hungry

 

I wonder what you are hungry for?

God made us with bodies, and with appetites. Those bodies, and appetites, are good. Our appetites are designed to keep us close to God, as the one in whom all our hunger is met. But we can also seek to fulfil our hungers elsewhere, in false consolation. The invitation of Lent is an invitation to sit with our hunger long enough to name it, and to allow it to draw us back to God.

While we all experience all kinds of appetite, we each have a core, habitual hunger. It might be a hunger for justice, that, whenever you see injustice in the world, leaves you with a physical ache, or longing, for justice. It might be a hunger for order, or originality; for success, or knowledge; for security, or peace; a hunger to be helpful, or comforted.

Each of these can draw us back to God, the source of justice, harmony, diversity, creativity, wisdom, fidelity, contentment, support, joy.

But we must wrestle with the temptation to settle for false consolation. To be drawn away from God into vengeance, control, supremacy, drivenness, despair, legalism, misery, resentment, cynicism. These things can all feel good in the moment — self-indulgent — but they leave a bitter aftertaste.

We are so schooled to be ashamed of our hunger, as if it revealed some failure, that we hide our hungers even from ourselves. When emotions threaten us, we displace the feeling (we feel sad, find that uncomfortable, and reach for a doughnut). The reality is, we might hide so well that we can’t even identify our own deepest, core hunger — a hunger that most probably is shaped by childhood experiences (such as needing to compete for parental love) but which also reveals something profound about who God made us to be, the way in which, our hunger being met in God, we might contribute to the healing of the world (for example, extending justice, rather than perpetuating injustice).

The invitation of Lent is an invitation to sit with our hunger long enough to name it, and to allow it to draw us back to God.

I wonder what you are hungry for?

Matthew 4.1-11

‘Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished. The tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.’ But he answered, ‘It is written, “One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”’

‘Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, “He will command his angels concerning you”, and “On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.”’ Jesus said to him, ‘Again it is written, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”’

‘Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour; and he said to him, ‘All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! for it is written, “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.”’

‘Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.’

 

Candlemas

 

This coming Sunday is a pivot-point in the year, forty days on from Christmas, when we turn away from celebrating Jesus’ birth and turn towards remembering his agonising suffering, death, and glorious resurrection, in Holy Week and Easter.

This coming Sunday we recall the occasion, forty days after his birth, when Jesus’ parents presented him before God at the Temple in Jerusalem. This coming Sunday we bless candles — the ritual lighting of which symbolises our deepest moments of sorrow and of joy; and of recognition that God, who is invisible, is with us.

When a Jewish woman gave birth, she entered niddah, a period of seclusion and abstinence from intimacy with her husband she entered whenever she bled, in menstruation or in childbirth. Niddah lasted around seven days (or, seven days after the bleeding stopped) after which she would take a ritual bath before being reunited with her husband. (In recent years there has been a renaissance of this practice of withdrawal and reunion among Jewish women, as a beautiful gift of self-care, and a means of sustaining intimacy over time.)

After giving birth to a son, a woman entered niddah for seven days, followed by thirty-three days before she returned to public life, marked by presenting her son before God. After giving birth to a daughter, the periods were doubled — fourteen days of niddah, followed by sixty-six days before returning to public life.

This much is set out in the law of Moses, though no reason is given for why it should be thirty-three days for a son and sixty-six for a daughter — leading to much speculation. My own speculation (no more than that) is this. In Genesis 46 we read about the family of Jacob — grandson of father Abraham, and whom God had re-named Israel — who went with him down to Egypt to find salvation from a lengthy, region-wide famine. Jacob had twelve sons — who would give their names to the twelve tribes of Israel — and a daughter, by four different women, his wives Leah and Rachel, and their slaves Zilpah and Bilhah. We read that the number of his offspring, those belonging to him, his sons and their children, by his first wife Leah — beginning with his firstborn son, Reuben — numbered thirty-three; and the total number by all four women came to sixty-six. (The list of names and the accompanying numbers don’t exactly match; but these are symbolic numbers, not literal ones.)

I would suggest that to wait thirty-three days before presenting a son before God, and sixty-six days before presenting a daughter, is a means of including them in the family of Israel. Every son extends the family into the next generation. Every daughter completes the family again. Thirty-three. Sixty-six. This one, too, belongs to Israel. This one, too, takes their place within the family who are saved from famine, and, later, saved again, from enslavement. This one, too, is numbered.

So, Mary and Joseph bring Jesus, forty days on — seven, plus thirty-three — to take his place within the story of his people.

And there, there will be a reversal, a pivot-point, a turning. For the old man Simeon will bless Mary with a strange blessing: ‘and a sword shall pierce your heart, too.’

This points us to the cross, where a spear is thrust into Jesus’ heart to establish that he is, truly, dead; and the blood that has pooled there, and separated out into red and white blood cells, pours forth as blood and water. And a sword shall pierce your heart, too. Mary, at the foot of the cross. Her heart pierced, in the personal pain of any mother who witnesses the violent death of her son. But also, a symbolic union. Mary, who is the Church, the family of Jesus, shares in his piercing, in his death — and in his resurrection.

Just as Jesus is brought into the story of the family of Jacob/Israel, so, now, Mary — and all future generations to come — are brought into the story of the family of Jesus (which is a continuation, and a fulfilment, of the family of Israel).

This is the story into which the Church enters, participated in, down through the generations. A share in Christ’s suffering, dying, rising in glory. This is the life we are called to live in the world, not seeking to shield ourselves from pain but to know pain transformed, to bear faithful witness to, first, evil, and then, good — and truth, and beauty — rising from the bloody ground.

This is the story we enter into, symbolically — in embodied ways — in observing Christmas and Holy Week and Easter; and in observing the pivot-point between them, this Sunday, with the blessing of candles, which we light in times of great joy and sorrow.

 

consoled

 

2 Corinthians 1.3-7

‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, who consoles us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to console those who are in any affliction with the consolation with which we ourselves are consoled by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are abundant for us, so also our consolation is abundant through Christ. If we are being afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation; if we are being consoled, it is for your consolation, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we are also suffering. Our hope for you is unshaken; for we know that as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our consolation.’

Consolation is anything that draws us closer to God, and to the healing of our woundedness and brokenness, and forgiveness of our sins, that was won for humanity by Jesus on the cross.

The opposite of consolation is desolation, which is anything that closes down our awareness of God, and pushes us deeper into woundedness, brokenness, and sin.

Using your imagination, find yourself as a child running around a play park. As you run, you trip and fall and cut your knee. You cry out to your mother, who is sitting on a bench at the side of the playground.

Your mother gathers you up in a cuddle, speaks soothing words in your ear, takes a wipe from her bag, cleans the cut, puts a plaster on it, and sits with you until you are ready to go back to play.

How do you feel? Safe. Secure. Loved. Healed (even though the cut will take time to heal) (this was the brilliant insight of one of the children at our service today).

Now imagine that instead your mother says, ‘Don’t be such a cry-baby, run along now and give me five minutes’ peace.’

How do you feel? Ashamed, of being weak.

The scenario didn’t change. In both, you fell and cut your knee. But the outcome was very different. In one, you experienced consolation; in the other, desolation.

Now imagine that it is Mothers’ Day. You have bought your mother flowers. And as you go to loft her favourite vase down from the dresser, it slips through your fingers, falls to the floor, and is broken. How do you feel, in that moment?

Imagine that your mother, hearing the noise, comes into the room, surveys the scene, and asks, ‘Are you alright? That was a nasty shock, wasn’t it? It’s alright to feel sad about the vase, but you don’t need to feel afraid of me. It’s alright. We can mend the vase, or if not, buy a new one, and make lots of memories with it, just like the old one.’

How does that make you feel? Relief, for starters. And your guilt is dealt with. (Both suggestions offered by people at our service today.)

Now imagine that instead your mother’s response was, ‘You’re so clumsy, you never take any care about anything, now you've ruined everything!’

How do you feel now? Ten times worse that you did, and you already felt bad enough to begin with.

Or what about this. Your mother responds, ‘Never mind, there’s no use crying over spilt milk, it was only a vase.’

How does that make you feel? I would describe that as false consolation. Well-meant perhaps, but this response invalidates sadness, does not enable us to sit with and become familiar with our emotions. It doesn’t acknowledge that things can have sentimental value. It trivialises how we feel.

Now imagine that you come home from school one day very upset because your best friend has done something that really hurt you.

Your mother says, ‘I am so sorry that happened, it feels horrid, doesn’t it? Do you know, I think Jesus understands. He had a best friend, Peter, who let him down when he most needed a friend. And afterwards, Peter felt awful too. But Jesus forgave him, and they mended their friendship. Shall we talk to Jesus about it? Lord Jesus, thank you that you understand. We are glad that this brings us closer to you. Would you help me to forgive my friend? Would you help them to forgive themselves? Would you give us the grace to mend our friendship, like you and Peter? Amen.’

That’s consolation.

Now imagine that your mother responds, ‘People will always let you down, you might as well find out now as later. Move on. You don’t need them in your life. They obviously weren’t a real friend anyway.’

That’s desolation.

Or what about this? ‘Oh well, never mind. How about an ice cream?’

That’s false consolation, seeking comfort in something other than the deep, deep love of God. In this instance, seeking comfort in food. And again, it dismisses difficult or painful emotions, instead of meeting them head on.

We are invited to be people who experience abundant consolation and called to bring others into that same experience of being consoled.

We don’t always get that right. It takes a lifetime to grow into this, receiving forgiveness and extending forgiveness where necessary (which is part of consolation). But Jesus meets us in our joys and sorrows and draws us to himself and one another. And one day, every wound will be healed, all that is broken will be made strong. Until that day, may we live as if it were so.

 

minefield

 

Here in the UK, tomorrow is Mothers’ Day (tied, perhaps unhelpfully, to the fourth Sunday of Lent, which, known as Mothering Sunday, had a pre-existing history of honouring the Church as the Mother who nurtured our faith).

Mothers’ Day is difficult for many people for a wide range of reasons and so becomes a minefield to navigate. But the thing about minefields is, they need clearing, not avoiding. Clearing minefields is, of course, a skilled task, and not one best done with the whole village present. Nonetheless, it serves the whole village to undertake such work, better than teaching generations to keep their distance.

There is a reason why psychiatrists ask their clients to tell them about their mother. Everyone had a mother, even if you never knew her, and everyone has baggage relating to their mother. Even those who have a good relationship with their mother. (And perhaps none more so than those who claim that their mother is their best friend.)

Everyone has things for which they need to forgive their mother; and things for which they need to forgive themselves in relation to their mother.

Everyone.

Learning to diffuse the improvised explosive devices that lie buried in our lives, or strapped around our chests, is patient but necessary work.

The same, of course, is true in relation to the Church, for those whose faith has been both shaped and misshaped by their experience of that Mother community.

Spare a thought for those who will face up to Mothering Sunday / Mothers’ Day tomorrow (on an hour's less sleep, as the clocks go forward tonight in the ironically named British Summer Time).

 

Christ the King

 

I wonder whether you are familiar with the Horrible Histories series of books—by the wonderful local northeast author Terry Deary—also turned into a children’s television show? If so, you’ll know about the Revolting Romans.

In 66 CE, the Province of Judea rebelled against Rome. The emperor, Nero, sent one of his commanders, Vespasian, to put the rebellion down, in a campaign that would last eight years. But only two years later, Nero was facing rebellion closer to home. Sentenced to death by the Senate, and deserted by the Praetorian Guard, Nero died at his own hand in the summer of 68 CE, throwing the Roman empire into civil war. Galba seized power, only to be murdered seven months later in a coup that put Otho on the throne; only to take his own life three months later, having been defeated in battle by another claimant, Vitellius. In response, the Roman legions based in Egypt and Judea proclaimed their commander, Vespasian, emperor. Leaving his son, Titus, to command the siege of Jerusalem, Vespasian turned his attention to defeating Vitellius, who was killed eight months after becoming emperor. Vespasian, whose claim was ratified by the Senate the next day, would rule for a decade and die of natural causes. Titus captured Jerusalem in 70 CE, destroying the city and its Temple, and finally defeating the last of the rebels four years later. At his father’s death, he became the first biological son to succeed his father as emperor. Two years later, he, too, died of natural causes, and was deified by the Senate. His younger brother, Domitian, became emperor of Rome and would rule for fifteen years before being assassinated by members of his own court.

Domitian was ruthless, an authoritarian ruler who used religious and cultural propaganda to build what, today, we would call a cult of personality; stripped away the powers of the Senate; and nominated himself as perpetual censor—the censor being an obsolete role, which had been served in elected terms and shared in pairs, that gave the holder absolute power over the registration of  citizens, the appointment of Senators and government officials, the defining and keeping of public morals, and the administration of the finances of the state. These actions set Domitian up as a populist ruler, in bitter opposition with the Roman elite. He would be very much at home today, among the likes of Trump and Orbán.

During Domitian’s reign (81-96 CE) an old man named John wrote a book that circulated, at first, among the Christian communities in seven cities across Asia Minor. John had been one of rabbi Jesus’ apprentices, who had lived in his company for several years leading up to his execution under the Roman governor of Judea and the astonishing claim that he had risen from the dead some days later and appeared to many witnesses over a forty-day period before ascending into heaven. From Jerusalem—since destroyed by Titus, whose brother was now emperor in Rome—the news that the God of the Jews had established this Jesus as Lord over the nations had spread and a community, made up of both Jews and gentiles, who were attracted to the hope of this message, was becoming established across the Roman world.

The genre of John’s book was apocalypse, the pulling back of the curtain to reveal what was really happening ‘behind the scenes.’ And John’s message was this: despite the authoritarian rule of Domitian over the Roman world, with its very real consequences for those who he considered his enemies, Jesus was still on the throne in heaven. And that while Roman emperors came and went, sometimes in quick succession and often having met a bloody end (Vespasian might have died of natural causes, but that cause was dysentery, so it was hardly peaceful), the kingdom of God under the rule of his co-regent divine-human Son, remained secure through all time.

This, proclaims John, is the deeper reality behind the flow of history that passes itself off as reality. And so, John encourages those who will hear his book read aloud in their midst to hold firm in their faith that—as Mother Julian of Norwich would put it, in the fourteenth century—'all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.’ And, just as Domitian would be very much at home today, so, today, we need to hear John’s tale—to see his vision afresh with our own eyes.

Like our time, the Roman age was saturated with images, especially images of powerful men. They might not have had TVs or carried smart phones, but they were confronted with images of the emperor in every public space. We even have surviving busts of emperors who only ruled for months, not years. In time, we will come to see images of Jesus and his first apprentices; but the first place where we see King Jesus—and where we see him still—is in the faces of unremarkable women and men like those gathered in this place today.

The emperors of Rome are long dead. They cannot harm you; but neither are they touched by the tyrants of today. And here is the thing: you are dead, too. We who proclaim that Jesus is Lord have died with him and are seated with him in the heavenly places. His death is our death; his reign is our reign. This is the reality behind the scenes. And because you are dead, the kings you fear—Trump, the Putin—can’t touch you: as the church-planter Paul, who knew many hardships in his body, put it, ‘No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.’

 

Mary

 

Today the Church remembers Mary, the mother of Jesus.

By the Holy Spirit, Jesus lived and grew in Mary’s womb for nine months, and thereafter lived and grew in her heart.

By that same Spirit, that same Jesus lives (or can live, if, like Mary, we say yes to God) and grows in our hearts.

The latter is dependent on, but by no means a lesser miracle than, the former. Just as the ‘second’ (not secondary) vocation or purpose of being human, to ‘Love your neighbour as yourself,’ is ‘like’ (that is, dependent on, but the same in every way as) the ‘first,’ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your mind, and with all your strength, and with all your soul.’ Or just as the Son is dependent on, but in all ways equal to, the Father.

As we gaze upon Mary gazing upon Jesus in love, may our lives be transformed so that we look, and live, more and more like him.

 

Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary : part 2

 

Today, 8 December, the Church is invited to reflect on the Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Though there are alternative lectionary readings set for this lesser festival, I chose to use the main readings for the day, Isaiah 41:13-20 and Matthew 11:11-15, along with an icon of Jesus in the womb of Mary in the womb of her mother, St Anne.

The Isaiah reading includes this vision: ‘I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive; I will set in the desert the cypress, the plane and the pine together, so that all may see and know, all may consider and understand, that the hand of the Lord has done this, the Holy One of Israel has created it.’ (vv 19-20)

In the Bible, where we come across trees, they stand for people, sometimes an individual, sometimes a community. So here we have a vision of God transforming barrenness into an ecosystem, the descendants beyond measure of childless Abraham and Sarah.

The reading from Matthew says this:

“Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force.” (vv 11-12)

Interestingly, while the standard text for the Church of England is the NRSVA (New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised) translation, the person who read the Gospel did so from the REB (Revised English Bible), which translates these verses as:

‘Truly I tell you: among all who have ever been born, no one has been greater than John the Baptist, and yet the least in the kingdom of Heaven is greater than he.

‘Since the time of John the Baptist the kingdom of Heaven has been subjected to violence and violent men are taking it by force.’

This translation removes women from where they are; and inserts men, where they were not. The Greek explicitly says ‘among those born of women,’ en gennētois gynaikōn; while ‘the violent,’ though the noun is in the masculine, biastēs from biazó, is not qualified by ‘men’. It is assumed that all who have ever been born are born of women, and it is assumed that the violent are men; but both assumptions obscure the point. Jesus is comparing physical birth and spiritual birth. Just as we are born from our mother’s womb through the violent contractions of labour—or the violence of Caesarean section—so spiritual rebirth is a Kairos moment of crisis and opportunity, of violent energy, risk, and all being well, subsequent joy.

Today we reflect on Mary’s conception, within the ‘salvation history’ prepared by God before the creation of the world, before there ever was history, carrying us away from and back to God in time’s ebb and flow. Mary’s place, not only within Anne, but within Abraham, within Adam. The work of God to transform the wilderness of time and space, devoid of anything other than the three-person God, into cedar, acacia, myrtle, olive; cypress, plane, and pine; all rooted in this life-sharing God.

Today we give thanks for the gift of labour in place of barrenness, and of particularity in place of mere potential—what is, in all its contingency; all that I am, free of might-have-beens or if-onlys. For, like Mary, you and I are chosen, and loved, from before the worlds.

 

Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary : part 1

 

Today the Church is invited to reflect on the Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The icon below (thank you to my friend, Cameron Abernethy, for sharing it on facebook) is of Jesus in the womb of Mary in the womb of her mother, St Anne. Looking a little like Russian dolls, it is a beautiful depiction of the scriptural truth that future generations exist within their forebears. When the Lord speaks with his childless friend Abram/Abraham, and promises that his descendants shall be as far beyond counting as the stars of the heavens or the grains of sand on the seashore, we are to understand that those future generations beyond number are present, to God, (with)in the person of his friend Abraham.

We may tend to thinking that God chooses Mary to be the one through whom the Son will be born into the world on account of her disposition, that she is particularly devout, or feisty, or whatever it is that God might be looking for. And, certainly, how we fashion the life we are given matters to God. But this is less than the whole truth. It may be closer to suggest that Mary is the young woman whom she is because God chose her before she was conceived in her mother’s womb, indeed before the creation of the world. And that you are also chosen, and loved, within the divine purpose to reconcile all things, within ourselves and between us and our neighbour and us and Godself.

As you gaze on the human face of God through the window of this icon, can you dare to imagine it carrying on so as to include Anne, Mary, Jesus ... you?

 

All Saints and All Souls

 

Half of my time is parish-based (the other half is city-centre/civic based) and half of that time is currently invested in one of the local schools, at their invitation. This afternoon, we talked all things Halloween/All Saints’ Day/All Souls Day and from All Saints to St Nicholas (for whom the parish church is named)/Sinterklaas/Santa Claus and from there to Advent and Christmas and evidence for God and back again to death and ghosts and evidence for what they called afterlife and how Christians celebrate our communion with those who have died, held together, as we are, by and in Jesus. A sprawling conversation, with a lot of tangents along the way.

 

Evidence

 

The best evidence for the bodily resurrection of the dead is the persistent hope of the bodily resurrection of the dead, and the lives of billions of women and men oriented, in the here and now, to that hope.

For a narrow scientism, this is no evidence at all. But the failure is one of scientism, not of evidence. In all the known universe, there is not a shred of empirical evidence that love exists. We can measure short-term and long-term physiological changes attributed to love, but evolutionary biologists can and do offer alternative explanations. There is no standardised, universally accepted scale (Hk, hugsnkisses) by which we can measure the love we have for one parent, sibling, or child in comparison with the love we have for another; nor by which we can track the rise and fall of love for a spouse over time. And for scientism (as opposed to scientific enquiry) what cannot be measured cannot exist. Yet deny the existence of love, and you will rightly be pitied.

The apostle Paul said that if there is no resurrection, then Christians are to be pitied above all people. Not commended, as good people who seek to serve their neighbours. Not condemned, as hypocrites who think they are better than others. But pitied.

On the other hand, if our hope is not in vain, we are the most hopeful of all people, for death has no hold over us, now, keeping life at arm’s length from us, or when it comes for us.

Don’t discount evidence simply because it doesn’t look like we were told it should. Evidence for the bodily resurrection of the dead is all around.

 

For all the saints

 

The Apostles’ Creed, the baptismal confession of all Christians, says of the Church:

‘I believe in…the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.’

The Nicene Creed expands:

‘We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church. We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins. We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.’

It is perhaps a commitment to the forgiveness of sins that is the most culture-critical aspect of this confession in my twenty-first century British context (and while the Nicene Creed emphasises baptism as a sacrament of forgiveness, the Apostles’ Creed makes forgiveness of sins, without qualification, a creedal sign of the baptised). But today, we ought to reflect on the communion of saints, on resurrection and life.

Today is the Feast of All Saints, the day Christians are called to give thanks for and rejoice with all those who have gone before us, who have died ‘in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life through our Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our frail bodies that they may be conformed to his glorious body, who died was buried, and rose again for us’ (taken from the Committal, Common Worship Funeral Service).

Tomorrow is the Feast of All Souls, the day Christians are invited to give thanks for and rejoice with those we have known personally, who have died in this same hope.

One of the local churches I serve has been a confessing community since 930AD. There are many more Saints to rejoice with than Souls. The other has been a confessing community since 1939. There is among our number one man, in his nineties, who was there on Day One. Here, in contrast, the Souls outnumber the Saints.

One of the things I note in Sunderland, among both those who would locate themselves at the heart of the confessing community and those who slip in and out of our buildings to remember their dead before God, is a crisis in confidence in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting, and therefore in our ability to look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Every day of the year functions as a truncated All Souls, in which my loss is cut off from the community, becoming individual (that is, atomised) rather than personal (that is, embedded in relationships and an institution that provides meaning). People leave written prayers for the dead, imploring God to take care of their relatives. Every Sunday becomes a day to read aloud the names of those whose anniversary of death has come around, yet again, that week. There is no letting go, and therefore no meeting up again (as with, say, the Mexican day of the Dead celebrations; as All Souls ought to be). There is no receiving the grace to expand around our grief, such that we ourselves are signs of resurrection and participate now in the future breaking-into the present. These things are more peculiar to Sunderland than they are to any of the other cities I have lived in, Glasgow and Sheffield and Liverpool. This is not to say that grief does not break in uninvited, nor that it should be pushed away: rather, that when it comes, we can be confident in the promises that are ours in Jesus Christ and encourage a collective confidence in place of a collective anxiety.

The resurrected person of Jesus Christ bridges the divide between this life and the life of the world to come and holds together those we see and those we see no more. Through him, we are one. Through him, we can engage in conversation, using both shared words (liturgy) and the personal imaginative gift of prayer (our own words, shaped in part by the community). The rhythms of the year, these Feast days of Saints and Souls, are a gift that is both a duty and a joy. They ought rightly to be attended to, in their time. May these days be filled with light and celebration.

 

Michael part 3

 

Today is the Feast of St Michael & All Angels. And earlier today, I reflected on two passages of Scripture that speak of angels descending and ascending. Except that they don't. Looking again, I am reminded that both passages, Genesis 28:10-17 and John 1:47-51, speak of angels ascending and descending:

‘And [Jacob] dreamed that there was a ladder [a ziggurat] set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.’ Genesis 28:12

‘And [Jesus] said to [Nathanael], “Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.”’ John 1:51

Another passage set for today is Revelation 12:7-12, which opens:

‘And war broke out in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. The dragon and his angels fought back, but they were defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven [or, they lost strength, and no region was found for them in heaven]. The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.’

So, the angels of God ascend and descend, and the rebellious angels rise up and are thrown down. In both cases, the movement is up > down. Emissaries who approach the throne of God and are sent out from God’s presence. Whose purpose is to bring representation to God—this is why Accusation, false rumour, is so serious an offence, a betrayal of God and of angels and mortals—and to carry messages from God in return. To Jacob, and to his offspring Jesus and to all his offspring: “Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” (Genesis 28:15)

This offspring, the Son of Man or faithful remnant community, with Jesus as their representative, are the new humanity, the new ground, earth animated by the life-breath of God’s very word.

May you hear that word, carried by angel messengers, spoken over you today. And may it restore your weary body and soul to life.

 

Michael part 2

 

Today I celebrated the Feast of St Michael & All Angels in this space, dedicated in thanksgiving for the archangel who contended against the great dragon, the ancient serpent known as the Devil and as Satan, and threw him out of the heavens down upon the earth. And we are told that the Accuser is overcome by the blood of the Lamb—that is, Jesus—and the testimony of saints and angels. As we see in the East window, the testimony that plays its part in overcoming the Accuser is the FORGIVNESS OF SINS. May we, therefore, declare this testimony over one another.

 

Michael part 1

 

Today is Michaelmas, the Feast of St Michael & All Angels. (Happy feast day to all Michaels/Mikes & Angelas among my friends!)

In one sense, Michael is an unusual saint, in that almost all saints are humans whose lives demonstrate an unusual awareness of the presence of God. The exceptions are the few angels whose names are revealed to us, including Michael, and in this greater sense Michael is an exemplary saint, for the angels live in unbroken awareness of God’s presence.

Michaelmas is to Michael as Christmas is to Christ: (not a birthday, but) a season of great thanksgiving for what God has done. In Christmas, we celebrate the incarnation, that, in Jesus, God has become one with God’s creation. In Michaelmas, we celebrate divinization, that, by and with and in Christ, creation is being caught up in union with God. Michaelmas is a consequence of Christmas, and its near-completion, as, in the Church calendar, we move towards the Feast of Christ the King.

There is a story in Genesis of a broken man running away from the mess he has created, who, in the restless sleep of drained exhaustion, is graced the vision of angels descending to earth and ascending to heaven. Sent from and returning to God, their beginning and their end. And early in John’s Gospel, Jesus calls another runaway to follow him, saying he shall see the angels of God descending and ascending on the Son of Man, that is, the faithful community which is focused on Jesus, the Alpha & Omega, the source and completion, of angels and disciples alike.

According to later legend, Michaelmas is the day on which Michael defeated the rebellious angel Lucifer, and threw him down to earth; the fallen angel, who landed in a briar patch. Some say you should not pick its fruit, the blackberry, after this date. But if you are looking to celebrate the Feast of St Michael, a blackberry crumble would be appropriate.

Happy Michaelmas! In these days, may you become increasingly aware of God’s presence in our world, in our midst.

 

Creation Season

 

The Season of Creation, which runs from 1 September to 4 October each year, is that part of the church calendar dedicated to God as Creator and Sustainer of life. The great poem of Genesis chapter 1 is a text of many layers, enabling us to discover something new each time we go there; but as we approach Creation Season, I am reflecting on it as a curriculum of habitat, the study of God preparing a home for all life.

First, the vocation of light (day) and dark (night). Of habitats for diurnal and nocturnal animals (and diurnal plants that unfold their petals with the unfolding light, and twist to track the sun through the course of the day, before folding their petals again for sleep). Day and night, of course, are not binary, and this first work of creation also creates habitats for crepuscular animals, both matutinal (active at dawn) and vespertine (active at dusk).

Second, the vocation of the water cycle. Of (ice and) fresh water, saline water, atmospheric water. Of evaporation, condensation, precipitation. The processes of producing and sustaining the 1% accessible freshwater life depends on, as well as directly shaping the lifecycle of some animals, such as frogs that spend most of their life sleeping buried in mud, waiting the rains and the release of tadpoles that will grow into frogs by the time their pool evaporates.

Third, the vocation of land (and plants) and seas. Again, these are not binary, but meet and flow into one another. Forests and grasslands and semi-arid zones and deserts and icesheets. Marshes and estuaries and intertidal zones and reefs.

Fourth, the vocation of sun, moon and stars as markers and guardians of the seasons. Of aestivation (animals that sleep through the summer months) and hibernation.

Fifth, the vocation of marine biodiversity and birds. Of krill, and great migratory whales; migratory swallows; and category-defying penguins and ostriches.

Sixth, the vocation of land animals and, last to appear on the scene, people. Of migratory butterflies and zebra; migratory domesticated cattle, and their migratory nomadic herders. Of human ethnic diversity, and the many ways we have made our home in different habitats.

Seventh, the vocation of rest. God moves from care for creation—a home for every living thing—to enjoying, delighting in, creation. And God draws humans to first delight in creation, that we might care for creation.

 

Blessed

 

Today (15 August) the Church honours the Blessed Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus. The Gospel passage set for Morning Prayer is Luke 11:27-28,

While he was saying this, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts that nursed you!” But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!”

Jesus’ response mirrors that of the woman, and goes deeper: blessed (happy) are those who hear and comprehend the word spoken by God so that faith is birthed within them (the idea here is conception, not full-term birth) and who guard, protect or watch-over it (the idea here is pregnancy, of the foetus developing in the womb, and the mother cherishing this miracle of new life within and with her). In other words, Mary, who said yes to God and in whose womb the Word of God took on flesh, and who treasured these things in her heart (the word rightly translated womb in Luke 11:27 can refer to any internal organ and the inner being) is the model for all.

But there is more to this brief exchange on the birthing and nurture of God’s word in our lives. In the Greek, verse 27 begins, ‘It came into being, or, to birth, by Jesus saying this, that a woman in the crowd lifted up her voice and said to him...’ By Jesus saying what, exactly? In Luke 11:14-23, Jesus casts out a demon who has prevented its ‘host’ from speaking, and the crowd is divided in its opinion: some argue that it is by the authority of the ruler of the demons that Jesus casts demons out. Jesus responds, how can a kingdom divided against itself stand? Rather, I do this on the authority of God, and as a sign of God’s kingdom among you. Jesus continues (Luke 11:24-26, the saying that births a response in the woman), explaining that when an unclean spirit is cast out of a person, it wanders through waterless regions in search of a place to rest and be refreshed, and, finding none, determines to return to the person whom it had made its home (‘my house from which I came’) and, finding ‘the house’ in order, brings seven other spirits more evil than itself, and together they take possession of the person’s life, such that their state is now worse than before.

Jesus is speaking about our lives as a resting place, either for the Holy Spirit (of whom Jesus speaks in Luke 11:9-13) or for unclean spirits. Even if spirits who afflict a person’s life are driven out, unless the life-giving Holy Spirit is received, the relief from affliction may be short-lived. We don’t like to admit that we aren’t fully in charge of our own lives, but if we are honest, we know it to be true (even as I was writing this, I nipped out to buy milk; the woman in the queue ahead of me confessed to the cashier that she had fallen off the wagon over the weekend, and the cashier replied, oh well, it can’t be helped). And the woman in the crowd hears and comprehends that Jesus is the fruit of another woman who had welcomed the Holy Spirit and made first her very body and then her home, both building and family, a resting place for the liberating word of God, breath given voice.

May we be as the unnamed woman in the crowd, who was, in turn, a woman in the pattern of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

 

Corpus Christi

 

Today is Corpus Christi, the Thanksgiving for the Sacrament of Holy Communion.

A sacrament is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. There are two Sacraments of the Gospels: baptism, and communion. There are further Sacraments of the Church, including marriage, and the anointing of the sick.

Sacraments take something of the world (water, bread, wine, metal, oil) and recognise it as a place of encounter with Jesus Christ (the one who is both fully human and fully God, in whom heaven and earth are united) and so as a point at which earth and heaven come together.

Sacraments take something temporal (bread corrupts quickly, but even a platinum ring does not last forever) and see in it all eternity.

Sacraments combine something given by God to creation; and by the wider creation to humans; taken up and transformed by human activity (the work of farmer, miller, and baker to make bread; the work of vintner, of jeweller, of herbalist; even water comes to us via aqueducts: What did the Romans ever do for us?) and offered once more; taken up  by God—Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer of all—transformed once more and given yet again. A circle of grace upon grace, of life-enhancing gift upon gift, begun, continued, and brought to completion in God. The perfection of diversity in harmony.

In the Old Testament reading set for today, Abram (later, Abraham) returns from victory in battle, having taken back his nephew who had been carried off in defeat, and is met by Melchizedek, king of Salem (later, Jerusalem).

‘And King Melchizedek of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was priest of God Most High. He blessed him and said,

‘Blessed be Abram by God Most High,
maker of heaven and earth;
and blessed be God Most High,
who has delivered your enemies into your hand!’

‘And Abram gave him one-tenth of everything.’

Genesis 14:18-20

Melchizedek sets before Abram bread and wine, and in this sacrament, Abram experiences strength renewing his weariness and healing for his wounds. Some would say that in his host, Abraham encounters the second person of the Trinity, that Melchizedek is the outward and visible sign of God with Abraham.

Melchizedek pronounces a blessing over Abram: ‘Blessed be Abram by God Most High, maker of heaven and earth…’ and the blessing is deliberately expansive. The word here translated ‘maker’ can also be rendered ‘possessor’ and encompasses both God as possessor of heaven and earth by virtue of being its creator, redeemer and sustainer ‘[Blessed be Abram by] God Most High, maker of heaven and earth…’ and Abram as the one who possesses heaven and earth by virtue of being in covenant relationship with God Most High ‘Blessed be Abram [by God Most High], possessor of heaven and earth…’].

Jesus said, ‘The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.’ (John 10:10) Jesus came that we might know love, joy, peace, comfort in our sorrows; but these gifts of heaven, these spiritual graces, can be stolen from us in the outward and visible dimension of life, such that we grow weary of life itself. In the sacrament of Holy Communion, Jesus, our High Priest in the Order of Melchizedek, sets bread and wine before us, the outward sign of his body and blood, and as we eat, our souls and bodies are nourished.

So come, those who are weary. Gaze upon Mystery! Eat, and drink. Be made whole.

 

Images: detail of a pelican feeding her chicks with her own blood, a Medieval symbol of Christ nourishing the Church with his body and blood, embroidered on the chasuble I wore at Holy Communion today.

 

Third Day

 

From the Gospel set for Holy Communion today:

‘Then he [Jesus] began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”’

(Mark 8:31-33)

Today in the Church calendar we remember Janani Luwum, Archbishop of Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Bogo-Zaire, murdered on or around this day in 1977 on the orders of Idi Amin. May he rest in power and rise in glory.

In our Gospel reading for today, Jesus is teaching his disciples that he will be killed, and on the third day rise again. What is it that God did on the third day? On the first day, God said Let there be light! and there was light. But on the third day, God drew the earth out from the waters, and then vegetation from the earth, fruit-bearing trees, seed-bearing fruit.

On the third day, God will draw the Son of Man — the creature made from the earth and given life by the breath of God — out from the waters of death that have overwhelmed him. God will cause this life to be fruitful, bringing joy and sustenance to many. And God will cause this fruitful tree of life to bear seed, that is, to reproduce itself.

The fruitful life of Christ, who suffers at the hands of violent men and is killed, and who rises up on the third day, is the life that is reproduced in his followers. We do not seek martyrdom, but we proclaim that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.

Janani Luwum was a true follower of Jesus the Christ. His life was fruitful, and the manner of his death gave glory to God and renewed life to the Church.

May we not set our minds on human things, but on the things of God, and of the Christ in and through whom all things are being reconciled to God. Amen.

 

The apprentice

 

Today is All Souls’ Day, or the Commemoration of the Faithful Departed, the day on which we are encouraged to remember before God those women and men we have known personally, who, by their lives, their example, and their investment in us, trained us in the faith for holy living.

And on this All Souls’ Day, I have been thinking about how we speak to God.

When Jesus’ first disciples asked him to teach them to pray, he taught them to come before God as Father. I note how many Charismatic Christians will call God Father over and over in prayer. But when Jesus calls God Father, I think he has something particular in mind, and that is the role of the father, in his cultural context, as the one to whom you were apprenticed.

Jesus had been apprenticed to his father, Joseph, as a builder of homes. (Before you offer me any pious nonsense about Joseph not being Jesus’ father, please don’t; instead, reflect on any brilliant adoptive or stepfathers you might know. And then, repent.) After Joseph’s death (as well as that of his cousin John) Jesus experiences God calling him into something new and apprenticing him: I only do what I see the Father doing. Jesus even explicitly refers to this Father God as the builder...

Likewise, Jesus calls Simon and Andrew, James and John, who have been apprenticed by their fathers Jonah and Zebedee to be fishermen, to become ‘fishers of people.’

It is in this sense, I think, primarily, that God is both the father of Jesus and of those who follow him. Not only the one who gives life—in that sense, God is parent of all—but the one to whom we are apprenticed (and this also applies, to some degree, to all humanity).

As I think of all the images Jesus takes up to describe what God is like, I wonder why we so rarely think to pray to God the widow, to pester us out of our hard-hearted indifference to injustice; or to housewife God, to search out and find what we have lost, of our dignity, or discarded of our resources...

But I also wonder what it would look like if we saw God less as daddy to a helpless infant, and more as master builder, from whom we are called to learn?

Which brings me back to All Souls’ Day, and the hope that one day, after am I gone, future generations might remember me before God, with thanksgiving.

 

Maturity

 

Some thoughts on the Gospel reading set for Harvest:

Matthew 6:25-33

‘Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? Therefore do not worry, saying, “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?” For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.’

 

[1] ‘And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?’ The word lifespan, hēlikian, contains within the scope of its meaning ‘maturity,’ and ‘stature’. The observation here, then, is that anxiety does not produce maturity. That anxiety, as seed, does not produce maturity as harvest. A harvest, a culmination, of maturity requires a different seed.

 

[2] God is not anxious, does not sow seeds of anxiety.

 

[3] Jesus points to God’s reliable activity in relation to the birds of the air and the flowers of the earth. From this, the human, the creature made of and for the earth and the air—soil humus fashioned by God, and animated by the breath of God—is to extrapolate meaning. (That is, the choice of birds and flowers as examples is not random.)

 

[4] God is not anxious. Yes, I know I have said this already. See also [7]

 

[5] God provides food for the birds and clothes for the flowers. This addresses two very specific anxieties. In Jesus’ culture, in marriage vows husbands committed themselves to provide their wife with food and wool/yarn/cloth, and wives committed themselves to turn these into meals and clothes—we might share the labour of love differently, but the principle of partnership remains—and each committed sexual and emotional faithfulness to the other. We know that of Jesus’ disciples at least one, Peter, was married, and called away from the family business, the most obvious means of fulfilling his marriage vows. As the progenitor of birds and flowers and humans, God is our Father—and Mother—in heaven; but as provider of food for the birds and clothes for the flowers and whatever is to be extrapolated for the humans, God is our spouse, husband—and wife—to creation. The primary thing we do not need to worry about is God’s faithfulness, God’s covenant commitment to us. To be non-anxious, which is to display true maturity or stature, flows from knowing this.

 

[6] The life God calls out of us—and the life God calls us out from—is held in covenant love. The soil and the breath, and the creature formed of the two, the mystery of life, and the interdependence between all life—when this flourishes, it is called ‘righteousness’—these things are all cherished. This is the seed that produces maturity.

 

[7] God is a (the) non-anxious presence in our lives. What God has spoken will not return void, what God has planted will bear fruit, what God has sown will produce harvest. All in rhythms and cycles, as God has created the world.

 

[8] ‘But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness [or, for the kingdom and its righteousness], and all these things will be given to you as well.’ This righteousness is the alignment of ‘cosmos’—the world as we experience it—and ‘ethos’—the world as it ought to be. Sometimes the ‘cosmos’ pulls away from God’s ‘ethos,’ resulting in injustice, in an inequitable distribution of resources. Sometimes our ‘ethos’ pulls away from God’s ‘cosmos,’ as when we seek to secure harvests that, through our ingenuity and ‘work-ethic,’ violate the cycles of nature, exhausting the earth. Where we learn to see and commit to the nearer-alignment of our ‘cosmos’ and ‘ethos’ with God’s, there life flourishes.

 

[9] How might we ‘strive’ [search for, desire, demand] for such alignment, in a non-anxious way? Perhaps through paying attention to small things, as signs of the First thing, or thing from which the kind of life in which all life flourishes, flows. In this way, we might keep First things first.