Category: Life

Confirmed (Part II)

With St John's superb Reverend Raymond Draper after my confirmation

I don’t normally talk about my faith in public as I consider it a private matter and because I don’t believe that having a faith makes you a “better” person than someone who doesn’t.

Indeed, over the last two years, the people I have received the greatest love and support from are hardcore Atheists who are proud to be so. These friends have actually been more “Christian” than half the religious people I knew from the period when I had a “perfect life” – I wouldn’t be without my Atheist friends for the world.

However, St John’s Church in Leytonstone has also been a major part of my life over the last two years and in May I was confirmed there. The fabulous Reverend Raymond Draper (with whom I’m pictured above at the confirmation service) asked me to write an article on my experience for St John’s October edition of ‘Good News’, which has just come out.

Seeing as the print version of the article is now all over Leytonstone, I see no reason not to reproduce it here.

I thank Rev Raymond Draper and Rev Kathryn Robinson again for everything they’ve done for me over the last two years. Alongside my family, Atheist and non-Atheist friends, I wouldn’t have survived without them.

Continue reading “Confirmed (Part II)”

In Praise of Fairy Godfathers

As many people know, I have no relationship with my biological father so I’ve never really celebrated ‘Father’s Day’ in the way I have Mother’s Day.

Over the last two years, however, another silver lining to a very dark cloud, has been the deepening of my friendships with some seriously ‘can do’ father-type men.

Friends who have good dads tell me they rate them ‘good’ because their dads are caring, tough, supportive, practical, protective and would fight to the death for their children and anyone else’s children.

I would like to thank A, L, T, F, S and R for doing exactly that.

Happy Father’s Day 2009 to all of you and to every other good dad, be they biological, adopted, honorary or – in my case – fairy 🙂

Lots of love,

Miranda

xxx

For Simon Tucker

julia-andrew-miranda-at-london-marathon

An absolutely lovely day out on Sunday supporting good friend Andrew Lock in his first ever London Marathon bid.

Andrew (pictured above after the race with wife Julia and I) is (amongst many other things) a superb runner and it was therefore no surprise to us that he managed to complete the race in an excellent 3 hours and 54 minutes.

Simon Tucker, good friend of Leyton and Wanstead CLP

But this year, the cause Andrew was running for made the event even more special.

Back in January, Simon Tucker (pictured above), a local Councillor in neighbouring Newham and a former councillor for the London Borough of Waltham Forest, who was also an extremely popular Leytonstone solicitor and community activist, suddenly passed away aged only 48.

Those of us who knew Simon (Andrew had served alongside Simon as a local councillor in Waltham Forest in the 1990s) were really shocked and many of his friends and comrades from Leyton and Wanstead still can’t believe he’s gone.

It was testimony to how loved Simon was that his funeral, held at St John’s Church in Leytonstone, was absolutely packed and was attended by both Harry Cohen MP and Lyn Brown MP, Sir Robin Wales and his Deputy Cllr Christine Bowden, Newham’s Greater London Assembly Member John Biggs, 33 Newham Councillors (including councillors from the opposition Respect and Christian People’s Alliance Party), at least 10 Waltham Forest councillors and umpteen former Waltham Forest councillors, representatives of local community groups, the Leytonstone business forum, and many many more.

Simon suffered from asthma and so Andrew thought it only appropriate to run for the charity Asthma UK, which supports British asthma sufferers and their families.

We know it might be too late to bring Simon back but Andrew hopes that some of the funds raised may be able to help other asthma sufferers.

Rest in Peace Simon.

You may be gone but you will never be forgotten.

Lots of love,

Andrew, Julia and Miranda

– To find out more about the work of Ashtma UK, go to: www.asthma.org.uk