Plenary, 08 Nov 2006

Meeting date: Wednesday, November 8, 2006

Official Report 404KB pdf

---

Time for Reflection

Good afternoon. Our first item of business is, as it is every Wednesday, time for reflection. Our time for reflection leader today is the Rev Malcolm Rooney, of Glens and Kirriemuir Old Parish Church.

Thank you for the invitation to do today's reflection.

I am very pleased to be able to do this, because it allows me to thank you, Presiding Officer, for a card that you sent almost 32 years ago—I am sure that you remember it well. It was the card that you, as the local MP for Clackmannan, sent to my wife and me to mark our wedding in 1974.

It was a small gesture—a card of congratulations—but, as you can hear, the gesture has stayed with me, although I have to be honest and say that I do not remember whether I voted for you at the subsequent general election.

It was a small, caring gesture and I want to reflect on such gestures today because it seems to me that they are the life-blood of organisations such as this that seek to bring a lot of people together into a working environment. Small gestures can make the difference between this being a place of welcome and support and an alien environment in which to work.

During the recent Ryder cup, it was small gestures of support to golfer Darren Clarke that marked the humanity of both teams. I do not know whether you saw the picture of Tiger Woods, who lost his father through cancer, hugging Darren Clarke, whose wife had just died from the same illness. They were arch rivals on the golf course, but through circumstance they were united in grief.

It was the small gesture of a hand on a shoulder that meant so much to hostage Brian Keenan as he and John McCarthy lay in the dark in captivity, Keenan ill and shivering. That hand, he said afterwards, contained all the prayers in the world.

Those small gestures are how many of us believe that God works in the world: through small gestures of love; small positive gestures; the good gestures of human beings from one to another.

I encounter them all the time in Kirriemuir and the Glens as people face the joys and trials of life together: the card; the phone call; the flowers; the five minutes of listening; and the hand on the shoulder.

Presiding Officer, ladies and gentlemen, I commend the importance of small positive gestures of support, companionship and camaraderie.

I wish you well and God's blessing on your work.

Thank you.