WELL, there’s certainly no shortage of bad news, is there? Everywhere you turn, it’s all doom and gloom. With rolling 24/7 news channels and social media, there is actually not enough real news or hard facts to fill the space and time, so the vacuum is filled with opinion, speculation and gossip. There comes a point, however, when all the rumour and chatter become toxic, peddled by equally toxic people. We all know at least one of those, don’t we?

When St Paul was writing to a young church leader called Titus, he advised “as for a person who stirs up division, after warning him once and then twice, have nothing more to do with him”.

It takes courage to take that action but toxicity is contagious.

On the other hand, there is much to celebrate and be grateful for but, somehow, good news rarely makes the headlines. Why is that? Is it that we, the audience, prefer bad news to good news – a quirk of human nature? Perhaps if we don’t read or react to bad news, then the initiators might realise we prefer more good news.

Yet, good news is all around us. We can see spring advancing with blossom and buds everywhere. Birds are busy building nests and starting their courtship. Lambs are in the fields. New life, new beginnings.

As St Paul wrote to the church at Philippi, “brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things”.

So, why not take a test? Fill a glass halfway with water. Look at it for a few moments. What do you see? A glass half-empty? Or half-full? What makes the difference is how you see the water… and life.

Julia Keep

St Austell Deanery