The Friday Fix

  • ‘Tired Since 1994’ – Last Train

    Jane writes:

    Oh how very real this seems sometimes. Just a song title describing exactly what’s going on inside your head. I came across it on one of those walks with the earphones planted firmly in my ears providing the perfect chance to discover new music amidst old favourites.

    This is a song that comes with both a fabulously distinctive voice, spare sound and a certain kind of lament. Then it does the thing I love most. Builds and builds and builds. It’s a song aware of its own shape and style which brings a
    desire not to lose it in the multitude of choices provided by modern-day music listening.


    I’ve been tired since 1994.


    I don’t feel like this all the time of course but there are some days when you feel that there’s a relentlessness to life, the universe and everything, and with good reason. I suspect too that for some people life is a treadmill and that there is no possibility for proper respite.

    The pace of working life caused by the gig economy and the desire for 24/7 retail and service. The need to be up when the rest of the world is awake. The unseen carers holding down jobs and looking after loved ones so they can sleep but unable then to get any rest themselves. The support services in hospitals, care homes and other “round the clock” care providers. It’s a list that you could probably extend yourself.


    I can’t remember how it feels to be bored.
    I’m still dancing with pressure and fear.
    And made from myself,
    There’s nothing I wish but to disappear.

    The lyricist suggests that sometimes the anxiety and the pressure is of their own making. Maybe even their own choosing. Whatever is going on for them is, in their view, turning them into a faded flower and they’ve had enough.


    I’m starting to fade away,
    I’m too young to fade away,
    No I just can’t fade away !


    Research says that the good old “me time” is of increasing value and that the importance of finding some way to exploit what gives you life is the key to improved mental and physical health. Burnout is now a word we hear in
    many more professions and our communities of faith are no different.

    In fact, Sanctuary Mental Health says that “One in four people will be affected by a mental health challenge at some point in their lives, yet the stigma surrounding these experiences often prevents faith communities from responding compassionately and effectively.”

    In the stories that humankind shared about their origins, there is one that tells of a set of guidelines for life. Christians know it as the Ten Commandments and among them there is one that says this:

    “8-11 Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Work six days and do everything you need to do. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to God, your God. Don’t do any work—not you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your servant, nor your maid, nor your animals, not even the foreign guest visiting in your town. For in six days God made Heaven, Earth, and sea, and everything in them; he rested on the seventh day. Therefore God blessed the Sabbath day; he set it apart as a holy day”

    Finding time to value yourself, those you love and keeping at least one day precious is a story as old as time. It seems that it’s not easy and for people of faith it gets tangled with their duty towards church attendance but God sees how critical it is to rest. To keep something holy. Kadosh. Kodesh. Set apart for a specific purpose.

    The world does too. So whether it’s the weekend or a random half day somewhere let these words from Last Train inspire you to release the pressure – or help someone else to – and take the rest option. Walk up a hill, paint a
    picture, read a book, dance with a loved one, or sit silently. The choices are yours.

    You can find out more about Last Train here https://www.lasttrain.fr/home/


    And Sanctuary Mental Health here https://sanctuarymentalhealth.org/uk/#

  • ‘Enjoy The Silence’ – Depeche Mode

    Gill writes:

    My 17-year old self might look upon the life her middle-aged self is experiencing and say ‘Well, who knew that life in the 21st Century could feel like you’re living in 1984.’ And by ‘1984’, I obviously mean the book by George Orwell that 17-year old Gill kind of enjoyed at ‘A’ Level but was a bit too immature to quite grasp the politics, social commentary and let’s face it, prophetic visions, that Orwell described.

    It feels to me that week by week, month by month, year by year, Orwell’s novel makes more and more sense, and disturbingly, elements of it feel more real too. Take this week, for example, when more than one public figure has used words and said things that have disturbed, angered, and provoked. I am sure I can sense that they are manipulating and dividing people by the words that they are choosing to use.

    “But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.” said George Orwell.

    Words can be used as weapons. They can also be used to bring people together. To fire people up. To motivate. To manipulate. To show love. To share hate. They can sow seeds of thought that impact positively and negatively. A homophobic attitude might be cloaked in language that comes across as legitimate; a comment about whether a woman is the sort you’d chat up in a bar or a statements in official government documents labelling people with the ‘N’ word. The use of such words and language by public figures and places give permission for them to be used in everyday life to oppress, denigrate and degrade our neighbours, friends and family.

    Words like violence
    Break the silence
    Come crashing in
    Into my little world
    Painful to me
    Pierce right through me
    Can’t you understand?

    ‘Enjoy The Silence’ is one of the most popular songs by Depeche Mode (it was voted Best British Single in the 1991 Brit Awards) and it reminds us about the damage that words can do. Even when we love people, there are times when we can’t stop ourselves sniping, gossiping, talking behind their backs or responding passive-aggressively (just a few examples).

    No wonder the narrator of the song prefers to sit and hold their beloved in their arms, in silence. Letting the moment calm them, reassure them and dwell in the feelings of love. If we enjoy the silence, we can feel safe in the space that words – even well-intentioned ones- are not going to come in and disrupt.

    Vows are spoken
    To be broken
    Feelings are intense
    Words are trivial
    Pleasures remain
    So does the pain
    Words are meaningless
    And forgettable

    The Epistle of James has quite a bit to say about the use of words. We’re confronted by the image that the tongue can be like the spark of a fire that leads to the devastation of a forest. Just one small word can lead to destruction.

    I find this in my work as a Place for Hope Practitioner. Place for Hope is a charity that ‘accompanies and equips people and faith communities so that all might reach their potential to be peacemakers who navigate conflict well’. What you often find at the heart of a conflict or challenging situation is a conversation or an exchange of words that was the catalyst that has reeked havoc through a community or into a relationship.

    The founder of Methodism, John Wesley, also had thoughts on the words that we utter. He wrote quite clearly about the expectations of what a Methodist should be like. These thoughts should apply not just to Methodists but to anyone who is a Jesus Follower. Here’s what he says:

    “He cannot speak evil of his neighbour no more than he can lie, either for God or man. He cannot utter an unkind word of any one; for love keeps the door of his lips. He cannot speak idle words. No corrupt communication ever comes out of his mouth, as is all that which is not good, to the use of edifying, not fit to minister grace to the hearers. But whatsover things, are pure, whatsover things are lovely, whatsoever things are justly of good report, he thinks and speaks, and acts, adorning the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ in all things.” (The Character of a Methodist by John Wesley)

    It’s a challenge isn’t it. We love to talk and natter. We love a good craic. What we say can build people up; can encourage and can be the thing that changes a life.

    Perhaps enjoying the silence is also about that moment we can take before we utter our words to one another. A moment when we can consider how what we are about to say might be received. A moment to recognise that the person before us is created in the image of God.

    Enjoy the silence.

    You can find out more about Depeche Mode at http://www.depechemode.com.

  • ‘Common People’ – Pulp

    Tom writes:

    The principal years of my musical upbringing were from 1989 (when I started Secondary School) to 1999 (when I moved to the US for a year as a university student). This means that I am undeniably a Brit Pop kid (and I acknowledge the problems with both the term and the culture that often went along with it). I’ve also previously mentioned that halfway during this decade of musical
    inculturation I moved to Pilton in Somerset, home of the Glastonbury Festival. It was at the Festival in 1995 (my first) that Britpop obtained one of its most memorable moments. The big deal was supposed to be The Stone Roses but they pulled out at the last minute. So into the breach stepped Pulp. There was much nervousness about this, including from the organisers. In the end, though,
    they stole the show.


    It helped that at that point the band were riding the wave of the success of the single “Common People”, the lead single from the album A Different Class, which was released later in the year and probably Britpop’s greatest anthem. “Common People” takes the LP’s over-arching themes of class and wealth from the viewpoint of those who are working class and live in poverty, and ramps them up to 11 on a scale of 10. With wit, charm, intelligence, and no little amount of scathing invective, Cocker and the rest of the band take aim at those with wealth who choose to “slum” with those less fortunate themselves, all the while knowing that “if you called your dad he could stop it all”. The song is clear – living alongside those in poverty, even joining in with their lives, while knowing you can escape at any moment, is neither appropriate, nor a way to make friends amongst those whose social and financial problems cannot so easily be solved.


    As Cocker sings in the album version of the song (but, interestingly, not the radio-played 7” single edit that’s also used for the video):


    Like a dog lying in a corner
    They will bite you and never warn you
    Look out, they’ll tear your insides out
    ‘Cause everybody hates a tourist
    Especially one who thinks it’s all such a laugh
    Yeah and the chip stains and grease
    Will come out in the bath


    You will never understand
    How it feels to live your life
    With no meaning and control
    And with nowhere left to go
    You are amazed that they exist
    And they burn so bright
    Whilst you can only wonder why


    As I listen to these words today, I find myself wondering about how the Church lives out its calling to be “Church at the Margins”. Too often, I think, the Church can fall into the trap of tourism. Too often we look to “walk alongside” those whom society has treated unjustly and pushed to one side, all the while knowing that we can escape when we choose. We try and be a “Church for the Margins” or a “Church currently on the Margins”. I think, for example, of the challenges we sometimes set ourselves to live on a limited amount for a week or other period of time – no doubt well-meant, possibly even eye-opening and view-point changing, but nowhere near the true experience of those who are forced to live on such limited resources every day of their lives, such as those the Hope@Trinity project work with in Clacton-on-Sea where I’m Superintendent.


    As a Christian, as someone who seeks to work for justice in the world, as someone who is undeniably middle-class and always at risk of forgetting the maxim, “Nothing about us, without us, is for us”, I am grateful to the ongoing challenge that “Common People” offers. I know that I’m one of those Cocker could easily be targeting in his lyrics. As the Church, as we rightly seek to focus on the justice, dignity and solidarity that God calls us to, as we seek to properly offer new places for new people and be a Church on the margins, we must be careful never to lose sight of the risk that we might fall into the trap of spiritual tourism.

    Find out more about Pulp at https://www.pulpwiki.net/

  • ‘I’ll Be Your Mirror’ – The Velvet Underground and Nico

    Gill writes:

    I’ve been reminded this week of the Johari Window – a key tool in understanding self-awareness and self-development. In 1955, psychologists Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham, of the University of California, were exploring group dynamics. They discovered that there was some dissonance between how people thought others perceived them and how they were actually perceived.

    They developed what’s known as the Johari Window (a merge of their names) which rests on four assumptions that humans make:

    • There is information that is known to only me (hidden self)
    • There is information that is known to only you (or, whoever you’re communicating with) (blind spot)
    • There is information that is known to you and me (open self)
    • There is information that neither of us know (unknown self)

    The more self-aware you become, the more the open self and blind spot areas grow wider, and the hidden self and unknown self become smaller.

    I love the tenderness and vulnerability of this song. All of us need reassurance and affirmation of who we are and what we are capable of at times in our lives. We need some people to really ‘see’ us and know us. To reflect back who we are.

    I’ll be your mirror
    Reflect what you are, in case you don’t know
    I’ll be the wind, the rain and the sunset
    The light on your door to show that you’re home

    This is probably the loveliest love song that Lou Reed ever wrote. The Velvet Underground were managed by Andy Warhol, and consequently were part of the pop art world of challenging modernism with provocative perspectives on everyday life. The Velvet Underground’s music was dark and aggressive at times. Yet here is a beautiful, melancholic song professing unconditional love.

    Nico was a German model and singer whom Warhol pretty much foisted on the band. Lou Reed apparently found her irritating and I imagine there were times when there was little sense of love. However, after many takes that reduced her to tears, they produced this tender, reflective, and compassionate song.

    I like to think that for a moment at least, Lou and Nico were able to see and appreciate each other’s gifts – that they were able to see each other. That they were able to move past the twisted and unkind thoughts and attitudes and lay themselves open by putting down their hands.

    When you think the night has seen your mind
    That inside you’re twisted and unkind
    Let me stand to show that you are blind
    Please put down your hands
    ‘Cause I see you

    Thomas Merton said this:

    “Man [sic] is the image of God, and his inner self is a kind of mirror in which God not only sees Himself, but reveals Himself to the ‘mirror’ in which He is reflected.”  
    ​
    When we live with open hearts and minds,  we start to see God not only in the people we meet or live with; or in the places where we go and hang out. We also God in songs, film, writing and everyday interactions.

    And finally, the next time you pass a mirror and groan because that’s not how you want to look (or how you used to look). Stop. Others see you differently to how you see yourself. They don’t see what you see. They’ll see a beautiful human. And they probably get a glimpse of God too.

    Remind yourself about The Velvet Underground at https://www.velvetundergroundmusic.com/

  • ‘Pompeii’ – Bastille

    Marc writes:

    “How am I gonna be an optimist about this?”
    That’s the perpetual question I have in my calling to be part of the church, to be faithful to Jesus, and to reclaim the title “Christian” from all the negative connotations it brings up in peoples’ minds!

    When I look around and see the walls keep tumbling down of the movement that I love, grey clouds rolling over the hills, bringing darkness from above and it all looks a little bit hopeless, what am I going to do!?

    But when ‘Pompeii’ by Bastille came on in the car today, it was a different line that really jumped out at me:​

    Oh, where do we begin,

    the rubble or our sins?

    I think the problem is that a lot of the time we begin with the rubble. We begin by looking at the destruction that has been caused or the havoc that has been wreaked, and we start by sifting through the debris.

    ​Particularly with church life and church history, I think I’d be right in saying that we have often spent a lot more time trying to fix what we have ended up with rather than challenging the root cause, the neglect, the abuse, the culpable actions that we as a people of faith have inherited the consequences of and often benefitted from.

    And when we start with the rubble we can regularly discover that if we close our eyes it almost feels like we’ve been here before… like nothing’s changed at all.

    Wherever I have seen the courage to deal with the sin, the disturbances of Shalom that are as a result of our action or inaction, the courage to address the sometimes missing image of God in our collective experience and expression as disciples, the willingness to hold up our hands and be held accountable for our shortcomings, THAT is where I have seen change. That is where I have seen growth. That is where I have seen God moving and breathing.

    I’ve never been to Pompeii, but it’s a place where friends have been. It appears to be a place that is resigned to the history books, lost to rubble, damage and decay. Bits still stand out to remember what was once there before the destruction, but it’s lost to life.

    I wonder if the church will end up the same way?
    I wonder whether we’ll insist on carrying on starting with the rubble and ignoring our sins?

    I hope I see the day when I can close my eyes and it feels like we’ve changed for the better, and we discover something new.

    Find out more about Bastille at http://www.bastillebastille.com/

  • Pray For Me – Ailbhe Reddy

    Jane writes:

    Oh, what joy a new song is! A new artist. A new take. Sometimes they surprise you so much and just enter your ears without invitation. This is one such song that appeared on Spotify ‘cos I’d started out with something else.

    I was initially attracted by the voice of this artist, and the simplicity and emptiness of the sound, but then the lyrics kicked in and I wondered what it was all about. Digging around, it seems to be dedicated to the singer’s Grandma. An explanation of the “wordless promises” to someone loved at the end of their lives. The hand-holding and the close affection.

    Anyone who has had the privilege of sitting at the bedside of a loved one during those days will know the profound impact of it. What to say and what not to. How to behave and how not to. What to express and what to hold in. The value of your physical presence and theirs. The need to be sure that they know you care and for me, most profoundly of all, what to pray for and when.

    Life’s circle and balances seem all too hard to navigate when time is obviously at a premium and in those precious moments maintaining communication, no matter how small or limited, is like a hidden treasure. The last vestiges of love evident in the need to keep contact through voice, or expression, or breath.

    How then do you talk to God about the situation and what do your prayers contain? Peace. Thanksgiving. Desperation. Acceptance. A need to be sure it will be the right thing, the right way at the right time. A bit of rage. A request or a deep-seated knowing. I love the way the songwriter accepts that prayer is a two-way thing here and is in need of its comfort as much as their loved one.

    Eventually, of course, the inevitable happens but for me, this song sums up those last few precious days and hours when “sitting on the edge of the bed” is what is of value, and holding a hand says more than any words can.

    No experience is the same as any other but this song touched me with its honesty – so on this occasion, it seems best to share the whole set of lyrics. Make of it what you will, but know that the value of the instinct to pray in such tough circumstances is precious beyond words.

    I’ve never seen wrists so thin

    I’ve never seen your hair without the curls that you put in

    Your eyes flutter when you talk about the places that you’ve lived

    But Dublin’s different now and you miss your best friend

    You say she’s waiting

    I sit at the edge of the bed

    Baby, I’ll pray for you if you pray for me

    The radio’s on, but the signal’s weak

    Oh, please, keep talking

    And I’ll keep listening

    I’ve not been so good at visiting

    Regretful now that time is always slipping

    You’d tell me I’ll regret many things

    This will be the least of it so embrace

    Life’s chеcks and balances

    You hold my hand

    I make wordless promises

    Baby, I’ll pray for you if you pray for me

    The radio’s on, but the signal’s weak

    Oh please, keep talking

    And I’ll keep listening

    She says she loves to hear the birds sing

    In the back of her flower garden

    She says she loves to hear the birds sing

    It’s what keeps her going

    When the day is dying

    When the day is dying

    When the day is dying

    Baby, I’ll pray for you if you pray for me

    The radio’s on, but the signal’s weak

    Oh please, keep breathing

    And I’ll keep listening

    You can find out more about Ailbhe Reddy here http://www.ailbhereddy.com/

  • A Small Hiatus…

    It’s that time of year when many of the Friday Fix writers are away, have been away or are going away, so this Friday we don’t have a Fix to share.

    Many of the usual contributors will actually be at the Greenbelt Festival celebrating it’s 50th birthday (and also the 50th birthday of Friday Fixer Kristie!).

    So – as it’s a Bank Holiday Weekend with time to listen to music – here’s the Greenbelt 2023 Playlist to get an idea of the music we’ll be listening to live at Greenbelt.

  • ‘I’m Free’ – The Soup Dragons

    Tom writes:

    I wrote recently that I’m not sure all my memories are quite what I think they are – my brain might even have made some of them up, or at least to have improved them. However, one memory I know is accurate is from the summer after I turned 16. That memory relates to an experience common to the vast majority of British kids at the end of the school year now known as Year 11 – results day! I had just moved from Shropshire to Somerset, so I couldn’t just go in and pick my results up. Instead, they were to be posted to me. Even in the days of a reliable Royal Mail, this didn’t mean I could be certain of getting them the day everyone else did, so I put in a phonecall and one of my former teachers (also a parent to one of my best friends at the time) gave me the basic idea.

    What I particularly remember about that day, though, wasn’t the phone call, but the sense of relief that I felt that morning that no longer was my life governed by the rules that said I had to go to school (law changes mean this normally applies at 18 nowadays) – whatever the results happened to be, the future was to be decided by me. To mark this moment I chose to leave my bedroom that morning and dance around our new house to a taped copy of The Soup Dragons’ cover version of the Rolling Stones’ “I’m Free”. Whenever I hear it nowadays, I am returned to that sense of euphoric release that I felt that morning.

    Of course, if I’m being pedantic, I’d want to challenge some of the somewhat hedonistic direction that the Jagger/Richards lyrics take – in particular, a Christian ethos suggests that while we have free will, a choice to follow Jesus places in a situation where we can’t do anything we want.

    But, as someone who went on to work in Higher and Further Education before ministry, and who spent much of that time engaging with young people making decisions about education, often in the light of results that might be seen as disappointing, I don’t want to focus on questions of free will, hedonism, or Christian ethics. No, when it comes to exam results I want to hold onto that sense of release and freedom I felt that morning – and felt before I knew what my results were (on this occasion they were very good, but 2 years later my initial A-Level results were a disaster!)

    We are not, any of us, defined by our exam results. Not now. Not ever. They may require us to take different and unexpected paths to our preferred destinations. They may cause us to re-evaluate our goals and make alternative choices. They may seem like an amazing blessing that take us to places we thought we wanted to go but it turns out we didn’t. I’ve seen those who struggled at school flourish at work, and those who succeeded at college struggle at university, and many, many folk find later in life that what they did at school, college or uni, is utterly irrelevant to what they’re doing and how their life feels when their teens are but a faded memory.

    As a Christian I will specifically say that the definition of who I am and who I am seeking to be is found in Christ, not my exam results or qualifications, good or bad. Yet, even without that faith aspect I will declare to anyone and everyone who needs to hear it as they open the brown envelope that holds results of whatever kind: you are free to be who you are, whatever you find enclosed in that paperwork. Exam results cannot define me, you, or anyone else. The things that define us are how we live our life, how we love others, how we engage with the rest of humanity and the wider creation. Exams? Not so much. So, open your bedroom, turn up the stereo, and dance with me…

  • Ch-ch-changes

    Hi Everyone

    As of 1st September 2023, the weekly ‘Fix’ will also be dropping on our new Facebook Page and Instagram account as well as this Blog.

    If you would like to start following the Facebook page/Instagram account then this is the logo to look out for:

    And here’s where to go (just to say it will be very quiet until 1st September!)

    The Friday Fix – https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100095789821782

    @the.friday.fix