At the heart of Our Town is a profound Christian eschatology, a theological perspective that playwright A. R. Gurney says pervaded all of Wilder’s mature work. In Our Town, this eschatology is brought to focus on human mortality. Death runs like a ribbon through Grover’s Corners. In the very first minutes of the play, the stage manager, speaking from the vantage point of the future, matter-of-factly informs us of the coming deaths of the first three characters we have met. As the play proceeds, we are told of a number of other, usually premature, deaths. When the stage manager introduces a local university professor to supply some historical details about Grover’s Corners, he advises him to be brief, saying, “Unfortunately our time is limited.” By the third act, which begins in the cemetery, we realize what he meant.

All of this death, so much of it unexpected and untimely, does not lead to unrelieved tragedy. To the contrary, Wilder sees the fleeting nature of life as one of the factors that render human life precious. Like sacramental bread and wine, human lives and relationships are earthly and perishable but also bearers of the sacred, the eternal.

So much the pity, then, that when Our Town was made into a Hollywood film in 1940, the third act was damaged. In the movie, Emily only dreams that she has died. She delivers her final speeches in a fever from her sickbed, then recovers and returns to her life in Grover’s Corners. This makes the film happier, more sentimental, something akin, Sherman observes, to the sunny “there’s no place like home” outlook of The Wizard of Oz.

“Knowledge has no light but that shed on the world by redemption,” said T. W. Adorno. In Our Town, the light of redemption shines on the fragility of human life, revealing hidden holiness. One significant way this happens is through the singing of the Congregational church choir, which Wilder employs as a kind of hometown Greek chorus. They sing three hymns, all with eschatological themes: “Blessed Be the Tie That Binds,” “Art Thou Weary, Art Thou Languid,” and “Love Divine All Loves Excelling.” The first is of particular importance. It is sung on three occasions in the play: at choir practice on the first day, at Emily and George’s wedding, and at Emily’s funeral. “I always liked that hymn,” one of the dead in the cemetery says. “I was hopin’ they’d sing a hymn.”

The hymn affirms the resonance between heaven and earth, between fleeting mortality and eternity, which is the central truth of Our Town. As the ordinary people of Grover’s Corners share their mutual woes and bear their mutual burdens, the choir reminds us that “the fellowship of kindred minds is like to that above.” As Eugene Peterson rendered the incarnational claim of John’s Gospel, “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood”—and that blessed neighborhood is Grover’s Corners.

Read it all (emphasis mine in first sentence).

Fun fact–Thornton Wilder arrived at @LvilleSchool in 1921. He served as assistant house master of Davis House, French instructor, and advisor to The Lit. During his tenure, he published The Trumpet Shall Sound, The Cabala,+The Bridge of San Luis Rey #books #history #NewJersey pic.twitter.com/N6ZILNedpK

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) May 19, 2021

Before the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announcement last week that fully vaccinated people can forgo masks in most settings, the majority of U.S. workers reported doing their jobs remotely during the pandemic, including 51% in April. But this varied widely by job type, including 72% of white-collar workers and 14% of blue-collar workers. These rates have been fairly stable since last fall, after declining from their peaks in April 2020, when most schools and non-essential businesses were shuttered.

Gallup’s remote-worker trend is based on data collected each month via web as part of its COVID-19 tracking poll, a nationally representative survey of U.S. adults aged 18 and older, using the probability-based Gallup Panel. Workers are considered remote if they report working from home at least 10% of the time in the past week.

Given the relative stability of remote work over the second half of the pandemic to date — from October 2020 to April 2021 — it is appropriate to use the combined data to analyze aspects of remote work in greater detail. On average during this period, 52% of all workers, including 72% of those in white-collar occupations and 14% in blue-collar occupations, have performed their job all or part of the time from home.

Gallup’s white-collar job category comprises occupations traditionally performed in offices or behind a computer. The blue-collar category includes jobs mainly involving manual work or physical labor. Three job areas — education, healthcare and sales — primarily involve interaction with clients or the public and are harder to categorize using the blue-collar/white-collar definitions. Their orientation to remote work is unique and is discussed below in the context of other specific occupations.

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72% of U.S. white-collar employees worked remotely in April, unchanged from most of the past year. https://t.co/rrnMTKyUEa

— GallupNews (@GallupNews) May 17, 2021

So, we have a situation where a Church of England chaplain, who must have held a licence from the Bishop of Derby, has been reported to the police (though they did not pursue it) for articulating the possibility of believing in something which is the current doctrine of the Church of England, and has been made redundant subsequently, which he believes to have been discriminatory and unfair. What would we hope that leaders of the Church of England might say publicly in support of him and his ministry? What might they say to other clergy who could be in a similar challenging situation? What resources could the national Education department have made available to give guidance to chaplains and Christian teachers in schools using the Educate and Celebrate material?

Answer came there ‘None’.

Yesterday, the Daily Mail reported on the case, and reported that Andrea Williams, of Christian Concern, approached Libby Lane, the bishop of Derby, as well as the office of both the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, for comment. Libby Lane was reported as saying:

Public statements in support of one side in a dispute, prior to the evidence emerging in legal proceedings, is neither in the interests of good legal process nor, indeed, likely to serve Dr Randall’s personal interests well.

York said that there is nothing to add, and Canterbury (in the absence of Justin Welby on sabbatical) said ‘No comment.’

I find that extremely odd. I don’t see how difficult it would be to say something like ‘We cannot comment on this particular case. But we support him in his ministry, and he was, of course, quite right to tell pupils that they can believe in the doctrine of the Church of England.’ The initial talk was in June 2019—nearly two years ago. People have had two years to make a comment, and a clear 18 months before this case was brought.

And I don’t need to take the Daily Mail’s word for the story, because Bernard contacted me himself, in June 2019, to check what he was planning to say, and whether it was a fair expression of Christian faith and Church of England doctrine. I affirmed that it was. And I have therefore also offered an ‘expert witness’ statement for the court case being led by Christian Legal Centre on Bernard’s behalf.

Read it all.

New post: Does the Church of England deserve to survive? https://t.co/GhsjTSG6jH

— Dr Ian Paul (@Psephizo) May 17, 2021

The House then discussed updated proposals relating to the Clergy Conduct Measure which were shared with the House in December. The proposals were discussed in an opening plenary session (introduced by the Bishop at Lambeth), followed by breakout groups and a final plenary discussion in advance of wider Synodical engagement in July. Amongst the issues discussed were the wider work needed to develop an appropriate ‘framework’ for ordained ministry in the Church of England, covering such areas as fitness to practise, ‘supervision’, ministerial development review, grievance procedures, and capability procedures. The House agreed to support in principle the outline of the proposed Clergy Conduct Measure as presented to the House.

The Bishop of London then addressed the House in her capacity as the Chair of the Next Steps Group. The House discussed engagement with the Living in Love and Faith (LLF) processes to date across dioceses. The House heard encouraging reports of good engagement and, in break out groups, considered how further engagement with LLF can be strengthened. The House discussed additional working groups related to the LLF process and agreed in principle to the formation of a working group on gender identity and transition under the auspices of the LLF Next Steps Group, details of which will be announced in due course.

Read it all.

The text comes from Hymns of the Anglo-Saxon Church, ed. Inge B. Milfull (Cambridge, 1996), pp. 317-8. Here’s a translation:

Hail Dunstan, star and shining adornment of bishops, true light of the English nation and leader preceding it on its path to God.

You are the greatest hope of your people, and also an innermost sweetness, breathing the honey-sweet fragrance of life-giving balms.

In you, Father, we trust, we to whom nothing is more pleasing than you are. To you we stretch out our hands, to you we pour out our prayers….

Read it all.

Today is the feast of St Dunstan, Abbot of Glastonbury, Archbishop of Canterbury, famed for his cunning in defeating the devil, pioneer of English monastic life and church reformer. Glass at Peterborough Cathedral, and in Moira Forsyth's Benedictines window at Norwich Cathedral. pic.twitter.com/c71m10k8I7

— Simon Knott (@last_of_england) May 19, 2021

O God of truth and beauty, who didst richly endow thy Bishop Dunstan with skill in music and the working of metals, and with gifts of administration and reforming zeal: Teach us, we beseech thee, to see in thee the source of all our talents, and move us to offer them for the adornment of worship and the advancement of true religion; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Today the church celebrates Saint Dunstan. A great English saint. Born in Glastonbury he was the abbot of Glastonbury. He became bishop of Worcester, London and finally Archbishop of Canterbury. He restored monastic life in England and reformed the church pic.twitter.com/rKg02rZWuS

— Fr. Samuel-Bruno SSC (@FatherSJMC) May 19, 2021

O God, whose dearly beloved Son was, by thy mighty power, exalted that he might prepare a place in thy kingdom of glory for them that love thee: So lead and uphold us, O merciful Lord, that we may both follow the holy steps of his life here upon earth, and may enter with him hereafter into thy everlasting rest; that where he is, we may also be; through the merits of the same Jesus Christ our Lord.

The sunrise today was surreal! Eastham, Massachusetts. #capecod #StormHour pic.twitter.com/HW6uUX5tqL

— Darius Aniunas (@dariusaniunas) May 19, 2021

And the word of the Lord came to me: “Son of man, your brethren, even your brethren, your fellow exiles, the whole house of Israel, all of them, are those of whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, ”˜They have gone far from the Lord; to us this land is given for a possession.’ Therefore say, ”˜Thus says the Lord God: Though I removed them far off among the nations, and though I scattered them among the countries, yet I have been a sanctuary to them for a while in the countries where they have gone.’ Therefore say, ”˜Thus says the Lord God: I will gather you from the peoples, and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.’ And when they come there, they will remove from it all its detestable things and all its abominations. And I will give them one heart, and put a new spirit within them; I will take the stony heart out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my ordinances and obey them; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God. But as for those whose heart goes after their detestable things and their abominations, I will requite their deeds upon their own heads, says the Lord God.”

–Ezekiel 11:14-21

Sunrise over Old Ironsides this AM. Happy Wednesday from Charlestown! pic.twitter.com/5hHJkKnuyC

— Nick Giovanni (@NickGNews) May 19, 2021