Showing off? shutting shop? showing up?

Even amid a forest of high towers, St Paul’s Cathedral remains, architecturally, the heart of the City of London.

It could be a key place for people to confront anxiety and seek a new vision for the future of humanity, money, and power. This process, that is goinog on around the world, has to take in all interested parties — Limiting it to the elite who got us into this mess is insane.

After visiting the OLSX camp yesterday, I have no idea why St Paul's shut up shop last week. The appearance of a large handful, but still only a handful, of cheap tents fifty yards from the front door would be possible to manage, one would think. If, as Woody Allen suggests, 80% of success is showing up, at least now St Paul’s has reopened it is back in the game.

But what game?

Once upon a time an Urban PCC in theSouth of England was interviewing candidates for the post of Vicar. One willowy Anglo-Catholic youth made a big pitch for a shift up the candle — recalling the grand tradition of Anglo-Catholic slum clergy he said “what this place needs isn’t a leader, but a Priest!” Stirring stuff... until, quarter of an hour later a local bag lady with a skinful of cider but a heart of gold, crashed through the doors crowing, as was her wont, her signature line - “Help! I need a Priest!” Willowy Anglo-Catholic youth disappeared to the Toilet. He did not get the job.

And, as St Paul’s reopens its doors, this tale raises a question for its managers. Can they redeem their initial hysterical over-reaction? Do they want to draw all voices into a vital public debate, or will they clear the site as tactfully and soon as possible, probably in the middle of the night — when Caiaphas and chums used to do their business?

In other words do they have the stomach to engage in the real world at the crest of a tidal race between people, money and power, or are they just overgrown public schoolboys playing indoor games in their own self-important Tourist Disneyland?

Over to them...

Woody Allen: Losing it or Finding it?

Cassandra’s Dream is Woody Allen’s third London movie, and his first with the toffs taken out.

The Blaine Brothers have ambitions, but are no hopers really. For all their borrowed Jaguars and 007 poker runs, one is essentially gormless and the other essentially basic. Whilst improving themselves they both land up in severe financial chokey, necessitating a bailout from rich Uncle Howard. Sadly this costs a spot of help with a job of his own, that carries its own moral and human price tag.

Family is family. Blood is thicker than water. Everybody, by trying to move their lives on and sort things out, ends up in worse chokey than ever. That’s tragedy, folks. This is an outing farther up and farther into classic Woody Allen country — Take the Money and Run, Small Time Crooks, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Match Point.

This film’s engine is Greek Tragedy, with a dash of Dostoevsky. Overwhelming psychological probabilities indicate that Oedipus could have, and you and I would have, married the nice girl next door, not mum. But imagine for a moment he did the terrible thing, and couldn’t help it. What would follow from that? Greek Tragedy isolates one strand of human behaviour, traps it in a deterministic web, then anatomizes, not psychologizes, it. Therefore, people who complain about some psychological flatness about motive and process in this movie are probably wasting their time.

This ain’t no ribtickler. The gawky conflicted Allen character is split and morphed onto two brothers, one gormless and one basic, rather than squirming in front of us as schlemiel. There is a very small amount of expository heavy handedness early on, but after that the script drives things forward as smoothly as Ian’s borrowed Jag. All the actors drew Lucy and me in avidly. As someone who lived in the East End as a kid, I bought the London stuff, though, of course, I could be snooty about it. Tragedy builds itself up inexorably, but the problem is always how to end it. Perhaps this one dissolves into cock-up, but for me the ending was a kind of “1-2-3, you’re back in the room” at the end of a thoroughly convincing stage hypnotist act.

I suspect this one will achieve a higher place in the Canon than most of the critics are willing to give it right now. It’s surely worth a shoofty.

Sons of the Clergy strike again

I don’t do a lot of this sort of thing, but the 354th Festival of the Sons of the clergy in Saint Paul’s Cathedral yesterday was a blast. This charity started in 1655 as a testimonial and fundraiser for poor clergy who had lost everything by staying loyal and losing their jobs whilst the monarchy was abolished during the Commonwealth period.

The original Sons of the Clergy festival is a collaborative venture by the Church and the City of London. No fewer than three Cathedral choirs blast away in St Paul’s, then there’s a slap-up dinner in the Merchant Taylors Hall, with the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lord Mayor of London. Rowan did a brilliantly clear, simple and funny speech to say thank you, among others. These days the charity spends over £1m a year helping clergy and their family members in all kinds of hard places, often caused by illness, marriage breakdown, or debt.

It’s very good to be with the network of people who make all this happen, having often seen the practical value of the things they do to help clergy and their families behind the scenes. There is a great variety of needs and predicaments among working clergy, and I’ve been trying to sharpen up the focus of our own Bucks Clergy charity, so that it can help more effectively. I’m very keen to collect creative ideas, as well reacting to the obvious things. Need and debt, like death and taxes, don’t go away... How can others help?