I’ve not been sleeping too well this week. As I lay awake in the middle of the night, my mind began to wander to my body. Mindfulness body scanning is a tool I have used often, but this was less intentional. And for some reason, I was drawn to my abdomen. My bowel.

The cries for peace are strong right now. Israel/Palestine, Russia/Ukraine, Syria, Iran, multiple African nations … all are in conflict and the world feels shaken to its very core. The truth is, warfare across the globe at any one time is nothing new. Our current capacity to extend them internationally and inflict weapons with devastating global consequences, however, is.

In recent years I have discovered an affinity with the Jewish way of engaging with scripture, or Midrash. The work of scholars and writers such as Amy-Jill Levine and Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg, alongside explorations of Christian faith through Jewish practices, such as those conducted by Rachel Held Evans and Rev. Will Gaffney, have brought richness of colour into the tapestry of my own faith. I find much in their approach which directly soothes the spiritual wounds of evangelicalism, which is based on the foundation of one absolute truth and questioning is B.A.D. In my understanding (and apologies if my explanations are crude), Midrash presents multiple possible interpretations or ways of engaging with a text. Doing midrash is to bounce these ideas and possibilities off each other, testing theories and exegesis before agreeing (or not!) the most likely outcome. I yearn for more of this in my own cradle faith.