? To believe that healthy, well-to-do people such as Chris Collison and his daughter are heirs of Heaven while this poor, unfortunate soul would perish forever is anathema, a wickedly cruel theory! Then I remembered what Jesus once said concerning little children: 

Forbid them not for such is the Kingdom of Heaven - (Matthew 19:14).

This woman, adult as she may be, has a mental age of a two-year-old, probably even less. Therefore in God's eyes, hers is the Kingdom of Heaven. It makes sense. It makes perfect sense. There she is. Never having worn a wedding ring. Never knowing what it's like receiving a husband's intimacy. Having a womb which never, and will never, carry a developing fetus and giving birth. Having breasts which never and will never give suck. Never, and will never experience the joys and hardships of motherhood.

Yet she is happy. Happy in her own little world. Never having to worry where the next meal will come from. Never ever to worry about fuel bills, the taxman, nor a mortgage or rent arrears. As for travel, she most likely had never left the UK - and she couldn't care less! And she will never miss the experience of independent travel and backpacking, nor be aware of its existence. Nor even boarding a train, let alone sail on a ferry or board a flight. Yet she is happy, contented with her lot. Because in her little world, and among many other trials, she would never have to worry about nursing a physically disabled beloved or maintaining medical care in a way I need to. Yet I couldn't but help feel something of a love for her.

Bracknell Competition Pool - weekly therapeutic.

And a feeling of shame of myself. Ashamed of my feeling of repulsiveness, and of disgust at the sight of her drooling saliva. And yet I realise that sin is just as repulsive in God's eyes as the dear woman was to me. Yet God loves her, just as much as he loves Chris Collison, his daughter and her new husband, and all family members. The fact that she's middle class and a celebrity makes no difference. We are all sinners and in need of God's love and forgiveness. All of us. Status is absolutely irrelevant. God's grace fulfils the need for each and every one of us.

That was why I had a longing for her to rise up and make a dash for me, to receive a tight embrace. Even with her saliva dampening my shirt, I would have held her tight, and look joyfully into her eyes, smiling at her warmly. The same kind of love Christ has for us.

The kind of Christlike love such stoical, stiff-upper-lip, church-going Amanda Platell needs to show to Martha Collison, is a far better form of encouragement to get her flan right, instead of publicly criticising her and putting her down for the sake of being British.

A Load of Bull

I grew up with a partially correct thinking that a bull is that particular species of beast which can be found at the arena of any Spanish city, both chasing and evading the smartly dressed Matador who is there to torture the life out of it with his use of decorated spears. Personally, I believe that the term Bullfighting is a misnomer. The type of bull in question is the male gender of cattle, of which the more familiar female cow provides us with our daily supply of pasteurised milk. I have actually visited a bullfighting arena whilst on a package holiday with a college friend way back in 1972, the first ever trip abroad without my parents and a year before my first ever backpacking trip into Italy in 1973.

Mt college friend refused to join me for that day trip to Barcelona. Instead, he preferred to remain in the growing popular Mediterranean resort of Tossa-de-Mar on the Costa Brava, just south of the Pyrenees, where our hotel was located. I think he had a point. I was keen to sample some foreign culture, which to my mind was the foundational basis for future backpacking. He was more aghast with the thought of witnessing torture as a source of pleasure. And torture it was. Bullfighting? The animal has always been herbivorous. A bull will only charge when its territory is invaded and its harem of females are under threat of competition or harm. In the ring, the bull's attempts to charge was always frustrated by the far greater agility of the slim-built matador, who watched the beast's life slowly ebb away in full sight of the cheering crowds. I went away having just learnt that the matador wasn't the star hero that the Spaniards make him out to be. Now had he fought a hungry lion or tiger like the ancient Roman gladiators did, then I guess that would have been more of a nerve-tingling, edge-of-the-seat entertainment. 

It was during the years that followed when I became aware that the word bull was not just reserved for male cattle. Rather it applied to other male species of mammal, mostly herbivorous, which include the rhinoceros and the elephant. Plant-eater the rhino may be, but having one of those charge at you has been proven fatal, as without the spears and a crowd of cheering spectators, a cattle bull can also gore a human to death as well. Among marine life, the male whale and dolphin, both mammals, are also referred as bulls. It looks to me that the bull is the male of any large, bovine-type mammal often having the capacity to kill a human. Going by what I have seen throughout life, the bull looks to be synonymous with masculinity.

During my school days, male respect was based on physical strength, an athletic prowess and the ability to co-operate well in team sports. Throughout the year, three team games were played by all the boys - Football, Rugby, and Cricket. The snag was that I did not have good team co-operation, although I did enjoy playing cricket to a certain extent. But attempting to play rugby was nigh impossible when I wasn't even taught the object of the game - to score a try by passing the ball over the touchline without passing the ball forward, and then convert the try by kicking the ball over the crossbar of that H-like structure at both ends of the pitch. In addition, the goal-kick, aiming the ball randomly over the crossbar without having to score a try beforehand, also added points to the score. Indeed, if only I knew all that whilst at school. Chances that I might, just might, have performed better.

The culture of the day was that rugby was a he-man's game, the ultimate of masculine team sports, especially if rain has muddied the pitch. Aside from a determination to win, perhaps together with performance enhanced by a degree of aggression, the display of all other emotions on the pitch was well off the cards. When a try was scored, there was no congratulated hugging from team mates. If one got hurt, unless his injury was serious enough for treatment, the player just got back up and continued playing. In rugby, British stoicism and stiff upper lip reigned supreme. After all, the game originated here in the English town of Rugby in Warwickshire. So it was not surprising that the game, throughout my youth in particular, carried such English characteristics. This was emphasised not long after leaving school, by a national newspaper which published a thesis of the game as a whole. The article opened with a bold headline which read:

SISSIES, STAY OUT! 

The British bulldog. Yes, it's back to the bull again, although I can't exactly equal the bulldog in strength and prowess as the bull of a rhino, elephant, cattle, or for that matter the Blue whale bull, the largest ever living animal of any kind existing on this planet, or that of the orca, perhaps living right on the top of the marine food chain. Against such creatures, in conflict the bulldog wouldn't stand a chance! And that despite that the bulldog was originally bred for bull-baiting, which peaked around the year 1800 before its abolition in 1835. As such, this dog has always been the symbol of British masculinity, particularly in the portraying of Winston Churchill.

And by reading national newspapers such as the daily Mail, columnists such as Richard Littlejohn, only a couple of years ago criticised the BBC for firing Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson for throwing a punch at programme producer Oisin Tymon, as well as calling him "Irish" and "lazy" when he failed to come up with the roast beef dinner Clarkson had hoped for after a full day's work. Littlejohn, along with fellow columnists Amanda Platell, Kate Hopkins, and perhaps Piers Morgan as well, all in their own way expressed the promotion of the great British Bulldog in which these writers saw Clarkson as an ideal candidate - courageous, stoic, unemotional, strong-minded, as characteristic of national pride, self confidence and optimism. As an example, Littlejohn has not only criticised the BBC over Jeremy Clarkson's dismissal, but also poured heaps of praise on the presenter for being characteristically British - rough, tough, sometimes crude but always fair, and something of a bigger-than-life hero not unlike John Wayne of Western legend.

And as one who has voted Remain in last year's Referendum, I now belong to a larger group known as the Remoaners, and even the editor of the Daily Mail newspaper now refers to us with such a title. Maybe the paper has a point. After all, the British are reputed worldwide as being a nation of moaners. We even have an edict here: Mustn't grumble. Instead, according to these writers, we are now a generation of snowflakes, of which columnists Amanda Platell and Melanie Phillips described us as emotional, mawkish, sentimental, and lacking of masculinity, courage and principle. Indeed, I now wish I was good at rugby at school, and maybe even joined a rugby club as a young adult.

It goes to show what a misconstrued meaning of masculinity these writers have. The Biblical meaning of the word is quite different. There is just two words making up a whole verse in the Bible, and those two words are Jesus wept (John 11:35). And surely, if there was ever the finest example of what masculinity really is, one has only to look to Jesus of Nazareth. And Paul reflects the human nature of Jesus Christ when he exhorted the churches of Galatia in his letter:

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control 

Galatians 5:22.

This means that true masculinity is about love and concern for the welfare of others, which is quite a contrast to having pride and confidence in self. And with such other fruits as gentleness, the total opposite of the "rough, tough and often crude" mentality which is erroneously defined as masculinity. True masculinity involves self-control - a virtue lacking in Clarkson when he punched Tymon - just because he did not get what he wanted. Self-control is the ability to remain calm when wronged. But this virtue is not to be confused with the stiff upper lip. Self control involves showing love and kindness despite being wronged.  The stiff upper lip is nothing more than keeping anger and frustration bottled up - which is detrimental to health and can lead to suicide. Clarkson would never have struck out at the producer if he also had the virtues of kindness, goodness, faithfulness and patience. These are definitions of true masculinity.

The fruit of love contains all eight segments of the Holy Spirit. 

A real man is someone who doggedly journeys to work each day at a job he hates because of a neurotic and foul-tempered boss - in order to keep up with his mortgage payments and to feed and clothe his family. It is the love he has for his wife which motivates him to climb out of his bed early on a cold winter morning to head for his car for the drive to work or attend to his outdoor job. His love for his wife is a fruit of true masculinity.

True masculinity involves fulfilling the vows made at the wedding altar. It means staying with her even if she falls ill and permanently loses her mobility and ends up in a wheelchair, and as such, he finds it too inconvenient to take foreign holidays he once so loved. True masculinity is refusing to leave his wife for a far better lifestyle - even if staying with her means the loss of his children to Social Services. True masculinity will always see his wife as beautiful as the day he married her, even after age has taken its toll. True masculinity is showing love and compassion which can be costly. True masculinity is offering friendship to someone who has a different opinion. As such, for example, I have at least two friends, and no doubt, others whose friendship I value highly, yet who are patriotic and have voted Brexit. It means showing kindness, goodness, patience and faithfulness to someone who differs in theological issues. That is masculinity, which also involves not un-friending someone on Facebook and then blocking him and his wife too, just because they perceive life in a different manner. To block someone on Facebook is not masculine at all. Rather it is craven cowardice.

True masculinity can only come with a true love-relationship with God. The Bible even delivers an acid test - that anyone who loves God loves his fellow believers too, and anyone who claims that he loves God but hates his brother is still in darkness (1 John 2:9-11, 3:15). With still the flesh at work within me, it is true that I can, and do get impatient and angry with somebody else, whether believer or unbeliever. That could be the reason why John exhorts his readers to love one another (e.g. 1 John 4:11) - which corresponds with Paul's letter, especially to the church in Corinth (1 Corinthians 13). This love can only come with the residence of the Holy Spirit within. My own experience in life has shown a strong desire for forgiveness and reconciliation whenever I fall out with someone, especially at church. This desire for reconciliation and friendship restored can only come from the Holy Spirit within, which I find far more beneficial to mental and physical health alike, than pride - the insistence that I'm in the right and therefore sticking to my guns. Pride is not masculinity. Admitting that I was wrong is masculinity.

You want to be controlled by the Holy Spirit within? Then read your Bible everyday, and allow the Word of God to dwell richly within you (Colossians 3:16). Here lies the real power source for true masculinity - without the British Bulldog spirit.

Manhood Defined

Just this evening I was doing the weekly main shopping at the local superstore when I began to notice how empty it was of the usual crowd of shoppers. For me, Friday evenings has always been a great time to shop, as it relieves the weekend of the responsibility. After the last item was placed in the wheeled basket, I made my way to the checkout, where the teller sat idly, waiting for the next customer. A very unusual sight at any supermarket store. Usually on a Friday there is always at least one person in the process of being served, quite often two, with the second still waiting his or her turn. During the weekend itself, queues of two to three, sometimes even four at each checkout waiting to be served is more of the general norm.

But not this time. Instead the tellers sat idly, and I was able to breeze through. Then it dawned: I said to the young female serving me that it must be the live football on TV which was keeping their customers at home. It was an important match for all football fans, as this game was of a series of fixtures which would climax with the F.A. Cup Final later in the year. Then I said to her that I am not a follower of football. When she replied that she wasn't a fan either, I concluded the conversation with the words:-

This does not make me any less of a man, though - as I spoke with a hint of embarrassment.

The question of masculinity. And I write this more than a week after an incident at a curry restaurant which made me feel very hot under the collar with rage after suffering public humiliation while seating myself at table. Under the Facebook link, A Punch Averted, a good friend of mine typed, You are the bigger man not biting. In a situation like this, he was absolutely right. Had I responded by giving way to my anger - rather than prove my manhood, I would have lessened it, with the risk of all of us thrown out by the restaurant staff and bringing shame and disgrace to an Ascot church of adult men.   

Is being glued to a TV watching live football more masculine than missing the programme to go out shopping? Many years ago, back in the mid-1970's, whilst working at a precision engineering company, I cracked a joke at a fellow machinist, an ardent Queens Park Rangers supporter. In a discussion about watching the match, I came up with a suggestion on going out shopping with his wife instead. The fierce look he gave me would have launched a thousand ships! I went away laughing, back to my own machine, having both caught the funny side. But this kind of thinking most likely had arisen from his adolescence, when he accompanied his father to the weekly visit to the football stadium, while his mother went out to the shops and cooked the dinner. Those post-War days when men were men and women were grateful had an effect on my schooldays, when boys evaluated each other according to their physical prowess and their ability and competitiveness at team sports rather than on academic attainments.

Perhaps very much modelled on John Wayne. This six foot four inch tall embodiment of American masculinity left a trail of broken hearts and jaws everywhere, along with millions of fractured male egos, as this rough, tough, two-fisted, ramrod-backed, but always fair, character who conquered the Old West became the celluloid idol of masculinity to whom no other man can measure up to in the real world. John Wayne remains a fictional character, the ideal model of male toughness. But no less masculine is the far less muscular husband and father who doggedly goes to work each day to the job he hates in order to support his wife and children and to keep those nagging fuel bills paid.

John Wayne.

Indeed, devotion to wife and children through self-sacrifice marks out a far more masculine character than the hulking logger who desserts his wife "for that other bit on the side." Going by experience, true masculinity is not based on how physically strong one is, but on how he relates to others, in particular, putting the interests of others before self. This may even include the swallowing of pride in full public view, for something much better. I once read a story about an evangelist who was preaching the Gospel at a public auditorium. In the audience stood one gangster who has a record of street violence, and based his masculinity on his own toughness and prowess, along with his pride in the fights he got himself into. Soon after the main preach, this young man ran up to the evangelist in full view of everyone, and hugged him tight, breaking into tears. He had just learned what a real man is.

Another misconception of masculinity was emphasised by three journalists of the same newspaper, but at different times, two of the three were female. It is the British notion that stoicism in public is the sign of true masculinity. Over the years as a Christian believer, I had the "virtues" of the British stiff upper lip thrown at me by fellow Christians as well as by newspaper journalists and columnists. They write that since the death of Princess Diana in August 1997, our country had lost its "stoic, bulldog spirit" to become publicly emotional, mawkish, sentimental, schmaltzy, and wet - that is, except the emotion of anger. Like the time when the BBC Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson punched the producer Oisin Tymon in March 2015, over a meal served at a hotel - almost exactly eleven years after punching journalist Piers Morgan in another dispute over a boxing contest. Nobody referred to him as emotional or sentimental, but instead received praise from columnist Richard Littlejohn for "being typical British."

This brings out what I find interesting about British masculinity. Littlejohn's article about Clarkson wasn't unique. The same idea was also reflected by fellow columnist Amanda Platell, who equally praised him. When he was ousted by the BBC over his hotel incident, a very large percentage of Top Gear viewers stood behind him, demanding reinstatement. They all loved his saucy humour, his bias towards racism, and his sense of superiority over foreign nationals, as was the case during his stint in India. While Clarkson could be seen as the more genteel British equivalent of his predecessor John Wayne, he too has left a trail of bruised faces and dented male egos, much to the delight of his fans.

Simon Peter could be seen as another who had similar traits to that of Wayne and Clarkson, even if he was Jewish and lived some two thousand years earlier. Muscular in build, this experienced and hardened fisherman was not only the life of the party, but would have been the first to throw a punch at anyone who dared cross him. Before his encounter with Jesus Christ, he most likely filled his talk with strong language, and according to the culture of the day, it would not be surprising if after a heated argument, end up in a fist fight with the local tax collector, seen by him as a traitor of his people while sucking up to the Romans. Little wonder that Simon and Matthew ending up as members of the same team was nothing short of a miracle, the power of God demonstrated. One interesting incident found in the Gospels was when Jesus allowed mothers to bring their children for a personal blessing (Mark 10:13-16). The narrator says that "the disciples rebuked them." I would not be surprised at all if the ringleader was Simon himself, who didn't want to see his Lord wasting his time on "soppy, sentimental drivel"- and ready to throw a punch to any unfortunate dad who had the temerity to insist on a blessing for his offspring. Instead, Jesus quelled any rising tempers with a rebuke before it got out of hand.

The whole life of Jesus really was a demonstration of manhood and the true nature of masculinity. This makes him distinct from the likes of John Wayne, Jeremy Clarkson and Simon Peter. In the world (and not just in the UK either) male anger is seen as a trait of real masculinity, and is often seen as a means of power and a display of masculine strength. And yet the only time when Jesus showed anger was at the Temple precincts in Jerusalem, making a whip and throwing over the trading counters. But his anger was never the result of suffering as a victim of personal injustice. He was angry because he saw that his Father's House of Prayer was suffering under dishonest violation of its true purpose. When the issue was resolved, his anger was totally dissipated, and he was able to plead with the same crowd that he is Eternal Life, and to come to him and receive it.

While on Earth, Jesus shows compassion to the sick, the lowly, and the rejected. As a boy he was subject to his parents, and as an adult he had a kind attitude towards children. In a culture where women were deemed inferior to men, and their word or testimony generally disregarded, and even gender segregation at the synagogue as well as at the Temple, Jesus has shown a high regard for women. Like the elderly lady who suffered twelve years of vaginal bleeding, (Luke 8:43-48) the chat he had with the woman at the well, (John 4:1-42) and his ministry to Martha and Mary (John chapters 11, 12). Here Jesus shows his true masculinity by showing love and compassion towards women while at the same time going against the grain of culture, and risking to suffer reprisals for this.

While the Lord determinedly set course for Jerusalem to be tried and crucified, and knowing with certainty of his fate, he went with the full knowledge that this was the will of his Father in heaven. Yet he also fulfilled Isaiah's prophecy that he did not open his mouth (Isaiah 53:7) in protest, grumbling, or in defence, nor did he shout in retaliation. He never wept for himself or for his coming fate. This has nothing to do with the stiff upper lip. It had everything to do with his love for Israel and the whole world taking precedence over his own affairs. In addition, the Gospels does record him weeping in public on two separate occasions. The first occasion was when he foresaw the fate of Jerusalem. After rejecting him as Messiah, Saviour and King, the city would be razed to the ground by Roman general Titus less than forty years later. He wept over the city (Luke 19:41) without caring what others might think of him.

The second occasion is recorded in John 11:35, the shortest verse in the entire Bible: Jesus wept. He loved that family so much - Lazarus, Mary, and Martha, that the sight of Mary's distress brought out his tears. If this was an occasion to show off his sentimentality, surely this was it. It was nothing of the kind. Instead, he wept out of love for the family.

Jesus Christ demonstrated a level of masculinity which was way above Wayne, Clarkson or even Peter. But it does not end there. We too can have the same level of manhood Jesus had. This is achieved by being controlled by the Holy Spirit in our lives, who is available to anyone who asks for him. It is that simple. Believing that Jesus is the Resurrected Christ and having the Holy Spirit dwelling within makes the man whole, and the Holy Spirit can direct him towards true masculinity, which involves putting the interests of others on the same par as himself at least, if not above himself.

It is the goal to aim for.

Celebrities...

Last Sunday, after a long wait of 77 years, history was made in Wimbledon when Scotsman Andy Murray won the grand slam against Serbian Novak Djokovic at the All England Tennis Club. He was the first male Briton to have won the tournament since Fred Perry in 1936, when he defeated German Gottfried von Cramm, whom he also won against on the previous year in the Wimbledon men's single finals, after defeating Australian Jack Crawford at the same venue in 1934. So although Murray brought the long wait for a British finalist to win to an end, he still have to win two more tournaments at Wimbledon to equal Fred Perry.

But unlike Perry, who was generally disliked by the club officials for having come from a working class background, Murray was greeted by the besotted Etonian Prime Minister David Cameron, along with Liberal Democrat leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, and opposition leader of the Labour Party Ed Milliband. Cameron even suggested a Knighthood for Murray, who in turn had far better sense to withdraw from such a proposition, with the greater percentage of the public agreeing.

Murray with the Wimbledon 2013 trophy

Along with his trophy, Murray also received a pay cheque of £1,600,000 as well as admiration from the nation - as a Briton, not an Englishman, as he was born in Dunblane, up north in Scotland and grew up there. Therefore I could not help but feel a notable lack of local public celebration for someone who had put Britain on the winning map after such a long wait. Now, had the winning finalist been his predecessor Tim Henman, a true blue Englishman and a Tory to wit, the whole nation would have had a forest of St George flags flying from just about every house and car aerial along with street bunting. Instead, life carried on, the world continues as it always does - no street parties, no bunting, just a day of front page newspaper coverage and a series of Facebook postings from a fan or two.

Murray was one of the fortunate ones. He happened to excel in a particular sport and now having received worldwide fame. A celebrity, even the chief Government minister fawned over enough to make a hasty decision to have him awarded a Knighthood. This takes me back to 1969 when three American astronauts: Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins, travelled 250,000 miles to the moon on the Apollo 11 and two of the three setting foot on the surface of the moon on July 20th for the very first time in human history. Instantly, all three became worldwide celebrities.

I recall the tremendous public applause as we watched the whole episode on monochrome television. I was sixteen at the time and it was more than a year after leaving school. As the three faced the TV cameras shortly after splashdown, I felt a wave of envy take hold of me. At my job, all I was doing was dogsbody work at a family-owned furniture-making factory under a war-veteran supervisor who had a hangup about not making any impact or a name for himself in the world. Fame and public recognition had totally eluded him. He hated his position of being "of the masses" or simply "rank and file" - both terms depicting ordinary unimportant people. He made sure that I fully understood that I was in no better position than he was. When I suggested that I was special, he rebuked me, followed by a stream of constant teasing. Unfortunately for him, he died around 1975 after being hit by a car, and took his grudge with him to the grave.

But his power over me not only stuck, but in the years to come I was able to see that the inward desire for fame and recognition is universal. Who would not want to appear on television, or better still, on the big screen or at a theatre stage? Alternatively, one can become an author and write books, or to be a newspaper journalist or news reporter on TV. Although a few authors with little or no academic qualifications do get their work published first time, this is rare. Rather, it is fiendishly difficult to get an edge in anywhere, and I read on a reliable source that the vast majority of novice writers see their efforts winging their way back home from the publishers accompanied by a reject note. Or ending up shedding tears in front of the TV camera. Such was the case of the audition of the Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat West End theatrical production as chief actor/singer, a few years ago. When one candidate's song failed the first round of the audition, he fell into the arms of presenter Graham Norton and cried like a baby while still live on air. Not the sort of emotion shown if failed for a post as a plumber. The role as Joseph was eventually won by a professional singer.

Even here on this website, it has been suggested that I write of my travel experiences and submit for publication. This sounds fine, if I knew that I stood a high chance of acceptance. Who would not want to see their own works on display for sale at Waterstones? Then again, it's my opinion that backpacking travel is not specifically unique, although this might have been the case half a century earlier. Nowadays there are a large number of undergrads who travel abroad on their gap-year and come back with tales of extraordinary adventures.

And here's the hunch. Such professions mentioned above all require degrees. It does look to me that gaining a university degree is a good alternative to local, national or worldwide recognition, and as in the case of journalism, a necessary stepping stone. As these careers are fiercely competitive, with thousands applying for so few posts, maybe physical excellence is possible with out and out determination, training and a huge dollop of pure luck.

So failing at school, being lucky enough to find and hold down a humble manual job, feeling one in a faceless crowd, of the masses, an also ran in sports, not recognised - let alone famous - little wonder that to my experience, being a nobody has the capability to lead to self-pity, depression, a life of hopelessness, failure, worthlessness, class envy, even suicide. I'm sure that among sport celebrities like Andrew Murrey, David Beckham or Bobby Charlton, or presenters like Brian Cox, Simon Reece or David Attenborough, along with numerous actors, singers, news reporters and newspaper journalists, such occupations are linked to public recognition and fame. It was interesting to note that just before writing this, a filler appeared on Amanda Platell's page of the Daily Mail. In it I read that since the Goring Hotel in London was the venue of Kate and the Middleton family just prior to her Royal Wedding to Prince William, its fortunes have soared with bookings stretching over months.

International footballer David Beckham

When I feel so small and insignificant, unimportant and worthless in a world of celebrities, one of the most liberating forces at work is the truth of the Gospel. I have found the value of celebrity losing its power when I learned the truth of the Gospel. In it is the knowledge that God loves you personally. When Jesus Christ died on the cross, he died with my name and your name on the cross. When I first believed, God the Judge granted judicial acquittal, or justification. The very fact that every believer has his name written in the Lamb's Book of Life shows that God Almighty knows each one of us as individuals. And furthermore, the relationship is eternal.

What a wonderful truth - to be known and loved individually by the Almighty God!

And that's why I tend to pity, rather than show reverence to a celebrity. True enough, there are some, like singer Cliff Richard, who is world famous and a believer in Jesus. But most of the others do not, or had never known the Lord. Actress and singer Marilyn Monroe and ex Beatle John Lennon were such cases of great celebrities who lived and died without knowing Jesus Christ as Saviour, both stepping into lost eternities while still at the prime of their lives.

As for Andrew Murray, a friend I know personally, had given this tennis champion praise on Facebook for elevating patriotic and national pride and glory. Underneath, in one of the comment boxes, I wrote; 
What Andy needs now is Jesus Christ as Saviour.
My friend actually clicked "Like" on my comment, implicating full agreement.

Although Andy Murrey had done a great service to Great Britain, his glory is self-ward. I actually mourn for him rather than show reverence. In fact, I find it very difficult to show reverence to any celebrity who is still in his sins. Instead, I long for such a person to have faith in Jesus. This applies to everyone alive - to know Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord, and to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Like this, an eternal crown awaits him in Heaven.

Calling God A Liar...

Anyone who is familiar with my blog archive may have come to the conclusion that I am rather amazed and astonished with the English; their culture, their way of thinking, what they believe, and their attitude. Probably as one like myself who speaks with an accent, appear different, that is, having a Continental appearance, and especially during my schooldays; prone to show emotion, lacking physical strength, useless as a popped balloon at team sports, and subject to verbal bullying, I had never felt that I fully belonged here. Even when I was older, more than once was I told to go back to my own country - but wait - England is my own country. I was born here, grew up here, and became very well acquainted with the English way of life over a span of sixty years. Nothing about my homeland should take me by surprise, even from one whose both parents arrived from Italy soon after the War, making me a full-blood Italian with a British citizenship.

 

Maybe it was the luck of the draw, or perhaps the Sovereign plan of God, that while my mother was pregnant with me throughout 1952, she frequently breathed in air which was polluted with London smog. Smoke from the city chimneys, both domestic and industrial, spewed daily into the air along with fumes from cars, buses, trucks and even steam-powered locomotives. When there was no wind, this stratum of smoke particles remained hanging in the air, combining with the winter fog to produce smog, hence the term. This gaseous gloup which Mum had to inhale surely brought no good whatsoever to this unfortunate foetus; as its mother was so familiar with the state of the buildings, Victoria Station in particular, being literally blackened with soot before the Clean Air Act was passed by the Government around 1962. But by then it was already too late. What if Mum lived by the coast throughout 1952, enjoying the daily sea breeze which was free from any pollution? Instead of failing at school, would I have had success in graduating as a doctor, which was my childhood dream?

So I could toss the argument back and forth. A developing foetus - better off by the sea, blown daily by a chilly sea breeze? Or being subjected to thick city smog marooned over the city by an area of meteorological calm? Whatever the outcome would have been, one famous guy I always have a liking for is Andrew Marr; journalist, news reporter, documentary presenter, and author.

 

Andrew Marr, in one of his more jovial moments.

 

To be honest, I have no idea of the condition the city of Glasgow was like in 1959 when Marr's mother walked the streets to complete her errands. Perhaps being much further up north, the constant chilly breeze kept the city free of smog, despite the presence of heavy, smoke-spewing industry at the time. But whatever the case might have been, towards the end of July of that year, a baby boy let out his first ever cry as he was brought into the world, destined for greatness.

 

And what was the difference between us two children? While I was a slow learner (although certainly not stupid) and already "doomed" for a life of menial tasks; several hundred miles to the north, young Andrew was making rapid progress in his primary school, which looked very promising - and perhaps assurance to his parents that their son will not end up scraping a living in some smoke-billowing, dirty, noisy factory or mill.

 

It doesn't seem fair, does it? Who knows what I could have been if my mother lived at an area well away from London. And another characteristic strength Andrew Marr seemed to have had as a boy which I didn't - stoicism, emotional suppression, the stiff upper lip. Could this have been the making of the British Empire? The master race? National superiority? Not to forget, also - greater advance in biological and social evolution? As a victim of bullying, I had shed tears often. Andrew apparently did not, as this extract from a recent article, about a severe stroke he had suffered recently and came close to death, had shown:

 

I have known Andrew Marr for many years,and he is not a man given to showing his emotions, let alone to talking about them.

 

He says: "Some people told me after what happened that I had to express my emotions - that I had to cry and let it out. Perhaps it's my Presbyterian upbringing, but there were no tears from me - even though there were many from others.

 

"I remember thinking that if I allowed myself to cry, who knows where it would stop. There are few things less attractive than self pity.

 

"I was never angry and I never asked, 'Why did it happen to me?'

 

In hospital I was surrounded by people in far worse situations than I was. They were all very brave, very tough and very cheerful. Being around people like that is a great antidote for self pity.

 

"In any case, I have had a very lucky life. I would have been pathetic to collapse at the first bit of bad luck."
Citation: The Daily Mail, Saturday June 29th, 2013.

Now if anyone said those words to me privately, I would have thought, What a pillock! - and took it no further. But instead, his words were published to the world and were available to anyone who could rustle up a quid from his loose change in his pocket. It was this widespread publicity which moved me to write this blog in response.
 

The interviewer was none other than journalist Amanda Platell, a strong advocate of British stoicism and the stiff upper lip. By reading the article, it was without doubt that Platell coaxed him with questions throughout the interview, and being as she is, wanted to bring their discussion to a climax of true British heroism, with the implication that Bulldog Britain has indeed evolved into a white master race from which other nationalities can look upon with reverential respect. Platell herself was born in 1957 and grew up in Perth, Australia. In the 1980s she backpacked to the UK with her partner at the time because, according to her own words, she was impressed with British stoicism which, we assume, made it the motherland of the greatest empire the world has ever had, and she wanted to experience life in the UK for herself, against the wishes of her partner, who eventually returned alone to Australia, leaving her to pursue her career in journalism as a lifelong single. 

Amanda Platell 

Marr and Platell represent two typical, well educated, middle class Brits. To them, showing emotion was considered very un-British, and Platell herself laments the decline of Britain to a sentimental, mawkish, emotional society since the death of Princess Diana in August, 1997, not long, as a matter of fact, after my own worldwide backpacking trip to Australia, going as far as Sydney. It is clear that if Marr and Platell typify Britain as it should be, I can't help feeling that there is something seriously wrong with a culture which classify itself as Christian.

Andrew Marr admits in growing up as a Presbyterian, a major Scottish denomination, which creed he renounced as early as fifteen years of age. He believes Charles Robert Darwin to have been the greatest Briton to have ever lived, and like Richard Dawkins, he became an ardent advocate of organic evolution as opposed to Divine Creation as taught by his Presbyterian church.  He had also visited and made documentaries at the Galapagos Islands, where Charles Darwin found his inspiration to write his thesis, On the Origin of Species. It looks apparent to me that there is a close link between Darwinism and British stoicism.

Not that I'm against stoicism. It is in itself a good characteristic quality to have, particularly in a crisis. Rather than explode in panic or end up tied in emotional knots, stoicism goes a long way towards tackling the task to either solving the problem, averting a disaster or saving lives. But where I disagree strongly with Platell, and perhaps Marr as well, is that those two believe stoicism is uniquely British. Here I can quote two examples of human stoicism outside the UK. One was of the pilot and crew of Flight 1549 New York La Guarda Airport to Charlotte, Carolina on January 15th, 2009. The 'plane came down soon after take off and fell into the Hudson River, most likely due to a bird strike at both of the 'plane's engines. The pilot in particular, an American, was hugely praised for calmly taking the right action in saving the lives of all the passengers and crew.

But the greatest example of non-British stoicism must be the 33 miners trapped in an underground mine cavern at St. Jose, Chile for several weeks before finally being rescued, with every life saved. This crisis was the result of the collapse of the access shaft leading to the chamber, which happened on August 5th, 2010. Rather than screaming in panic or gripped by terror, the trapped miners, with enough fuel for lighting and with available tools, converted one end of the chamber into a chapel, from where the miners prayed each day to be rescued. They eventually attracted attention from outside and a shaft was excavated to the roof of the mine chamber, with which a special elevator lifted each miner, one by one, six weeks after the initial disaster. It was a stupendous feat, carried out slowly and with meticulous care. There were no reports of panic, even though some of these miners remained mentally traumatic for years afterwards.

An elevator lifts a miner out of the doomed mine chamber, Chile.

With such a display of stoicism, the weekend after the rescue was completed, I bought a copy of the Daily Mail newspaper hoping to read Platell's verdict at her weekly column. Surely, this journalist would have poured praise upon praise to those who rescued the miners and to the miners themselves. What a demonstration of stoicism! But, much to my disappointment, Amanda Platell was away that weekend. Her very absence had sent a strong message which was this: Faced with a situation contrary to her pet opinion, she had done a runner. If the rescue had taken place in Britain, especially southern England, she would without doubt splashed several pages of the newspaper with adoring praise and declaring that the British Bulldog hadn't died with Princess Diana after all!

Also noted in Platell's interview with the TV presenter, Marr was right about self-pity. Self-pity is actually a sin, and according to one American Christian psychologist Tim LaHaye, this emotion is the universal cause of depression, with extreme cases of suicide. Worldwide, and certainly in Britain, depression is a universal mental and emotional malady, experienced by just about everyone to one degree or another. A number of times lately I have experienced train delays and journey disruptions due to someone jumping in front of a moving train, all in the prosperous south of England. Self-pity - feeling sorry for oneself - is wrong. The one proper remedy for this is to trust in the atonement Jesus Christ had made on the cross and his resurrection, and be filled daily with the Holy Spirit, which entails becoming familiar and knowledgeable with the Bible. I should know. There was a time I was tempted to commit suicide myself before I met Jesus Christ.

But this blog is not primarily aimed at self-pity and depression. Rather, it is allowing one to express emotions freely when at certain circumstances, some positive. To say that displaying emotion in public is sentimental, mawkish or un-British is making a declaration that the British bulldog is above God and stronger than the Almighty. This considering that at two recorded occasions Jesus wept in public. The first occasion occurred on the way to the city of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives (KJV):

And when he was come near, he beheld the city, and wept over it. Saying, if  thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes. Luke 19:41-42.

The second was over the death of Lazarus, to whom Jesus wept (John 11:35) and to whom the Pharisees remarked how Jesus loved him, v. 36.

It is important to note that in neither occasion did Jesus weep out of self-pity, but from a genuine grief over someone's demise or the fate of a city. This is the very same set of emotions Platell criticises British society of mawkishness. If a loved one dies, and the widowed cannot hold his or her emotions in a public setting, then that person should be comforted, not frowned upon, especially if the widowed is male.

But does Paul the apostle mention stoicism as a Fruit of the Spirit in one of his letters? I'm referring to Galatians 5:22-23, which reads (NIV):

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. Against such things there is no law.

Self control as a fruit of the Spirit could well be similar to stoicism, but British culture leaves out the rest! - Although their ability to form orderly queues may consider patience as included. But these virtues which Platell promotes are not fruits of the Holy Spirit, as the vast majority of the British are unbelievers. British stoicism therefore must be counterfeit to the real fruit which is divine. The unbelieving British, or of any other nationality, does not have the Holy Spirit manifesting from within, so therefore cannot produce any of his fruits. Stoicism is a counterfeit, based on human strength and pride, leading to a lost eternity in Hell, and therefore cannot be the fruit of the Holy Spirit. The genuine fruit of self control has the ability to return evil with goodness. If a person wrongs a believer, or even verbally or physically abuses him, the believer, instead of retaliating, treats his foe with kindness and compassion. That is self control. Divine fruit is far superior to British stoicism!

How I wish I could sit opposite Amanda Platell at her office desk, look hard into her eyes and let her see the truth which she had been blinded from all her life. How I long for her to see the love of Jesus Christ, who died for her! But I guess that would never happen, not because such a meeting would be considered a waste of her time, although that would be the excuse she would come up with. The real reason why I would never meet her is because such a confrontation with one who has the truth would terrify her.

As for Andrew Marr, he is a staunch evolutionist who nominated Charles Darwin as the greatest Briton in history. Evolution is contrary to Divine Creation. The Bible says that the heavens and the earth were created in six literal days and nights, the Hebrew evening and morning making a whole day, as the Jewish day ends at sundown. Uniformitarian geology and organic evolution says that it took billions of years for both rock strata and living things to arrive to where they are at present. The two cannot be both right. One says one thing, the other says something totally different.

If God says that he created everything in six literal days and nights, then the evolutionist who denies this is calling God a liar. Lucifer accused God of lying to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. To this day the snake in the garden is still talking. And he is using the academic and the well educated to spread his Edenic lie. Darwin was an Englishman. Geologist Charles Lyell, who wrote Principles of Geology and coined up the theory of Uniformitarianism, was a Scotsman. Is it a coincidence that the twofold lie which is keeping people away from Jesus Christ began here in the UK?

And so we have our modern duet, continuing with the Edenic lie. One maintains that inner strength through self effort and culture is a virtue in itself. The other is calling God a liar, as straightforward as that. As Lyell and Darwin had drawn the rest of us away from the truth of Christ, so Marr and Platell continue to push the Edenic lie.

Thus making all four the perpetrators of Hell, which grieves my heart. My longing is that everyone believes the Gospel and are saved, the English included.

Enough to make me weep aloud on a crowded station platform.