Trinity Methodist Church, Castleford

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A Pastoral Letter from the District Chair

She, so beloved…..

This is the title of a film and installation based on the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, currently showing in Leeds Art Gallery. I found it a moving experience. The music of Monteverdi’s opera Orfeo takes the viewer through the filmed ‘re-awakening’ of Eurydice from death, in the Underworld. The love of Orpheus calls to her through song and then through touch, and seemingly reluctantly Eurydice appears almost ready to leave the peace and tranquillity of death in response to her lover. At the last moment, as we know, the enchantment of ‘re-awakened life’ is broken, as Orpheus does the one thing forbidden to him and steals a glance at his beloved. The veil of death once more shrouds Eurydice and she disappears from his sight.

Reflecting upon this ancient myth, and this particular presentation of it, in this Easter season prompts many thoughts about ‘resurrection’ and the ‘new life’ which we proclaim at the heart of our Christian faith. There are significant echoes and dissonances between the Orpheus myth and the Resurrection gospels. I was struck, however, by the tenderness of this portrayal of costly love, and by the echoes in Eurydice’s being called back to life with our own experience of being called into the life of discipleship.

Christ’s loving call to us, sometimes through music and song, often through the care and touch of others, stirs the deepest core of ourselves in response. It reaches the depths of us, and can feel like a call to what is dead or deeply sleeping within us. Our response, like that of Eurydice is both one of having been ‘found’ at last, and possibly of some reluctance to being stirred and changed by God’s grace. How often at the crucial moment do we revert, or slip back into ‘old ways’ or a seemingly ‘unredeemed’ self.

In this Easter season I have also been reflecting upon the poem of Gerard Manley Hopkins in which he uses the word ‘easter’ as a verb:

“Let him easter in us, be a dayspring to the dimness of us….”

May God continue the work of grace eastering within us, calling us to new life, and to generous love.

Liz

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