In all our sanctuaries we sit at risk

Author: Rogan Wolf

  • Shahada

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    I have recently imagined myself standing before a man of good sense, deep learning and positive engagement with humanity, and professing to that person my basic beliefs. A profession of faith. A sort of Shahada. Once, in a much less comfortable public situation than mine, Martin Luther found himself setting out his position in similar…

  • Fable 9 – The Ark One Hour Long

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    “The ark one hour long” explores the ubiquity in modern life of only partial and manipulative human contact, person to person. Most of our encounters through the day are with people who only see our outward edge, our mask, or just a passing glimpse, and anyway do not want to see us true ; we…

  • Mental Health Witness – Marketing “Recovery”

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    In the mental health services, the “Recovery Model” has achieved good sales in recent years. Good pitch, good branding. Upwardly-mobile managers and organisations able to lay claim to being passionate about “recovery” win brownie-points and funding. We function in that sort of climate these days, in the care services. But this seems more than just…

  • Mental Health Witness – Who’s a Skiver, then ?

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    George Osborne’s division of the nation into Us “Strivers”  and Them “Skivers” (but weren’t  we once “all in this together” ?) has reminded me of some nineteenth century history I learned at school. It provides some context for Osborne’s venomous jingle two centuries later, and a way of measuring its quality and pedigree. I still…

  • Mental Health Witness – Abiding with Mental Ill-health

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    This is the second piece specifically on mental health I have posted up. The first can be found a few posts further down. They will form part of a series, all sharing the title “mental health witness” and all filled of a strong sense of present emergency.(However, it’s worth saying that several of the fables,…

  • Fable 8 – The Ring of Defence

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    I am adding  Fable Eight here to the pieces I’ve uploaded earlier, each under the same banner. They belong in a series called “Fables and Reflections” which consists of sixteen pieces in all. “The Ring of Defence” describes a position and way of living given over entirely to defence. It might be said that the…

  • Word from Myanmar

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    Last week, I added six new poems to the bilingual collection called “Poems for…one world.” All the new poems were Burmese, our fifty-first language. Remember that Burmese is a language whose speakers are themselves presently learning to be free again, to speak freely. You can access the six poems here .  You can read the…

  • Fable 7 – The People who don’t Appear

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    I am adding Fable Seven here to the pieces uploaded in previous posts (see further down on the blog for earlier Fables). They belong in a series called “Fables and Reflections” which consists of sixteen pieces in all. In this fable, I suggest that the “people who don’t appear” are the helpers, the healers, the teachers,…