colours of the night
A friend of mine announced at the beginning of this year that to celebrate my birthday I was to be treated to a trip to a European city of my choice to see something beautiful. It took a bit of co-ordinating, but one day this week, 2 months after my birthday, the treat was this:
It seems amazingly indulgent to go all the way to Amsterdam just to spend two hours in an art gallery. (Actually I think we stayed nearly three in the end.) But oh my word, so worth it. The exhibition was so well put together, and nearly all the starry night paintings were there (alas the cafe one was missing). But for me, this was the one that drew me in completely. I've always liked reproductions of it, but the depth and luminosity of the colour when you see the real thing… wow. It's rich and happy and sad and romantic and poignant all at once.
Then some sunshiny walks along canals, a brief but excellent half hour in the Rijksmuseum to see four Vermeers, some completely fab food and wine, and home again.
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Maggi has kept a blog since September 2003, writing about theology and faith, the arts and literature, and a little about life and random nonsense...
In an increasingly secularised society few people have a good working knowledge of the Bible. Yet a great deal of our culture is built on stories or ideas that come from the Bible. Literature, art, music, language and even the fabric of our society - such as our justice system - are built on Christian concepts and biblical references. The Writing on the Wall provides a fascinating introduction to the Bible's best-known, and most influential, stories. Each chapter gives some background to the text of the Bible, and shows how the stories have become enmeshed in Western culture. Adam and Eve, the ten plagues of Egypt, The Prodigal Son and Mary Magdalene all feature - along with how the Bible has influenced everyone from Shakespeare to Monty Python, and Caravaggio to Banksy. 
Giving It Up explores the Lenten idea of 'giving up', taking it beyond the traditional idea of simply abstaining from something, and suggesting instead that what we need to give up is our existing ideas about God. With a daily readings for each day of Lent, from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday, it follows the heroes of the Bible who had to give up their own too-small ideas about God.
This is Maggi’s bestselling book of daily readings for each day of Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. Advent is the beginning of the Church year, and marks the anticipation of the coming Messiah. These readings explore how beginnings and endings in our own lives are illuminated by the different Gospel narratives of Christ's coming.
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a few classic exceprts of him on the today programme this morning from just a minute v funny