Catholic Contextual urban Theology, Mimetic Theory, Contemplative Prayer. And other random ramblings.

Sunday 25 November 2012

Sermon at Parish Mass, Christ the King 2012




Daniel 7:13-14
Revelation 1:5-8
John 18:33-37

What are kings for? What do they do? If we’re asked that we might think perhaps of our own United Kingdom. It’s been a good year for our monarchy, with the celebrations of the diamond jubilee, our own visit from Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall, and signs that the monarchy is more popular than ever.
Of course, ours is a constitutional monarchy in a parliamentary democracy. It wasn’t always so. This year has also seen the discovery of what may well be the remains of Richard III, killed at the battle of Bosworth Field in the deadly struggle between two rival dynasties, the Plantagenets and the Tudors. Those were days when Kings had real political power, which could be arbitrary, capricious and cruel. 
And it was much the same in Biblical times, as Jesus himself tells us in today’s gospel reading. This is a scene of contrasts, Pilate and Jesus standing for two completely different understandings of power. Pilate represents the earthly power, that of the Emperor, by whose authority Jesus in the end will be put to death. But Jesus reveals the power of God; he is the Word of the Father come to reveal God to the world.
Jesus says, “If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” Jesus says instead that his purpose is “to testify to the truth” and that “Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to [his] voice”. Although it doesn’t seem obvious, somehow, the kingdom of God is not to be found in exercising power but in entering the truth.
This takes us back to chapter 8 in John’s Gospel, where Jesus talks about his mission to make known the truth and about the world’s failure to understand. To a group who rejected his teaching he said:
You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him... But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me. Whoever is from God hears the words of God. The reason you do not hear them is that you are not from God.
No wonder that Pilate, in reply to Jesus in today’s gospel, says, dismissively, “what is truth?” 
Jesus teaches us that the kingdoms of this world are characterised by people defining themselves in opposition to other people, setting themselves over against other groups, and seeking to maintain that division by violence. They depend on regarding your so-called “enemy” as somehow fundamentally different from you: someone who is disposable. It is your enemy, not you, who is the cause of your trouble, the source of the violence you suffer. He must be eliminated! And your enemy may well think the same about you.
According to Jesus, this is founded on a lie, on the rejection of the truth. And that truth is first of all the good news about God. “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” This is the truth to which Jesus bears witness. The purpose of creation, of human existence, is love, and the good news about God is love which will not compromise with half measures, love that longs to share the life of God with all people. All people. We are all in this together, all equally in need of knowing that love and receiving that life. 
So there can be no over against other people, no division or violence, in the Kingdom of God. God is light and in him is no darkness at all. Those who see the light, who hear the truth, and respond to it, enter that Kingdom. They leave behind the old way of being human, which was founded on a lie, and enter God’s truth. 
And it is that truth to which Jesus bears witness in this scene, most acutely, most personally. Because Jesus is the innocent victim who stands for all human victims, all people who have ever been seen as “the enemy”. Jesus is the enemy! He must be - look at how all the people are rioting and demanding his death. And so Pilate sees him as disposable, different, not the same as him, and hands Jesus over to death. In his unjust judgement Pilate rejects the truth and enacts what the kingdoms of this world are like. And in his acceptance of suffering and death out of love for the world, Jesus enacts the Kingdom of God, the Kingdom of the truth.
Pilate rejects the truth of the person before him, and so fails to see the truth of God. But those who receive the truth which Jesus speaks become children of God. They become witnesses who testify to the truth. They enter his kingdom and live according to the new way of love, leaving behind the old way of division, of defining ourselves over against others.
That of course is not always easy, particularly when people disagree about things which they think are very important. The past week has seen the Church of England in crisis over the rejection by General Synod of legislation that would have enabled women to become bishops. For the most part the speeches in Synod itself were thoughtful and respectful, resisting the temptation to caricature opposing views, wanting to find consensus and a shared way forward. 
But that can’t be said of much of the reaction that has followed. There has been a huge emotion dump as this process that has taken so much energy and care over 12 years has collapsed. That emotional energy has got to go somewhere, and it is understandable that some people are hurting and angry, while others are relieved. But there has been much unhelpful and unedifying commentary, knee-jerk reactions, pinning of blame, name calling, and caricaturing of others. 
That will not help find a way forward for our church. But more seriously, if we fail to recognise one another in the truth of our identity as beloved children of God, then we are in danger of slipping back into the old way of being human, the way of the kingdoms of this world.
As the Church of England seeks to find a way forward it is important that we do so with a profound attention and respect for the truth of the other person. The truth that the person who disagrees with me is nevertheless caught up with me in God’s embrace, and that we are called together to bear witness to the truth of God’s patient, transforming love. There is no-one who is “the enemy”. 
That doesn’t offer any instant answer or easy solution. But the church is not called to reflect the values of the world, with its oppositional politics and imposed conformity. The church is not called to be “relevant” or “credible” in terms that the world might want to impose. God’s kingdom is not of this kind. Our task is to bear witness to the truth. Because although God’s kingdom is not from this world, it is for the world. It is the kingdom of Jesus Christ, who, because God so loved the world, was sent into the world, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. And that truth is something to which we can all bear witness.

Sermon, Parish Mass, All Saints 2012




Revelation 7:2-4, 9-14
1 John 3:1-3
Matthew 5:1-12

What kind of city would you like to live in? A week ago the Camden New Journal was much taken up with the “Wheelie Bin Rebellion”; the front page and the letter writers highlighting the resistance of some borough residents to having wheelie bins for waste disposal in their front gardens.
On a rather different level, the Evening Standard has been running a “Ladder for London” campaign which aims to get disengaged and disadvantaged young adults into employment though apprenticeship schemes, young people who would otherwise be unemployed and lacking in opportunities.
Both stories are linked in a way, in that they are both about the kind of society that we would like to live in. Is the space in which we live enjoyable? Is it beautiful? Does it work, practically? Who is able to participate in the communities we build? And who is left outside?
Today we heard the beatitudes: Jesus’ description of a society that that he calls “blessed”.  To be blessed is to be in tune with God’s purpose in creation. You are blessed if you inhabit the world in a way that reflects what God is like. And, according to Jesus, it is the victims, those on the margins, those who live precariously, those who take risks for peace and justice, those are the ones who are blessed, who reflect what God is like. 
Now, the prevailing power structures of the world say something quite different: happy are the strong, the powerful, the rich, the successful. The world says it’s the winners, not the losers, who determine what society is like. You’re happy if you climb to the top of the heap, and never mind those you’ve trampled underfoot on the way. 
Jesus preaches something radically different. In a world which is fallen and distorted by sin, a society which reflects what God is like is bound to appear as a contrast, as a protest, against the way things are. A stumbling block to be rejected. Just as Jesus can only do the Father’s will and reveal his love, in the world as it is, on the cross.
But the society described in the beatitudes, which is such a sign of contradiction to the world as it is, is nothing less than the Kingdom of God and the Communion of Saints. This is the great truth which we celebrate today. The Communion of Saints is human society made holy - that’s what the word “saint”means. It is human society perfectly reflecting what God is like. It is humanity sharing the Divine nature. 
Jesus, in theological language, is God incarnate. Jesus is the meeting point, the face of God turned towards humanity, and the face of humanity turned towards God. And Jesus shows us God as Trinity. God is the Son finding himself in the Father and the Father knowing himself in the Son and both delighting in one another in the self-giving love of the Holy Spirit.
And because humanity is made in the image of God, we can only reflect what God is like in communion, in society. We only find our true selves in mutual love and self-giving, each to the other, reflecting the life of the Holy Trinity. 
In the beatitudes Jesus calls us to enter into and reflect that life by repenting of our individualism, our self-assertion and self-aggrandisement. We can only find our true selves by turning our attention away from ourselves to God, and finding ourselves in God in one another.  
So, blessed are the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for what is right, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, the persecuted. Blessed, because they are finding themselves in God, in one another. Blessed, because they are entering God’s Kingdom, and becoming the Communion of Saints. 
And this vision of Jesus has very little to do with religion. Jesus nowhere says, “blessed are the churchgoers” or “blessed are the devout”. Instead, the beatitudes are about what it really means to be human. They are the blueprint for being human as God intended in creation. Because to be fully and truly human is to be holy, to be in the Communion of Saints. 
Jesus’ vision of society is more than just human beings getting along with one another. It is not a naïve humanitarian dream. Human society ordered as it should be is founded and rooted in God. Human relationships become transfigured in the light of God the Holy Trinity. True society, is what happens when we acknowledge our need of one another and recognise and receive each other as we find ourselves in God. 
The beatitudes express this perfectly: “blessed” and “happy” mean the same thing.  True happiness, true blessedness, lie in becoming perfectly what God has created us to be. As St Irenaeus said, the glory of God is humanity fully alive.
The Communion of Saints is the mutual recognition that God is the ground of our being. It is seeing the ultimate truth about one another, and in that seeing there is blessedness. This is the beatific vision, the “blessed” vision. In that Communion the veil is parted and the dualities of our earth-bound sight fade away. Time and eternity, earth and heaven, no longer stand apart. The living and those we call dead are bound to one another in one communion and fellowship in Christ our Lord. We have a foretaste of this in the Eucharist, this astonishing action in which all the saints in heaven and earth in every age are truly one, worshipping with the angels and archangels, breaking one bread, becoming what we receive, one body, in Christ. 
Eternity and time intersect on the altar, and worshippers on earth stand in the sanctuary in heaven. And glimpses of glory overflow and appear wherever in this world the Kingdom of God is becoming real, wherever human society begins to reflect the life of God. And, most often, those glimpses will be not where we expect, but on the margins, among the dispossessed and the ignored, among the poor and the meek whom we so easily fail to see. This should not surprise us - Jesus has told us this is where the Kingdom is happening!  But so often still it does.
Last week, at the end of a busy day in the parish, visiting, celebrating Mass, praying with people, I got on the bus to begin my journey home, thinking, I rather suspect, “oh well, that’s a day well spent, now I can have a well earned gin and tonic”. A dishevelled man was sitting on the bus, drinking from a can of beer, quite possibly going nowhere where he could relax or be comfortable.  He saw my collar, and this touched off some deep vein of hurt and alienation. He started swearing and shouting at me. For the first time in the day I felt quite helpless. His rage was directed, I suppose, at what he saw as authority and privilege and being at the centre of things instead of on the edge. And I realised how much I had been unconsciously assuming those things myself. It can be uncomfortable but very teaching to see yourself as others see you.
I had no idea how to respond, and stood there mute, looking away. He gradually quietened down, and as I was getting off the bus, I glanced in his direction. The man sitting next to him, who looked nearly as careworn as he did, had taken his hand and was gently massaging his fingers, and my man with the beer can was leaning against him and, I think, crying. 
And that was where I saw the Communion of Saints, that day. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.