Thought for the Week: Paul Hunt is a man of the moment

‘To him it represented hope.’

In 1659, Thomas Ellwood met a group of old friends who, as was the custom of the time, greeted him with elaborate gestures and sentiments. He did not respond in kind, and this amazed them: ‘At length, the surgeon… clapping his hand in a familiar way upon my shoulder and smiling on me said, “What, Tom, a Quaker!” To which I readily, and cheerfully answered, “Yes, a Quaker.” And as the words passed out of my mouth, I felt joy spring in my heart, for I rejoiced that I had not been drawn out by them into a compliance with them, and that I had strength and boldness given me to confess myself to be one of that despised people’ (Quaker faith & practice 19.16). Ellwood experienced a defining or identifying moment, just as we occasionally do in our century.

Sarah Belal, a lawyer who represents people condemned to death in Pakistan, says that the first time she interviewed a client on death row, she experienced what she calls a ‘moment of obligation’, in which she knew what she had to do for the rest of her working life. I would say that a moment of obligation is a particular, very compelling, form of moment.

Kate Atkinson, in her novel Big Sky, depicts another intensely-emotional moment. Her hero, Jackson Brodie, has saved the life of a drowning teenager, which causes him to reflect. ‘Jackson himself had once been dead. He had been injured in a rail crash and his heart had stopped… He had been revived by someone… and had for a long time afterwards felt the euphoria of the saved. It had worn off now, of course, the commonplace of everyday life having eventually defeated transcendence.’ Jackson’s realisation was a transcendent moment which made him euphoric.

All this sounds like a very contemporary notion, but Jesus said something similar in the Sermon on the Mount: ‘Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof’ (Matthew 6:34). A modern translation of this might be: ‘Today’s troubles are enough to occupy you for today; don’t concern yourself with what happened yesterday, or what might happen next week.’ That’s fine in its way, but we are also encouraged to save for retirement. Personally, I respect the concept of living in the moment, but I doubt whether we can sustain the peak experience for very long. We can visit the moment on a good day, but I am not so sure that we can live in it. It is fleeting.

A Sheffield Friend ministered recently about an encounter he had had with a wren, which was singing loudly. He whistled back, in an attempt to imitate its song; the bird turned up the volume. This felt too like a sacred moment, communication between creatures of two very different species, and to him it represented hope.

Perhaps the best we can do, regarding moments, is to be available for them, appreciate them when they occur, learn from them, and remember them.

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