Advertise on podcast: John Davies: Notes from a small vicar

The widow who took on the judge, and the Liverpool Poverty Hearing speakers whose truthful, expert, voices were for once given a platform to be heard. A talk for The Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity, 19 October 2025; Church Action on Poverty Sunday. Referencing 2 Timothy 3.14-4.5, Luke 18.1-8. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://bit.ly/jd-talks.

“In the modern world, we compete as individuals, against all other individuals. The community is nothing and the individual is everything. We have identified the enemy and he is us.” (René Girard). Discussing the conflict between a spirit which bows and bends us out of shape, and a spirit which helps us stand tall. A talk for The Tenth Sunday after Trinity, 24 August 2025. Referencing ⁠⁠⁠⁠Hebrews 12.18–29, Luke 13.10-17. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

We need to talk about Israel because today we stand witness to the extreme aggression of the current State of Israel against the Palestinian people, and as our Christian faith is intimately bound up with the historical faith of these semitic peoples, it gives rise to many troubling questions for us. A talk for The Ninth Sunday after Trinity, 10 August 2025. Referencing ⁠Hebrews 11.29 – 12.2, Luke 12.49–56. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

But proof isn't the point of faith. Life is the point. The important thing about faith is how it makes us live. The essence of faith is that it’s about seeing things from a different point of view. It is 'the perception of the incongruity', (to quote Ken Dodd). A talk for The Eighth Sunday after Trinity, 10 August 2025. Referencing Hebrews 11.1-3,8-16, Luke 12.32-40. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Will God help us when it hurts? Will God help us bring an end to the massacre of innocents? Can God show us how to overcome those things which divide us, how to escape our cycles of condemning and being condemned? Will God guide us into ways of goodness and hope? How we long to find a way to ‘shorten the distance between ourselves and God’. There is a ‘way’ to do this, and a ‘how’. The way is Jesus and the how is prayer. A talk for The Sixth Sunday after Trinity, 27 July 2025. Referencing ⁠Colossians 2.6-19, Luke 11.1-13. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠.

The Good Samaritan story is a parable that ‘parables’ us - in other words, we see ourselves in it, and where it puts us, may be an uncomfortable place. It's not intended to condemn us for thinking ill of others: but to motivate us to cultivate love, even for those we fear or dislike, to help us to be better prepared to be compassionate. A talk for The Fourth Sunday after Trinity, 13 July 2025. Referencing Colossians 1.1-14, Luke 10.25-37. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠.

Jesus entrusted seventy followers to visit people's homes and greet them with “Peace to this house!” It's a simple prayer we can make our own in our search for peace in the world. A talk for The Third Sunday after Trinity, 6 July 2025. Referencing Galatians 6.1–16, Luke 10.1-20. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠.

Men can be reluctant to embrace - in the traditional icon The Embrace of the Apostles Peter and Paul these two certainly are. But the iconographer is saying that, despite their differences, the Spirit united them in the work of the mission of God, in making 'a new thing' happen in a world exhausted of hope. A talk for The Festival of Peter and Paul, Apostles, 29 June 2025. Referencing the icon The Embrace of the Apostles Peter and Paul by Tamara Rigishvili, ⁠https://www.tamarapaint.com/Icons/Apostles_Peter_and_Paul_Embracing_by_Tamara_Rigishvili.jpg. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠

The exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac is a tale about anyone who does not feel at home in the world at large, anyone uncomfortable with the way of life imposed on them by the powerful spirits of society; it is for anyone made to feel that their so-called ‘mental health problems’ are entirely of their own making, rather than being symptoms of the sick society we live in. And this is a tale which turns that whole conversation upside-down, for the exorcism Jesus performs shows all the witnesses, ourselves included, that when the Spirit of God encounters a person possessed by the spirit of "Legion", the military state, it is not that person who is condemned; it is "Legion" who is expelled. A talk for The Second Sunday after Trinity , 22 June 2025. Referencing ⁠⁠Luke 8.26-39. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠

Public prayers outside the Cavern to commemorate John Lennon; faithful prayers for the good of the next generations - a meditation on hope. A talk for Trinity Sunday, 15 June 2025. Referencing ⁠Romans 5.1-5⁠. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠

Luke describes the coming of the Holy Spirit in these words: “And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting.” This was the sound of walls falling down, the sound of barriers to love and understanding collapsing; this was the wind of change which blows away our fear and suspicion of others, and fills  us instead with joyful, mutual respect and understanding. A talk for Pentecost, 8 June 2025 Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠

Referencing ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Acts 10.34-43, Luke 24.1-12. A talk for Easter Sunday, 20 April 2025.  The absence of God "is like a presence”, writes R. S. Thomas. What might this mean for us, living in an era of absence, where, with things lacking in society which we feel should be there, our world seems eerie? Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Referencing ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Exodus 1.8-2.10, Luke 2.33-35. A talk for Mothering Sunday, 30 March 2025.  Our remarkable scriptures privilege and celebrate the outsiders: like the subversive midwives, the defiant mother and sister, the sympathetic princess, united by their surreptitious risk-taking actions to save a baby. The pharaohs and presidents, the CEOs and chancellors, will go on doing what they have always done, drawing ever-more power and wealth to themselves and their caste at a cost to the people and the planet. But through learning to listen to the stories of those at the edges facing abandonment or drowning, those at the brink of disaster, we get to know the voice of God, and understand his worldview, for he so often speaks through and for such people. In scripture, and in life today. This people's history is a story of beauty bubbling up from beneath. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Referencing ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Psalm 91.1-11, Luke 4.1-13. A talk for The First Sunday of Lent, 9 March 2025.  "...Then the devil appeared at a supermarket checkout, and said to the customers purchasing processed food, ‘If you throw yourself wholeheartedly into consuming food full of additives, fat, sugar, and calories, you have nothing to fear, for the angels of God will protect you from cancer, heart disease, obesity and tooth decay.’ And they said, ‘I believe you, here’s my loyalty card’.The three temptations of Jesus in the wilderness are the very same temptations which we succumb to today..." Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Referencing ⁠⁠2 Corinthians 3.12-4.2, Luke 9.28-43. A talk for The Sunday Next Before Lent, 2 March 2025.  Esther Ghey says that the practice of mindfulness saved her. Originally rooted in Buddhist mediation, mindfulness is now popularly attached to no religion in particular. It’d say that it’s not unlike the Christian, Lenten, practice of taking oneself off for a time to quietly be in the moment, to listen for the voice of God, to lift one’s face to the face of God. Find the text to this and all my talks at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠bit.ly/johndavies-talks⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.