Hope
Hope
Hope is a very small word. Both a noun and a verb, it is a desire which may or may not be possible to fulfil or, as a verb, a word of action or being. Therein lies its crux. Will we just sit down and passively hope or will we get up to try to make hope happen? Is hope positive or is it just something we yearn for and which may leave us forever disappointed?
During Covid, I recorded a podcast with Bishop David of Basingstoke which talked about hope – I bounced out of the recording walking more lightly, looking further ahead and smiling and have never forgotten it. Hope matters.
Hope has been described as a rainbow which helps us live. Perhaps like art it gives us illusions or perhaps it has transfigurative powers to make this life better or, if you believe in the next life, hope will carry you there.
Geordie and I however cannot live at Highclere and just hope. We need to plan, to create strategy, to enact, to take stock, to adapt and to seize the day – carpe diem. We can be more hopeful if we have done what we can to look ahead and predict using all the data we can gather.
Too many years ago now I went to St Andrews university in Scotland. The motto of the town named for the Saint is “dum spiro spero” – “while I breathe, I hope” whilst that of the university is “Ever to Excel”, which is taken from a speech in Homer's Iliad where Glaucus responds to Diomedes just before a battle promising to do his best. To excel requires planning, structure determination and courage - you may not necessarily be the best but you are the best at trying. As Winston Churchill said “Never give up, Never give up, Never give up” and Churchill was undoubtedly not the best at school – his school reports give most of us hope.
As the Christian story unfolds into the New Year, it is about showing and telling and thus giving hope. One of the best known phrases in the Bible is in St Paul’s Letters to the Corinthians “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” Hope and trust underpin morality and hope has an object, you need to be courageous to enact what you hope for: it is not just shallow optimism.
I prefer to live life with a glass half full, with a desire to enjoy fairy tales which have happy endings and may be slightly out of this world. I prefer to hope for something better yet, along with Geordie, know that it is also about putting one foot in front of another. It often seems to me to be rather like climbing Beacon Hill at the top of which the 5th Earl is buried. Everyone starts with enthusiasm but it is quite steep. Then it opens out and you keep hoping you are nearly there but you are not. It offers false hope that you are near the summit and you feel a bit disappointed not to mention out of breath but you have to keep on going and then you do make it to the top.
The 5th Earl of Carnarvon worked in hope – he looked for the tomb of Tutankhamun for years – but he planned to succeed, looking where no one else had looked and being methodical. His hopes were crowned with success yet at that moment of triumph he met disaster and died, caught between an ancient culture which tried to create eternity and a more modern Christianity which revered it. Either and both promise hope.
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58 Comments
Thank you for today’s post on hope. Just what we need for a cold January morning. In the words of Bill Keane the American cartoonist, “Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift of God, which is why we call it the present.”
Have a Happy New Year and continue to educate and inform us of all with your wonderful writings.
Thank you. I need this reminder today.
Very interesting ,thank you ,
What an uplifting piece of writing. Thank you & Happy New Year to you all
Thank you for these inspiring words. Never give up and have faith in God.
So very well said.
Planning, tenacity - perhaps ability - and great hope are essential ingredients in the fulfilment of our aspirations.
May your hope and dreams be fulfilled!
Happy New Year!
Beautiful, thank you!
Beautiful reminder! Hope always!
Thank you!
I’m so glad you gave Keanu’s quote. Thank you! It’s a keeper.
Martha
So inspirational is Hope! In this present world, I think hope and love are in a constant race. To breathe, hope and erase our fears is the biggest challenge we face right now. How soothing to read this as I look out of my window the day after a Nor'easter with blue skies, sunshine and sparkling snow. Thank you Lady C, my week is off to a great start! Happy New Year!
Lady Carnarvon,
Thank you for inspiring thoughts. Now that we are faced with muddling through the bleak midwinter, we once again have hope for bringing peace to the New Year and beyond. It keeps us sane and calm.
Martha
A wonderful expression of how we should all live our lives
Thank you for your beautiful reminder of HOPE as we enter 2024. Great photos to go with the topic. I would like to know name of the cathedral ruins and its location in the aerial photo. Thank you.
Ina Sue
Bellingham, WA
Your words ring with truth. What a gifted writer you are.
Susan Willis
Lady Carnarvon............Hope. A very thought provoking word. I feel it is like planting a seed. You cultivate the soil, condition it, plant the seed and water it in the hope it will take root. To that end you nurture that seed in the HOPE it will grow into that shaft of wheat or mighty oak tree one day. Hope is putting your faith in the future and your fellow man as I hope this will be a successful year for you and Lord Carnarvon.
I was feeling quite down before I read this, but now it has given me so much comfort to be able to look forward, thank you
We've visited Highclere twice and never climbed the Bracon Hill. So, I hope we will visit again and visit the palace where the 5th Earl is buried. I also believe that sometimes hope needs a little help.
Thank you for shYear's. the words which we undoubtedly all can use as we start into the New Year.
A beautiful and uplifting message for this new year. Thank you! And what a fantastic rainbow picture!
The podcast Lady Carnarvon mentions in this week’s blog is still available to listen to - it’s episode 11 ‘Tea with the Bishop’.
You can see (and listen to) the entire library of podcasts from ‘the real Downton Abbey’ at ladycarnarvon.com/podcast/
Thank you!
Oh my….. I’m not sure what to write first, but may I say that as I comment my eyes are filled with tears because what you have written, not only is perfect timing for the way in which I’m feeling as I sip my 1st cup of tea, but I am moved by the beautiful way in which you penned your thoughts.
I know that I will read it again and perhaps again before this day is done but thank you so much for what you have shared with all of us.
It is so true…. Hope is so necessary to not forget about or leave idle. Today is a day when I’m feeling a little overwhelmed and thinking, “can I get my tasks done in time??” Will I ever change or will other situations ever change? And then I read your post.
The timing is so precious to me because like Winston Churchill has said I need to be reminded to NEVER GIVE UP! And as you have so beautifully reminded us the Bible so clearly says the same thing.
Thank you Lady Canarvan for this beautiful post. I truly believe that God intended for me to read it this morning and be reminded of all that you have written.
I will trust in the Lord and will not give up. Just like the Bible also says in Proverbs 13:12 Hope deferred makes the heart sick, But desire fulfilled is a tree of life.
Thank you again and I pray you have wonderful week.
Blessings from
Tressa
Thank you Tressa, I hope you are well.
With blessings and light.
Thank you for this lovely blog - such inspiring words for the new year. Your photos are beautiful.
I shall always look for our wonderful late Queen Elizabeth in rainbows. You may remember that almost immediately after her passing was announced there were many rainbows seen. Coincidences perhaps, but they still bring faith and hope for the future.
Happy New Year to you, Lord Carnarvon and everyone there at Highclere.
Dear Lady Carnarvon
You know this morning, I hope up feeling alittle blue. Your words help me cheered me up, thank you and have awesome day...
Excellent article - :)
Such a true, true, true, Monday Morning Blog again Lady Carnarvon.
Given my personal situation since 2022, I have relied on HOPE so much for me to
be able to live life forward. So far Hope has helped me accomplish getting through life on
my own and still going forward. So glad to have read it this morning as I am Hoping & praying 2024 will be a better year for us all then 2023.
Thank you again for your wonderful Monday morning Blog.
Remain well.
Thank you for the lovely reminder to always carry the gift of hope in our hearts and minds. ❤️
HOPE ALWAYS . THANK YOU.
Yes! ❤️
Beautiful as always, and we have to have hope to keep us going.
Wishing you all well.
Regards Lorraine xx
Thank you for the message. It has been a difficult start to 2024 and it is good to remember that Hope can carry us forward. Never give up!!!
For me, it's important to remember that hope isn't just optimism. Hope is a reliance on God, a trust that all will work out for good in the end, and the peace that comes from that calm trust. Thanks for your beautiful words this morning!
Thank you, Lady Carnarvon, for your thoughtful and timely words. Hope does indeed matter. It is what unites us and makes us distinctly human.
You expressed beautifully the importance of active hope — one has to actually 'do' something with the courage and conviction which underlie real hope. It is not sufficient simply to be a bystander, idling in wishful thinking. Hope drives us to be ever better.
I wish you and Lord Carnarvon continued strength of purpose and rewarded hopes all through this year to come.
With best wishes from Vancouver Island, Canada!
A lovely message, and the double rainbows amazing.....Remember the late Queen's double rainbows over Windsor and Buckingham Palace when the dear lady passed away.
Action is always preferable to in-action, but is not always possible especially when people are afraid to take action......so then we turn to HOPE. My Hope for 2024 is to try and help build up community...something which is sadly lacking.
God bless you for your kind wor
What beautiful words of inspiration, thank you for sharing! I love the photos of Highclere Castle
Beautiful, Hope!! Love this!
Thank You Lady Carnarvon,
Best regards always,
Barbara xx
What a wonderful message, thank you for this to start our New Year 2024 with a doublr rainbow, and HOPE!
Brilliant, I just loved this message. It resonates so much with current talk in Australia about the need to kindle hope after the failure of the national referendum to give Indigenous People a Voice in Parliament. Thank you.
Dear Lady Carnarvon,
When I saw the photographs accompanying your article I was taken aback; I thought maybe you had followed me outside during my visit to Highclere this past Fall! When my husband and I finished the tour and lovely tea, a slight shower occurred, followed by the most brilliant rainbow we both ever had seen! And, we also could see both ends of said rainbow upon the ground! Never had this experience in our lives, and by golly, it filled us both with the emotions of HOPE and happiness! Thank you for your lovely message and photos. Happiest of New Years to you and yours.
In 2014 I was diagnosed with Prostate cancer and treated. In February 2014 I will have my next and final checkup, all clear so far. In September 2023 I was diagnosed with Myeloma, a blood/bone cancer, not curable but treatable. My fourth cycle of treatment started today. Treatments and test results do drive me, but the main driver is hope by me, passing on to my wife and children and grandchildren. If I have hope for the future, then they will also feel it and we will all feel positive for the future outcome. And hope gives them Love. Embrace love of your family. friends and those friends who are strangers today, but you have yet to meet. Thank you, Lady Carnarvon for you thought provoking and kind words.
A really lovely post, thank you. Happy New Year and I hope it brings many tourists to you.
“Hope springs eternal”
May it spring now in winter and throughout the year! Happiest of New Years
Laura Getman
California
Lady Carnarvon, we must always have hope now and in the future. We have nothing if we do not have hope. Cheryl.
Je vous souhaite, ainsi qu'à tous ceux qui vous sont chers, le meilleur dans tous les domaines pour 2024 et mon rêve est de pouvoir visiter Highclere cette année !
Que cette nouvelle année vous apporte bienveillance, sérenité et paix.
Thank you for these words of hope.
May 2024 be filled with joy
André Leclerc
Thank you for sharing, une très belle photo de votre domaine.
Best regards, Lady Carnarvon and family
Québec, Canada
Thank you!
Great phrase!
Amazing rainbow
Hope is a companion to the effort to reach your goal(s). Having loved history and the people who defined most of my life, I began recording the people who made my life the fairytale I dreamed for myself.
I was blessed to grow up with my four grandparents and two great-grandmothers. My great-grandmothers were at my first wedding, and I did not lose my first grandparent until my early 30s. I know the stories of their lives and the hilarious ones defining their personalities. Their lives of love, kindness, and service live within me, as I now see the same in my daughter.
I hope as I work to record these stories, I know and also witnessed myself; I will pass along my love for them all. Keeping their memories alive will let them live forever.
Beyond this, many hopes follow beside me as I do what I can to help our community shelter change the lives of people experiencing homelessness and help them re-enter society—passing along hope to those in great need.
An urgent effort with great hope is for my country to remain a strong democracy after our November presidential election. Pray for us so the United States can continue to offer hope to Ukraine as an example.
Please keep sharing your family history, the stories, and the pictures we all enjoy receiving from you.
.
Thank you for your very inspiring message this week - hope springs eternal!
Lovely the picture of hope and did you and lord Carnarvon have a wonderful weekend and lam fan of Downton Abbey and happy new year to you and lord Carnarvon and your staff
Your lovely message about hope, Lady Carnarvon, is one that has resonated with many it looks like! And it is one which I am particularly invested in, as this world (the news at least), sadly tends to focus on hope's direct opposite.
Your post reminded me of an excerpt that I recently read which is anchored in the bedrock of hope:
Thankful for your New Year's reminder!
Just came across this today and I have to say what beautiful heartfelt words of wisdom. If we have to live our lives amongst struggles, heart ache, and pain, we would never be able to survive without hope. Hope is so important as we all navigate through all the ugliness the world can bring. We all go through hardship, sadness, and reality checks, and its because there is always hope amongst all of us. Even during happy times we often feel this is too good to be true and continue to hang on to hope. Because we often feel it just won't last, but we hang on to hope and it guides us while we navigate all of the ups and downs through our lives. Rainbows have always been my sign of strength to hang on through hard times, and happiness, rainbows are a message from God and the angles that watch over us. We are all here to serve a purpose, the world needs us as much as heaven does. "We walk by faith not by sight" and always remember "Seek and you shall find"
Lady C,
An inspiring post on Hope that after a hospital stay over the Christmas New year period has inspired me to plan ahead for better things in 2024.
AS Winston Churchill said "never give up"
Thank you
with best wishes to you and Geordie for 2024
Dear Lady Carnarvon:
Thank you for this Monday's blog. What an inspiring story for the new year. Enjoyed looking at the pictures, particularly the rainbow over the field and Highclere Castle.
Until next time, all the best to you.
Perpetua Crawford
Lovely inspiring words to begin a new year Lady C, and thank you. Our hopes need some action to bring them to fruition - most of the time.