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A spiritual comment and prayer to begin the day with Rev Azariah France-Williams, priest, author and broadcaster.

Good morning.

Outside the new Crystal Palace and Park in London on this day in 1853 a fascinating dinner party took place. The diners were high society scientists and men of letters. Crowds came from far and wide to witness the spectacle. You might be wondering why on earth people would be so interested in watching men eat. Well, did I mention the meal was served inside a dinosaur?

In the lead up to the opening of the new Crystal Palace, the world’s first ever giant replica dinosaurs were constructed by the sculptor Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins and they were placed around the park. It was an iguanodon replica that was chosen to host the fancy meal . The people of the present sat within a predator of the past.

The main guest of honour was Richard Owen, he went on to raise a toast to Gideon Mantell who had died the year previously. the two men had been bitter rivals with conflicting visions of the field of palaeontology. It is surmised that the toast being raised by Owen was him making his peace with the past, whilst sitting in a piece of the past. On this New Year’s Eve I wonder who we can toast? Who can we celebrate? Who or what do we need to make peace with?

Faithful God, the same yesterday today and forever, before we try and hurtle forward into this New Year help us to pause and spend a moment sitting in the past - acknowledging the relationships in need of repair, the events of the last year that have surprised, shocked, or saddened us, and the grieving and the celebrating to be done. We lift it all to you – the God of the past, present and the future.

Amen.