Buffy's Salon

That's Christmas

Thanks to Girl Talk

Tour of France Part V:Provence

Here I sit, in a world of frost and bone-chilling iciness, preparing for the Christmas festivities, watching the dusk appear earlier and earlier, and remembering the days we spent in Provence back in September.  The temperatures reached the 30s, we ate dinner outside with the other guests until late at night and read by the swimming pool.  Another country, another time.

 

Antique shops along the banks of L'Isle sur la Sorgue (island on the River Sorgue).  Prettiest town in Provence, beloved by English tourists; light reflects from the canals running through the centre and side streets.

 

I couldn't resist taking a photo of this artistically arranged courtyard shop.

 

Colourful Roussillon, ochre deposits explain the yellow and red tints of the buildings.

 

Church at Roussillon

 

So much thought had gone into decorating this tiny terraced house, the views from the rooftop must be excellent. 

   

Refreshing greens against the ochre tints.

 

Inside the Palais des Papes at Avignon.  In 1309 Pope Clement V moved the papacy from Rome to Avignon.  Later Popes returned to Rome in 1377 causing the Papal Schism (during which time there were two or more popes simulataneously), which lasted until 1417.  It fell into a state of disrepair over the years, and was taken and sacked by revolutionary forces in 1789.  Over the next century it was used as a military barracks and prison.

 

This is the village of Bories, abandoned a century ago but lovingly restored.  Bories are built from flat stone, without using mortar.  It is unclear exactly how old these habitations are.  As well as homes they include a barn and a silk-making shop.

     

Gordes, most fashionable of the Provence towns because of its stylish buildings made of creamy rock. A castle dominates the town centre at the top of hill, the buildings and terraced gardens hug the incline.  Gordes was the site of a hilarous goat race in A Year in Provence.

   

The medieval Abbaye de Senanque, surrounded by fields of lavender.  It's a working monastry and the monks sell honey, liqueurs and lavender oil that they have made.

 

The pretty, steeply cobbled village of Lacoste has the dubious pleasure of being the home town of the Marquis de Sade.  He lived in a castle overlooking the village.  During the German occupation this area of the Luberon was a stronghold of the French Resistance.

 

Visiting Lacoste feels like going back in time.  You don't see too many cars traversing these windy streets!  The oldest building dates back to the ninth century.

Good Religion - Good Science?

Creation

I recently read an interesting article on the BBC website entitled Who are the British Creationists?  Now, in the US, 47% of people have rejected the theory of evolution outright and accept a more-or-less literal interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis.  However, in the UK there has long been a more general acceptance of the theory of evolution, to the extent that Charles Darwin appears on our £10 note. The article mentioned above looks at what appears to be growing interest in Creationism as an alternative to Evolution.

The Evolution v Creationism debate looks increasingly like a battleground as each side becomes polarised towards absolute belief in one or the other option, with no in-between.  I have quite often heard it said (by both sides in the debate) that people who have become convinced of evolution lose their faith in God.  (My own personal experience is that there are plenty of people who believe in evolution to some extent and don't find it a problem to believe in God as well.)  Of course, the idea that learning about evolution and loss of faith go hand-in-hand can drive many religious people to decide that the theory of evolution is both dangerous and evil.  Consequently the gap between the two sides grows even wider.

Let's contrast the views of the two sides in question:

"Creationism is anti-science,"says Mr Porteous Wood in the article above. "Teaching it to children is a form of intellectual child abuse, because it gives them the wrong facts about life."

Meanwhile another site claims: "Thousands of valuable classroom hours are wasted every year teaching non-science like evolution and outright lies."

You see how each side claims the other is teaching children lies?  There seems to be little desire on either side to view the other's position with any kind of serious consideration or attempt at understanding.

Of course there are some people who seek to reconcile popular science and the Bible (sometimes called theistic evolution), one of which runs a site called Answers in Creation.  However, they appear to attract equal amounts of condemnation from both sides of the argument.  The Creationist claims "I must say that I have more respect for those who reject the Bible altogether".  The Evolutionist argues "theistic evolution ain't science. Admittedly, it is closer to the dividing line than the explanations of Young Earth Creationists but "close" isn't good enough. Theistic evolution is still in the "Non-Science" half of the diagram. There is no middle ground." 

In an article called Good Religion Needs Good Science the Rev Dr Malcolm Brown reflects over the issues raised by this clash between the Titans of Science and Religion, and seeks a path that may lead to some kind of harmony between the two:

'At a university in Kansas, I asked a biology professor how he coped with teaching Darwin’s theories to students whose churches insisted that evolution was heresy and whose schools taught creationism. “No problem,” he replied, “the kids know that if they want a good job they need a degree, and if they want a degree they have to work with evolution theory. Creationism is for church, as far as they’re concerned. Here, they’re Darwinists.” Perhaps he was over-cynical. But he was also pointing to young lives which could not be lived with integrity – the very opposite of how Christians are called to live. There is no integrity to be found either in rejecting Darwin’s ideas wholesale or in elevating them into the kind of grand theory which reduces humanity to the sum of our evolutionary urges. For the sake of human integrity – and thus for the sake of good Christian living – some rapprochement between Darwin and Christian faith is essential.'

Is he right, or is it impossible, or even wrong, to build a bridge between these two extremes?

Advent

 

If you want to celebrate advent in a more meaningful way than just opening a cardboard door to find a picture or a chocolate, here are details of two on-line advent calendars that are well worth visiting every day of advent.

The first is Why We are Waiting?, which is the Church of England advent website and it has daily reflections by different contributors, sometimes including sound clips or videos, all exploring the theme of waiting from a spiritual point of view.

Even more flash is Paperless Christmas which is run by the Bible Reading Fellowship.  It's a vibrant, and very modern, take on the advent calendar and each day they release a new short video clip designed to make you think. 

Looking Chic

Woman Modeling a Full Sleeved Suit

One shouldn't confuse looking good with trying to look younger than one is - they're not the same thing at all.  The French seem to understand that better than we do and whilst one sees older French women who are enormously chic, as a rule they seldom look ridiculous.  Women who take a modicum of trouble can look good at any age without trying to pass themselves off as anything that they are not.  On the other hand I don't think trying too hard is attractive either.  It speaks of narcissism and vanity, and of a lack of proportion in one's life and of other, proper interests.  We've all seen those "Noo Yorkers", Tom Wolfe's famous X-ray skeletons, whose over-made-up elderly faces and frail figures look quite scary.  The aim surely should be to try to get the balance right, to work out what suits one and what doesn't, and then to get on with the more interesting parts of life.

Things I Wish My Mother Had Told Me
by Lucia van der Post

The Turbulent Age of the Reformation

 

If you have not yet found the Matthew Shardlake series of books set during the English Reformation, but you like either a good mystery or are interested in the history of the Reformation, I would strongly recommend them.  Written by C.J. Sansom they recreate this most fascinating time with faultless detail.  In the first of the series, Dissolution, the year is 1537 and Henry VIII has proclaimed himself head of the Church of England, forcing a break with the Pope and the Roman Catholic church, and opening the way to radical religious reformers.  The dissolution of the monasteries is underway.

Our hero is the hunchbacked lawyer, Matthew Shardlake, a Reformer of unusual sensitivity and intelligence who is sent to investigate politically delicate,and often brutal, crimes by Thomas Cromwell (Henry VIII's chief minister), and then, in later books, by Archbishop Cranmer.

I arrived in London in 1518, the year after Martin Luther posted his challenge to the Pope on the door of Wittenberg Castle church.  I remember how hard it was at first to get used to the noise, the crowds - above all the constant stench - of the capital.  But in my classes and lodgings I soon found good company.  Those were already days of controversy, the common lawyers arguing against the spreading use of the Church courts... This was no mere cynical desire for business; the Church had become like a great octopus, spreading its tentacles into every area of the nation's life, all for profit and without authority in Scripture.  I read Erasmus, and began to see my callow thralldom to the Church of my youth in a new light.  I had reasons of my own to be bitter against the months especially, and now I saw that they were good ones.

In Dissolution Shardlake is sent to investigate the mysterious murder of one of Cromwell's investigators in Scarnsea monastery, which is marked for dissolution.  Whilst uncovering the truth behind the mystery, he is able to experience for himself the corruption that lay in many such houses, but also is forced to question some of the more dubious methods utilised by the leaders of the reform, as well as the hardships that result from the dissolutions.

Dark Fire is set in a superbly recreated Tudor London, as the race is on to find the secret of Byzantinian Greek Fire, a weapon which would make the English navy unassailable; but political intrigue and corruption hamper Shardlake at every turn.

In Sovereign our hero is sent north to the city of York to prepare for the King's Progress, which is an attempt to overawe the northern rebels following the Pilgrimage of Grace the previous year.  Historical facts are woven into another suspenseful story about the monarch, who had by then become a tyrant.

Revelation is the darkest of the series to date, as you can perhaps guess from the title.  In a post-dissolution world England totters between extreme reformism and a return to Roman Catholicism.  Amidst a feeling of great social instability is it possible that the times prophesied in the Book of Revelation have started to come to pass?

I don't know what the author's religious sensibilities are but he examines issues of faith and spiritual healing.  For example, In Dark Fire Shardlake helps a young woman who has lost her faith in God because of the terrible things that have happened to her and in Revelation he is the only hope for a boy who, because of his struggle to understand the idea of being saved by faith, is likely to be burnt as a heretic.