Homily for 8.00 30th July

It began with a handful of grain – scattered carelessly in the field...

Not a big handful you understand...you wouldn't have noticed it falling on the soil - but nonetheless, through the grace of the Creator it sprouted and grew and in time there was a patch of corn...

Not a whole field, but a good few ears, which when harvested produced enough to grind to make a sack of flour

Not that much flour – nobody would have struggled to carry the sack home from the mill – but still it was enough for a family to thank God as they made their bread for a few months

Nothing spectacular in all of that.

The stuff of ordinary life.

You'd wouldn't bother to turn your head to look...not at the grain, nor the corn, nor the flour...not even at the fresh baked bread which made the whole kitchen smell so good.

5 loaves, wrapped up to make a picnic for a child...a child off exploring in the hill country, running free, but pausing, his attention held by the man telling wonderful stories to the crowd.

Just one small child

And one packed lunch

Nothing spectacular here either...

But when the moment came, when there WAS no food for all those gathered....that one ordinary boy dared to offer himself, with all that he had, to the Teller of Tales

That small basket, packed with a small boy's lunch – fruit of the earth and work of human hands – was taken, blessed, broken open and distributed

And somehow, beyond all expectations, by the grace of God it was enough.

So it is with us.

We bring nothing spectacular to God's table...

Ordinary people, bringing ordinary hopes, ordinary fears and broken dreams...

Nothing to offer, really – but if we dare....if we truly offer ourselves, with all that we have and all that we are

Then, we too can be blessed, broken, distributed....and find ourselves transformed beyond all hopes and expectations...

Blessed by God as we meet Him in the bread and wine of Eucharist

Blessed to go out and be a blessing in our turn

Augustine said to his confirmation candidates, as they brought bread and wine to the altar at the Offertory - “there YOU are on the altar...You are to be taken, blessed, broken, distributed so that the work of the Incarnation may go forward”

The best I can do tonight...

Proper 12A – Romans 8 & Matthew 13

Another week when the news has been anything but good.

Corruption and scandal at home, famine abroad and then late on Friday night the news of the horrific events in Norway....the bomb in Oslo and the shooting of so many young people off at a summer camp in an idyllic island setting.

Truly the stuff of nightmares – and just as things seemed to be at their worst news began to spread across the internet – the gunman, Anders Behring Breivik, was described as a fundamentalist Christian.

Suddenly, I realised without any stretch of the imagination how the majority of peaceable, devout Muslims must feel as they read the often hysterical references to Islamic fundamentalists.

I was distraught as it appeared that none of those reporting could see the contradiction between the horrific violence that claimed só many young lives and the label of “little Christ...Christian” that had been attached to it.

I wanted to rush out into the road shouting

“No.......No..........You've got it all wrong. Christianity isn't like that....Nobody who is following Jesus could ever act in that dreadful way”

I wanted to – but I didn't.

Because I started thinking about the way that I live out my baptism....the ever present gap between the person I'm called to be, the one whom on my best days I aspire to be, and the thoroughly ordinary, hurt and hurting Kathryn who repeatedly fails in her quest to follow Jesus.

I realised that Christianity isn't that much like my life either....That though I may long to spend my time as a sign of God's Kingdom, I sometimes find myself pointing in a very different direction.

And I'm probably not alone.

Because, I guess, each one of us betrays the Kingdom of God in só many different ways.

We may do só by failing to care enough – by ignoring the cries of the hungry children of Africa or the loneliness of the troubled old lady down the road.

We may do só by a disproportionate focus on the interests of our own kind – our own family, perhaps even our own church family...

We may do só by the choices we make in our shopping trips – to save ourselves money at the expense of others, far away out of sight and thus out of mind

We may do só by staying silent in the face of injustice or by the simple hypocrisy that leads us, like the Pharisee in the Temple, to thank God that WE are not like other people.

Though perhaps none of those betrayals is as flagrant or as cataclysmic in its immediate impact as the probable actions of Anders Breivik, still each reflects our failure to truly live the cross-shaped life that we're called to in baptism.

Too often when I read a report of the latest mad or bad cleric, the sillier discussions at General Synod, or the minor selfishness of a small community that thinks that “charity begins at home” means “US first – everyone else can just wait their turn” I want to exclaim

“No...you've got it all wrong...Being a Christian isn't like that”

But sadly, that's often all the Christianity that people see.

Is there no hope, then?

If even the best of us fall over our own feet again and again, should we say, as one rather weary friend lamented earlier this week, that “the Christian project has failed”.

Certainly if we look at the lives of those who profess themselves Christians, there is lots of ground for disappointment...We don't seem to be bringing in the Kingdom, do we? The world is every bit as broken and enslaved as it has ever been.

But wait.

How does Jesus describe the Kingdom, that state of being in which God's will is done on earth as in heaven?

He doesn't, you'll notice, talk about overnight revolutions – about the world turned upside down, and everything made perfect in an instant.

Nor does he talk about our working our way into the Kingdom...It's nothing to do with us qualifying by our behaviour.

The images of the Kingdom that he gives us in our gospel today are all about gradual growth, delayed gratification...

A seed, só tiny that you might drop it without even noticing, that grows slowly, imperceptibly to become a home and shelter for many

Yeast, that takes it time to work within dough...that cannot effect change unless the conditions are right...but that cannot BUT change everything with which it has contact

A treasure buried in a field...buried so deep that few people suspect that it is there...but something of such value that it is worth all we could possibly pay and more....

A priceless pearl – worth more than we can imagine...the sort of jewel you might spend a lifetime seeking...

Nothing quick, easy or dramatic here...but also nothing that depends on us.

The Kingdom, - where God's love rules regardless of our failures, our intransigence, our stupidity....that Kingdom will come.

It will come because there is nothing that can stop it.

Not human sin

Not the powers of evil

Not the things of time, nor those of eternity.

God's love is inexorable...

It will find its way through our rebellions, our apathy, our feeble attempts to live as Christians and our petulant refusals to let God be God...

It will even find its way through the pain of those who are weeping for lost children today...

That's what love does.

It does not eliminate pain...so it is right and proper to lament, to cry out with all that is in us “Oh God – why”......knowing that as we do so, Christ allies himself to us in our weeping and in our longing for redemption.

Love comes with us into our darkness, shares our desolation, cries in our tears, but is not overcome.

Even Paul, who was undoubtedly a fundamentalist Christian in that so much of our theology is founded on his writings, never doubted that.

“Love never ends” he said, to the Christians in Corinth......and then, as he looked at the trials and terrors that surrounded the new-fledged church in Rome he wrote still more powerfully

I am confident that neither death nor life nor angels nor rulers nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Christianity does not depend on us.

Hope does not depend on us.

We fail, again and again, but always, always God's love wins...and as we recognise and begin to respond to this, so the task of following, of becoming signs of the Kingdom, becomes, step by tiny step, that bit more possible

So – despite the grief of the world......Despite the shame that I feel when I measure my own Christianity against the fulness of God's kingdom, despite all that casts shadows across our lives I can say

“I believe in the sun, even when it is not shining.

I believe in Love, even when I do not feel it

I believe in God, even when God is silent”

In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

Mission Shaped Kathryn?

Off and on through the past year, though far less regularly than I'd hoped, I've been part of a group exploring "Mission Shaped Ministry". The course finished just a week ago, and I've been reflecting on its impact on me and the ministry of the church in my parishes.

At the same time, I've been part of other conversations around the work of our Deanery pioneer minister, - so the mission theme has been bubbling away quite close to the service this week.

We're blessed with a very able pioneer minister working as a curate in a nearby parish, but also giving 50% of his time to developing a Fresh Expression of church in the town at the centre of the deanery.

This neighbouring town*  is a wonderful mixture...some very down to earth people born and bred here....some spiritual explorers with alot of energy and commitment to alternative spiritualities...many devotees of Rudolf Steiner....lots of artists, thinkers, askers of Big Questions.

Altogether, it's an extraordinary place where it's never hard to find something interesting and thought-provoking going on, but sadly the Christian presence does not, to my mind, really seem to connect with the essence of the town. We've tended to hide in our churches, or to offer an attractive but specific model of evangelism through "Churches Together" - which has, I think, depended heavily on inviting people to some well-organised events, sometimes with big-name speakers. Of course, this approach does bear some fruit, just as it always has - and there are thriving independent, Baptist and evangelical Anglican churches about the place who are deeply committed to it, and who draw in good numbers through Alpha, "Praise in the Park" and, no doubt, through last year's Deanery mission.

Regular readers in the "glory days" of this blog may not be surprised to hear that this isn't quite where I am. I felt called to these communities for a ministry of incarnation - offering practical support, sharing where I can with the struggles and joys of life on the estates of my parish, above all trying to encourage people who rarely look up, to dare to lift their gaze and notice God at work in and among them every day. I also felt a vague tug - nothing as clear as a call - towards the spiritual explorers of the neighbouring town. I love being with those on the edge, always have.It was, actually, the one thing that made my much-loved title parish frustrating at times - for life was so comfortable and certain for the majority there. I'm famously keen on multi-sensory (aka touchy feely?) worship, on tea-lights, pebbles and plainsong in a darkened church, -so, when it came to the mission last year our contributions in the valley were based on helping to reclaim the community centre FOR the estates community and offering a labyrinth, as a toe in the water experiential prayer opportunity for those who will never engage with the black and white certainties of evangelical Christianity. 

No - we didn't,as a result, bring lots of new Christians to baptism but both ventures were valuable in quite different ways, and connections were made on which we continue to build.

You see, for me it's all about community....About affirming the communties that do exist and helping them to see God in one another...About doing all that I can to help build community where there seems to be isolation and struggle (Messy Church is an important part of this)...About remembering again and again that God IS community - the community of the Trinity...into which we are invited. The vacant seat at the table in Rublev's icon. 

At the heart of my calling as priest is the need to invite others, wherever and however I can, to experience the hospitality of God - in ways in which that will be recognised and welcomed.

I love inherited church. It has formed me, given me a route to ministry, sustained and supported me through a whole host of life crises (and been noticeably missing at others) - but even at my most optimistic I can't say that I expect it to "work" for a majority today.

So, I also love the climate of exploration and discovery that has emerged in the wake of "Mission Shaped Church"  but the thing that really excites me most is the invitation "to find out what God is doing and then join in".

I'm pretty sure that while God is undoubtedly at work in and through God's Church there's an awful lot more to God's mission than our limited, church-shaped imaginations will allow. I wonder what God is REALLY doing among those alternative seekers...and how best I can join in and celebrate.

*our boundaries touch - til I lived here I believed that valley parish was part of hippy dippy Town...now I know better :)

What a timely Friday Five

After a particularly stressful June, and an amazingly helpful time with my ever-wonderful Spiritual Director, I found myself writing 2 blogs in the space of 12 hours for the first time in months...I remembered how helpful I used to find the process of writing reflectively for this space, the web of wonderful connections that emerged, the fact that most of my best writing is here. And I felt wistful. I spend alot of time on twitter & have new & treasured friends there too - but the medium is utterly different, and I do feel the loss.

But ironically, it was a RevGals tweet that sent me over to look at the Friday Five for the first time in - well, a year possibly....

This was what I read, from my good friend Kathryn - one of those whom I really miss now I no longer spend my free time wandering through my blog reader.

A friend and I were lamenting recently about the good ol' days of blogging and memes. Certainly there are still some very active blogs around our web ring, but the days of the Friday Five getting 50-70+ responses are in the past. We lamented that the Friday Five is the equivalent of the women's guild of RevGalBlogPals.

I am one of those who went from blogging just about daily to periodically at best. Unfortunately, the number I routinely read has gone down as well. What about you?

1) Have your blogging (writing/reading) habits shifted since the days of yore?

Goodness, yes! I used to find time to blog well nigh every day - sometimes more than once. It was a huge part of how I learned in ministry during my curacy, a place to try out ideas, to receive encouragement and challenge, as I explored what it meant to be a priest and a parent, how to balance my own expectations and those of other people with the emerging reality of parish ministry...I loved this blog at its best and am sure that I was a better priest, more alert to God's presence in the everyday, because I was engaged in constant reflection here. 

Then I became an incumbent in two very different but quite challenging parishes. I still look for God's presence in the everyday, but too often I'm galloping through life at such speed that I don't really engage with it. The weight of expectations has increased, as has the need for reticence and circumspection if I am writing about the parish. So, inevitably, my blogging has declined - and as for my reading.....When bloglines, the reader I'd used from 2004, announced it was about to vanish, I wasn't even sure that I needed to find a replacement...I now depended on a tweet to alert me to updates from friends - and so I often missed important news, the minutae of daily life that we'd once shared on our blogs. I can't imagine a return to my former practice - but I'm hoping, with the help of a few wise friends, to engage in some serious rebalancing of my life this year...and I know that, as part of that,  it would be good for me to return to a regular process of reflection here if I can manage it.

2) Do you have some favorites that you miss?

Far too many....Some are still there, but I just don't get time to read them. Some have changed character (rather as this blog has) to become more of an official voice, less a personal journal. Some have gone for good...My friend and colleague HopefulAmphibian was one of the first to vanish, as he moved from curacy to incumbency...On the far side of that same divide, I now understand why....but I still miss his voice, along with many others, here.

3) Are there some blogs you still put in the 'must read' category?

When friends tweet about a blog update, I'll usually try to drop in to catch up - but I barely look at my google reader so I guess that means "no". How sad. Perhaps now is the time to change this...

4) If we gathered at your knee, what would you tell us about those early days of blogging?

I had no idea, when I first began to blog (as I found myself reading and responding to the writing of a small group of Greenbelt friends) that I would ever MEET anyone this way...But in being as honestly myself as I knew how to be, as I explored my first beginnings in ordained ministry, I found frienship, support and my voice as a small time theologian and began to believe that I really WAS the priest whom others seemed to see. Blogging changed my self-understanding and widened my horizons beyond all my wildest dreams. I'm certain that, if I'd not begun to build friendships all over the world, the life-changing trip to India in 2006 would quite simply have looked too frightening to contemplate...And I know that I'd never have crossed the Pond without RevGals reaching out to me, to share in the first Big Event. I guess that means that blogging changed my life...which sounds over dramatic, but is, nonetheless, absolutely true!

5) Do you have a clip or a remembrance of a previous post of yours or someone else's that you remember, you know an oldie but goodie?

This weekend I'll celebrate the 6th anniversary  of my ordination as priest, and on Sunday I'll preside at 10.00 in my lovely valley church, remembering my 1st Mass at St Mary's, on 3rd July 2005. This is what I wrote then...and it remains so true, an inextricable part of who I am

Off to Mount Moriah

The Eucharistic lectionary yesterday featured that story that strikes dread into the heart of children's workers throughout the world - the (almost) sacrifice of Isaac...
As my curate read it to the small Thursday congregation gathered up the hill, painfully conscious of the high cost that some clergy families are paying right now for the sake of vocation, I was almost speechless...

Why THAT reading today?

What could I possibly say about it?

It didn't seem to me that there was the option of ignoring it - it's not the kind of Bible story you can gloss over or expect the congregation to forget.

So I waited for inspiration.
Nothing.

I read the Gospel.
Nothing stirred.

We said the Creed (BCP service, this).
Still nothing.

Too late now. No escape..

"Please sit down.

What are we to make of this story? 

What does it say about God? how could we ever share it with our children?"

And suddenly I found myself answering my own questions - not just for Abraham and Isaac, but for my own children (who have undoubtedly felt themselves offered as a sacrifice on the altar of my priesthood from time to time) and for the families of all my friends who have asked, from time to time, whether this mad, wild and sometimes wonderful calling is really worth it.

Because, of course, in the end God DIDNT demand that sacrifice.

The point was not that God wanted to take back the gift that had been given, nor that some ghastly blood-lust should be assuaged.

God wanted Abraham to confirm his that relationship that had enabled him to leave his father's house and venture into the unknown at God's invitation.

I'm pretty certain that this is what it's all about, really.

Even at my darkest, most disillusioned moments I've always known that God cares about my children even more than I do...because God's perspective is total. My recurring problem is actually trusting in my heart that God will deliver the care that, in my head, I know I can rely on. So, I make contingency plans, try to protect my loved ones just in case God fails to turn up, struggle with herding a whole flock of sheep and rams up the mountainside so that there's absolutely no danger that one of my most precious, beloved children will be sacrificed on the altar of my ministry - or in any other way at all.

And in doing that, I limit both my expectations of God and God's opportunities to act - because, in my experience at least, God just doesn't wade in unasked.

I don't think this makes things feel any better, when you seem to be stuck in the wilderness with nothing to rescue your children from all sorts of painful sacrifices...but it does, perhaps, offer a further reassurance that, as FabBishop always says as he shares the cure of souls with a new incumbent, we can honestly

"put our trust in God. He is faithful"

And of course, the ending of the Abraham story gives us something huge to look forward to....for he is, famously, blessed to be a blessing. I know that will be true for my friends who are stuck on the mountain as well.

Transitions

I was one of those fortunate women who have very easy labours. Perhaps this is why I never stopped hankering after "just one more baby" - or perhaps that was simply because I didn't really want to grow up. Who knows? However, I could guarantee that even in the shortest and most straightforward of labours (my longest lasted a cool 4 hours) there would be one stage in which I would become thoroughly miserable and unreasonable, ask if I could call the whole thing off and generally rue the day that I ever contemplated motherhood.

This stage will be familiar to parents as transition........and since then I've realised that I don't much enjoy other transitions either.

I don't think many people do.

Currently, I've several friends and family members who are in that threshold space. My beloved daughter Hattie Gandhi returns here this evening, leaving the city that she has loved since her arrival as a 1st year undergraduate. With 2 degrees to her name, she has certainly made the most of her time there in every possible way - and I know it's hard for her to head back to the vicarage, which has never been home for her, with no idea of what comes next.

Meanwhile, a dear friend is waiting to begin a new ministry in a new place and going through all the uncomfortable adjustments that this entails - coupled with the awful bereavement that seems to be part of leaving any parish, at least until the next chapter really begins...and others are on their ordination retreats, contemplating stepping through the door into a completely different world.

Another has just announced that she will be leaving this country and heading across the Pond...And I spent yesterday morning at the Cathedral with the year 6 from valley church school, as they attended the diocesan Leavers' service.

And so it goes on.

Transitions wherever I turn.

So - for all of these dear dear people, specially those who are struggling with what comes next, a prayer by beloved John O'Donahue, from "Benedictus"

For the interim time

When near the end of day, life has drained

Out of light, and it is too soon

For the mind of night to have darkened things,

No place looks like itself, loss of outline

Makes everything look strangely in-between,

Unsure of what has been, or what might come.

In this wan light, even trees seem groundless.

In a while, it will be night, but nothing

Here seems to believe the relief of dark.

You are in this time of the interim

Where everything seems withheld.

The path you took to get here has washed out;

The way forward is still concealed from you.

The old is not old enough to have died away;

The new is still too young to be born.

You cannot lay claim to anything;

In this place of dusk

Your eyes are blurred;

And there is no mirror.

Everyone else has lost sight of your heart

And you can see nowhere to put your trust;

You know you have to make your own way through.

As far as you can, hold your confidence.

Do not allow your confusion to squander

This call which is loosening 

Your roots in false ground,

That you might come free

From all you had outgrown.

What is being transfigured here is your mind

And it is difficult and slow to become new,

The more faithfully you can endure here,

The more refined your heart will become

For your arrival in the new dawn.

PS. Oh - and for the record - after transition came the hardest work of labour - and then three joyful deliveries. Well worth enduring for!

Homily for 8.00 Trinity Sunday Yr A

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit

Before I've even written a word, that opening prayer puts us straight into the heart of God.......and straight into the heart of today's feast.

Trinity Sunday – the day when limited human minds, and limited human language attempt to explore the nature of the God who is beyond all our greatest imaginings, our finest words.

There's a tradition in theology called the apophatic tradition, which can be summed up in the words of Wittgenstein

“Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent”

In other words – if words fail, then don't use words.

But actually, the doctrine of the Trinity is all about lived experience...a doctrine formulated to make sense of God as encountered by humanity in só many ways from the very beginning.

Só, this morning, we might focus on the Creation story from Genesis – and encounter all the imaginative excitement of God at work, his Word (THE Word) bringing forth light and life........while the Spirit, God's breath, moves over the face of the waters....

Or we might instead find ourselves standing with the disciples, who have spent 3 years realising that their beloved Rabbi is só God filled that he must BE God – (I and the Father are one) just in time for his risen body to leave them once again – with a Trinitarian commission to obey

Or we might submit ourselves to the embrace that we só often share with one another, those familiar words of mutual blessing that are part of our Epistle today

“May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all, evermore”

You see, the essence of the Trinity is love, though it is too simple to present it as Love, Lover and Beloved....for what is true of one is true of all.....

John Wesley said
“Tell me how it is that in this room there are three candles and but one light, and I will explain to you the mode of the divine existence”

Because however much we may try to find clever ways to illustrate the truth that God is three and God is one, what we need to grasp most fully is that God in Trinity is God in relationship – a relationship of endless mutual love, into which we are invited.

The point of Christianity has never been to figure God out by reading and learning, but to experience God. The pertinent question is the same question it always was: how do we find God?

How do we experience God's love?

There's a story about a training incumbent who promised his curate a substantial sum if he could manage his first sermon on Trinity Sunday without using the word “mystery”......

He did só, knowing his money was almost 100% safe........but the problem is that we too often treat the Trinity as the sort of mystery that needs to solved – like a detective story – rather than the sort we submit to, like falling in love.

But actually, falling in love is the central concern.

For ours is a God who knows what it is like to give of self completely for the other and who can do that because the other is totally invested in giving its self for the the first.

Here there is no hierarchy, no anxiety over precedence.

Instead the love that defines and informs the one reaches out and spills over into the other

Look, says the Father.......look at the Son........

Look, says the Son...........look at the Spirit

They gaze at one another in mutual love and delight – and invite us to do the same – to participate in their loving relationship and to draw others to do so as well.

In a few moments, we'll enter into that Communion as we come to receive God in the sacrament....Here we find all the love and all the sustenance we will ever need....Here, touched by love, we are made lovely too

só let's pray, using some words of Catherine of Siena

Eternal Trinity, you are a deep sea, into which the more we enter the more we find, and the more we find the more we seek. The soul ever hungers in your abyss, longing to see you with the light of your light and, as the deer yearns for the springs of water, so our souls yearn to see you in truth. Amen

Uncharted territory

June 17th 1978....a Saturday, just 2 days before my 1st A level (Music Aural, as it happens)

The independent school I was attending had Saturday morning lessons, but these were suspended for the Upper 6th so that we could concentrate on revision. 

I think I was working on history when my housemaster came into the library, tapped me on the shoulder and took me away from my books and, I guess, away from my childhood too.

That morning, while I was worrying about the causes of the English Civil War, my father had quietly moved on from the pain of the last weeks of cancer, the sadness of saying farewell, and had gone safely home to the God whom he'd served with quiet devotion all his 67 years.

The next days, weeks, months were unlike anything I had ever experienced.

From being younger than my years, focussed solely on exam work and music I found myself abruptly transformed into the adult as my mother struggled with a loss so devastating that it took with it her will to live, her reason to engage with the world.

When she died herself, 6 months later, it was almost a relief. They needed to be together - and, surely, had done all they could to prepare me for the world.

And, you know, I think they pretty much had.

They had taught me that there is always enough Love to go round, and had given me a language to recognise this.

They had taught me that it's ALWAYS worth going the extra mile for your friends (and had given me friends who demonstrated that in so many many ways)

They had shown me how books and music can transform pretty much any situation and left me with a lifelong passion for both

And they had shown me how to give, and why it matters to make a difference.

Sometimes, though, I wonder what else I might have learned - particularly now, as I explore what it means to be the parent of adult children...how to provide enough support to be helpful without either swamping or disabling them...how (the familiar, but still challenging lesson here) to both embrace and let go.

They never had to do that...I hope that, one day, my children will look back on my parenting with the same gratitude with which I remember - not just on anniversaries, but whenever I think of them.

Naming the challenge

On Sunday, the feast of Pentecost, we celebrated in both hill and vale with the full seasonal provision that "Times and Seasons" allows. Inevitably, this had a quite different "feel" in each church - probably at least in part because I presided in the valley, which gives you a particular set of priorities during worship. 

There, I stood at the head of the nave and looked down at the congregation, lit on a particularly damp and dark June morning by the light we had shared from the Paschal flame - and was struck above all by the courage of that group of people, none of whom have the easiest of lives...

The commissioning rite that Common Worship includes as a concrete reminder of what "being the Church" actually means, minces no words at all....

Listen

As part of God’s Church here in N, I call upon you to live out what you proclaim.

Empowered by the Holy Spirit, will you dare to walk into God’s future,

trusting him to be your guide?

By the Spirit’s power, we will.

Will you dare to embrace each other and grow together in love?

We will.

Will you dare to share your riches in common and minister to each other in need?

We will.

Will you dare to pray for each other until your hearts beat with the longings of God?

We will.

Will you dare to carry the light of Christ into the world’s dark places?

We will.

Those are big words, aren't they....a huge weight of commitment.

It was one thing to ask a congregation if they would live out what they proclaimed. That felt splendid - an affirmation of our common purpose, to be celebrated triumphantly.

Being asked to voice those same proclamations myself not once but twice -both up the hill and in a packed Cathedral, full to welcome our new Dean - was quite quite different.

There, perhaps, we were all carried along by the occasion, by being part of a huge congregation bouyed up by splendid music (Locus Iste, Howells Gloucester Mag. AND If ye love me, all in one service is pretty celestial in my book), and all the high liturgical drama of the day. 

But up the hill, as part of a congregation 2 dozen strong, I felt the weight of every word and all but stumbled.

It was OK to be asked the huge, broad-spectrum questions about walking with God, growing in love, sharing the Christ-light in dark places...While I know that I fail in these every day, I know too that they are intrinsic to the faith that I profess, and actually I do try - and I know that God knows this.

But these are also pledges with soft edges, addressing areas where "success" and "failure" are hard to define.

But what about sharing my riches in common with those in need?

Was I, or anyone else in either congregation, actually up for that?

My voice faltered. 

Giving? - yes - but always with the rider in my head "When I can..." and with the right reserved to determine just what those words mean...

Sharing in common....ummmm.....

I looked around me - at comfortable people in their Sunday best - people like me...

None of their faces registered any disquiet and I wasn't conscious of any sudden diminuendo in the responses.

Were they all crossing their fingers? 

Or was I about to witness an amazing scene in which we poured out of the building to pool our material resources with the rough sleepers of Gloucester, or swept down the hill to solve the financial worries of the valley estates by taking them upon ourselves?

Or was there a shared assumption that we could make huge commitments "by the Spirit's power"

and then blame God for our failure to follow through?

Or worse still, did we not actually mean a word we were saying?

And if not in this context, then where else in our worship might this be so?

I loved the liturgy on Sunday, - but I'm distinctly uneasy when I remember what we promised. Perhaps that unease is the gift of the Spirit....I wish I'd asked to speak Polish* instead.

*Not an entirely random choice - we do have some Polish families at both my valley schools.

Yr A Pentecost Sermon for St M's & All Saints: Acts 2, John 14

When the day of Pentecost had come the people of St Matthew's/All Saints were all gathered together in one place and suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire church where they were gathered and……

How did you feel as you heard those words?

What would that sort of dramatic outpouring of God’s Holy Spirit actually mean for us here?

Do you honestly believe it could happen?

Every year as we approach Pentecost, I’m conscious that I’m being pulled in two directions.

On the one hand, I feel safe within the familiarity of Anglican liturgy here. I come expecting to find God (in this community) amid the blend of Word and Sacrament, and I am seldom disappointed. I’m Anglican by choice as well as by chance, and I do value worship which is conducted “decently and in order”…so imagining the sort of radical transformation that the Holy Spirit might bring to us is, on one level, more than a little alarming.

But on the other hand what Christian, confronted with the diverse challenges that face both church and world today could fail to pray for the transforming power that enabled a group of fearful uneducated men to take on the world for Christ?

I value what we have, but I know that we so often settle for less than our primary calling – to BE the church – a sign of God's kingdom, a powerful agent of transformation in a broken world...And I know that we will continue to fail, without a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit – in these communities, at this time.

I guess the struggle that I experience is simply par for the course. We all know that encounters with God are unlikely to leave us untouched – and sometimes the changes and challenges ahead seem too huge to contemplate.

The good news is - I rather suspect the disciples felt the same. When the Acts reading begins, they are gathered together, waiting. Though Luke doesn’t say so, it’s quite possible that they are actually gathered together in the upper room, their unofficial Jerusalem HQ. This is holy ground for them, the place where they’d celebrated the Passover with Jesus, and hidden in fear when the Lord was arrested and crucified. It was the place where they had huddled together in the fear and grief of Holy Saturday and the place where they heard the first rumours of resurrection. There they had encountered the risen one who came among them despite barred doors, there they had regrouped when he went from them, there they had watched and prayed for his promise to be fulfilled. Holy ground indeed,the place where they felt themselves to be a community, still united despite the departure of their Lord.

Yes, they were a community in waiting, uncertain about their next step, but a community gathered in faith and hope nonetheless.

Does that sound at all familiar? I do hope that it does

Of course, they were also a community under threat.

Outside the house, the streets were thronged with people once again – just as they had been at Passover…Perhaps the disciples defined themselves as if set against the crowd outside. They were the ones with the special knowledge and experience of God, though the crowds were the ones with the courage and freedom to move about the city.

We don't really know, but we DO know that with the coming of the Spirit, everything changed.

Hiding no longer, they went gladly out from their place of safety, out to speak to the crowds, overwhelmed with enthusiasm for a message that just had to be delivered. They were caught up in the excited turmoil, which was so pervasive that it seemed to onlookers that this was a scene of drunken revelry.

Rather alarming, I think?

But alarming or not, it worked. This wasn’t simply a particularly raucous worship service from which everyone went home scratching their heads, thankful to get back to normal.

Lives were changed.

People heard the Gospel and responded to it. They were baptized and “devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of the bread and the prayers"

Happy Birthday, Church!

For the disciples, the coming of the Spirit meant that they had to let go of the securities of their holy place and go out into the streets, among the crowds that could so easily turn nasty.

The Spirit made that venture possible…and in doing so, opened up Salvation to the whole world.

Wonderful, inspirational....but perhaps a bit too far away from our expectations here this morning.

But, you know, Pentecost was not a once only event...The Spirit has been active throughout history, moving over the face of the waters at creation, transforming Ezekiel's dry bones, descending like a dove upon Jesus at his baptism.

And the Holy Spirit has not vanished from the world, not even from the Church!

At that first Pentecost, God reached out to communicate directly with everyone.

And God still does.

But not always, of course, in the mighty rushing wind, the multilingual gifts and high excitement of the day of Pentecost.

While Luke presents the coming of the Spirit with fanfares and celebrations, John offers us only a gentle whisper, so quiet that we might even miss it.

Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you."

When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit.

Jesus looks at his exhausted, disappointed disciples, wrung out by all the dramas of holy week, of death and resurrection – and offers them nothing less than artificial respiration.He breathes HIS life into them...literally INSPIRES them....That weary, fearful group is given the very life of God, and a new calling, to reconcile and bless If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained."

We have to do the same.

Filled with God's life-breath, Inspired as God's church, this is our calling.

Knowing that God so loved not church alone but the whole world, we are to reach out to her in all her pain and brokenness and speak God's words of healing and forgiveness.

Knowing that our language may not be adequate, we are to listen to God and allow the Holy Spirit to translate so that we may more fully communicate God's love.

We speak so many different languages – of mind and heart and spirit – culture and community – yet all must hear the Gospel.

There is no official language for God rather God comes down and speaks our language, whatever it may be.

God's one supreme message of love is translated so that nobody can fail to understand.

Today, the Church's birthday, we should not celebrate a monochrome church, full of people who see the world exactly as we do.

Rather, let us rejoice in the diversity of God’s people, within and beyond our churches, and reach out to share good news with them.

If we will only let him, God can speak through us to all in their own tongue, and God can and will reconcile them all.

We may not experience the drama of that first Pentecost, -but we can and must pray to be open to the Holy Spirit, as strong as the wind, gentle as is the dove.

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Your faithful, and kindle in them the fire of Your love.

Send forth Your Spirit, and they shall be created, And You shall renew the face of the earth.

Spiritual discipline?

Next to valley church stands the old old vicarage - a huge and impressive building which must always, surely, have been too much for the clergy family to manage. It hasn't been church property for decades. The house that is now home for me was built on the site of a more recent old vicarage, a 1920s building that was much loved by the local community but less popular with those who lived there, and had to deal with the astronomical heating costs - and maintain the huge garden. That house was demolished in the vacancy before my appointment here - and I thank both God and the diocese that someone with my domestic and horticultural limitations does not have to live in it.

Meanwhile, the original vicarage still stands, a testimony to the days when the vicar really was Somebody - and, (cynics might say) its fortunes perhaps reflecting those of the church, the building is now a care cum nursing home for the elderly.

I've been a regular visitor there for some time, since a new regime decreed that the local vicar was not, after all, persona non grata, and among the residents who most welcomes Communion there is, amazingly, the daughter of the last vicar to actually LIVE in the old old vicarage. She moved away from the area sometime in the 1930s, married, but had no children, and now in her 90s, struggles with short-term memory loss, though she always knows who I am and why I am there. She lights up as she talks about the many parish children who knew her as Auntie H...and shows a childlike delight in the trinity of teddy bears that are her close companions.

Always, even on her bad days, she recognises and responds to the Sacrament - but yesterday she brought me close to tears.

You see, H is almost crippled by arthritis. Hands that once worked hard knitting and sewing for the struggling families of her father's parishes can now barely manipulate the mechanical grabber that made life manageable from her chair for some time.

She also has a tremor, which was particularly bad yesterday - but she has a will of iron.

She was not going to let anyone, but anyone, prevent her from receiving both the sacred elements herself, in her own hands even though the journey from hand to mouth involved copious false starts and took, to an observer, almost a lifetime..

I hovered, desperate to help but desperate too, not to intrude on this personal battle - wishing that I habitually brought intincted wafers, so that she might be spared going through the whole ordeal twice.

But, I suspect, H would have felt cheated if things had been any easier.

When the host had been consumed, it was time for the chalice.

No compromises allowed...

Could she close those pain-wracked fingers around the cup?

If she could, would she be able to tilt it to allow herself to sip?

She brought her head as low as she could, and laboriously brought the chalice to her lips.

Swallowing, too, cost her so much effort - but it was clear, even while I wept inside, that every second of this painful journey (which must have lasted a couple of minutes) was precious to her, somehow a spiritual discipline in itself.

I could bring the sacrament to her,(even this an unwelcome surrender as she always laments that she is not strong enough to be brought to church) but yesterday I began to understand how hugely important it is for H that she takes an active part in receiving, expressing by her efforts her longing for the One who, when we were still far off, met us in His Son...

One day soon, I think, she will have to receive under one kind...and that tiny spoon that nestles in my Home Communion set will finally get an outline. That, I think, will hurt...and we may have to do some revision of theology. For now, though,  H. will continue to "Take, eat"- and it is not for me, or anyone else, to attempt to make things easier.

Out of darkness...

I hope that I'm always conscious of the privileges of ministry, - the way people suddenly open their hearts and tell their stories, hoping and expecting that I may be able to point out where God is amid the joy, pain or confusion.

Apart from saying Mass, it is simply the most amazing gift, to be allowed to spend time listening to people and helping them notice God at work...but sometimes it is more evident than others.

For me, one Baptism in this weekend of many positively shone with evidence of God's presence.

It started in a rather unpromising way. An infant baptism arranged, at least in part, to placate an anxious great-grandma.

Nothing unusual about that, nor in the discovery that not all those invited to be godparents were themselves baptised.

At this point, I give the parents a copy of the service to share with the would-be godparents, explain that there is nothing to stop them from being wonderful, supportive role models for the infant even without baptism - but that they cannot make promises on his account that they would not make for themselves, and send them off to discuss it.

Often, that is the end of the matter.

Sometimes, I meet up with a possible godparent and we discuss whether or not they might ever have considered baptism were it not for the current possibility...usually, they have the grace to admit that they would only be going through with it to support their friends, and we go our separate ways with our respective integrities intact.

Occasionally, they seem prepared to jump through hoops, and I find myself, bizarrely, trying to talk them out of making promises they really don't plan to keep.

Just sometimes, - there's another agenda running.

So it was when I met with one potential godfather a couple of weeks ago.

Accompanied by the baby's mum, he sat uncomfortably on the vicarage sofa, very young, very male, and very ill at ease.

My heart sank.

I was certain this was going to be one of those conversations that led nowhere - but I could not have been more wrong.

While far from chatty, he was very willing to tell me that he had made some bad choices, wanted to draw a line under those and make a new start, and hoped he would be able to show his godson that there were different possibilities.

How could I do anything but rejoice, and book a date for the baptism.

It happened last weekend.

He came along to church, with only his mum for support...I'm not sure if the alochol fumes that came too were a memory of Saturday night, or Dutch courage to spur him on his way - but he made his promises with clarity and, I believe, conviction.

At the end of the service, I sent him on the journey from the font to the Paschal candle, which still stands in its Eastertide position at the head of the nave....Not a long way, really, but one that seemed freighted with extra signficance as we watched him go. 

7 weeks ago that Paschal candle was carried up the aisle and the darkness of Holy Saturday receded with every pace.

As the young man walked back to us, carrying his baptismal candle with huge care, there were no words necessary.

In the meantime...a homily for Easter 7 A

I sometimes wonder what would happen if some gloriously off-beat, definitely deluded writer attempted a pantomime script based on the Bible.

There would, I'm sure, be ample opportunity for cries of “Oh no he didn't! Oh yes he did” (what about John 3:16, for starters) – and of course, there are any number of truly amazing transformation scenes – as lepers are cleansed, the dead raised, the way of the cross becomes the way of life and peace – all culminating in the new heaven and new earth that we are promised when God's kingdom comes.

But it's the way that pantomime characters so often spend their time looking in completely the wrong direction that came to my mind as I thought about Ascension.

It's not the only time, of course, when God takes us by surprise...indeed, in the post Easter narratives it happens repeatedly.

And today here we are again

The disciples are craning their necks, trying to catch a final glimpse of Jesus (have you seen that wonderful window at Fairford, which depicts his toes vanishing into the clouds?) - only to be challenged by the angels – not quite “Look behind you” but rather......

“Look ahead”

“Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

In other words – this is not “Good bye” but most certainly “Au revoir”.

They will see Jesus again.....just not yet.

Of course it is hard for them to let him go...after all, it was just 40 days since he had been restored to them, against all hope, against all reason, as he appeared in the upper room in his resurrection body.

Of course, they are inclined to stay put...to seek security in the place where they have last encountered Jesus – and I don't think that's such a foreign idea to most of us.

But the angels make it clear that God has another agenda.

Indeed, he has had another agenda all along.

‘Lord,’ they ask, ‘is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?’

While they were waiting for dramatic action, an unmistakeable declaration that God IS God, that the ancient prophecies will be fulfilled and all made well

God sneaked off in another direction entirely, leaving them to hurry up and wait.

To wait to “receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon them”

To wait before they can set out as witnesses , to tell the great story in which they have been swept up, against all their expectations.

And in the meantime, while they wait........they pray.

Two millennia later, we wait as well.

We wait for that final fulfillment of the kingdom and, on a smaller scale, in the church's year, we wait to celebrate the coming of the Spirit at Pentecost.

We wait to discover our own part in telling that great story....for this is our story too.

And as we wait – I hope we pray. For how else will we learn how best to join in with God's agenda

To return to our pantomime theme – some tell this story as a joke – but I'm more inclined to take it seriously.

What do you think?

When Jesus ascended to Heaven to return to His Father, the eleven disciples stood and watched Him rise through the clouds. An angel in the clouds nearby saw Jesus pass by and called out, "Jesus, where are you going?"

"Back to be with my Father in Heaven," he said.

"I thought you were going to bring salvation to the whole world!" the angel protested.

Jesus said, "I have. The atonement is complete. My work on earth is finished."

"But who is going to be your witness and go out into the world and spread the Good News and tell people you love them?"

"They are," Jesus said motioning toward his disciples.

The angel looked down on the rag-tag group of disciples. "Do you have a plan B?"

Remember – this is our story...That call to mission is ours...It is our turn to become witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

There IS no plan B.

“People of Selsley......why do you stand looking up towards heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.’

‘It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. ⁸But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses … to the ends of the earth.

Easter 6 A

Acts 17 22-31 /I Peter 3 13 onwards

In the group of Cotswold villages that used to be home, there was a wonderful woman called Sheila. She’d lived in the village a long while, and was up to her ears in every aspect of community life, -the W.I., the village hall committee, and every sort of village celebration from Bonfire Night to the Harvest Supper. She was also one of those key people without whom the church could not survive, hosting the Mother and Toddler group, and taking her turn at the various jobs on the PCC as well as serving on the Local Ministry Team. She spent, and indeed still spends, nearly every waking minute in the service of other people, and is one of the most shining Christians I’ve ever encountered.

But, though Sheila is endlessly prepared to live her faith, she is firmly opposed to the idea that she might ever have to talk about it. Evangelism is almost a dirty word to her…indeed we used to tease her by referring to it as the E word, to be avoided at all costs.

The trouble is that, if we’re honest, most of us are pretty uncomfortable around that E word. It has gathered too many negative associations through the decades… It’s OK for those who have the gift, but most of us aren’t cut out to be Billy Grahams. So we have a problem.

We're tasked with sharing the Good News of God's love – there's no mistake about that and on Thursday as we celebrate Christ's Ascension we'll be reminded of our calling “Go and make disciples of all nations....”

but despite the urgency of God's voice, we really seem to struggle.

I think it may be specially hard in our current context...because the good news ISNT really new to our neighbours – or at least, that's what they believe.

They think they know all about Christianity and don’t need it

They are self sufficient and successful.

They don’t care.

And they still don’t know Jesus.

So, our job is to help them to meet him – through our words and our lives to make His love real wherever we may be.

It's challenging but essential – what the Church is really for. We can't not do it.

So – can we learn from an expert? Here's Paul, arriving as a kind of working tourist in first century Athens, and choosing to work with, not against the grain of the culture. In a city filled with religious activity, he builds on what he sees about him and with the motto when in Athens, do as the Athenians, goes to the Areopagus, - a kind of philosophical speakers' corner, and joins in debate there. It's all about meeting peope on their own terms in the kind of multi-cultural multi-faith context that is much like ours today.

After all, we live in a society fascinated by “spirituality” but reluctant to buy into any one religious creed.

Christianity may be approved as the basis for moral decisions, while eastern religions are plundered for meditation techniques, and reflective CDs mix plainsong uneasily with new age dolphin noises. Ours is a pick and mix world, in which people hedge their bets by taking the most attractive features of a range of world faiths, cafeteria style...What do you fancy? Ancient or modern?Christian worship without social action? No problem...You choose...

It's only a slight caricature, I'm afraid.

On the whole, people choose a faith that meets their needs but demands little. That's why so many churches are all but empty. We've lost the plot....forgotten that if we practice our religion without knowing God, we're wasting our time.

So too, the people of Athens were 'hedging their bets'. It wasn't enough that there were shrines and temples to dozens of different gods and goddesses, here was an altar dedicated to the 'unknown god', just in case they’d missed one! Rather than lamenting this, Paul recognised an opportunity and launched straight in with the Gospel,doing everything in his power to introduce the Known to the unknowing.

These are the people who are, as verse 27 says, groping for God…“seekers”…which, of course, is where that E word comes in.

Unlike Sheila Paul has no inhibitions.

Evangelism is his vocation. He wastes no chance to share the good news he has experienced, even recruiting an Athenian poet to his cause, for he has a message he is burning to share.

But what about us?

Does God want us to court ridicule by broacasting through a megaphone in Sainsbury's car park? Or to twist every conversation with our friends to enable us to sqeeze God in somewhere....

Relax. I really don’t think that IS what we are called to.

But we do have something amazing to share…

Our world is full of lives and altars, dedicated to the “unknown God”.

But here's the irony...all of those altars scattered around Athens were dedicated to unknown gods. Not a single one of the gods of stone was known personally by the citizens. There were no personal relationships with Zeus or Apollo. They were merely statues of legends. Paul presents something completely new--a deity who is both infinite and personal, the God of people, like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. This God desires to be in relationship with His creation, so much that He took on human form. This is a God that is knowable.

I sometimes wonder how many who define themselves as Christians really know God.

Have we simply constructed altars for worship, instead of actually getting to know God?

We know a church building, but that's not God.

We know an inspiring theologian, but that's not God either.

We know a liturgy, a discipleship course, a supportive faith community, but that's no substitute for knowing God. We even know our Bibles, but that should not be mistaken for knowing the infinite, personal God who is revealed in its pages.

It's one thing to 'know about Him', another thing entirely, to "know Him” and we know God when we meet him in Jesus. After all, ours is a God who so wants to be known that he joins us in our humanity. Jesus, in last week's Gospel, pointed out that if you had seen him, you had seen the Father, for "I and the Father are one". The Gospel speaks of a self-revealing God who calls us into relationship with himself. Once we have met him, well then our task is to invite others to get to know God and worship Him.

So we're all involved, reluctant or passionate evangelists...

We all have our own stories to tell of how we met God, how he makes a difference to our lives, why we come here Sunday by Sunday.

That’s not the stuff of sandwich boards, or wayside pulpits…but it is the sort of thing that might come up in an ordinary conversation. The Epistle calls on each of us to have ready our own story, to be able to “give an account of the hope that is in you”.

The more distinctive and attractive our lives, the more we are likely to be asked what makes us tick…We don’t so much have to preach Good News as live it, and then respond to the interest in will generate.

What hope is it that builds inclusive communities when the rest of society is divided and segregated?

What hope is it that allows you to be people who travel light in a world dominated by consumerism?

What hope is it that allows you to transform your homes and workplaces with grace?

What hope is it that keeps you uncomplainingly joyful and positive, even when life deals you a worse hand than you deserve?

This hope is surely something to shout about, something that is Good News to those nearby and those far off.

So share it!

Give an account.

And, when you’re asked the question, answer by telling the story of who Jesus is, what he has done and what he will do. Tell it clearly, courteously and respectfully, and your neighbours and friends will find themselves wanting to share your hope.

You may well have done this already…

So, there you are…you’ve fallen victim to the E word. Thank God for it.