A Forbidden Room

Spirit – Artistry – Community

Spirit

God is Alive: A Prayer

Anna McGahan

(For Sunday) Here is a call Open and voiced From this gut Grated along the back Of this throat Come back My God As rock is smoothed By generations Of precipitation Of this pull Deeper Down To the animal Crouched In the crater Of this earth As the deer pants for Water So my soul longs for You I have these strange visions, sensations Under my eyes, along my skin I have an entire universe Lifted off my shoulders As if I have carried you while You Have waited To carry me I Have waited For the empty suitors For […]

God is Dead: A Prayer

Anna McGahan

(For Friday) I have chosen to speak to you publicly This is not an address a letter a collection of ideas I can now present I have nothing to say to you and so I pray You have said to me Ask and it will be given Seek and you will find My darling Just knock The door will be opened to you Oh we are raging at this door I have slept up against it The tomb is closed I have been looking You are the lost thing Are you so small Yeshua That I could drop you like […]

The Third Man: On the apparent condemnation of Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan

Anna McGahan

There was once a man sentenced to capital punishment by the state. The authorities decided to kill him for political reasons, because he undermined their laws with effortless and controversial leadership. They were afraid of a revolution, and afraid of being deemed irrelevant. They managed to convince the governor of the region to approve of the execution, claiming it would apparently please the people, and help cement all their positions of leadership. The governor questioned the prisoner, demanding he explain himself, but the man stayed silent. The governor had heard that this convicted man had in fact encouraged and cared […]

The Choice

Anna McGahan

Let’s talk about sex. And I’m quite serious. Not just ‘Let’s talk about not talking about sex’. This is a conversation, not a monologue. But a lot of people in my life who know about my convictions and choices have been challenging me on them recently, and I have loved it. We need to have these debates. We need to be open. What we don’t need is to impose our personal convictions on any other human being – but it is loving and constructive to try and understand. There are a lot of voices, a lot of opinions – and […]

The Holes in my Hands

Anna McGahan

This is a story that only a few people have heard. It is sensitive, but it is a small part of a huge victory. This year I turn 27. It has been ten years since I started Year 12 as a nervous sixteen-year-old. Ten years. This is significant, because I never expected to live past that year. When I was fourteen, I started to get sick. Though the illness was mental and emotional, my physical deterioration was by my own hand. It was almost a game in the beginning, an experiment with my body that spiraled into addiction. It wasn’t long before […]

Spare Change

Anna McGahan

The first time we spoke was on a tram to St Kilda. For the first two months of our relationship, a lot of our deeper conversations were on the number 16. Perhaps it is the melting pot of public transport that really excites Him – or renders me restless enough to ask questions and peer into strangers’ faces. Our first conversation was about need. It wasn’t a conversation like something I might have had with my mother, or myself – that was the chill of it – He wasn’t me, and yet he existed, as a voice within me. I was […]

Healing

Anna McGahan

I went back to the theatre this year. It was anticipated (on my behalf) and terrifying. It had almost been two television-filled years since I last performed professional theatre. I had wriggled out of a contract early just so I could take up the role – the script was a beautiful essay on neuroscience, love and depression, and I was a first-hand explorer of all three. In prayer, about two weeks before rehearsals started, I got a strong impression that the job was going to be difficult. My pride would be tested. I would feel my own limitations. This wasn’t […]

Hands

Anna McGahan

June 2012. I was trying to fall asleep in an hotel room in St Kilda. I was restless. I was in Melbourne to film a job, but I felt strange. I didn’t know if I wanted to continue acting. It was beginning to grate against my chest. My trajectory was unpredictable. The opportunity to forfeit integrity was forever present. I didn’t know if I could still serve the work. I didn’t know if God would bless the process or the pursuit. I was finding myself desperate to live for more. To do more, to be more. To make a difference. Acting – […]