Preaching to the Birds<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"On Fridays we have a school Mass, and I usually preach without notes. The ideas are in my head, and I take a 'prayer walk' around the school campus and\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/standingonmyhead\/2007\/10\/preaching-to-the-birds.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Preaching to the Birds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"On Fridays we have a school Mass, and I usually preach without notes. 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{"id":2963,"date":"2007-10-04T09:11:00","date_gmt":"2007-10-04T09:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/standingonmyhead\/2007\/10\/preaching-to-the-birds\/"},"modified":"2007-10-04T09:11:00","modified_gmt":"2007-10-04T09:11:00","slug":"preaching-to-the-birds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/standingonmyhead\/2007\/10\/preaching-to-the-birds.html","title":{"rendered":"Preaching to the Birds"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/span><\/a> <\/span>On Fridays we have a school Mass, and I usually preach without notes. The ideas are in my head, and I take a \u2018prayer walk\u2019 around the school campus and practice the homily out loud. There\u2019s a flock of canadian geese in residence at the moment and the other day they started to follow me around. I don\u2019t know if they were listening to the sermon or not, but they certainly left plenty of \u2018offerings\u2019 in their wake.<\/span><\/p>\n

St Francis preaching to the birds is the sort of charming, foolish and prophetic thing he was best at. In preaching to the birds perhaps he was making the point that the birds were the only ones who were willing to listen. After all, God is interested in the birds too, otherwise he wouldn\u2019t know when a sparrow falls, and didn\u2019t Jesus point to the birds as an example of how we should live the life of faith? \u201cLook to the birds of the air. They do not toil or spin, yet the heavenly Father looks after them.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a poem about the birds by e.e.cummings<\/span><\/p>\n

may my heart always be open to little
birds who are the secrets of living
whatever they sing is better than to know
and if men should not hear them men are old<\/p>\n

may my mind stroll about hungry
and fearless and thirsty and supple
and even if it\u2019s sunday may i be wrong
for whenever men are right they are not young<\/p>\n

and may myself do nothing usefully
and love yourself so more than truly
there\u2019s never been quite such a fool who could fail
pulling all the sky over him with one smile<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"