Letters to garden makers

Dear Monty, The dog rests after his walk His paws washed Still smell earthy. He curls foetal Feet under his nose Smelling the earth he came from. It brings a kind of comfort A memory of the walk In the garden of a one-time Eden. Birches white barked and purple topped Bright sun between the clouds Which brought so much rain. He dreams of rabbits and squirrels and chasing sticks He drifts into deep sleep Limbs relax. He twitches and quietly barks As an orchestra plays mellow music Plucked mysteriously from the air. When I smell the earth It smells of God It is where I belong. I am the elements The rain The river The light made manifest. My flesh is a hindrance And all that men reach for To make themselves holy. Why do we forget where we came from? Why is humility so hard to grasp While in the land of the living ? I am alive when I smell the earth Out of death comes life Rich and full of potential. Na...

Dear Monty, As far as I can tell - there was no celebration of the birth of Christ (Messiah) by the early church. This celebration was created in order to coincide with pagan festivals and has now become a sanitised version of who this Christ was. He was born into dangerous times of occupation - of political unrest in the Middle East. A time of expectation, of acts of terror and of dumbing down God. There were factions that were trying to undermine the rule of Rome and there were the local Temple leaders who were actively suppressing revolt. This Christ didn't take sides in this man made struggle. Instead he said that we were all at fault, all corrupt, all in need of something new. There was no difference between the religious and the irreligious - all had missed the point and could not and indeed still cannot solve such issues by political or moral means. Here we are still trying to solve these issues - still applying the same formula - wielding the sword a...