David Bell and Terry Wall, Methodist Church of New Zealand Te Hāhi Weteriana o Aotearoa supernumerary presbyters, have been engaged in a project that combines their interest in exploring and conveying spirituality in diverse ways.

Both David and Terry have a keen interest in the formation of theological perspectives for expressing spirituality. From a combined eight decades of pastoral ministry, they have explored how these can be well-presented in familiar church contexts, such as liturgy, preaching, study and prayer. Terry wrote the reflections on three poems while David made the intaglio etchings and designed, letterpress printed and hand bound the books.

The poems chosen “for those who yearn for a fresh approach to the Gospel’ include Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost, As Kingfishers Catch Fire by Gerard Manley Hopkins, and
When You Are Old by William Butler Yeats.

Each poem has been handcrafted as a limited number of signed artist books, 140 mm x 270 mm, printed onto a variety of fine art papers. The collection includes three signed editions featuring the three reflections bound in a single collection. In addition, there are also 40 copies of signed Risograph book reproductions, featuring Terry's three reflections. Terry and David use these for teaching workshops.

Adding music and narration, the poems have also been made as individual videos with John McWade and Rebecca Livingston. The videos, including images and interviews about the project, are available at www.kiwiconnexion adding the phrase The Soul, Unguarded Now.

Terry and David believe in the importance of local churches and purposeful fellowship groups for thinking through the gospel and encouraging members in their Christian commitment.

“Poems such as these are gems of language, thought and feeling; and whether or not specifically Christian, such as the Hopkins, or more personal like the love longed for by Yeats, or from Frost’s cadences of beauty and regret binding our human destiny of growth and loss, all convey a deep spirituality,” David says.

“We hope our work will evoke a recognition that the Gospel is here in these poems, these different, distant ‘Lands away’”.

A selection of 21 of the books were a feature at Printopia Festival in Henderson in May.

David and Terry’s work will be included in the dedicated exhibition space at the MCNZ Conference in Kerikeri in November 2022.