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Thursday 14th January, 2021

I write this just having been told that this part of Scotland is on red alert. It indicates expectation of snow and ice. Then if one reads the advice there is a whole list of actions to be taken: pipes to be lagged, paths to be salted, walks to be limited, torch to be available, warmth to be sought and it goes on. When I awoke this morning there was a little snow on the ground but rain had arrived and the snow was disappearing. I looked all morning for a break in the rain and grabbed an opportunity at just after two in the afternoon. I had three letters to post and wanted simply to exercise. Sadly I had just reached the post box when the rain returned so I also returned. I feel caged. I am still hoping for a let up and I will try to get some exercise but the red alert dampens my hope.

So I have been exercising my mind. I have continued to listen to a podcast. It is entitled 'Young heretics'. It claims to be an insight via literature in to Western Culture. Yesterday I listened to the podcast, they are given by Spencer Klavan, on Homer's Illiad. Today was the turn of the prophet Isaiah in the Old Testament of the Bible. Klavan defines western culture as that coming from, influenced by, associated with the Culture and writings of Athens and Jerusalem. He claims that both Homer and Isaiah and the western writings are the source of wisdom in the west and making the world aware of that which is beyond knowledge and known as wisdom.

He professed his own Christian Faith but said that such a belief was not necessary for the appreciation of the literary gems and cultural power of the writings to which he referred. I know a little of Isaiah, of the background and history of the book of that prophet but Klavan added more. He read from the book and noted Isaiah's anger at the greed of the Rich of Jerusalem, of the general license of the peoples and of the evil deeds of Jerusalem.

I was amazed at how closely Klavan's observations of Isaiah's thoughts and deliveries and prophecy were to what I had been reading in Carlo Carretto. In passing he spoke of the faith needed and how God alone cleanses the soul and liberates the sinner. The description of the 'cleansing' of Isaiah, of his call by God, was powerful for me. Isaiah spoke of the atrocities, the sufferings, the hell that was to come and yet in all of that the need for the people of God to hold fast to hope, to trust in their God and to be aware of their sinfulness. Carretto almost mimicked the same.

Later I spent some time in bed keeping warm and reading a less intellectually demanding book. I dipped in to Daniel Holmes and again noted his need to hang on to trust in God and how his faith seemed to grow even in suffering.

In the background with a few short jabs of the finger on my iPad I learned of President Trump's position and of the new South American strain of the Covid virus. Somehow I feel Isaiah might have recognised the circumstances in which we need to hold on to hope and faith.

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