Thought for the week: the Glastonbury miracle

The 75-year-old remarked: “There is no more fitting way to say goodbye to my British fans.”

The annual event at Worthy Farm attracts thousands upon thousands of music lovers, many of whom seem to enjoy wallowing in the mud which often seems to accompany an English summer. Even politicians somehow feel the need to burnish their credibility by flocking to the Somerset extravaganza.

Music aside, Glastonbury features large in British mythology. It is purported to be the burial place of King Arthur, and was certainly the place where Dunstan established a monastery at the behest of King Edmund I before the end of the first millennium. The said Dunstan later became Archbishop of Canterbury, and some elements of the Coronation Ceremony for King Charles III date back to the liturgy Dunstan used for the coronation of King Edgar.

Most celebrated of all is the claim that Joseph of Arimathea became a fearless Christian believer after the resurrection of Jesus. During his missionary adventures he came to Britain and established a church at Glastonbury. Significant for present purposes is the claim that at the site he had chosen for his church he thrust into the ground the thorn wood staff which he had brought with him from Palestine. The story goes that on Christmas morning the staff had miraculously blossomed in honour of Christ’s birth.

Whether Charles Dickens knew the legend is immaterial, yet in his finest Christmas story he told of a compassion which blossomed in the most unlikely way. ‘The Christmas Carol’ begins with a focus on the grasping, covetous old sinner, Ebeneezer Scrooge. Visited by his cheery nephew on Christmas Eve, he described the annual celebration of Christ’s birth as ‘humbug’.

When asked to subscribe to a charity collection he expressed the view that it would be a good thing if the poor should die off to reduce the surplus population. And he kept his employee Bob Cratchit shivering in his office, and begrudged him the day off for Christmas. But then Scrooge is visited by three spirits and a change of heart results; he ordered the biggest turkey for Cratchit’s family, astonished the charity collectors with his generosity, and was the life and soul of his nephew’s Christmas party.

The world into which Jesus was born was a cold and callous place. The decision of Herod to order the death the babies around Bethlehem because He feared the ‘new-born king’ was among them, is typical of the gratuitous violence of the age. It was the influence of Jesus that brought in a more humane and compassionate age.

As one writer observed: “It is He who has spread abroad the spirit of kindness and love in the world. It is he who has taught us that we are all brothers because sons of the one Father. It is He who has told us that it is more blessed to give than to receive.”

Let your love and generosity blossom this Christmas season.