I entered the gift shop with a view to doing a little Christmas shopping, when my eye alighted upon a fetching display right in the centre of the boutique. “Oh no!” I thought. “Lead me not into temptation!”
The shop display in question showed an array of gorgeous handbags. I have, unfortunately, an addiction to handbags (and totes, and bags of all description). I could quite easily be described as a bag lady, and if I departed this world tomorrow morning, my heirs and successors would have to wade through a shameful cache of various bags, purses and reticules. Even though I regularly donate some to the charity shops, there always remain blushingly many.
“Oh no,” I repeated to myself. “Lead me not into temptation.” Avert the eyes. No justification for perusing, let alone considering purchasing, another handbag, however beguiling they look.
Thankfully, I did not succumb. Although there was another occasion later when again my gimlet eye alighted upon a handbag display – in a museum shop, of all places.
We all have our little failings and foibles and the handbag addiction, in the sum of things, is a minor weakness indeed. But the episode was a useful reminder to me that the phrase “Lead us not into temptation” can have an apt application.
Pope Francis is now critical of this phrase from the Lord’s Prayer. It seems to be implying that the Lord might be leading us into temptation, and that is not what a loving Father does.
I see his point, but I wonder if it is – with respect – a little nitpicking. Does anyone who says the Lord’s Prayer really think that the Our Father of the entreaty is, literally, leading us into temptation?
We know full well that it is our own failings and weaknesses that prompt the temptations. But being aware of temptations – forewarned is forearmed – helps us not to be “led into” them.
Support groups that help alcoholics or drug addicts often use these strategems to avoid their charges yielding to the lure of addictive (and destructive) desires.
The Lord’s Prayer is a beautiful, comforting prayer of unique cadences which has been recited for millennia, and it is the one prayer that Christians can say together. That American wisecrack “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” comes to mind.
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I seldom get involved in Middle Eastern political affairs as they are so complex and all the statistics seem to be so contested.
But I do feel it is regrettable that President Trump has chosen to move the American embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. It seems to be directly politicising Jerusalem as the hub of the three great monotheistic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
Surely we should aim to keep Jerusalem, as much as possible, a place of faith and of peaceful spirituality, rather than underlining the political strains.
Tel Aviv is the modern capital of Israel, and therefore surely the most appropriate location for a political mission.
Politicians are often motivated not by reason of long-term considerations, but with an eye to their own electoral base, and the majority of the Evangelical Christians in America who supported Mr Trump interpret a biblical directive that “Jerusalem has been the eternal, undivided capital since the reign of David”.
In America, a greater percentage of Evangelical Protestants than American Jews favour having Jerusalem as the capital.
Biblical texts often need scholarly interpretation, but it seems to me that “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and unto God what is God’s” is a pretty clear statement that politics and faith are not in the same box.
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When I interviewed Christine Keeler, who died recently aged 75, I thought her a vulnerable woman who was, in her day, a beauty. But her personality was ill-equipped to withstand the slings and arrows of life. She’d had a terrible childhood, and she was drawn to people who were destructive to her self-worth. She was utterly unlike Mandy Rice-Davies, who was sassy and smart and had a strong sense of self-preservation.
Christine did have a certain spirituality and I asked her if she believed in God. “Of course I believe in God,” she answered with emphasis.
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