Cathedral Harvest

One way and another, this is not a great week to be celebrating Harvest.

Hospitals bombed and students shot on their college campus.

Teenage jihadists and the continuing pain of refugees across the world

And now, so close to home, Saturday evening shoppers caught up in pain, terror and tragedy.

Truly, there's little to give us hope when we look at the News.

And yet - and yet - we are called to give thanks.

And somehow we have to believe that those words we've just heard about God's care for the birds of the air and the flowers of the field mean something in a world that often seems harsh, unpredictable, downright hostile. That the truth of God's presence throughout creation - in the beauty and in the pain - is as fundamental and sustaining today in Coventry as it was 2000 years ago in the gentler landscapes of Galilee.

We come together this morning with so many different things on our hearts - carrying all sorts of grief and pain - and we are called to give thanks.

And I know that's not easy. 

Not easy at all.

But nonetheless

“We mustn't forget to say a great big thank you”.

So ran the favourite harvest hymn of the schools on my last patch - – so let me begin by voicing some of my own particular thankfulness.

I love being here as your Canon Pastor...

I really really do.

I love being part of an amazing group of people who give time, energy and buckets of love to the Cathedral day by day, way beyond any call of duty...

I love the place that the Cathedral and its story of brokenness and healing holds in the hearts of friends and visitors from around the world.

And of course I love that I get to participate in worship which includes such fantastic music week after week after week.

It's a delight, a privilege and something I need to pause, notice and enjoy from time to time.

But it's fair to say that at Harvest, I rather miss engagement with all those playgroups, schools and nurseries that were part of life before...

Harvest, after all, is just made to be a messy celebration – a time for leaf prints and grain collages...for sticky fingers kneading dough to make the harvest loaf...A time to help children remember the thankyous that are due to a whole string of different people- and at the very end of the chain, the One we might forget to thank...the One who is the source of everything.

Because, actually, that's the point of celebrating.

An annual opportunity to pause and say, “Thank you! Thank you for all those good things that have come our way this year.”

To pause and think; to pause and thank.

Of course, thankfulness is an attitude central to Christian belief.

It's part of the name of this service. The Cathedral Eucharist is nothing more than the Cathedral Thanksgiving.

But we're in trouble if we limit thankfulness to this time and this place....Our worship times here should be simply the tip of the iceberg – of our Christian community, of course, - but of our thankfulness too.

We should be a people defined by our gratitude as much as by our love.

We really should, always and everywhere, give thanks.

Unfortunately, generally we don’t. 
We look at the world, at all that we have to enjoy, and we take it as our right. We no longer see God in it. Instead we attribute the blessings we enjoy to human ingenuity...

And yes, it can be hard to glimpse God in a tin of chopped tomatoes, a loaf of a pizza or an Indian takeaway.

But God is there.

God is HERE.

If we open our eyes, wherever we look we see signs pointing the way to the creator.

Despite the way we treat it, the world is so much more than a gigantic supermarket, or a mine from which we extract what we want, using or discarding to suit ourselves as if nothing has any value.

Creation is, rather, part of the love song of our God who delights in creating...whose artistic genius gives us the wild flowers of the field,whose care provides for the needs of countless flocks of song birds on the wing.

Have you noticed God at work today?

Last week, as a small group of us kept vigil for peace on the Queen's steps, a long line of people made their way into the Cathedral for a “Mindfulness” event. Mindfulness is, of course, very fashionable right now – and bookshops are full of titles encouraging you to become more aware of yourself and of the world around you, with the claim that this will bring health and happiness. I have to confess to more than a pang that the queues last week were not for our vigil – but on reflection, those practising mindfulness are surely responding to the invitation Jesus gives us in this morning's gospel

“Consider the lilies. Look at the birds...”
Wonder at creation.
Savour its beauty.

What's that if it isnt mindfulness?

A conscious focus on the gifts that surround us – and a constant attitude of thankfulness too.

The great medieval mystic, Meister Eckhardt, once said,

"If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough."

I’m not sure, though, if I quite agree.

Saying thank-you is important, certainly.

It’s a great thing to be mindful of one’s blessings and say so from the heart.

But on another level, SAYING thank you is only a small part of the full meaning of gratitude.

Thanksgiving is both an attitude and a response, it’s both faith and works.

We need, in other words, to DO our thank yous too.

Think for a moment about how wildly profligate God is in creation.

Thousands of thousands of seeds, each with the potential to create a whole new life.

Myriad creatures so small they can only be glimpsed through a microscope.

Intricate webs of life held in balance.

Gift upon gift upon gift.

Simply amazing.

This year we've been overwhelmed by the harvest from our single apple tree in the Canonry garden...

One tree

Five huge boxes of apples.

Wonderful abundance – but I caught myself grumbling...thinking “What a nuisance! What on earth am I going to do with so many apples?” (part of the answer is that there is a box beside the community table...please do help yourselves)

Really. How dare I? How dare I??

Harvest reminds us of God's unlimited generosity...and yes, that can be overwhelming, more than our hands can hold...but that generosity should call forth a response that overflows as well...

The more we receive, the more we must open our hands to pass on the gift.

It seems to me that my own besetting sin is the fear that there might not be enough. Perhaps you're the same.

Time and again, though I want to give, I want to be generous, I hear a little voice at the back of my mind:

“Have you made sure you’re saving enough for old age…

Did you remember that all your children have student loans to pay off? Take care of the pennies. What shall I eat? What shall I drink? What shall I wear?..”

So instead of practising thanksgiving in all that I do, I fret, mither and worry, lapsing into self-protective meanness.

And – guess what – Jesus was right!

Worrying doesn't improve anything. It only casts a shadow over a beautiful world, where all, ALL is gift.

Let’s face it: we do not need everything we may want in order to live abundantly.

Indeed perhaps the more we have the more cluttered our spirits become.

It's possible that we stand now at a juncture in human history where we will be forced to face certain realities- that we cannot continue to plunder the earth's resources for our own ends, that our economies, both personal and political, cannot and should not grow forever, and that we may have to be content with what we have, or even a little less.

“Tis a gift to be simple…” says the old Shaker song…but it’s a gift that we are strangely reluctant to grasp even if we remember the second line “Tis a gift to be free”

We seem determined to shore up our fragile selves with all sorts of material props…we focus not on thanksgiving but on thanksgetting…like a child who asks his friend on Boxing Day, not “what did you give?” but “what did you get for Christmas?”

But at harvest festival we have a chance for a rethink, a moment of mindfulness.

We come together to celebrate all that we have received, and we express that celebration by giving of our best, our first fruits, just as people have through many centuries.
And, make no mistake, we all have something to offer. 

It may be that God – and God's people – don't particularly want a box of windfalls brought in to the Cathedral....but there are many other gifts, skills, talents, that we can bring as an expression of our gratitude. 
What will you bring? 
What will you bring?

Harvest festival sounds cosy, reassuring, a link with the golden days when churches were full and summers were hot.
But we know that the world is a rather different place, where pain and confusion, loss and fear are all too present.
So - I would like to issue a challenge - because, you see, every single one of us is part of God's harvest - and when we count our blessings, we need, too, to become a blessing for others.
So we can live out our thanksgiving by becoming people for whom the world is thankful.
People committed to ways of peace and hope.
People who comfort the broken and champion the weak, as we recognise God at work in the whole human family - not simply those whom we identify as "people like us".

If you and I can remember that we are celebrating thanks-giving, and not thanks-getting, if we can live lives that reflect the boundless generosity of God, in the way that we use our time, our talents, ALL we have been given, then we can honestly say with Meister Eckhardt that a "thank you" expressed in word and in deed, will be enough.

So let us indeed be mindful...and let's ask for grace to recognise God at work in all God's children. 

Let's ask to see God at work in every corner of the world, from farmland to city street, from refugee camp to community college.

Let's ask for grace to recognise God, too, in all the times and seasons of our lives, - to discover the surprising gifts that are ours even when the way seems dark and full of pain and confusion.If we can manage that, then we will not have to worry about tomorrow – for we'll know that God will be with us then, as God is today.

And strengthened by that grace – our thankfulness can flow as never before. So let’s thank God, for life, thank God for food, family and friends, thank God for the means of grace and the hope of glory, and thank God for being able to express our gratitude in acts of love, sharing and giving. Amen.

Christ the Cornerstone - a sermon for Evensong and Cathedral Praise. Ephesians 2:11-22

Walls, borders and boundaries.

The news is full of them at the moment – human devices created to keep what we call “civilisation” in order.

After all, if people simply had the right to wander freely across God's earth – anything might happen.

We might, heaven help us, discover that strangers and aliens were actually parents and children, teachers, hairdressers, nurses, taxi drivers,  - people just like us.

And we might be tempted to repeat the radical transformation we saw in Berlin in 1989, to tear down the barriers we have imposed upon ourselves and make fresh efforts towards peaceful co-existence, trusting that there are sufficient resources for all, if we work from a position of need and not greed.

We might.

But perhaps we might not...because, you see, we humans remain anxiously small-minded and often small hearted.

We find it much easier to organise the world along the lines of “them” and “us”...
And that has been so since time immemorial.

As Paul writes to the Ephesians, those divisions are constantly in his mind.

His readership, Gentile Christians in Asia Minor, were very much outsiders from a Jewish perspective...excluded by law and by custom.

Even the very fabric of the Temple was designed to keep Gentiles at a distance, as a structure of several barriers. Outside the Temple there was a yard, called the court of the Gentiles, and a wall. On the wall at intervals was placed a warning for a Gentile not to go a step further on the penalty of death. On the other side of that wall, the next court was reserved for Jewish women. Another barrier kept them from penetrating further. Inside that barrier only Jewish men were permitted, but they too were excluded from an inner zone for the priests alone. But even then, a final barrier existed where only the high priest could enter the sanctuary of the holy of holies, and that only once a year!
"KEEP OUT" was pretty much the motto of the place, expressed in its every stone.

Writing this on Heritage Open Day, when our doors have been freely open and visitors have streamed in by the hundred, it’s tempting but facile to make a comparison. Buildings can shout so loudly that sometimes it is just not possible to hear the message of those who speak from within – and sometimes those buildings need to be interpretted, to make sure that architecture does not accidentally subvert purpose.

For the 1^st century Jews, though, architecture and purpose were as one and the message was clear. The Temple was a statement of the identity of the Jews as God’s chosen people…and God stayed secure behind the curtain that ensured that the holy of holies remained just that. Sacrosanct. Holy. Set apart…

It worked like this – in order of holiness...

God

Priests

Jewish men

Jewish women

and then – firmly outside, the Gentiles, non Jews – that is to say EVERYONE ELSE….- which would, of course, have included US.

And, says Paul, those Gentile outsiders were a very sorry lot, with nothing to look forward to at all.

Traditional Jewish teaching suggested that the coming of Messiah would bring only destruction for them. They had, after all, no place in the “commonwealth of Israel” - Paul's shorthand for the elect, the people defined by their relationship as God's chosen since the days of Abraham. And worse of all, these non Jews existed “having no hope, and without God in the world” - not, perhaps as atheists (the ancient world tended to believe in some sort of god for sure ) – but as those who found that the religion they practised made little difference to a life that was nasty, brutish and short.

As a rather cheesey Wayside pulpit (is there any other kind? Discuss) put it quite well

“No God, no hope"..and then, adding a “k” and a “w” 
“Know God, know hope”

No God. No hope.

The situation for centuries. A world in waiting.

But – something incredible happened...that something that made it possible to add the "k" and the "w"....

Something that tore the temple curtain apart and changed everything for always.

The crux of this passage – and the crux of our faith.
The cross – the ultimate expression of God's solidarity with God's creation, of his all inclusive love for the world.

Yesterday at the Reader's Service I found myself silenced by some words in a hymn that I otherwise love; words that suggested that, at the moment of Christ's death, a mighty righteous anger at the heart of all things was finally extinguished.

“On the cross as Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied”, the author wrote – and everything in me longed to shout out “NO! At that moment God finally proved to an awestruck humanity that God is totally FOR us...that there is nothing that God will not do and has not done to communicate God's love for us."

And the power of that love broke down all division. Matthew tells us that it split the curtain in the Temple so that suddenly there were no outsiders at all. Everyone was included. Everyone could have access to God – all the time. Including people like us.

He [Jesus] has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, 16and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it. 17So he came and proclaimed peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; 18for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father

Where there had been divisions, there was now a new community of faith and worship...founded on that utterly compelling love which the world saw – and sees – in the person of Christ.

If that sounds exciting – it should do – though it's easy to lose sight of the excitement amid the familiar ways of life and of worship.

But, you know, it is what brings us here...

WE are not simply the constant beneficiaries of God's love at work in the world, but we are also inheriters of that new way of being, that new humanity reconciled to God and to one another – though that might not always be as obvious as it should be.

Last week, as we celebrated our Queen's long reign, there were many memories shared of her visits to Coventry, and to this place where, of course, she came to lay a foundation stone. A corner stone is similar, but not identical in purpose. It was the first stone to be placed at a construction site when a building got under way,its function to set the pattern for the building as a whole.

So if Christ is our cornerstone – not only is he the one on whose love we build our lives, but also the one whose life provides the template, sets the standard for all of us who follow after.

This new community of love founded at the cross is now the place where God dwells on earth...not in a building but in a people.

The Church.

The household of faith -where those who were once excluded are now part of the family,

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, 20built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.

That's our genesis as a community of reconciliation...but it's important to note that the Church's potential as a dwelling place for God depends on COMMUNITY – on being joined together.

The Church to whom Paul wrote stood for the overcoming of those deepseated divisions that had split his first cenutry world into Jews and Gentiles...Today that Church MUST stand

for the overcoming of divisions forced on the world by tradition, class, color, nation, for only in our unity can we represent God's presence in God's world. The cross of Christ, lifted up and proclaimed, draws all people to our loving God, and speaks of an end to all division. And that is what we must show to the world, where the pain of division continues to hurt and destroy.

It's part of our calling to welcome and hospitality...which won't mean automatic assimilation...

When we speak of those who have joined the church as having experienced “conversion” - this won't automatically turn all who enter our doors for worship into people Just Like Us. Paul recognises this as he explains that unity comes through the blood of Christ...

The idea of blood shed to achieve conquest was very much part of life in the Roman world...and those conquered were quickly brought into conformity and uniformity with Rome's ways.

In the upside down world of God's kingdom, blood shed in apparent defeat brings diverse peoples together and invites them to share in God's mission in Christ...

So – nobody can be excluded.

We are asked to be reconciled with all people...not just those who fit in with our notions of what a church (small c) should be like....because actually, the point of Church (capital C) is that it is a community for all. It won't always seem that way (though look around at your neighbours at "Later" and you might feel more optimistic) - but that's our calling. 
Not a club for the likeminded but a home for the excluded...

We will all struggle with different kinds of people.... It may be people of other faiths, or alternative lifestyles. It may be those of a particular political hue...For me, I'm conscious of the very real danger of being illiberal in my liberalism...of wanting to exclude those who see the world in terms of black and white, “in” and “out”.

But...I'm not called to exclude them. 
I'm called to love them.

In case you're still not sure what you can do to practice reconciliation yourself, someone online suggested a quick route to discovering those groups with whom you most need to make peace. Try praying for yourself the prayer of the Pharisee in the Temple – and fill in the blank.

“O Lord, I thank you that I am not like ___________________.”

Then change your prayer

Ask God to help you to recognise His image in that group of people...and to enable you to work with them in the service of his kingdom, that together you – we – may be built into a dwelling place for God...and a sign of God's kingdom on earth.

Because that, after all, is what we are for.

Migrants, crumbs and the Syro Phoenician woman - a sermon for "Later" at Coventry Cathedral, Trinity 14, 6th September 2015

This time last week I was at Greenbelt contemplating another night under canvas. It had rained hard all afternoon – and I was feeling slightly grumpy about my decision to camp, having commuted to the festival from the comfort of my own bed for the past 10 years.

In the event I was perfectly comfortable, despite a rather leaky waterproof.

Camping at Greenbelt was a good choice.

I was there with my family, my friends, and the wider festival community whose presence makes those 4 days of faith, art and worship an essential highlight of my year.

Yeah, it was damp and chilly on the camp-site on Sunday and Monday – but the truth is that I wouldn't have changed places with anyone else in the world, no matter how much you paid me.

But at the same time as 6,000 festival goers settled down for the night in our muddy field, across Europe thousands of refugees were also struggling to get to sleep in camps that had nothing to do with faith, fun or creativity...

The refugees whose very existence has prompted the language of crisis ...whose desperate faces fill our screens...who, surely, if we listen, will call us back to ourselves and to our true humanity.

They are people on the edge, right enough.

People like the woman we encountered in our gospel – an outsider, on the fringes...less important than the dogs who scratch and scramble for crumbs under the table.

Someone who doesn't belong, who has no rights.

But a mother, desperate to do the best for her child.

Just as Aylan's parents, and thousands like them, were desperate to do the best for THEIR child.

But oh dear God – we're slow to learn, aren't we?

Living on an island seems to make us alarmingly well – insular.

And yet – and yet...LISTEN...to these words written by another Dean John...John Donne of St Paul's, writing almost 400 years ago

No man is an island,

Entire of itself,

Every man is a piece of the continent,

A part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,

Europe is the less.

As well as if a promontory were.

As well as if a manor of thy friend's

Or of thine own were:

Any man's death diminishes me,

Because I am involved in mankind,

And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;

It tolls for thee.

We can't pull up the drawbridge...because we are interconnected.

These are our brothers and sisters, crying out in despair.

And we can't hide behind the differences of race or creed or language.

Whatever Cain thought, there are times when we are most truly our brother's keepers...our differences swept away in the face of our common humanity.

I know it's not easy. Not easy practically, politically, even emotionally.

We're not good, on the whole, at dealing with outsiders

.

We are, all of us, more comfortable with familiar situations, familiar people...and that can make the Christian life a challenge.

We know the theory – God's love embraces all...but we tend to organise our lives, even our churches, into zones of like-mindedness.

And we're not alone.

1st century Jews, Jesus among them, had had many centuries to establish themselves as a race apart...God's chosen people...The ultimate insiders, secure in an identity reinforced by law, faith and practice. But in our gospel today Jesus encounters someone from the other side of the tracks – and is challenged and changed by the encounter.

He has crossed into Gentile territory, where Jewish law, Jewish custom have no remit – and comes up against a woman driven by that most compelling force, parental love.

She pushes her way in, intent on claiming the healing she believes her daughter deserves.

Like so many others, she throws herself on the mercy of Jesus. Kneeling at his feet she entreats his help.

And what happens?

For reasons that may be obvious, I’ve never tried to tell this story in a primary school assembly, but if I did, I know that the children’s answer to that question would be. What happens?

“Jesus makes the child better”

That’s what we’d all expect.

Jesus goes about doing good, healing, rescuing,- surely that’s the essence of his earthly ministry. Of course Jesus is going to comfort the mother and heal her child, without further ado.

Except that he doesn’t.

Not at first.

First, we find ourselves thrown off balance, our expectations flouted by words of such staggering rudeness that they are almost unbearable. Jesus, JESUS of all people, tells that frantic mother that she and her child are no better than dogs….and I don’t think we’re under any illusion that he meant cute and cuddly spaniel puppies.

He is saying without compunction that as Gentiles, the woman and her daughter are not fully human, and they’re therefore beyond the scope of his love, his healing.

“It’s not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs”

It’s extraordinarily hard to hear this. We want to retain our soft focus image of Jesus, the source of endless compassion…but this abrasive stranger shakes us.

However, this woman is made of sterner stuff, and refuses to go away quietly.

Instead, she responds in kind, picking up Jesus’s words and turning them back on him without missing a beat.

We may be dogs, but surely you’re not so mean that you begrudge us even the left-overs.

She refuses to take No for an answer…

And in doing so, she stops Jesus in his tracks.

Against his own expectations, he is forced into really seeing her, - another human being, a child of God…and what he sees makes him change his mind in a radical way.

Hang on...

Jesus change his mind?

Surely not!

As God’s Son, Jesus must be perfect…the unmoved mover, no shadow of turning, right?

Well, it seems to me that since Jesus is fully human, he must have lived and learned. Even Mrs Alexander was prepared to accept that Jesus went through all the normal stages of physical development – “day by day like us he grew”

So too, surely, he learned and grew in relationship…and maybe sometimes he changed his mind. It seems to me that today's gospel presents Jesus rethinking the scope of his whole mission, as he responds to that Gentile woman whose love for her child is every bit as fierce and determined as any Jewish mother's.

His eyes, his ears, his heart are opened...and another miracle of scandalous grace occurs.

And oh, how badly we need that scandalous grace today.

We find it so hard to admit we might be wrong.

We cling to the notion that we don't really need to listen to the voice of strangers, because we already know the truth. It’s hard not to sympathise with the Jews, who believe themselves to be the insiders, on a fast track to Salvation. We don't have to look far in our churches, or in ourselves, to find traces of that same approach.

Time, then, for us to be challenged.

Today's gospel concludes with a second encounter, as Jesus heals the deaf man, transforming his life and his world with that great “Eph phathah” “BE OPENED”.

That, surely, is the call to us as we confront the heartbreak of men, women and children fleeing for their lives, and risking those lives again and again as they seek a place of safety, somewhere they can call home.

Preaching back in July I quoted some words of radical welcome ...and because they were well received the Precentor decided to print them on the cover of our service books. They have generated tremendous interest in the weeks that followed...and I would want to say loudly and clearly “HERE I STAND. I CAN DO NO OTHER”

Here's what I said...

We extend a special welcome to those who are single, married, divorced, widowed, gay, confused, filthy rich, comfortable, or dirt poor. We extend a special welcome to wailing babies and excited toddlers.

We welcome you whether you can sing like Pavarotti or just growl quietly to yourself. You are welcome here if you are ‘just browsing,’ just woken up or just got out of prison. We don’t care if you are more Christian than the Archbishop of Canterbury, or haven’t been to church since Christmas ten years ago.

We extend a special welcome to those who are over 60 but not grown up yet, and to teenagers who are growing up too fast. We welcome keep fit mums, football dads, starving artists, tree huggers, latte sippers, vegetarians, junk food eaters. We welcome those who are in recovery or still addicted. We welcome you if you are having problems, are down in the dumps or don’t like ‘organised religion.’ (We are not that keen on it either!)

We offer a welcome to those who think the earth is flat, work too hard, don’t work, can’t spell, or are here because granny is visiting and wanted to come to the Cathedral.

We welcome those who are inked, pierced, both or neither. We offer a special welcome to those who could use a prayer right now, had religion shoved down their throat as kids or got lost in the city centre and wound up here by mistake. We welcome pilgrims, tourists, seekers, doubters… and you!*

But...speaking our welcome is one thing. Living it is quite another.

We can long to BE truly inclusive, reflecting God's boundless hospitality in our every moment....but we don't always get that right.

So- we need to pray...to ask God to speak that great “Ephthaphah” over us too....

We need God to open OUR ears, eyes, minds, hearts..

We need to allow ourselves to be challenged and changed, as we encounter a God who listens and changes his mind, whose unlimited love seems almost to surprise himself.

We need to be open to the realisation that with God there are no boundaries...that there is grace enough to include us all

We need our eyes opened so we may SEE our brothers and sisters as God does, as beloved children, neither better nor worse, more or less beloved than we ourselves.

... our ears opened to hear their voices – and our tongues loosed so that we can be their advocates, speaking for those silenced by circumstance.

Today the 3 readings the church offers all share a single theme

James makes it so very clear.

“If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? He asks

If we don't act on our faith, it is ultimately pointless...for our faith should be transformational, enabling us to go beyond our innate caution, our fear of the unfamiliar, to offer the clothing, food, shelter that our brothers and sisters so badly need.

We don't need to be fearful. God's generosity abounds.

To welcome the stranger will not lead to penury for the hosts.

To exclude them may just be the end of our claim to humanity....for actually, there is no “us” and “them”. Each of us, from the politicians who make decisions to open or close borders to the refugee family camped at Calais is created in the image of God...and God loves each of us equally.

No favourites.

“God loves the rich and poor.” the Old Testament reading from Proverbs proclaims...going on with stern words for those who try to restrict that love...

Whoever sows injustice will reap calamity.

Those who are generous are blessed.

Do not crush the afflicted at the gate

for the Lord pleads their cause.

The afflicted at the gate...a picture as compelling as the images that have shaken the world this week.

And but for the grace of God, we could find ourselves waiting there too.

A friend in ministry offered a prayer space, with stations that included a pop up tent and an invitation to pray for refugees...As she tidied up, she found this reflection, written from the viewpoint of a Syrian mother....another desperate woman longing to save her family.

Listen.

IT’S A JOURNEY I DIDN’T WANT TO TAKE.

BUT HERE I AM, RUNNING FROM FEAR AND MESS AND WAR.

WANTING TO FIND PROTECTION AND SHELTER. WANTING TO SAVE MY FAMILY.

IF WE HAD BEEN BORN IN DIFFERENT PLACES, THIS COULD HAVE BEEN YOU. IT COULD HAVE BEEN YOU.

It could have been you.

Or me.

No man is an island, entire of himself.

We belong together – children of the same heavenly Father....alike dependent on his love and his mercy – which are without limit.

So, in the end, there's no need for any outsiders.

We all belong and there is enough and to spare for all….

Nobody need be content with crumbs from under the table.

Again and again, God’s reckless mercy sweeps us off our feet, his love compels us to come in, and we find that we are all alike included in a boundless welcome.

May God give us grace to share that welcome with all who need to know that they are not alone, that the human family can and will care for its own, in God's name.

Sermon preached at the Cathedral Eucharist, Trinity 12B, Proper 16

Pray for me, that when I speak a message may be given to me to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel...

Lord – in your mercy hear my prayer.

That process of prayer before preaching is something we take for granted, I'm sure...and I know, if I'm honest, that more often than not, if I'm in the congregation, my involvement in the preacher's prayer is limited to a formulaic “Amen”...though the view is rather different when I'm standing here, as I am right now, hugely conscious of the sheer presumptuousness of ascending these steps to speak about God and expecting others - you - to listen!

Just who do I think I am??

Preaching the word can surely only be possible if we hand the whole process over directly to God.

That's why for me the hope that the words I preach will be in the name of the Father, Son & Holy Spirit always comes in the form of a petition . “May I speak...” and not a declaration "I speak..."

How could it be otherwise.?

I'm overwhelmingly conscious that when those words are simply the overflow of my own hyper-active thoughts, they remain disturbingly earth-bound. I need, then, to engage with Paul's exhortation to pray in the Spirit...for the whole business of prayer is, of course, always about both communication and relationship.

But here as we meet for worship it would be easy to take it for granted. It's pretty much the first thing we do whenever we gather to hear God's Word, and to support one another in the life of faith. We come as individuals, carrying all the joys & concerns of our own lives, and as we pray The Spirit knits us together, and transforms us into the Body of Christ. Together we hear, see, taste, smell, feel, and sing God's love. And we respond in prayer.

Prayer is what most sets a church apart from any other sort of gathering.

It's our core purpose – and there is something about meeting somewhere where prayer has “been valid” since the days of Leofric and Godiva that adds extra impetus to the process.

My former bishop Michael Perham reminds us that prayer is like a spring running underground throughout our worship. “We hear the scriptures read, but in a way we pray them and that is why God is able to speak to us through them. We listen to the sermon, but in a way we pray it ...and it the prayer that changes it from dry theology into good news for our lives. We sing hymns and psalms, chants and songs, but at another level we pray them...”

Prayer is the life blood of the Christian community...the means by which we put down deep roots into God

But prayer is not, really, about what we do. It is, to quote Rowan Williams, rather an environment that we inhabit...the environment that is our relationship with God.

Among many many books on prayer on my shelves is one called simply “An Affair of the Heart”.

I love that reminder.

Prayer is an affair of the heart...

It should have nothing to do with duty – with the formulaic business of “saying our prayers” - though it's true that established habit and carefully crafted words can hold us steady when our hearts and minds are in tumult.

Terese of Liesieux puts it beautifully

“I say very simply to God what I wish to say, without composing beautiful sentences, and he always understands me. For me prayer is an aspiration of the heart...”

An aspiration...

A longing of our heart to turn towards God...a re-orientation of heart, mind, spirit as God calls us back to our truest selves.

And that aspiration is outstripped in every way by God's longing to reach out to us.

So prayer is most truly a conversation based on the language of love.

The love with which God reaches out to us, in myriad ways...through creation, through the arts, through Scripture, through one another – and above all through his Son, the living, breathing Jesus, who walked the earth, and the risen Lord who invites us here to meet him in bread and wine

God's endless unconditional love ....and the faltering love that we offer in return.

Here is the God whose arms are always open...who waits constantly for us to turn towards him, whose heart aches in longing for us to come to know Him...the God who is “always more ready to hear that we are to pray” and whose boundless generosity outstrips even our egocentric demands.

But we are oddly resistant – bafflingly narrow in our view of what God can do in us and for us.

He offers us life in all its fulness, “more than we either desire or deserve” but we ask instead for a win for the Sky Blues, fine weather for a wedding, or a 4 bedroomed house in Earlsdon.

Perhaps it is because we are too conscious of our own shortcomings, “guilty of dust and sin” - but you know, God has already dealt with that.

No matter how much we may struggle with ourselves, with those recurrent patterns of thought and behaviour that we have tried and tried and tried to bury, with the distressing realisations that “That – THAT – is part of me!!”...God has already dealt with it.

Yes – even those things we can't bear to mention or acknowledge.

God, in Christ, has them covered.

“Forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid”...

Perhaps though we're simply too busy to bother. Prayer seems a pointless waste of our valuable time – for we're trapped in the self-important, self-reliant habits of contemporary life that leave little sense of the deepest realities

“People on sinking ships complain of many things, but never of distraction in their prayers” said Herbert McCabe...and it's surely true that we petition with most urgency when we know that we are at the end of our own resources.

At that place where human capabilities are exhausted, and material distractions lose their power, prayer takes off as never before - for at that point we know that what we most need are words of eternal life.

“To whom shall we go...?” indeed.

But in the meantime, perhaps it is simply that we don't believe prayer will change anything.

Sometimes we may not recognise God's gifts...

We pray for healing and perhaps God's gift to our loved one is the healing that comes as he gathers them safely into his arms.

Was our prayer answered?

Not as we chose...but surely the answer came.

If we imagine that prayer is all about changing God's mind, about bringing him round to our way of thinking – our hopes will often be disappointed, and so we decide to give up.

Transformation will happen right enough....but it's most likely to be a transformation of US as we pray, as we spend time with God, as we honestly struggle to mean those well-worn words “thy will be done”.

Sometimes, of course, we shy away from the recognition that God invites us to become the answer to our own prayers...that, having prayed for the poor and hungry to be relieved, it falls to us to go and feed them...but that is part of a continuing conversation as well. 

I know that when I'm tempted to let fly at God about refugees, global warming, child poverty, I can expect to hear God challenging me to BE an active part of the Body of Christ...to back up my words with radical action.

Prayer will change me, if I let it...and it is certainly futile to pray if you have no intention of doing anything different when you rise from your knees – for in every relationship we can expect to be changed by the one with whom we're engaged.

In this relationship we place ourselves, trembling, in the hands of the living God....and as we place ourselves where God can touch us, and try to let go of the protective layers of assumptions about ourselves, and about God which so often disrupt our conversation, we become more truly, fully ourselves...

There in the stillness, where words cease, is God.

And you.

And I.

And all the needs of the broken, hurting world.

Rowan Williams again.

“When you're lying on the beach, something is happening that has nothing to do with how you feel or how hard you're trying. You're not going to get a better tan by screwing up your eyes and concentrating. You give the time, and that's it. All you have to do is turn up. And then things change...You simply have to be there where the light can get at you”

So, in the end, there is nothing really to understand...nothing to “get right”...no props required, no special words - not even "hands together and eyes closed".

Prayer is all about love, God's love reaching out to us and helping us to respond little by little, as we are brought into alignment with the One who calls us to know him, leads us to trust him and speaks to us the words of eternal life...to Him be glory both now and forever.

Almighty and everlasting God, 

you are always more ready to hear than we to pray

 and to give more than either we desire or deserve: 

pour down upon us the  abundance of your mercy, 

forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid

and giving us those good things which we are not worthy to ask 

but through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, 

who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, 

one God, now and for ever. 

Amen.

Call me Mother - a footnote

After I linked to this post on Facebook, there were some interesting reactions...To start with, a number of colleagues read it as a directive to call me "Mother" whether they wanted to or not.

Can I say LOUDLY that I'm delighted to be called Mother if that's what you find helpful - but if you don't, for goodness sake don't feel that you have to!
The point is for the label to enable, not confuse relationship...There might be times, I guess, when those who normally call me Kathryn might want to relate more specifically to me as a priest - and use "Mother" to differentiate...but again, it's all about the terms of the relationship.

But I was also struck by a childless friend, an ordinand who felt that she wouldn't be able to use the title as she had not been a mother herself. To her I would say, as I do on pretty much every Mothering Sunday that I'm let loose in a pulpit, that Mothering has never, ever been the exclusive preserve of those who give birth. 
When I think of those who have offered me the most consistent nurturing along the way, my father would be at the top of the list, but he would be closely followed by my children as well as many wonderful friends, both male and female, parents and childless. 
That list of behaviours shared by priests and parents is absolutely possible (not easy, but possible!) whether or not you've given birth...and indeed, it does not include giving birth at all...

Because, you see, at that moment of procreative miracle, the parallel fails.
As clergy we do not birth the Church - nor the faith of any of our congregation.
That is, of course, the work of the Holy Spirit - and her alone.
In fact, that's just what Paul says in the passage from Roman's I've been wrestling with for 8.00 tomorrow
⁴For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. ¹⁵For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!” ¹⁶it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God...

At which point, of course, we're back at the paradox that if God is our true father, perhaps we should save the labels of parenthood for God alone...

But I suspect it's a second-order issue really.
If it helps you, great. If not, forget it!