In part I would agree with Peter’s secular analysis of Advent. I would not go so far as saying that the last vestiges of Christendom have disappeared but the church does, it seems for a while at least, to have lost the narrative plot of Advent. Before we rehearse the traditional apocalyptic Advent themes of death, judgment, hell and heaven, Christmas has already started in most our local communities, in our high streets and garden centres. In Durham’s Market Place the 2008 Christmas tree was erected before Remembrance Sunday! We do indeed sing the Lord’s song in a strange land. As we step through the wardrobe door we have entered a fantasy world of spiritual amnesia and neglect. For in this land it is already Christmas.
But it is too easy for ministers like me to jump on their hobby horse and enjoy a seasonal rant about the relentless tide of consumerism at this time of the year, desperate as that is. We need to be careful! I too enjoy all things Christmassy in the Advent season - Christmas shopping, the smell of baking Christmas cakes, wrapping presents, selecting cards, the gossip at office parties and preparing new house designs for Christmas. Far from being free of the corrosive values of consumerism, I like everybody else are compromised by them - I guess we are all implicated in the values of our society.
But the church cannot be exempt from Peter’s criticisms either. Some churches have their Christmas tree displayed from the 1st Sunday in Advent, we are reminded of that holy night as carols are sung as the 1st Advent candle is lit. A crib of plastic and pottery wise men greet me in the church vestibule. And all those Christmas church activities, Victorian markets, pantomimes, winter wonderlands, mince pies and mulled wine, Christmas Fairs, all encouraging us to part with our money. Christmas too, it would appear, in some of our churches at least, is in full swing from St. Andrew’s Day onwards. The Advent season forgotten.
The question is then (which Peter I think might be referring to) - is it worth trying to keep Advent at all? Should we just abandon the season and go with the flow? Do we really want to hear sermons about death, judgement, hell and heaven in a society and a church that would rather embrace sweet nostalgic Rutter carols and the warm lullaby atmosphere of a manger? Alas there is not much comfort in the Advent messages of divine judgment from the 8th century prophet Isaiah or the hissing, impatient, relentless radical- desert prophet voice of John the Baptist.
But if we were to persevere with our Advent readings and “keep” the season of Advent we might find the season’s readings about judgement a thankful relief. To hear of God’s impending judgement, frightening and alarming as that might be, is of course, to recognise in ourselves our failings and shortcomings, our ambivalence that often motivates selfish thoughts and actions. Advent in its brief 4 week season offers us a place to come before God as we are, without hiding, without pretence – and to reflect and think about what distracts us from being humane and God-filled as St Paul invites us as well as his Galatian church to become. Advent at its heart, is an invitation to reflect on what we truly need and long for in life. It's a summons to know ourselves.
But I think Advent can offer us more. If we can leave aside for a while John Betjeman’s “ tissued fripperies, the sweet and silly Christmas things, bath salts and inexpensive scent and hideous tie so kindly meant,” Advent I believe invites us to amendment of our lives as the Book of Common Prayer says, to know and discover God in a new way. For when God comes as Judge, he also comes as William William’s hymn Cwm Rhondda has it - as a great Redeemer. Our Advent readings of hope are shot through with the promise of salvation, so that those last things become the first things. The readings and Advent carols, our thoughts of Isaiah and other Old Testament prophets, the Baptist and Mary begin to change our direction and focus, open doors of possibility, offer new goals and values to live by, they give back to our lives dignity and worth, and help our churches in a new more positive direction.
The 19th century Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard talked about ‘the truth by which we live and die'. Advent is a time for doing both, to practise the one and rehearse the other. The church may indeed have lost control of the Advent narrative for a while. But let’s break the mould! Might I suggest we regain control of the powerful themes and images of the Advent season in our own lives and in our churches as we remain wakeful, waiting and praying with joy for the advent of God's kingdom of peace and truth. For the spirit of Advent, as the Welsh poet R S Thomas said in his poem Kneeling, “The meaning is in the waiting.”
Ray Anglesea
Friday 4 December 2009
Sunday 29 November 2009
Making Sense
Recently an unexpected event happened which has changed my life. I was made redundant. Rather my post was made redundant. After 36 years of continuous employment I was unemployed. The job I thought was for life suddenly evaporated into thin air.
Earlier in the summer I remembered an Air France plane carrying 228 people from Brazil to France suddenly vanished over the Atlantic after flying into turbulence. Sudden events happen to us in everyday life. Our days are suddenly, without warning, interrupted. Out of the blue an unexpected phone call relays sad news: suddenly you miss the promotion you were expecting, suddenly you find yourself with a medical condition that requires a radical change of lifestyle. Suddenly and unexpectedly a child is born with severe disabilities. Suddenly a bright, loving, teenager is randomly stabbed. Suddenly a gifted 40 year old finds himself slipping into a mental wilderness. Suddenly a close and loving friends dies. Life can suddenly change course for millions of people every day, and then life can seem terribly unfair, cruel, messy and decidedly unjust. That is the human condition. We live with uncertainty. Sudden events happen. What then do we do? How do we deal with these sudden unexpected life events that interrupt and change our lives?
Sudden events happened to Jesus too. Matthew records a couple of incidents that interrupted Jesus’ daily schedule - the account of the menstruating woman who touched the hem of Jesus’ cloak and the synagogue leader whose daughter had died (read Matthew 9 18-26 in the Authorised Version and the use of the word suddenly). How did Jesus deal with these two unexpected events which interrupted his daily life, how did he respond to this present emergency? The answer – with love and compassion. Jesus stepped outside the normal religious and cultural expectations and regulations of his day – he touches a dead girl and menstruating woman. He breaks with his society’s taboos of completeness and perfection (represented by the number twelve). He heals these two women by making himself ritually unclean. So when unexpected sudden events happen to us and to our friends Jesus way of dealing with such circumstances is to act with love and compassion, to embody mercy. Sudden events, good and bad, large and small will have affected most of our lives. It is often these sudden events that shape our lives for good or ill. Can you see in them, as Jesus was challenged to do, God at work bringing life and hope?
Janet Morley, writer and poet, has a challenging prayer which expresses this challenge of compassion and mercy in the sudden events that take place in our lives. It begins "O thou sudden God, generous in mercy, quickener of new life, giver of new love, irreverent, subversive " and concludes with Augustine's famous words from his Confessions, "Late have I loved thee O beauty so ancient and so new." Can we hold together in our experience the suddenness and the ancientness of God and of God's ways of mercy and compassion and be faithful to both?
O thou sudden God, generous in mercy, quickener of new life, giver of new love irreverent, subversive, deep source of yearning, startling comforter, bearer of darkness unmaker of old paths, bringer of strange joy, abundant, disturbing, healing unlooked for tender and piercing: late have I loved thee. O beauty so ancient and so new.
(c) Janet Morley, 1988
Late have I loved Thee, O Beauty so ancient and so new! Too late have I loved Thee. And lo, Thou wert inside me and I outside, and I sought for Thee there, and in all my unsightliness I flung myself on those beautiful things which Thou hast made. Thou wert with me and I was not with Thee. Those beauties kept me away from Thee, though if they had not been in Thee, they would not have been at all. Thou didst call and cry to me and break down my deafness. Thou didst flash and shine on me and put my blindness to flight. Thou didst blow fragrance upon me and I drew breath, and now I pant after Thee. I tasted of Thee and now I hunger and thirst for Thee. Thou didst touch me and I am aflame for Thy peace...."
Augustine Confessions (Lib. 10, 26. 37-29, 40: CSEL 33, 255-256).
Ray Anglesea
Earlier in the summer I remembered an Air France plane carrying 228 people from Brazil to France suddenly vanished over the Atlantic after flying into turbulence. Sudden events happen to us in everyday life. Our days are suddenly, without warning, interrupted. Out of the blue an unexpected phone call relays sad news: suddenly you miss the promotion you were expecting, suddenly you find yourself with a medical condition that requires a radical change of lifestyle. Suddenly and unexpectedly a child is born with severe disabilities. Suddenly a bright, loving, teenager is randomly stabbed. Suddenly a gifted 40 year old finds himself slipping into a mental wilderness. Suddenly a close and loving friends dies. Life can suddenly change course for millions of people every day, and then life can seem terribly unfair, cruel, messy and decidedly unjust. That is the human condition. We live with uncertainty. Sudden events happen. What then do we do? How do we deal with these sudden unexpected life events that interrupt and change our lives?
Sudden events happened to Jesus too. Matthew records a couple of incidents that interrupted Jesus’ daily schedule - the account of the menstruating woman who touched the hem of Jesus’ cloak and the synagogue leader whose daughter had died (read Matthew 9 18-26 in the Authorised Version and the use of the word suddenly). How did Jesus deal with these two unexpected events which interrupted his daily life, how did he respond to this present emergency? The answer – with love and compassion. Jesus stepped outside the normal religious and cultural expectations and regulations of his day – he touches a dead girl and menstruating woman. He breaks with his society’s taboos of completeness and perfection (represented by the number twelve). He heals these two women by making himself ritually unclean. So when unexpected sudden events happen to us and to our friends Jesus way of dealing with such circumstances is to act with love and compassion, to embody mercy. Sudden events, good and bad, large and small will have affected most of our lives. It is often these sudden events that shape our lives for good or ill. Can you see in them, as Jesus was challenged to do, God at work bringing life and hope?
Janet Morley, writer and poet, has a challenging prayer which expresses this challenge of compassion and mercy in the sudden events that take place in our lives. It begins "O thou sudden God, generous in mercy, quickener of new life, giver of new love, irreverent, subversive " and concludes with Augustine's famous words from his Confessions, "Late have I loved thee O beauty so ancient and so new." Can we hold together in our experience the suddenness and the ancientness of God and of God's ways of mercy and compassion and be faithful to both?
O thou sudden God, generous in mercy, quickener of new life, giver of new love irreverent, subversive, deep source of yearning, startling comforter, bearer of darkness unmaker of old paths, bringer of strange joy, abundant, disturbing, healing unlooked for tender and piercing: late have I loved thee. O beauty so ancient and so new.
(c) Janet Morley, 1988
Late have I loved Thee, O Beauty so ancient and so new! Too late have I loved Thee. And lo, Thou wert inside me and I outside, and I sought for Thee there, and in all my unsightliness I flung myself on those beautiful things which Thou hast made. Thou wert with me and I was not with Thee. Those beauties kept me away from Thee, though if they had not been in Thee, they would not have been at all. Thou didst call and cry to me and break down my deafness. Thou didst flash and shine on me and put my blindness to flight. Thou didst blow fragrance upon me and I drew breath, and now I pant after Thee. I tasted of Thee and now I hunger and thirst for Thee. Thou didst touch me and I am aflame for Thy peace...."
Augustine Confessions (Lib. 10, 26. 37-29, 40: CSEL 33, 255-256).
Ray Anglesea
Wednesday 18 November 2009
Masterclass
Birds. David Attenborough suggests that there are over 9,000 species of birds, the most widespread of all animals: on icebergs, in the Sahara or under the sea, at home in our gardens or flying for over a year at a time. Humans, alas can only look at and listen to birds, we cannot fly! We can enjoy their lightness, their freedom and richness of their plumage, and their song. Writing in his new book Life Stories taken from his BBC Radio 4 programme of the same name, Attenborough suggests that human beings are not the only creatures that sing. Birds do, and accordingly he suggests that the prime function of their song is something else. Shakespeare wondered if music was the food of love. Vocally in the bird and animal kingdoms, says Attenborough, it certainly is.
This theory was put to the test when I attended the Autumn Samling masterclass at the Sage Gateshead. I am delighted to say the hypothesis turned out to be true; music is indeed the food of love. Every season Samling elects talented young singers to take part in week-long programme of study where they are coached intensively in opera and lieder singing by some of the world's finest artists and eminent musicians. As part of the week’s tuition Samling opens its doors to the general public who are invited to observe the 'masters' and their Samling scholars at work in a masterclass afternoon. This season the six young performers performed to an exceptionally breathtaking standard – it was a sheer joy to listen to their captivating music of rich and beautiful love songs.
What links Birds with Masterclass? St Francis. One of Francis's most famous sermons is one he gave to a flock of birds. "My brothers, birds, you should praise your Creator very much and always love him; he gave you feathers to clothe you, wings so that you can fly, and whatever else was necessary for you. God made you noble among his creatures, and he gave you a home in the purity of the air; though you neither sow nor reap, he nevertheless protects and governs you without any solicitude on your part."
This love of and praise for the Creator is found in scripture but primarily in the verses of the psalms, a masterclass anthology of some of the most beautiful love poems and verses in the bible. The Psalms not only expresses our love and praise of God as St Francis instructed his noble birds to do – but also expresses the light and shadow of the whole human condition and Christian experience. That great teacher and reformer of the faith, Martin Luther, said of the psalms ‘In the Psalms you can see into the hearts of the saints as if you were looking at a lovely garden. How delightful are the flowers you will find there which grow out of all kinds of beautiful thoughts of God and his grace. Or where can one find more profound, more penitent, more sorrowful words in which to express grief than in the psalms of lamentation? In these, you see into the hearts of the saints as if you were looking at death or gazing into hell, so dark and obscure are the shadows. So, too, when the Psalms speak of fear or hope, they depict them more vividly than any painter could do, and with more eloquence than is possessed by the greatest of orators.'
The psalms are a mirror of who and what we are as Christians praying out of every conceivable condition known to human beings. Like a masterclass of musical tonality of expression and nuance the psalms touch the depths of despair and the heights of ecstasy, they teach and instruct about who and what we are and what we want to become, our love and our hate, our doubt and our longing, our fear and our hope, our celebration, thanksgiving and praise.
The Psalms were part of Jesus’ formation. According to three of the gospels, the first words he heard at his baptism came from the psalms, and the last words he breathed from the cross were drawn from them. If you want to hear the voice of Jesus at prayer, it is to the psalms that you must turn.
Ray Anglesea
This theory was put to the test when I attended the Autumn Samling masterclass at the Sage Gateshead. I am delighted to say the hypothesis turned out to be true; music is indeed the food of love. Every season Samling elects talented young singers to take part in week-long programme of study where they are coached intensively in opera and lieder singing by some of the world's finest artists and eminent musicians. As part of the week’s tuition Samling opens its doors to the general public who are invited to observe the 'masters' and their Samling scholars at work in a masterclass afternoon. This season the six young performers performed to an exceptionally breathtaking standard – it was a sheer joy to listen to their captivating music of rich and beautiful love songs.
What links Birds with Masterclass? St Francis. One of Francis's most famous sermons is one he gave to a flock of birds. "My brothers, birds, you should praise your Creator very much and always love him; he gave you feathers to clothe you, wings so that you can fly, and whatever else was necessary for you. God made you noble among his creatures, and he gave you a home in the purity of the air; though you neither sow nor reap, he nevertheless protects and governs you without any solicitude on your part."
This love of and praise for the Creator is found in scripture but primarily in the verses of the psalms, a masterclass anthology of some of the most beautiful love poems and verses in the bible. The Psalms not only expresses our love and praise of God as St Francis instructed his noble birds to do – but also expresses the light and shadow of the whole human condition and Christian experience. That great teacher and reformer of the faith, Martin Luther, said of the psalms ‘In the Psalms you can see into the hearts of the saints as if you were looking at a lovely garden. How delightful are the flowers you will find there which grow out of all kinds of beautiful thoughts of God and his grace. Or where can one find more profound, more penitent, more sorrowful words in which to express grief than in the psalms of lamentation? In these, you see into the hearts of the saints as if you were looking at death or gazing into hell, so dark and obscure are the shadows. So, too, when the Psalms speak of fear or hope, they depict them more vividly than any painter could do, and with more eloquence than is possessed by the greatest of orators.'
The psalms are a mirror of who and what we are as Christians praying out of every conceivable condition known to human beings. Like a masterclass of musical tonality of expression and nuance the psalms touch the depths of despair and the heights of ecstasy, they teach and instruct about who and what we are and what we want to become, our love and our hate, our doubt and our longing, our fear and our hope, our celebration, thanksgiving and praise.
The Psalms were part of Jesus’ formation. According to three of the gospels, the first words he heard at his baptism came from the psalms, and the last words he breathed from the cross were drawn from them. If you want to hear the voice of Jesus at prayer, it is to the psalms that you must turn.
Ray Anglesea
Wednesday 28 October 2009
Susan's Gift
He who sings prays twice,” said St Augustine, and to my mind a good singer is a good singer, as Susan Boyle proved to be. Susan Boyle, of Irish immigrants, the youngest of 4 brothers and six sisters from Blackburn, West Lothian, Scotland, and nicknamed “Susie Simple” at school came to international public attention this year after she appeared as a contestant in the television show Britain's got Talent. She sang I Dreamed a Dream from Les Misérables in the competition's first round, broadcast in April this year.
In the final of the show, Susan finished in second place, behind dance troupe Diversity. Within nine days of her televised debut, videos of her audition, subsequent interviews and her 1999 rendition of Cry Me a River had been viewed over a 100 million times on the Internet. Although in second place she is now estimated to make a personal fortune of over £6 million. She has gone from singing in her local catholic church and at karaoke to being the most downloaded woman, so far at least, in history.
Susan was an unlikely star. When she came on stage to sing, in a new dress, leather jacket and chunky necklace the judges and audience laughed at her awkward, dumpy appearance, and buried their faces in their hands. Was she going to squawk like a duck? But when she opened her mouth the mood changed. You could see a wave first of confusion, then guilt, then wild applause. Her performance was a victory for talent and artistry in a culture obsessed with physical attractiveness and presentation. Far from being a comedy loser, a freak show entertainer, a Shrek to a My Fair Lady, Susan’s performance was a triumph for "women of a certain age" over a youth culture that often dismisses middle-aged women.
Susan had a rare and beautiful gift – which overcame poverty and adversity - she could sing – and she sang from the core of her being. Millions testified to her special gift. Like Susan, we too are given gifts; called gifts of the spirit, special abilities provided by the Holy Spirit to Christians for the purpose of building up the body of Christ, for building up others in a life of faith. The gifts of the Spirit enable believers to do what God has called them to do, they are part of the "everything we need" to fulfill His purposes for our lives. He will equip us with whatever gifts of the Spirit we need to accomplish the task or tasks.
It is the experience of Christians over the years that the Spirit usually harnesses one's talents in the service of the purpose for which the gifts are given. Yet sometimes, the spiritual gifts seem to work against a person's natural endowment. This is, after all, the same God who led his people out of Egypt using a stammerer named Moses, made a shepherd boy/musician named David into a renowned warrior and king, and turned rural fishermen into leaders who left a mark on the course of history. There are examples everywhere of people who don't have training, aren't highly skilled, have no particular knack, aren’t particularly attractive or beautiful but when the time comes for them to benefit others, the gift is there. Just like Susan Boyle. The Spirit takes pleasure in surprises and on turning the tables on the expected. It is wise to leave ourselves open for such action!
As well as Susan’s singing gift, there is one other thing that can remind us of Susan - Susan – and that is her looks. She reminded me, or the press did, of the way the Gospels speak of Jesus, identified with the broken figure from the book of Isaiah. One “with no beauty that we should desire, despised and rejected of men, one from whom men hide their faces.” In spite of her her looks I hope Susan will keep her peculiarity, her mysteriousness, her vulnerability, her inner gift. We have these treasures, says, St Paul, in earthen vessels. As my parents and Sunday School teachers were often to say “It’s not what’s on the outside but what is on the inside that matters.” Either way I hope that Susan hangs on to her God given gift, and if she is changed by her celebrity status she in addition will changes us.
Ray Anglesea
In the final of the show, Susan finished in second place, behind dance troupe Diversity. Within nine days of her televised debut, videos of her audition, subsequent interviews and her 1999 rendition of Cry Me a River had been viewed over a 100 million times on the Internet. Although in second place she is now estimated to make a personal fortune of over £6 million. She has gone from singing in her local catholic church and at karaoke to being the most downloaded woman, so far at least, in history.
Susan was an unlikely star. When she came on stage to sing, in a new dress, leather jacket and chunky necklace the judges and audience laughed at her awkward, dumpy appearance, and buried their faces in their hands. Was she going to squawk like a duck? But when she opened her mouth the mood changed. You could see a wave first of confusion, then guilt, then wild applause. Her performance was a victory for talent and artistry in a culture obsessed with physical attractiveness and presentation. Far from being a comedy loser, a freak show entertainer, a Shrek to a My Fair Lady, Susan’s performance was a triumph for "women of a certain age" over a youth culture that often dismisses middle-aged women.
Susan had a rare and beautiful gift – which overcame poverty and adversity - she could sing – and she sang from the core of her being. Millions testified to her special gift. Like Susan, we too are given gifts; called gifts of the spirit, special abilities provided by the Holy Spirit to Christians for the purpose of building up the body of Christ, for building up others in a life of faith. The gifts of the Spirit enable believers to do what God has called them to do, they are part of the "everything we need" to fulfill His purposes for our lives. He will equip us with whatever gifts of the Spirit we need to accomplish the task or tasks.
It is the experience of Christians over the years that the Spirit usually harnesses one's talents in the service of the purpose for which the gifts are given. Yet sometimes, the spiritual gifts seem to work against a person's natural endowment. This is, after all, the same God who led his people out of Egypt using a stammerer named Moses, made a shepherd boy/musician named David into a renowned warrior and king, and turned rural fishermen into leaders who left a mark on the course of history. There are examples everywhere of people who don't have training, aren't highly skilled, have no particular knack, aren’t particularly attractive or beautiful but when the time comes for them to benefit others, the gift is there. Just like Susan Boyle. The Spirit takes pleasure in surprises and on turning the tables on the expected. It is wise to leave ourselves open for such action!
As well as Susan’s singing gift, there is one other thing that can remind us of Susan - Susan – and that is her looks. She reminded me, or the press did, of the way the Gospels speak of Jesus, identified with the broken figure from the book of Isaiah. One “with no beauty that we should desire, despised and rejected of men, one from whom men hide their faces.” In spite of her her looks I hope Susan will keep her peculiarity, her mysteriousness, her vulnerability, her inner gift. We have these treasures, says, St Paul, in earthen vessels. As my parents and Sunday School teachers were often to say “It’s not what’s on the outside but what is on the inside that matters.” Either way I hope that Susan hangs on to her God given gift, and if she is changed by her celebrity status she in addition will changes us.
Ray Anglesea
Friday 23 October 2009
St Cuthbert's Locum
Sheila and I spent 15 days in October living in the Manse and holding the fort while Barry and Hazel were on holiday. It made us appreciate how much they do; not just in the things seen, but in the unseen, and how many people have been helped by what they do.
October is a ‘quiet’ time of the year (which is why Barry and Hazel felt they could go away). Never the less our fortnight included:
- Preparing and conducting morning prayers for ten days
- Changing and washing the Bothy bed linen etc on a change of occupant
- Housekeeping for the ‘Faith and Feathers 2’ weekend (such as arranging the Centre each morning and evening; ensuring a plentiful, permanent supply of tea/coffee/ biscuits; preparing lunch for 15 on the Friday; having three leaders staying in the manse over the weekend.
- Housekeeping for another morning conference for 15 people the next weekend.
In the 43 weeks to the end of October 2009, the Centre has been used for 115 half days for courses or conferences. In those 43 weeks the Bothy has been occupied for 214 nights – i.e. 5 days a week. All of this involves housekeeping on top of Barry’s work of preparing and conducting the daily and weekly worship, writing and updating prayer sheets, fact sheets and his excellent Worship Book, and chaplaincy to tourists and retreatants, as well as the administration involved.
Various thing surprised us:
- How quickly Barry’s A4 sheet ‘Prayers for Travellers’ disappeared from the Centre.
- How many people read, and even photographed, his 10 A3 sheet display of ‘The Story of the World’.
- The appreciative comments we heard about the literature and layout of the centre, as well as those written in the Visitors’ Book.
- The number of request appearing on the Prayer Tree.
- The number of appreciative comments about staying in the Bothy from those who had previously done so – or from their relatives or members of their congregations who came to the Centre.
- The number of people who rang or e-mailed for Barry, and Janet would say “Oh yes, Barry is giving them spiritual direction”.
If we had to nominate highlights for the fortnight, they would be the two imaginative Saturday evening services with twenty two + people at each.
We came away quite certain that this unique Holy Island Project is fulfilling a very real and valuable role in the witnessing and strengthening of Christian faith for the thousands of people who come through its doors each year. It is creative, modern ministry for the 21st Century.
Bill Flett
Monday 19 October 2009
Is Vision 2020 fundamentally misconceived?
It seems to me, writes Rev. Professor Charles Cranfield that `Vision 2020' is fundamentally misconceived. (Vision 2020 planning for growth in the URC : hearing your views) On p.8 we read: `It challenges the whole church at local, synod and denominational level to think about what kind of church we want to be in ten years time'. But this `WE WANT TO BE' surely indicates that this is the wrong question for a Reformed church to be asking. Surely we should be asking what do we seriously believe to be the sort of church that Jesus Christ, the only Head and King of the church, wills us to be.
This seems to me to be the fundamental error of `Vision 2020'. And closely related is what struck me most forcibly when I first read these papers, the fact that there does not seem to be any clear indication in them that those who produced them realize that the church has a gospel to proclaim, good news from God of his love for us sinful human beings revealed in what he has done for us in Jesus Christ his Son, in his bitter death at the hands of human beings and in his resurrection from the dead to be our living Lord.
In view of these two closely related and (I believe) extremely serious deficiencies in `Vision 2020', I can only declare my whole-hearted conscientious objection to this project and plead with the URC to think again, more humbly, more prayerfully and with much greater attention to the witness of Holy Scripture.
This seems to me to be the fundamental error of `Vision 2020'. And closely related is what struck me most forcibly when I first read these papers, the fact that there does not seem to be any clear indication in them that those who produced them realize that the church has a gospel to proclaim, good news from God of his love for us sinful human beings revealed in what he has done for us in Jesus Christ his Son, in his bitter death at the hands of human beings and in his resurrection from the dead to be our living Lord.
In view of these two closely related and (I believe) extremely serious deficiencies in `Vision 2020', I can only declare my whole-hearted conscientious objection to this project and plead with the URC to think again, more humbly, more prayerfully and with much greater attention to the witness of Holy Scripture.
Tuesday 13 October 2009
Desperate Romantics?
In September I had the happy occasion of visiting St Paul’s Cathedral London to attend a special service. There in the nave of Christopher Wren’s great architectural masterpiece is Holman Hunt’s, Light of the World (1853-54), reputedly painted at night. I vividly remember a copy of the painting hanging on my Sunday school wall; a kingly robed Jesus with crown of thorns and comforting glow of a lantern stands on a footpath preparing to knock on a door covered in luxuriant overgrown plants, vines and passion flowers, whose door has no handle and can only be opened from the inside.
The original painting I later discovered is hung in a side room off the large pretentious chapel at Keble College, Oxford. Towards the end of his life, the Victorian painter painted a life-size version, which after a world tour “of the colonies” is the one hanging in St Paul’s. In 2001 the seven sided brass lantern designed by Hunt for use in the painting was found hanging in a stairwell of a London suburban house. It sold at auction for £30,000!
John Ruskin once wrote of this painting "It is, I believe, the most perfect instance of expressional purpose and technical power which has ever been produced." The painting has been copied in many a stained glass church window: Boldon URC has one in its sanctuary: a gold crown replaces the crown of thorns. The painting proved to be a turning point in Hunt’s artistic and spiritual life. It records his conversion to the Christian faith.
Hunt belonged to a brotherhood of painters called the Pre-Raphaelites, Victorian men who were to blow the art world apart. The private lives of the brotherhood were recently shown in a BBC six part drama called Desperate Romantics, a television tie-in of the published biography of the tangled lives of the pre-Raphaelites created by Franny Moyle. The costume drama was heavily criticised. I thought it was unfair and all too easy to snigger at poor old John Ruskin, the influential English art critic and social thinker; the three prominent members of the brotherhood were often depicted as a boy-style band with background jaunty music, Rossetti portrayed as a selfish irreligious creep, Holman Hunt an arrogant hulking freak, and John Millais (who is buried in St Paul’s Cathedral) a petulant wimp, whose bottom lip permanently quivered. And, of course, sex. A lot of sex, groupie and otherwise. But we all knew the pre Raphaelites liked to bed their models, Annie Miller in particular.
Apart from bizarre lives what the Pre-Raphaelites had in abundance was imagination and vision - rare qualities at a time when society was thrusting forward with post-Industrial Revolution invention and fervour. The brotherhood spawned passionate young vibrant painters of Christian symbolism that was lifted from pre-reformation sources and applied to post-reformation piety.
In the 1850s Hunt travelled widely in Palestine. His researches there were aimed at finding accurate, historical detail with which to bring alive biblical images and present them devotionally to his admiring art lovers. One of the best examples of this is The Scapegoat, (1854/55, Lady Lever Art Gallery, Liverpool). Hunt had the idea for the painting whilst studying the Talmud. His research disclosed that on the Festival of the Day of Atonement, a goat was ejected from the temple with a scarlet piece of woollen cloth on its head. It was goaded and driven, either to death or into the wilderness, carrying with it the sins of the congregation. It was believed that if these sins were forgiven the scarlet cloth would turn white. Hunt regarded the Old Testament scapegoat (Leviticus 16 v22) as a pre-figurement of the New Testament Christ whose suffering and death similarly expunged man's sins. Hunt chose to set his goat in a landscape of quite hideous desolation - it was painted on the shore of the Dead Sea at Osdoom with the mountains of Edom in the distance.
Like most of the pre-Raphaelite paintings they are a bit too neat for modern taste, but they certainly captured the religious imagination of the late 19th century, though not without scandalising some. And that is why this art matters. For a nation whose religious sensitivities had sanitised the imagination, these images were truly shocking. Charles Dickens wrote a fearsome letter denouncing Millais' painting of Christ in the house of his parents 1849/50 because it associated the Son of God with dirt, work and degradation. The half-naked image of Jesus, in cruciform shape in Hunt’s The Shadow of Death 1869-73 was no less troubling to people for whom the sight of a crucifix was alien and repugnant, too Catholic by far.
Years later, as Sunday Schools walls have revealed, Hunt’s painting of The Light of the World still has popular appeal, in large measure because it tells a story and invites the viewer on a sort of hide and seek of Biblical themes and allusions. But perhaps more important than this appeal is the legacy left by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood of art as subversion and disturbance. Their art contributed to the challenging of a complaisant, comfortable Church. It awoke a generation to the force of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the imperative of his mission. We should be optimistic that in our day we can still find contemporary exciting artists with imagination and energy who will provoke us in to new visions of the unchanging God revealed in Christ, and the mission he entrusts to us.
Ray Anglesea
The original painting I later discovered is hung in a side room off the large pretentious chapel at Keble College, Oxford. Towards the end of his life, the Victorian painter painted a life-size version, which after a world tour “of the colonies” is the one hanging in St Paul’s. In 2001 the seven sided brass lantern designed by Hunt for use in the painting was found hanging in a stairwell of a London suburban house. It sold at auction for £30,000!
John Ruskin once wrote of this painting "It is, I believe, the most perfect instance of expressional purpose and technical power which has ever been produced." The painting has been copied in many a stained glass church window: Boldon URC has one in its sanctuary: a gold crown replaces the crown of thorns. The painting proved to be a turning point in Hunt’s artistic and spiritual life. It records his conversion to the Christian faith.
Hunt belonged to a brotherhood of painters called the Pre-Raphaelites, Victorian men who were to blow the art world apart. The private lives of the brotherhood were recently shown in a BBC six part drama called Desperate Romantics, a television tie-in of the published biography of the tangled lives of the pre-Raphaelites created by Franny Moyle. The costume drama was heavily criticised. I thought it was unfair and all too easy to snigger at poor old John Ruskin, the influential English art critic and social thinker; the three prominent members of the brotherhood were often depicted as a boy-style band with background jaunty music, Rossetti portrayed as a selfish irreligious creep, Holman Hunt an arrogant hulking freak, and John Millais (who is buried in St Paul’s Cathedral) a petulant wimp, whose bottom lip permanently quivered. And, of course, sex. A lot of sex, groupie and otherwise. But we all knew the pre Raphaelites liked to bed their models, Annie Miller in particular.
Apart from bizarre lives what the Pre-Raphaelites had in abundance was imagination and vision - rare qualities at a time when society was thrusting forward with post-Industrial Revolution invention and fervour. The brotherhood spawned passionate young vibrant painters of Christian symbolism that was lifted from pre-reformation sources and applied to post-reformation piety.
In the 1850s Hunt travelled widely in Palestine. His researches there were aimed at finding accurate, historical detail with which to bring alive biblical images and present them devotionally to his admiring art lovers. One of the best examples of this is The Scapegoat, (1854/55, Lady Lever Art Gallery, Liverpool). Hunt had the idea for the painting whilst studying the Talmud. His research disclosed that on the Festival of the Day of Atonement, a goat was ejected from the temple with a scarlet piece of woollen cloth on its head. It was goaded and driven, either to death or into the wilderness, carrying with it the sins of the congregation. It was believed that if these sins were forgiven the scarlet cloth would turn white. Hunt regarded the Old Testament scapegoat (Leviticus 16 v22) as a pre-figurement of the New Testament Christ whose suffering and death similarly expunged man's sins. Hunt chose to set his goat in a landscape of quite hideous desolation - it was painted on the shore of the Dead Sea at Osdoom with the mountains of Edom in the distance.
Like most of the pre-Raphaelite paintings they are a bit too neat for modern taste, but they certainly captured the religious imagination of the late 19th century, though not without scandalising some. And that is why this art matters. For a nation whose religious sensitivities had sanitised the imagination, these images were truly shocking. Charles Dickens wrote a fearsome letter denouncing Millais' painting of Christ in the house of his parents 1849/50 because it associated the Son of God with dirt, work and degradation. The half-naked image of Jesus, in cruciform shape in Hunt’s The Shadow of Death 1869-73 was no less troubling to people for whom the sight of a crucifix was alien and repugnant, too Catholic by far.
Years later, as Sunday Schools walls have revealed, Hunt’s painting of The Light of the World still has popular appeal, in large measure because it tells a story and invites the viewer on a sort of hide and seek of Biblical themes and allusions. But perhaps more important than this appeal is the legacy left by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood of art as subversion and disturbance. Their art contributed to the challenging of a complaisant, comfortable Church. It awoke a generation to the force of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the imperative of his mission. We should be optimistic that in our day we can still find contemporary exciting artists with imagination and energy who will provoke us in to new visions of the unchanging God revealed in Christ, and the mission he entrusts to us.
Ray Anglesea
Thursday 8 October 2009
Junipers and (Re)generation
Last week I joined volunteers to pick Juniper Berries in the Autumn sunshine in Upper Teesdale, High Force, an annual event organised by Natural England. According to the field officer the Upper Teesdale National Nature Reserve has one of the largest and oldest Juniper woodlands in Britain (100 hectares), with some 15-20,000 trees; some are well over 300 years old. The Juniper is one of only 3 native British conifers (Scots Pine and Yew are the others); seeds grow on the female trees; the seeds take 2 years to ripen. Not all the seed from old trees are viable so wardens have to check a sample of the berries on each bush/tree before deciding whether to instruct the volunteers to harvest the berries from that particular tree. Over the years there has been much planting of young Juniper saplings grown on from the berries picked in the autumn months (they are planted in rabbit free guards). But what I didn’t realise and was quite surprised to find out was how small the juniper berries were – no bigger than peppercorns!
When I returned home I mused over a sermon I preached earlier in the year about Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed (Lectionary gospel reading June 14th) - like all parables its teaches the concept or “the big idea,” a broad brush approach, comparing the kingdom of God to a mustard seed: it’s such a small thing in itself, but like the swine flu virus, too small to see, it can have an enormous effect with global consequences.
But on re-reading the parable a couple of days ago I wasn’t so much struck about the smallness of the mustard seed and its familiar gospel implications, but the verse “Yet when planted it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants with such big branches that birds that can perch in its shade” (Mark 4: 32 TNIV).
I began to think whether this sentence was perhaps a standard Rabbinical way used by Mark to refer perhaps to the Gentile nations and peoples – people like the wise men - who stand outside the covenant of God and his chosen people. I might just be an optimistic post modern universalist – but I suspect there may be some interesting ideas at work in this sentence which I hadn’t appreciated before – is Mark suggesting that as God’s covenant people grow, like the bush, it will provide shelter for all the nations of the earth, just as birds will find shelter in the branches of the mustard bush? Is God’s kingdom then a broad inclusive place of many boughs and mansions, where all people can find a home and a welcome, where the birds of the air can nest and make a home, or is it a kingdom conceived as a place from which a small band of chosen people could rule the world? I suspect the former.
Taking the seed and tree analogy further St Paul in his letter to the Romans, and that difficult of all chapters – chapter 11 - moves this tree image in a different direction when he writes about the wild Gentiles being ‘grafted’ on to the tree of God’s family, as it were – could it be grafted on in place of an original branch which no longer bears fruit?
Are we too idealistic to suppose that for Jesus, a redeemed and faithful Israel working for the transformation of the world into God’s kingdom, is the place where the whole world can be and feel at home. The birds of the air don’t become the bush when they build their nest in it, but they do become a part of its life, and here in the shade of the tree there is not only room for, but a celebration of a diversity of bird types?
For those who work like me outside the church in the regeneration business, working for the transformation of the world into God’s kingdom, often with other people of different faiths or similar planning and community ideals I am increasingly aware of the possibility of God being at work in people outside the church, that are building his kingdom. Indeed it is true that some of my colleagues enjoy spiritual experiences outside the church or a faith setting.
My view would be that Jesus would appear to expect and particularly to value such people as these. More than once Jesus comments on how the faith he finds in Gentiles and Samaritans put the faith he finds in Israel to shame. In my re-reading of this parable Jesus appears to be saying there is a broad welcome to those who will live by the values of the kingdom. There are sheep of his who are not of his fold; there are many mansions in the heavenly home to which he goes; there is room in his view of God’s love for the birds of the air to nest in its branches.
Ray Anglesea
When I returned home I mused over a sermon I preached earlier in the year about Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed (Lectionary gospel reading June 14th) - like all parables its teaches the concept or “the big idea,” a broad brush approach, comparing the kingdom of God to a mustard seed: it’s such a small thing in itself, but like the swine flu virus, too small to see, it can have an enormous effect with global consequences.
But on re-reading the parable a couple of days ago I wasn’t so much struck about the smallness of the mustard seed and its familiar gospel implications, but the verse “Yet when planted it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants with such big branches that birds that can perch in its shade” (Mark 4: 32 TNIV).
I began to think whether this sentence was perhaps a standard Rabbinical way used by Mark to refer perhaps to the Gentile nations and peoples – people like the wise men - who stand outside the covenant of God and his chosen people. I might just be an optimistic post modern universalist – but I suspect there may be some interesting ideas at work in this sentence which I hadn’t appreciated before – is Mark suggesting that as God’s covenant people grow, like the bush, it will provide shelter for all the nations of the earth, just as birds will find shelter in the branches of the mustard bush? Is God’s kingdom then a broad inclusive place of many boughs and mansions, where all people can find a home and a welcome, where the birds of the air can nest and make a home, or is it a kingdom conceived as a place from which a small band of chosen people could rule the world? I suspect the former.
Taking the seed and tree analogy further St Paul in his letter to the Romans, and that difficult of all chapters – chapter 11 - moves this tree image in a different direction when he writes about the wild Gentiles being ‘grafted’ on to the tree of God’s family, as it were – could it be grafted on in place of an original branch which no longer bears fruit?
Are we too idealistic to suppose that for Jesus, a redeemed and faithful Israel working for the transformation of the world into God’s kingdom, is the place where the whole world can be and feel at home. The birds of the air don’t become the bush when they build their nest in it, but they do become a part of its life, and here in the shade of the tree there is not only room for, but a celebration of a diversity of bird types?
For those who work like me outside the church in the regeneration business, working for the transformation of the world into God’s kingdom, often with other people of different faiths or similar planning and community ideals I am increasingly aware of the possibility of God being at work in people outside the church, that are building his kingdom. Indeed it is true that some of my colleagues enjoy spiritual experiences outside the church or a faith setting.
My view would be that Jesus would appear to expect and particularly to value such people as these. More than once Jesus comments on how the faith he finds in Gentiles and Samaritans put the faith he finds in Israel to shame. In my re-reading of this parable Jesus appears to be saying there is a broad welcome to those who will live by the values of the kingdom. There are sheep of his who are not of his fold; there are many mansions in the heavenly home to which he goes; there is room in his view of God’s love for the birds of the air to nest in its branches.
Ray Anglesea
Friday 18 September 2009
Are Mission Partnerships becoming mini circuits?
I may be married to a Methodist but have stayed firmly in the URC with its understanding of the local church being the locus of God's work, supported and enabled by the wider councils of the church. So when David Bedford asked at a meeting this week whether Mission Partnerships are morphing into circuits, without clear discussion and debate about whether this was desirable, I was brought up short. It has left me wondering if this is the case - are Mission Partnerships (Northern synod clusters) becoming circuits? Will they end up with a staff team and partnership leadership meeting managing the churches in a more top down way than we are comfortable with in the URC and will they end up with, woe betide it, a superintendent minister?
There are some good things that I would want for our Mission Partnerships that I think Methodist circuits, when they function well, provide. These are the capacity to draw together individuals over a number of churches with a passion for a particular ministry or form of outreach, for example the healing ministry or cafe church, holiday clubs and retreats and be able to develop those things in an area. The ability to be involved in discussions and decisions about ministry and other resources at a much more local level than synod or even districts. I would also want our churches to have the support of other churches to share good stories, practice and expertise with and who they have good relationships with and so can pray for one another in informed ways.
It might also be good for our Mission Partnerships now that we do not have a Training and Education Officer to handle some finances (an annual grant) and be responsible for agreeing training needs and arranging for its provision in the churches in a more direct way. This maybe more empowering of the people of God in their localities than the synod deciding, even with consultation, what training is needed for everything. The Ministries and Training committee are currently considering this and views would be welcome before a paper is brought to March 2010 synod.
It may be that we do need 'mini circuits' to enable churches to have the expertise of treasurers, and people able to manage lay staff or work up their roles, where they are absent in some smaller churches or those in more difficult mission areas. Then one treasurer may do the accounts for several churches. Or there may be a management group drawn from several churches for a CRCW, as in Grindon, or an administrator deals with newsletters and communications for a group of churches.
But I have yet to be convinced that we are inventing circuits in an insidious way. I think we, as in Ashton under Lyme and as we are moving towards in Sunderland, are creating a local church that might meet in several locations. But how that evolves needs attending too so that it is the church meeting whether in one or more locations, and not a ministry team or group council doing its own thing, that agrees the policy and discerns what God is asking of the church.
In Mission Partnerships as loose formations each church meeting has to make the decision or delegate the authority to do so to the leadership meeting. When a joint pastorate or group is constituted then it is the joint church meeting that calls a minister and decides what God is asking of the churches. When several churches decide to come together as one church meeting in several locations their church meeting is the council of the church.
This direction is very different to a Methodist understanding of being a connexional church where ministers are ordained into the connexion and stationed to circuits, with only a nod of consultation to the local church. A view of church in which the local church council with circuit stewards on it make the decisions about local matters but the circuit meeting makes decisions about wider ones and where the superintendent minister can in theory move ministers in the circuit where s/he will.
Therefore I would argue Mission Partnerships are not becoming circuits as the role of the church meeting is enshrined in our understanding of what it means to be church and the basis of union. However there are gifts from the Methodist understanding of circuit that we might want to receive as good, providing that the essence of the URC identity in the people of God in church meeting together discerning God's will, is not lost.
So in answer to David Bedford's question I would say that Northern Synod's Mission Partnerships are not becoming circuits by default becasue of the significant role of church meeting.
However the issue of ministers serving across multiple churches and communities is one that needs wrestling with. How that changing role of ministry to groups and joint pastorates rather than single churches is shaped from a URC understanding of church is a prioir question that we need to be wrestling with as a priority? Answers on a post card please.
Rowena
There are some good things that I would want for our Mission Partnerships that I think Methodist circuits, when they function well, provide. These are the capacity to draw together individuals over a number of churches with a passion for a particular ministry or form of outreach, for example the healing ministry or cafe church, holiday clubs and retreats and be able to develop those things in an area. The ability to be involved in discussions and decisions about ministry and other resources at a much more local level than synod or even districts. I would also want our churches to have the support of other churches to share good stories, practice and expertise with and who they have good relationships with and so can pray for one another in informed ways.
It might also be good for our Mission Partnerships now that we do not have a Training and Education Officer to handle some finances (an annual grant) and be responsible for agreeing training needs and arranging for its provision in the churches in a more direct way. This maybe more empowering of the people of God in their localities than the synod deciding, even with consultation, what training is needed for everything. The Ministries and Training committee are currently considering this and views would be welcome before a paper is brought to March 2010 synod.
It may be that we do need 'mini circuits' to enable churches to have the expertise of treasurers, and people able to manage lay staff or work up their roles, where they are absent in some smaller churches or those in more difficult mission areas. Then one treasurer may do the accounts for several churches. Or there may be a management group drawn from several churches for a CRCW, as in Grindon, or an administrator deals with newsletters and communications for a group of churches.
But I have yet to be convinced that we are inventing circuits in an insidious way. I think we, as in Ashton under Lyme and as we are moving towards in Sunderland, are creating a local church that might meet in several locations. But how that evolves needs attending too so that it is the church meeting whether in one or more locations, and not a ministry team or group council doing its own thing, that agrees the policy and discerns what God is asking of the church.
In Mission Partnerships as loose formations each church meeting has to make the decision or delegate the authority to do so to the leadership meeting. When a joint pastorate or group is constituted then it is the joint church meeting that calls a minister and decides what God is asking of the churches. When several churches decide to come together as one church meeting in several locations their church meeting is the council of the church.
This direction is very different to a Methodist understanding of being a connexional church where ministers are ordained into the connexion and stationed to circuits, with only a nod of consultation to the local church. A view of church in which the local church council with circuit stewards on it make the decisions about local matters but the circuit meeting makes decisions about wider ones and where the superintendent minister can in theory move ministers in the circuit where s/he will.
Therefore I would argue Mission Partnerships are not becoming circuits as the role of the church meeting is enshrined in our understanding of what it means to be church and the basis of union. However there are gifts from the Methodist understanding of circuit that we might want to receive as good, providing that the essence of the URC identity in the people of God in church meeting together discerning God's will, is not lost.
So in answer to David Bedford's question I would say that Northern Synod's Mission Partnerships are not becoming circuits by default becasue of the significant role of church meeting.
However the issue of ministers serving across multiple churches and communities is one that needs wrestling with. How that changing role of ministry to groups and joint pastorates rather than single churches is shaped from a URC understanding of church is a prioir question that we need to be wrestling with as a priority? Answers on a post card please.
Rowena
Tuesday 18 August 2009
What are we preaching?
There were two good synod-related services this past weekend – but somehow they’ve left me feeling a bit like Spitting Images’ boy David and the Lib Dems, wanting things to be neither this nor that, but something in between.
David Peel’s induction on Saturday afternoon was the kind of occasion you might have expected – and not the place for theological slouches. With a former college principal being inducted and another principal preaching the charge, it was pretty meaty stuff. Certainly it had its lighter moments – Trevor’s quotes from (we hope a well outdated) elders’ manual from the Church of Scotland urging someone to speak to the visiting minister, even though he has been useless, might be blue-tacked to some of our vestry walls. And David’s statement that the job of a minister in a pastorate was the top job in the URC came well from a former Moderator of Assembly – though perhaps was spoiled for some of us who were wondering, Who was the “leading figure” who had voiced the opinion that he was wasted in a local church? And aren’t we all capable of the well-meaning but ill-thought-out compliment that backfires?
But the challenge to the Church in Trevor’s sermon and David’s statement did not make for easy listening. I’m sure our church culture shouldn’t be bound by the tyranny of sound-bites, but the truth of the matter is that we’re not used to listening with the intensity that’s needed on such an occasion. Not that I’d have wanted the service to be any longer (in fact I wish we could cut these inductions down a bit) – but we could have done with some pauses to reflect on what we’d heard and see where the arguments were leading. Certainly it would be good to have a script to read afterwards. Otherwise – and perhaps this is just me, but I doubt it – so much good stuff that’s been carefully thought out is just going to be wasted.
And then on Sunday afternoon some of us were at Brinkburn Abbey for the annual Holy Island service – the first time I’ve managed to get there. Barry Hutchinson led a reflective service, in the style that we would expect from the St Cuthbert’s Centre. It was as different from Saturday as chalk from cheese: is that the difference between theology and spirituality? The focus on feelings (including feeling the chair supporting you and all the rest) made worship less challenging, more embracing – and perhaps none the worse for that.
But then came the reflective reading – from the Shack! Now I’m waiting to see how many letters will be in the next Reform in response to the outburst from Kim Fabricius in July/August. “Forget about the Shack – it’s awful –” he tells us “but you must read, for the sheer grace and truth of it, Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead (2004).” I’d have thought someone might by now have told the sainted Kim that Marilynne Robinson’s Home (2008) is a yet finer novel: but much as I agree with the thrust of his letter, that novels, including many modern novels, can speak to us powerfully about the things of God and of our human condition, Marilynne Robinson is not necessarily the right voice for many of the people who’ve read and relished the Shack.
I wouldn’t choose to write to Reform to air my prejudices, but Barry’s reading on Sunday reminded me that yes, the Shack is pretty bad. Some of my colleagues have defended it on the grounds that it has encouraged their people to think and talk about the Trinity – but it seems to me that if you do that on the basis of such gross sentimentality (and what we heard on Sunday told us that if you walk on water you need to take your shoes and socks off: it didn’t seem to have much of a faith content) you haven’t really grown in theological understanding. Where’s the Reformed insight into the sovereignty of God in this off-beat trio of individuals hosting an all-American weekend in the woods?
So, after two sessions in the pew, I’m left wondering how we can put some theological content into our preaching and our leading of worship, but do so in ways that are accessible – and even enjoyable. I’m desperate to know how: any suggestions out there?
And in case anyone thinks I only go trolling round to other people’s services, I was in my own pastorate on Sunday morning. For the second time in not many weeks I had a full church – nothing to do with me, but the occasion of an infant baptism, which our moderator has wisely described as “the new weddings”. Who do we speak to and how, in a service like this, when most of our guests have no idea what any of it is all about? And is there any way in which such a service can feed the host congregation?
I think I heard Trevor on Saturday afternoon saying that the business of the Church was not to get more people into church, but to share in God’s mission to transform the world. By 10.15 the next morning, as I was telling Ruby that she is a child of God and member of the Church, I might have been asking myself, Just what does this sharing in God’s mission mean here and now?
David Peel’s induction on Saturday afternoon was the kind of occasion you might have expected – and not the place for theological slouches. With a former college principal being inducted and another principal preaching the charge, it was pretty meaty stuff. Certainly it had its lighter moments – Trevor’s quotes from (we hope a well outdated) elders’ manual from the Church of Scotland urging someone to speak to the visiting minister, even though he has been useless, might be blue-tacked to some of our vestry walls. And David’s statement that the job of a minister in a pastorate was the top job in the URC came well from a former Moderator of Assembly – though perhaps was spoiled for some of us who were wondering, Who was the “leading figure” who had voiced the opinion that he was wasted in a local church? And aren’t we all capable of the well-meaning but ill-thought-out compliment that backfires?
But the challenge to the Church in Trevor’s sermon and David’s statement did not make for easy listening. I’m sure our church culture shouldn’t be bound by the tyranny of sound-bites, but the truth of the matter is that we’re not used to listening with the intensity that’s needed on such an occasion. Not that I’d have wanted the service to be any longer (in fact I wish we could cut these inductions down a bit) – but we could have done with some pauses to reflect on what we’d heard and see where the arguments were leading. Certainly it would be good to have a script to read afterwards. Otherwise – and perhaps this is just me, but I doubt it – so much good stuff that’s been carefully thought out is just going to be wasted.
And then on Sunday afternoon some of us were at Brinkburn Abbey for the annual Holy Island service – the first time I’ve managed to get there. Barry Hutchinson led a reflective service, in the style that we would expect from the St Cuthbert’s Centre. It was as different from Saturday as chalk from cheese: is that the difference between theology and spirituality? The focus on feelings (including feeling the chair supporting you and all the rest) made worship less challenging, more embracing – and perhaps none the worse for that.
But then came the reflective reading – from the Shack! Now I’m waiting to see how many letters will be in the next Reform in response to the outburst from Kim Fabricius in July/August. “Forget about the Shack – it’s awful –” he tells us “but you must read, for the sheer grace and truth of it, Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead (2004).” I’d have thought someone might by now have told the sainted Kim that Marilynne Robinson’s Home (2008) is a yet finer novel: but much as I agree with the thrust of his letter, that novels, including many modern novels, can speak to us powerfully about the things of God and of our human condition, Marilynne Robinson is not necessarily the right voice for many of the people who’ve read and relished the Shack.
I wouldn’t choose to write to Reform to air my prejudices, but Barry’s reading on Sunday reminded me that yes, the Shack is pretty bad. Some of my colleagues have defended it on the grounds that it has encouraged their people to think and talk about the Trinity – but it seems to me that if you do that on the basis of such gross sentimentality (and what we heard on Sunday told us that if you walk on water you need to take your shoes and socks off: it didn’t seem to have much of a faith content) you haven’t really grown in theological understanding. Where’s the Reformed insight into the sovereignty of God in this off-beat trio of individuals hosting an all-American weekend in the woods?
So, after two sessions in the pew, I’m left wondering how we can put some theological content into our preaching and our leading of worship, but do so in ways that are accessible – and even enjoyable. I’m desperate to know how: any suggestions out there?
And in case anyone thinks I only go trolling round to other people’s services, I was in my own pastorate on Sunday morning. For the second time in not many weeks I had a full church – nothing to do with me, but the occasion of an infant baptism, which our moderator has wisely described as “the new weddings”. Who do we speak to and how, in a service like this, when most of our guests have no idea what any of it is all about? And is there any way in which such a service can feed the host congregation?
I think I heard Trevor on Saturday afternoon saying that the business of the Church was not to get more people into church, but to share in God’s mission to transform the world. By 10.15 the next morning, as I was telling Ruby that she is a child of God and member of the Church, I might have been asking myself, Just what does this sharing in God’s mission mean here and now?
Sunday 26 July 2009
Synod Pilgrimage: St Cuthbert's Way
More pictures at http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnandhillian/sets/72157621715286095/
Monday
Writing a blog where there’s no likelihood of internet access is perhaps missing the point – but we’re supposed to be following in the footsteps of Cuthbert, and we already have the impression that it would have needed more than that to put him off.
So this then is the blog of the Northern Synod Pilgrimage, July 20-25 2009, following St Cuthbert’s Way. For me the true nature of the exercise was revealed when, in response to a question of mine, Dave admitted that the St Cuthbert’s Way is a recent invention, the brainchild of a Wooler citizen in the mid-90s who was looking for ways of capturing a passing tourist trade. So we are not pretending to follow where Cuthbert walked on any particular journey, but rather a finding our way across a tract of country that he will have known like the back of his hand.
So here we are, standing outside Melrose Tourist Information Office at 12 noon. Colin has travelled all the way from Teesside, and I’ve driven from Durham, and we’ve met up with Dave from Belford (for no reason that we’ve really fathomed) at Wooler Youth Hostel where we three will be spending the night; and now we’ve travelled on to Maxton, leaving two cars there, and driving on to Melrose to meet the rest of the party. We have a sense the logistics of this all are, perhaps, a little less than logical – and I think we’re already wishing that we knew a bit more about what we’re letting ourselves in for. 62 miles: yes, we know that. But what else?Bill and Sheila, and John and Gwen, all from Rothbury, are there waiting for us. We’re all keenly aware that Dave has a bit of a vested interest in this pilgrimage: his current PhD research focuses on people who walk the St Cuthbert’s Way, and he even dives inside the Information Centre to make sure that they have a good supply of his questionnaire forms to give out to innocent walkers. Presuming the answers we might give, Dave reminds that we are not simply off on a long walk, but on a pilgrimage. He doesn’t exactly spell out the difference – well, we are all members of churches in our Synod after all; but we know that there should be a measure of interiority about the whole exercise. And we have a brief prayer together to send us off on our way.
We need extra strength an encouragement for that first stretch – a long pull up out of Melrose, with glorious views if we think to look backwards down on to the town and the abbey, and down the length of the valley. Soon we are in the midst of Eildon Hills. The sun is shining and there is a light breeze – the best pilgrim weather. We meet a friendly walker who takes a group photo at the top of the pass: shame that it later turns out he must have pressed the wrong button, but never mind, we will all testify that we were here. And besides, we’ve had our certificates as walkers of the St Cuthbert’s Way stamped at the starting point.
As we move down from the hills into some woods, the clouds become more threatening, but the rain doesn’t come to much. Dave has a good source of information about the walk and reflections on it in the form of Mary Lowe’s book, and we’re beginning to savour the odd “Mary Lowe moment” which at least means we can rest that long. We learn about a doughty deaconess from the kirk at Bowden (though it was left to me to enquire of a friendly native how to pronounce the place) and pick up other bits of information that give an extra coating to this lovely landscape that we’re passing through. Above the Tweed we watch a buzzard hunting – and have a welcome stop as Diana (who has just missed us at St Boswells Newtown) hurries to catch up with us. How much easier things would have been for Cuthbert if he had a mobile phone to help him organise his journeys.
Later the rain sets in – not viciously, but strong enough as we follow the Tweed from St Boswells to remind us how the river has its being. There are herons all along the banks: clearly the fishing here is good. The path is not so straightforward now – the scope for allegorising is endless – and we begin to tire of the ups and downs on wooden staircases. Maxton church is a welcome sight, although its closed doors are hardly welcoming.
A brief run through of the Northumbrian Office in the drizzle – then it’s into cars and, for us, back to Wooler and the Youth Hostel, and for the Rothbury set the luxury of the Jedburgh Hotel.
Tuesday
Back to Maxton Church, where we’re joined by Henry and Olive, both from Hexham. We’re relieved that Henry seems as fit as he does, as it’s a top bunk we’ve reserved for him in our little Room 7 in the hostel.
We have bright sunny weather as we stride out in a southerly direction and soon join Dere Street, which Dave reminds us in a Mary Lowe moment was a Roman road certainly walked by Cuthbert himself. The road leads us past Lady Lilliard’s stone, commemorating the heroine of the Battle of Ancrum, and then down to Harestanes which we reach just before the rain sets in.
So it’s a welcome stop. Diana joins us again for our afternoon’s walking, which we know is a ten mile stretch.
Thankfully the rain eases, and most of the distance is walked in the dry – along the Teviot, over a splendid bridge across Oxnam Water, and then up to fine vista across to the Cheviots. There are larks singing as we cross a style, and a few mushrooms for Diana to take back to Belford for tea. The view down the valley focuses on Cessford Castle, allegedly built for maximum protection rather than comfort, which is believable as we pass the ruin in the corner of a field. This would have been a good place to stop, but there were at least couple of miles to go, which seem interminable for at least some of us. Finally we reach Moorbattle (not named after a battle apparently), where we pick up the cars left earlier in the day.Is pilgrimage then about this experience of near-total exhaustion? Certainly we are too tired, and now too wet, for that Northumbrian Office. How do our physical feelings relate to our physical well-being? And where does the post-pilgrim part of the day fit into it all?
Part of the joy of this pilgrimage lies in the conversations along the way: some I confess have been about “synod business”, but others far more wide-ranging. But it seems sad that at the end of the day we move off in separate directions – some to Jedburgh and others to Wooler. It would have been good for time to reflect or simply eat together at the end of the day.
Somehow back at Wooler we manage to shrug off the tiredness just in time to get served a bar-meal at the local hostelry. But what state will we be in tomorrow?
Wednesday
This is to be a day of two halves. We start by leaving one of our cars at Hethpool, having time today for a good breakfast at the Wooler hostel, before checking out). This proves tricky enough as we get behind a flock of sheep halfway up the hill – a perfect excuse for being at least 20 minutes late at Moorbattle. Sadly Gwen and Sheila are not walking with us, but are off after attention for their blisters.
We’re in a pretty suppressed mood when we finally meet up, as we have been driving through pretty heavy rain for the past half hour. But amazingly the rain stops just after we move away from the tree where we have had a brief morning reflection from Dave, and soon we are climbing up into the outlying range of the Cheviots. The sun even shines for part of the way, and before too long we are at the top of Wideopen Hill which the plaque assures us is not only the highest point on the route, but also the halfway point. So it’s downhill all the way now – well, sort of.Soon Yetholm is in sight. As usual it takes longer to do the final section than anticipated: we by-pass Town Yetholm and follow the river up to the bridge, then across the river and straight to the famous Border Inn. Gwen and Sheila have reserved a table for nine in a room of our own – and we are well served and looked after, even though keeping to the modest end of the menu.
Sheila joins us for the afternoon – allegedly another five miles or so, with a comparable amount of ups and downs – while Gwen drives off to do some “homework” about Kirk Newtown church. Our route follows that of the Pennine Way for the first mile or so – then we leave the metalled road and are soon climbing steadily up to the border ridge. The significant sign post provides an even-handed welcome which ever direction you might be going in. Soon we are down in the Eldon Valley, and another quite long slog along the tarmac road back to the Collingwood oaks at Hethpool. There’s a bit of excitement in rescuing a trapped sheep at the end of the valley road – and then the usual driving off after parked cars, and the unspoken questioning of whether this is really the best way of organising a pilgrimage…
Going home takes us in different directions tonight. The Jedbergh group are now moving to hotel in Wooler; but the Wooler group, but because of accommodation shortage we now have to move away from Wooler to Belford. Settling into the bunkhouse, and buying fish and chips on Dave’s home turf, remind us that real life goes on, whatever find thoughts we may have as we walk our pilgrim way. This is hardly luxury, but we do now have a television that not only gives us the news of what is going on in that real world, but also gives us a better idea of what the weather is, well, might be, going to be.
Thursday
Forecast looks good today – and we’re glad to welcome Gwen back to the walking party. The track leads us back into the hills, and the promise today of wild goats. Sure enough we see the first ones after only half an hour. Maybe they’re still on our minds as we make our way towards Yeavering Bel – at least we forget about the path we’re supposed to be taking, and just walk down the main track missing a vital turning. Well, it’s the first time we’ve been lost – and Henry and Dave between them soon get us back on route, ironically through a field that at first appears to be full of sheep, but soon reveals its fair share of wild goats as well among them.
No luxury of a pub lunch today. Instead we find ourselves high up on the tops at about midday, listening to the curlew’s call, and thinking that perhaps it is lunch time, when we find a party of about twenty catching up with us. Is this an authentic part of pilgrimage, sharing diverse experiences with other people? This group are from Bristol, and have flown up specially to Edinburgh – so our first thoughts are that their carbon footprint must be bigger than ours. But now they are here they are relying on buses and taxis: now, why didn’t we do it that way?
We are soon sitting in the shelter of a wall (Henry is able to give us a professional account of how it will have been built) enjoying our lunch.
A couple more walkers pass us, and we able to watch them as they move across the moors over a mile ahead. Soon we are following them, and coming in sight of Wooler, our goal for the day. John has been using his GPS gadget to measure our journey each day. We’re used to discrepancies, but this looks like being greater than usual. As usual, it is the end of the day that proves the most tiring, and not only because of the state of the knees of some of us. The route leads us down to Wooler Common, but then up again through the wood and in a great arc above the town before finally getting down to house level. Surely Cuthbert would never have considered so absurd a route?It’s good to finish a day so early – and we are all invited to tea in the Ryecroft Hotel garden before moving off to the usual car-collecting, and for the Belford group a meal at the Bluebell Hotel before turning in.
Friday
The day was to turn out the wettest of the Pilgrimage – but the sun is shining as we meet up in Wooler, and stays with us for the first part of the way. We climb gently – in fact, to be truthful all today’s climbs will turn out that way – and then drop to the Weetwood Bridge, which is a listed monument which allegedly has been repaired with the aid of polystyrene. Those of us who’ve had to care for listed buildings wonder why we have never been allowed such latitude. Thoughts also turn to history: this is the bridge that led to the field of Flodden, the last occasion on which the English took Cuthbert’s banner with them into battle. As Mary Lowe comments, there were surely tears in heaven…
Sandwiches are eaten at a welcome stop by the Hetton Beck, in the area of Hetton Hall – home of the Northumbria Community. Then it’s another steady climb up into the Kyloe Hills, where we gather at Cuthbert’s Cave – a large overhang with long Cuthbert associations. Did he shelter here himself? Or did the monks carrying his disinterred body rest here on their long wandering journey? Pilgrims at least have an idea about their destination, but Cuthbert’s followers had no idea where they were headed. Maybe there is some extra discipline in that ignorance – which if not reflected on this pilgrimage, may well be experienced in a good deal of contemporary Christian experience and ministry.It’s a short step to the Mons Gaudium – the moment when we reach the ridge above the cave, and looking east see for the first time Lindisfarne spread before us. Such is the lie of the land that the view is less than spectacular – except for the three of us who choose to climb up to the cairn, where you can look back to the Cheviots (did we really come over those hills yesterday?) as well as down to the coast and the long line of Lindisfarne.
The last section of the afternoon turns out more demanding than we are ready for. Dave already has warned us that it will be damp walking through Kyloe Old Wood: this is the part of the Haggerston estate where the first Leylandii were raised. But it turns out to be more than damp as the heavens open, and we squelch our way along Dolly Gibson’s Lonnen and finally down the hill back to Fenwick.
Saturday
Fenwick is quite a different place this morning: cars parked everywhere, and anxious leaders moving from group to group checking that they have the right complement of walkers. We meet our taxi-driven Bristol friends for the last time. Rowena is able to walk with us today – and we are glad to hear that after all the anxiety of the past week which has prevented her being part of the pilgrimage, Alan is now progressing well. Here at Fenwick a Belford family join us too – and we will shortly be joined by Diana and another group of friends.
As we move off we become a self-contained group again. The sun is shining, and we cope well with missing a sign and having to walk a few hundred extra yards back along a metalled road to the field entrance that takes us down to the main line. There is a special crossing for the St Cuthbert’s way, which involves having to ring the signalman and tell him that you are wanting to cross. “A party of 13” Dave tells him, and then finds he has to answer “How many seconds do you need?” The answer “twenty” is presumably taken as a good enough guesstimate – it’s another ten minutes before a train thunders through.
All this time Holy Island is ahead or to the side. We’re soon at the causeway, where some of us can leave boots in the car. We meet up with our synod cameraman who is doing some filming for us in preparation for the launch of the Mission Fund – he does an interview with Dave about rural ministry before driving off to meet us later on the island. For the rest of us, it’s time to get the boots and shoes off and set off across the mud – most of us barefoot – for the last two miles of the pilgrimage.Today conditions are wet, and in places quite difficult. It’s hard to keep your balance, and the unevenness prevents any kind of rhythm or spring in the step. It’s a straggling band of pilgrims that finally reaches the Island where, as Mary Lowe points out, there is no real goal. We are here where Cuthbert certainly was – but there is no shrine to mark his memory, even if the URC alone among the churches and communities claims his name. Barry is at the end of the crossing to welcome us, with the essential water and towels to clean our feet; and then we all walk the short distance to the St Cuthbert’s Centre which, for this group of pilgrims at least, is certainly journey’s end.
Hospitality is one of the features of the ministry offered here, and we are grateful for it. Barry and Hazel have prepared sandwiches and baked cakes – and these and the short act of reflective worship that Barry leads make a fitting end to our six days of travelling together.Thank you Dave, and others who had a hand in preparations. And thank you, all my fellow pilgrims, who have been my companions on the way.
Wednesday 13 May 2009
Not for Sale Sunday
Can anyone answer this query? -
The comment in the URC diary for next Sunday is 'Not for sale Sunday'. Is this in support of a campaign for opposing Human trafficking; or is it in support of the Lord's Day Observance society? Other URC members have been equally uncertain!
Alan Dunstone
The comment in the URC diary for next Sunday is 'Not for sale Sunday'. Is this in support of a campaign for opposing Human trafficking; or is it in support of the Lord's Day Observance society? Other URC members have been equally uncertain!
Alan Dunstone
Monday 11 May 2009
A film worth seeing: starring Michael Caine
‘Is there anybody there?’
This is a great weepy film but not especially girlie, that explores beliefs about life after death, aging and dementia through the eyes of a child. He becomes obsessed with death after he moves into a older peoples home that his parents take over and is befriended by an ex magician with dementia.
Christianity does not do well. The vicar for one of the funerals is wet and inconsequential in the face of the eccentricities of the older people in the home. But reincarnation and ghosts are up there in the charts. The film raises lots of questions about beliefs about death and the after life in our eclectic post modern culture.
Why is the Christian voice portrayed as irrelevant or invisible not only in this film but much popular media today?
‘Is there anybody there?’
This is a great weepy film but not especially girlie, that explores beliefs about life after death, aging and dementia through the eyes of a child. He becomes obsessed with death after he moves into a older peoples home that his parents take over and is befriended by an ex magician with dementia.
Christianity does not do well. The vicar for one of the funerals is wet and inconsequential in the face of the eccentricities of the older people in the home. But reincarnation and ghosts are up there in the charts. The film raises lots of questions about beliefs about death and the after life in our eclectic post modern culture.
Why is the Christian voice portrayed as irrelevant or invisible not only in this film but much popular media today?
Monday 4 May 2009
The importance of knowing who we are.
When the URC came into existence in 1972, 1981 and to a lesser degree in 2000 we knew who we were. Our identity was in our passion for ecumenism and acting as yeast for the church to become visibly one. We believed we had come into existence to die in greater church unions.
This has not happened. The ecumenical movement in Great Britain, in a post-denominational age, with its frustrations with the great faith and order questions, and desire to just get on with working together in mission is no longer playing the same ball game as we are.
So what is our identity now? Who are we and what is our contribution as a separate body to the life and witness of the church today? If we can’t answer this then perhaps the foretelling of our imminent death that is spoken of from anxiety, rather than confidence in Christ, is not so far away.
So what is our identity?
1) A loved and valued part of the one holy, catholic and apostolic church.
2) A Reformed Church, centred in God’s word, seeking always to change in obedience to that word.
3) A church that seeks justice and peace for all, but especially the poor and marginalised.
4) An inclusive church that welcomes all and recognises that God can speak to us through a whole range of people, from the child, to the refugee, to the 90 year old, to the person in a wheelchair and therefore we need to listen to all the voices.
5) A church that desires the visible unity of all God’s people for the sake of God’s mission to the world.
The question of the identity of the URC and our being able to say who we are and what we believe is, in my view, vital. It needs to be a focus for our reflecting and discussing together in coming months.
What are your thoughts on the questions of the URC’s identity?
Rowena Francis
Synod Moderator
This has not happened. The ecumenical movement in Great Britain, in a post-denominational age, with its frustrations with the great faith and order questions, and desire to just get on with working together in mission is no longer playing the same ball game as we are.
So what is our identity now? Who are we and what is our contribution as a separate body to the life and witness of the church today? If we can’t answer this then perhaps the foretelling of our imminent death that is spoken of from anxiety, rather than confidence in Christ, is not so far away.
So what is our identity?
1) A loved and valued part of the one holy, catholic and apostolic church.
2) A Reformed Church, centred in God’s word, seeking always to change in obedience to that word.
3) A church that seeks justice and peace for all, but especially the poor and marginalised.
4) An inclusive church that welcomes all and recognises that God can speak to us through a whole range of people, from the child, to the refugee, to the 90 year old, to the person in a wheelchair and therefore we need to listen to all the voices.
5) A church that desires the visible unity of all God’s people for the sake of God’s mission to the world.
The question of the identity of the URC and our being able to say who we are and what we believe is, in my view, vital. It needs to be a focus for our reflecting and discussing together in coming months.
What are your thoughts on the questions of the URC’s identity?
Rowena Francis
Synod Moderator
Saturday 2 May 2009
Friday 1 May 2009
Getting started
Being Synod Clerk means hearing a whole range of opinions across our churches. Just today, for instance -
1) a colleague has complained that we're given notice of ministers' courses far too late for us to have an chance of getting organised to go on them (Yes: I agree! - and he had the grace to acknowledge it's not MY fault);
2) another colleague voiced the opinion that an event he was organising would be seen as "another of those things that synod wishes upon us" (Yes: he could be right!); and
3) an elder asked me how we were going to make sure that lay people take more initatives when there are fewer ministers round to give a lead (Why on earth did she ask ME??)
In other words, there are conversation-starters being thrown out all the time.
Blogging is totally new to me - but this blog is offered as a means of taking some of these and other conversations that much further. It's open not just to people from the churches of our synod, but for anyone who wants to add to the debate.
Don't be shy - have your say! Add your comment to anything you find here....
1) a colleague has complained that we're given notice of ministers' courses far too late for us to have an chance of getting organised to go on them (Yes: I agree! - and he had the grace to acknowledge it's not MY fault);
2) another colleague voiced the opinion that an event he was organising would be seen as "another of those things that synod wishes upon us" (Yes: he could be right!); and
3) an elder asked me how we were going to make sure that lay people take more initatives when there are fewer ministers round to give a lead (Why on earth did she ask ME??)
In other words, there are conversation-starters being thrown out all the time.
Blogging is totally new to me - but this blog is offered as a means of taking some of these and other conversations that much further. It's open not just to people from the churches of our synod, but for anyone who wants to add to the debate.
Don't be shy - have your say! Add your comment to anything you find here....
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