大象传媒

From Leslie Griffiths, Methodist Minister:听听听听 听

Who could fail to be moved by the sight of Terry Jones, accompanied by his tearful son Paul, receiving his Bafta award earlier this week? There he was, one of our cultural heroes, a member of the Monty Python gang, by turns actor, director, poet, historian, polemicist and creative genius, rendered speechless by dementia. I found it gutting.听

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I feel so connected to Terry Jones. We鈥檙e both Welshmen, both born on a Sunday 鈥� he exactly two weeks before me.听 And he loves Penny Lane, my favouritest Beatles track of all time. All those lovely people living along that street, - the barber, the banker, the children, the fireman, the pretty nurse and so on with their little tics of character and eccentric ways. So vivid, so real, so ordinary, and all played out under a blue suburban sky. Dear, dear Terry Jones.

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I remember how religious people got so upset when he and his pals brought out the film 鈥淟ife of Brian.鈥� They thought it was a send-up of Jesus but they couldn鈥檛 have been more wrong. Certainly, the film-makers began by thinking what a wheeze it would be to satirise Christ but, as Terry once said, 鈥渨hen we studied the gospels to see how best to do it, we found he was a very good bloke, that he said a lot of good things and we tended to agree with him.鈥� It was the church they poked fun at for having failed, again and again down the centuries, to honour and reflect the fabulous qualities of the man they call Lord. So their Brian was born in the next-door manger to Jesus and that鈥檚 where the fun began.

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Our first son and his lovely wife chose to end their church wedding service with the chorale sung in that film by Eric Idle with Terry in the backing group - the 鈥淐rucifixion Singers.鈥� I thought of that when I saw his smile on Sunday. 鈥淎lways look on the bright side of life,鈥� they sang and that鈥檚 just what he seemed to be doing. When life鈥檚 rough and the going鈥檚 tough, what better advice could anyone give?