The tentacles of wealth and domination
On the 9th November 2025 at 00:33 I wrote these words in response to David Olusoga’s first episode of his series on BBC television – Empire – where he tells the story of the British Empire, from its origins under Elizabeth I to the establishment of colonies in America, the Caribbean and India.*
The tentacles of wealth and domination
exploit the poor and elevate the rich,
the seats of power are turning in an instant
are sliding, twisting, now about to switch.
We mirror history in each word and action,
again we turn our values upside down.
If this is love we're cynical and empty,
the face of God is creased into a frown.
God's people what has happened to the gospel,
the grace that we accepted, now refused,
the love in which God holds us lies polluted,
the neighbours with Christ's face we have abused.
When will we turn again toward the beauty,
accept the loving kindness of God's care,
before us lies the world and all its riches,
sufficient for our needs if we would share.
© Andrew Pratt 9/11/2025
*https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002hytj
Christians may compare what Olusoga has depicted with the
Magnificat -
Luke 1: 51-53
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
Tag: history
When evil gathers in the wings – A hymn for Remembrance at a time of international tension
When evil gathers in the wings - A hymn for Remembrance at a time of international tension
1 When evil gathers in the wings
the time of crisis offers choice:
to rise with courage and resist
or keep our silence, still each voice.
What shall we do when chaos reigns,
act out God’s love? Submit to chains?
2 As history echoes from the past,
while memories can tend to fade,
‘lest we forget’ let us recast
the hard decisions others made:
to live the love that Christ had shown,
self-sacrificial, Spirit blown.
Andrew E Pratt (born 1948)
Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd
Metre: 8 8 8 8 8 8
Tune: ABINGDON
Easter hymn – We cannot speculate, or glance
An empty tomb is just empty. It took a meeting with Jesus to convince a woman, then a group of men that Jesus, who had died on a cross, was alive. It is still difficult to believe. Yet after two thousand years, whatever we believe, as Geoffrey Best has written on Facebook, ‘…in this (hi)story is the revelation of the very nature of God, a God who takes all that we throw and absorbs and transforms the dead and deadly into life abundant .... if we let it!’ Amen! 1 We cannot speculate, or glance into the well of history. Nor can we look beyond this time with any sense of certainty. We only have our faith and hope, to make us stand, to help us cope. 2 Great God we grasp at straws of faith, of things we hope will point to you. We read the ancient texts and scan those distant myths to make them new. And all the time we live between these metaphors and what is seen. 3 The past is gone, we cannot hear more than an echo down the age. And what is still to come we fear; we see each other's pent up rage. Yet what we need is close at hand, your present love in every land. 4 True resurrection brings to bear the things that heal, create, unite. Love launches its triumphant praise and builds on joy and will delight. The former things are passed away, dead night transformed to brightest day. Metre: 8 8 8 8 8 8 Tune: ABINGDON Andrew E Pratt (born 1948) Words © 2015 © Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England copyright@stainer.co.uk . Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Art © Andrew Pratt 2022
Life now with Covid-19 – We cannot see the future (hymn/poem)
We cannot see the future,
nor live as in the past,
our time the present moment,
yet know this will not last.
But can a human construct
give answers or make sense
as everyone will struggle
with this, the present tense?
Our understanding staggers,
but what can history prove?
What scripture has a message
to help us rest or move?
The wilderness was testing
a place to learn and think,
a sudden unthought action
might push us to the brink.
So in this present moment
the greatest gift is time,
a time of recollection
before life’s upward climb.
And can our faith sustain us?
Or simple human love?
While waiting in the valley
we lift our eyes above.
The heavens will not answer,
but through each silent night
the stars might make us wonder
at their insistent light.
We live within an instant,
as finite as our breath,
suspended in a moment
between our life and death.
What matters in this moment
is how we love and live,
is how we treat each other,
of how we share and give;
to speculate is pointless,
this is the earth we know,
this edifice of living:
what will OUR loving show?
Andrew Pratt 5/5/2020
Words © 2020 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Tunes: THORNBURY; CRUGER
When evil gathers in the wings – Bad things happen when good people do nothing…hymn
Bad things happen when good people do nothing…
When evil gathers in the wings
the time of crisis offers choice:
to rise with courage and resist
or keep our silence, still each voice.
What shall we do when chaos reigns,
act out God’s love? Submit to chains?
As history echoes from the past,
while memories can tend to fade,
‘lest we forget’ let us recast
the hard decisions others made:
to live the love that Christ had shown,
self sacrificial, Spirit blown.
Words © 2019 Stainer & Bell Ltd, London, England, http://www.stainer.co.uk.
Please include any reproduction for local church use on your CCL Licence returns. All wider and any commercial use requires prior application to Stainer & Bell Ltd.
Tune: ABINGDON
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