Lennox Raphael
by Lennox Raphael Photography Iva Brajdic
SPIRITFACE There is no such thing as ordinary Desire. The Archbishop of Canterbury has admitted to having doubts about the existence of God and disclosed that, on a recent morning jog with his dog, he questioned why the Almighty had failed to intervene to prevent an injustice. In a light-hearted but personal interview Justin Welby said: “There are moments, sure, where you think “Is there a God? Where is God?” Welby quickly added that, as the leader of the world's 80 million-strong Anglican community, this was “probably not what the Archbishop of Canterbury should say”. Earlier, BBC Bristol's Lucy Tegg, the interviewer, reminded him of the weight his words carried. "You have a remarkably prominent role within the faith community around the world," Tegg said. "I've noticed," Welby quipped. Tegg then asked: "Do you ever doubt?" Welby replied: "Yes. I do. In lots of different ways really. It's a very good question. That means I've got to think about what I'm going to say. Yes I do." He added: "I love the Psalms, if you look at Psalm 88, that's full of doubt." Welby suggested that his doubts were a regular occurrence, by recounting the recent morning run with his dog. "The other day I was praying as I was running and I ended up saying to God: 'Look, this is all very well but isn't it about time you did something – if you're there' – which is probably not what the Archbishop of Canterbury should say." He added: "It is not about feelings, it is about the fact that God is faithful and the extraordinary thing about being a Christian is that God is faithful when we are not." Later in the interview, Welby said he was certain, however, about the existence of Jesus, even talking about his presence beside him. "We know about Jesus, we can't explain all the questions in the world, we can't explain about suffering, we can't explain loads of things but we know about Jesus," Welby said. "We can talk about Jesus – I always do that because most of the other questions I can't answer." Asked what he did when life got challenging, Welby said: "I keep going and call to Jesus to help me, and he picks me up." Welby, who was appointed to his post in November 2012, has frequently made known his feelings on a wide variety of issues. He has raised questions about the "inexplicable" increase in energy prices, which he has said are putting strain on low-income households.
He has criticised government changes to welfare and targeted payday lenders, saying that he wanted to "compete Wonga out of existence", although it was later pointed out that at the time the church was an investor in Wonga. He has also offered wholehearted support for the consecration of women bishops, describing the rejection in 2012 as a "grim day". Look, says I, doubt and, perhaps, even impatience, is faith strengthened by openness & trust. Saint Mother Theresa herself left us a private word in her posthumous diaries. As early as 1953, she wrote, “Please pray specially for me that I may not spoil the work and that Our Lord may show Himself – for there is such terrible darkness within me, as if everything was dead. It has been like this more or less from the time I started ‘the work’. ” Me too!
What use is God as presently constituted? Is it enough for us to be made in his image? The world is not such a nice place. Who is Responsible? There is a Higher Order. We were brought up to believe in God as the image-maker. We have done everything we were supposed to do. Belief is an omlette on its way to Heaven, a toy gun whose anguish is fate. Believe me, then, I hold Someone responsible for the wreck of innocence. Who wants to be God? We worship the one who would take the blame for the ecstasy & the idiocy. Time will not do as an excuse any longer. Gender is a poor excuse – and so too intention. Thru the heart, we want results. The news is not enough; and history is the fart of speed reduced to butter in Hell. We are on the threshold of final promises wrapped in discoveries. Our memories are starved by regrets. But there is new Hope.
My soul doth rust from blind dust of God as a Girl, sum total of our world. My life as a woman ends when men stop looking at me. In my invisibility, I am shuffled into packs of cards whose Kings & Queens are Jokers wild as Hope.
I look out the window at people I once knew ; thousands in cornfields, like locust eating off trees, as though memories on stalk no longer talk. I cannot remember when last we felt hungry.
A white butterfly weaves artfully thru the muchedumbre, as though afraid of Desire freed from intentions & suspicious as ghosts bursting from pods of burnt lips soothed by reluctant teardrops.
I wait for my Lover. I lie in bed, on my back, legs apart, & think of rainbows around my body, squeezing me, forcing me to breathe heavily, weakening me ; & I bring my legs together, & squeeze to ashes ;
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At last, my lover comes. I hear him coming up the stairs. He used to run, but is slow now, like his fears, & I long to see his face, laughing, shy, no longer innocent, no longer victim of why – neither he, she, nor it – his eyes a whip – no bulge at his zip.
He takes a cob of corn from his pocket, &, like a rocket, plunges destiny into my soul. ! !Aahaah! ! ,
I Iong to be a ghost whose invisibility is curiosity.
As though fleeing a mob, he pulls out the cob & begins eating,
R * A * V * E * N * O * U * S * L * Y, cheeks in golden corn hair, & wings down to his calf as he breaks me in half, reaching with delicious sips for my holy lips.
O, corn is sweet as bitterness of satisfaction ! He lifts his eyes from doom, as butterflies enter the room. I feel the future as the sun goes downtown.
“Come,” he says, “hold on !” As butterflies sweep low, & I duck for cover, my invisibility is free as we soar with roars of silence, pity no more laughing bush my mush, only God as a Girl, life unfurling, my lover melting into me.
His wings now mine ; I dare not look back at mirrors of pleasures of flight from Northern light ; & the owl, whose howl reminds me of beauty, steps gingerly across the past hoping nothing to last & hunger & thirst only a boast as I stroke his face & reach my hiding place, avoiding a cliff whose beckoning is if …
– if we must – as butterfly lips of angels toast heaven to the crust. O, my cuntstantinople, big as the moon, lights up December & June as trolls sprinkle teardrops on my lips, sewing my belly button into folds of satin kisses.
Yes ! , being a woman exempts me from loneliness ; but it *s nice to know I am God as a Girl, & SISTERHOOD is POWERFULL & so are you, & U ; all of us, God as Girl, ! ! no longer laughing stock of incredible world ! !
CHAP. LXXXVIII. 1 O Lord God of my saluation, I haue cried day and night before thee. 2 Let my prayer come before thee: incline thine eare vnto my cry. 3 For my soule is full of troubles: and my life draweth nigh vnto the graue. 4 I am counted with them that go downe into the pit: I am as a man that hath no strength.
Dauids complaint.
5 Free among the dead, like the slaine that lie in the graue, whom thou remembrest no more: and they are cut off from thy hand. 6 Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit: in darkenesse, in the deepes. 7 Thy wrath lieth hard vpon me: and thou hast afflicted me with all thy waues. Selah. 8 Thou hast put away mine acquaintance farre from mee: thou hast made me an abomination vnto them: I am shut vp, and I cannot come forth. 9 Mine eye mourneth by reason of affliction, Lord, I haue called daily vpon thee: I haue stretched out my hands vnto thee. 10 Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead? shal the dead arise and praise thee? Selah. 11 Shall thy louing kindnesse be declared in the graue? or thy faithfulnesse in destruction? 12 Shall thy wonders be knowen in the darke? and thy righteousnesse in the land of forgetfulnesse? 13 But vnto thee haue I cried, O Lord, and in the morning shall my prayer preuent thee. 14 Lord, why castest thou off my soule? why hidest thou thy face from me? 15 I am afflicted and ready to die, from my youth vp: while I suffer thy terrours, I am distracted. 16 Thy fierce wrath goeth ouer me: thy terrours haue cut me off. 17 They came round about mee daily like water: they compassed mee about together. 18 Louer and friend hast thou put farre from me: and mine acquaintance into darkenesse.
God as a Girl – manuscripts and alphabet Photography Graphics and layout
Lennox Raphael © Iva Brajdic © Kenn Clarke ©