This Playwright's On Strike

(but can't bear to stop writing)

One of my amazing American hosts told me her church was under threat.

They ran a shelter for unhoused people in the basement, and a man was threatening to destroy it.

He had nothing to lose, he said, and he was going to torch the shelter and kill everyone that used it.

And I thought: but he does have something to lose.

His soul…

And I kept thinking about these things as we went to worship in her church, which was guarded by police; 

Still thinking later as we drove past the burnt out ruins of Faith Lutheran Church on Broadway, a sister church to hers, and like hers open and affirming to people of all genders and sexualities…

And destroyed by arson in Easter 2023.

I’m still thinking of those ruins, weeks later, here in St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh,

And wondering whether the man who did that thought he had a soul to lose

And thinking about the incredibly brave pastors I met all over the US

People for whom dealing with both the threats and consequences of extreme violence seem to be built into their job description.

I’m thinking of their grace and courage, laying their lives on the line, I guess,

Because they so passionately believe that every human soul is worth saving.

Whatever that means…

Just across the road from the burnt out ruin stand the massive high rise buildings that are the corporate headquarters of the hugely profitable startups from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, only a few blocks away…

And I guess we would say they are soulless buildings without elegance or beauty or grace

Speaking only of wealth and power

The wealth and power that is generated by those for whom education is just a means to personal enrichment,

By those I imagine who have signed up to the Faustian bargain and gained the world…

But lost their souls.

“And what’s a soul?” asks the Devil in my PLAYING WITH FIRE, “A bag of air. A little wind. Sign here.”

But he’s wrong, the Devil, of course he is. He’s lying.

That’s his job…

And I’m remembering the line here in the Cathedral, this building that resolutely points in the opposite direction

It being all about souls, but not generating money

Swallowing it up instead in repair and heating bills, the incredibly inconvenient monster that it is.

But that’s the point of it, really,

This total impracticality. Because that’s what it’s all about:

Soul work.

We’re all at it: me and the pastors and the crazy cathedral.

And that really is it: that’s really what I’m about, I realise,

Speeding down the highway towards the other cathedral,

The one in Boston, to perform my GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JESUS QUEEN OF HEAVEN.

And that’s why I’m here. Here in the pisky St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh,

Trying to learn my lines.

Because it all seems worth thinking about,

This question of what a soul is, and why it matters…

Matters here and now in these so aggressively secular times.

These times when there’s a massive ecological crisis,

Because our society is just about making profits, without regard for life’s moral dimensions,

Or the deep unshakeable connections that hold between everyone and everything.

These times when so many people are suffering profound mental illness and in the deepest anguish because the beleaguered human soul is under such relentless and cruel attack

And in such times what is the point of anything.

These times when there is such a massive addiction problem because so many people find the pain of living so unbearable

They are desperate for anything that will dull it or allow them to escape the agony of experiencing it.

These times when in spite of everything

Change is coming

And it seems to be connected with a rise in feminine energy

Because all of a sudden there’s an outbreak of angry frightened men doing their utmost to suppress it

Suppress it domestically with acts of violence and cruelty against their partners

 And suppress it globally with collective acts of the cruellest warfare.

And all this seems to me to be absolutely worthy of theatrical exploration.

And I’m so well equipped to undertake it…

Only conditions in the theatre here in Scotland have become so impossible they don’t really allow for the creation of serious work.

So this playwright is on strike.

On strike though because I cannot bear to be silenced

And must speak however and whenever I can

Here I am in the cathedral, shining my little light as best I can.

Getting ready for 6 performances I’m not really sure how to describe,

Because it’s not theatre,

And I’ve never done anything like this before,

Or ever seen anything like this before…

Shall we call them walks? Nothing too strenuous, because I can’t walk very far any more,

Maybe explorations would be a better word,

Purposeful wanders through this amazing, beautiful, eloquent space,

Sharing its stories,

Exploring its outer and its inner life.

Exploring its soul, and offering this space to you, if you come,

To explore your soul too.

And maybe find that beautiful space of stillness.

Come if you can. It’ll be lovely see you….

Performances at 2.15 on Tuesdays and Thursdays August 6th and 8th, 13th and 15th, 20th and 22nd.

In St.Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral, 23 Palmerston Place, Edinburgh EH12 5AW.

For further details, go to Searching for the Sacred

Photo Credit: Stuart Platt