St Jude - saint of hopeless causes

There is a cruel side to each of us which labels people as hopeless cases or causes. The rather 'fun' practise of asking for the help of St Jude (patron of hopeless causes) has a more serious point. The Gospel ethos is that nothing or nobody is beyond hope. Yet how often do we label people as useless or stupid, let alone use terms like 'chav'.

I was really struck on BBC's Question Time last week the BNP leader Nick Griffin made his infamous appearance on the panel. I was struck at how he fused two issues, immigration and the plight of the 'white' working class for his propaganda. (He even tried to fly the flag for Christians which was a bit rich!) I really think that it is crucial that these two issues should be kept as separate.

But there does appear since the mid-1980s to have been a collapse in confidence in the white working class and a loss of aspirating. Maybe it started with the failed Miners Strike of 1984 and the later the emergence of a more middle class Labour Party? Could it be that with an emphasis on university education, apprenticeships and traditional blue collar jobs are seen as second class. In all of this I am not advocating a class system but rather commenting on the lack of hope and aspiration in a section of society. Is it no wonder that people like Nick Griffin feed off this.

Although the churches have made some valiant attempts over the years, much of Christianity remains outside the British working class culture. I suspect that from within this culture the church is seen as just too respectable. In addition, the lack of working class 'hope' is being fed by a drip drip intellectual climate of athiesm and secularisation which at present offers very little to this class culture. I do feel that long-term the churches need to invest much more and fundamentally shift from being a middle class experience to being a working class community. More ASDA less Sainsbury's.

Year B - Proper 20 - The Centre of the Centre - Mark 9.30-37

My own personal reflection of the mission of the Church has coincided nicely with this week's Gospel - Mark 9.30-37. This pivotal part of the narrative marks the end of the Christ's mission and the beginning of his final southward journey to Jerusalem. We are told in the opening verse that Jesus passes through the Galilee anonymously with his disciples. This confirms that he senses that the period of outreach has finished. 'For he was teaching his disciples saying to them - The Son of Man is to betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three after being killed, he will rise again.'

However the disciples dont understand what Jesus is saying. The reality of either Good Friday or Easter seems incomprehensible. Instead on the way to Capernaum the disciples are arguing amonst themselves as to who is greatest? Two little footnotes here with regards to the passage. First, it is the disciples not the Twelve who are having this discussion. There may have been hundreds if not thousands - we are not told. But notice that it is the inner group, the Twelve who are taken aside. Secondly, the return to Capernaum is important too because Jesus begins his ministry there and it seems to in this Gospel the centre of his ministry.

So Jesus returns to the centre. But in many ways the followers are not pyschologically at the centre - at the heart of what it means to follow. Then he does an extraordinary thing - he places at the centre of the centre - a child. 'Then he took a little child and put it among them, and taking it in his arms, he said to them - 'Whosever welcomes one such child in my name, welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me, welcomes not me but the one who sent me.' The adults have been arguing who is the super-follower, whose had the greatest converts, whose done the most miracles, who has walked the most miles. But Jesus puts a child as the greatest.

I've spend a lot time wondering what the next thirty years is going to be like for the Church - nationally and in my own parish. I think we have underestimated the sheer power and influence of secularisation in Britain and the way it has decimated our congregations. The belief used to be that churches would always be filled with grannies and toddlers. The idea was that as people got older they returned to worship. But new research now points to the fact that they are not returning in riper years because they were never here in the first place. We can now speak of three generations of unchurched people. So our supply of returners is drying up.

Yet we are asked by the leadership of the Church to be missionary in our land. We have to be 'fit for mission' and a 'mission shaped' Church with lots of 'Fresh Expressions of Church' and have events like Alpha and 'Back to Church Sunday'. Now I'm not try to poo poo this because there is a lot of inspiratinal stuff here. But I think there needs to a minority report which challenges the presumptions that people are going to return in their droves - if only we make our churches a little bit more user friendly. Also, I sense that in many typical congregations, a small number of people are being asked to run the building, go to the endless meetings, pay the quota to the diocese, and then be evangelists outreaching into the community. And again, many churches do excellent work but many many more struggle.

Could we not at an epoch where we have to say to ourselves - has not this period of mission ended? Is it not the case that the majority of people in our land have not responded to the Gospel. Have we not to quote the psalmist -'Sit down by the rivers of Babylon and weep while we remembered Zion.' Is it not now the time to consolidate, regroup and come back to the centre? I dont think this is defeatist or negative. The greatest moment in our country's military history was Dunkirk - a retreat. If Dunkirk had failed we could have lost the War.

My guess is that our ecclesiastical Dunkirk would involve putting the child at the centre of the centre. By this I mean supporting families who trying to be little churches in their own homes. I dont mean house churches - but rather that we must have many special families in these diocese where Mum and Dad practice and are trying to live out Christian life centred on the home. Because of the age spread of most typical congregations they find it hard to find Sunday worship with people their own age. Their children may be the only children coming on Sunday. Yet surely, these people should be the mainstream not the exception?

So my controversial advice to the bishops is to say that we need to plant in each diocese a number of centres exclusively for families to come and worship. I would envisage that this would mean five to ten churches like this per diocese. Each would have a membership of at least a hundred so that they had the possibility of growth. They need to be this size so that newcomers can come and see what it is like without feeling they stick out. The other reason for a large congregation, (that is beyond the size of the a small 'club') is to draw on a lot more resources that can currently be shared.

For church like the one I lead in Salcombe, it may be that it is not possible to be a centre for families - even with our new reordering. However, thinking outside the box, could we not be a centre for families in the 'high season' where the population goes up from 1800 to 25,000?

Church Reordering

Occasionally I have heard some folks complain about the reordering of the church. Thankfully we havent had the 'pew wars' that other congregations have suffered. 95% of the membership have been behind the plans to reorder the church and many of the elderly parishioners are really excited. But we have had one or two negative comments this summer from non-church people now the building work is in full swing. I do find it hard to get my head around the idea of a pew being a fundamental to someone's faith. Surely what is of greater dignity is the person, made in the image of God, sat on the pew (or chair).

Interestingly enough most churches go through somekind of major reordering every few centuries. These buildings would fall apart is work like this is not done to this. In fact, as the underfloor heating is put in this week the builders have found that a small number of beams supporting the foundation are rotten. The base of the pulpit was completely rotten. (I knew there was a reason I dont use it!) So in our reordering we are able to do things which will ensure that this place of worship survives the next millennium and doesnt collapse into the harbour.

Put on the Armour of God

After ten hours on the road, numerous toddler squabbles, and one or two near misses, we stopped for supper at the Dartmoor Lodge, Ashburton. We were on the final leg of our journey back from Aberdeen. Parking the car, I slumped against the steering wheel, only to hear Nathaniel (3) whisper, ‘Luke – I am your father’.

It’s the best line in cinema (in my opinion) from the Empire Strikes Back (Star Wars), the film that brought us the cosmic struggle to rid the galaxy of the dark side of the Force.

It resonated for me with Ephesians 6. 11-17, my favourite bit of the New Testament, with the injunction to put on the armour of God because ‘of the cosmic powers of this present darkness.’ I like to use it in the baptismal liturgy when the child or adult is anointed with the oil of baptism. I think it is particularly powerful to do when baptising boys because the prevailing British culture wrongly sees the Gospel as something largely for girls. We rarely speak of the Church Militant or being a spiritual warrior for Christ.

Perhaps I should have presided in a suit of armour rather than an alb, stole, and chasuble? There is in fact a mosaic in Ravenna of a beardless Christ dressed as a Roman Soldier. Could we imagine a Ninja Jesus, or a Christ in Khaki battle dress, or Jesus paratrooper?

I am not advocating violence, crusades or some kind of Christian Jihad but rather the idea of the armour of God and the cosmic powers calls us not to sleepwalk in the task of being a Christian in the world? Remember Jesus said to the Pharisees that the kingdom of God was stormed by violent men (and women) and that these violent people were taking from them. In other words God’s revolution was being snatched from the luke warm and given to the enthusiasts for the Gospel. Likewise, the letter to the Ephesians wants us be to tuned into the bigger picture of what the Church is all about. The Church was devised not in committees, vestries or sanctuaries but in the mind of God before creation. The Church is the central instrument of salvation in the World. And as the Church increases her territory so she finds resistance, confrontation, injustice.

The battle that the Church finds itself is not simply against injustices or people who don’t like our religion. The battle, Ephesians is telling us, has an undercurrent. It is a battle for the heart, for imagination, for the soul. It is war of ideas. Even if you find it alien the concept of a devil or a supernatural dark side, believe that we are fighting a war of ideas.

In the news recently has been the passionate debate about the urgency to provide soldiers in Afghanistan with more helicopters, land vehicles, and personal body armour. Having half the kit, is almost pointless. The write of Ephesians clearly calls us to be strong in the Lord by putting on the whole armour. The emphasis here is on the whole, rather than part. All bits of kits are crucial, in many ways it’s a mindset as well as discipline. We need for our armour, a sense of salvation, an understanding of the Scripture in our life, the canniness to know untruth and heresy, and the shield of a mature faith to protect us.


Finally, and core to our armour is the breastplate. This protects the heart and lungs, the core of our being in other words. Ephesians links the breastplate with righteousness. This is not self-righteousness but rather you and me doing the right thing. Abbot Jamison has written a book called Finding Happiness which I would eagerly recommend. He wisely points out that most of us want happiness but when pushed struggle to define it? Monasticism understands it as the pursuit of what is good, namely living a virtuous life. If we do the wrong thing, if we choose the easy path, (or to quote Yoda – choose the ways of the Sith and not the Jedi) then will we know true happiness? Will not our conscience be racked and our spirituality fail? Surely this is at the heart of Jesus’ first sermon the Beatitudes (Matthew 5:1-12) which itself starts with the word ‘Happy’. Happiness is doing the right thing.

I want to end with the words of Soldiers of Christ Arise

Leave no unguarded place, no weakness of the soul,Take every virtue, every
grace, and fortify the whole;Indissolubly joined, to battle all proceed;But arm
yourselves with all the mind that was in Christ, your Head.

Persecuted Christian Churches in Parkinstan

The Archbishop of Canterbury's website points to this petition to the Pakinstan government. People may like to sign it.

Song written by Gerry McFarlane

This song was composed by my late father in-law Gerry Mc Farlane. We are playing it at the Requiem. It is something of a religious song but also contains personal stuff.

Faith, Hope and Charity

Blest with health – a little wealth
Fine family – loving wife
Sitting there in a room that’s bare
Sad and lonely life
Hope in man that he will change
Faith in God that he’ll arrange
Love to fill the hearts of every man

Faith, hope and charity
And the greater of the three is love.

Sitting by your fireside
Sipping on your Martini Dry
Thinking of all the things you would like to buy
By an ailing mother’s side
Watching life slowly passing by
Wiping every tear in every cry

Faith, hope and charity
And the greater of the three is love.

Words and music by Gerry McFarlane

Recent Problems

Please pray for my father-in-law Gerry McFarlance (69) who had a major stroke last month. He is critically ill in Aberdeen Royal Infirmary. Our holiday was interrupted early on and we have had to a lot of travelling back and forth in the last five weeks.

Meditation on the Bread of Life

Bread of Life – Used on the Sunday 8am Homily

I have been reflecting on the Eucharist, and I offer this meditation.

When you look at the crucifix, you understand how much Jesus loved you. When you look at the Sacred Host you understand how much Jesus loves you now.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta

In the past week I have been making bread. I have not employed a bread maker but wanted the experience of mixing the ingredients and kneading the bread. The whole process is ancient, a skill passed for millennia and somewhat mysterious. The smallest constituent, yeast, transforms the whole thing.

Jesus compared the kingdom of God to yeast. When I worry about the diminishing size of congregations, I remember that the yeast.

We are what (or who) God is using to raise everything around us. Our calling is to be yeast in Salcombe, or wherever we call home.

It may even be a mystery to us how God can do this. How can God use me to be his agent of change? In many ways this is not our business or concern. It may come years later, that we appreciate how our very presence changed everything around us.

When you and I leave this service, we carry Christ with us. We have received the bread of life sacramentally. Let us not keep him to ourselves. That would diminish the supreme gift. Somehow, let the joy, grace and peace be something we share.

The Eucharist is a miracle. Let us be a miracle when we leave here.

Trinity Sunday - Patronal Festival

Here are sermon nuggets for tomorrow - Trinity Sunday. I'll make something from this.

• Trinity Sunday - who thought that one up? It's a bit like the BBC deciding to have a broadcasting week! Surely every Sunday is a Trinity Sunday? I don't really understand the logic of this one.
  
• I can't get my head around why preachers sweat at the thought of this topic. Surely everything we proclaim subsists in the Holy Trinity?
  
• The danger is that we treat the subject of the Trinity as an optional extra. It's not as if some bored Early Church theologians thought it up on a rainy day. We cannot jettison the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, yet sometimes we act as if we could. I mean we just dont live it enough. As a remedy I would suggest that we ban the word 'God' for a while from our vocabularly. Instead let us speak of The Father (or 'Abba'), Jesus and Holy Spirit.
  
• Another one is to ban the word 'Church' and speak of 'Body' instead. The more we speak of the 'Body of Christ' the more we might begin to act like it.
  
• The collects from the Prayer Book and Common Worship dont always scratch were it itches with me. All those adjetives sound so parsonical and impersonal. Do you remember the sketch of the school chaplain from Monty Python's film 'The Meaning of Life' ? 'Oooou God you are sooo big. We're jolly impressed down here.' Sometimes these collects sound a bit like this.
  
• Dont get wrong its not a case of God all-matey. But surely the message of the Gospel is that the image of the awesome God stands before us as Jesus? 'I call you not servants but friends'. Through the Cross we have access to the majesty of Christ. Through the incarnation we can see God among us as the infant Christ of Bethlehem. The Eucharist unveils the God of mystery as our food. God touches us with his physical sacraments. The veil of the Holy of Holies has been torn in two.
  
• We are baptised into the name of the Trinity. Anything else is repudiated by orthodox Christianity and the baptism seen as invalid. The Great Commission of Jesus at the end of Matthew's Gospel tells us to baptise the nations in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We are to immerse the world into this mystery. We cant do the job if we are not spiritually immersed in the Trinity itself.
  
• I love all that stuff in The Shack about the Trinity and how the three persons explain that they live in perfect community. Human beings want to be independent of their creator and in doing so fail to be truly themselves.
  
• I appreciate in these rough notes I have not given Scripture references. Of course one of the aunt sally's that is put up is that the Trinity is not scriptural. (Some of the sects like Jehovah Witnesses make this point as does Dan Brown in the DaVinci Code.) But although the technical word 'Trinity' is not there, the relationships of Father, Son and Holy Spirit are there. Jesus for example in the last Supper Dialogue (St John) is quite clear that the Advocate is a person. Paul also speaks of the Spirit in a personal way. Since they are not speaking of an angel or the force from Star Wars, the Church has understood this as the Ruach Ha'Kodesh - the Holy Spirit.

Well I shall offer these little random thoughts to Almighty Everlasting God - Abba, in the hope that something will come together. (Not the Swedish band of Mama Mia fame).

PS Did that MP who claimed for £5 he put in the collection gift aid it. If he did at least we'd get someting extra.

Some Future Priorities for the National Church

My mind often ruminates on matters of home mission or what we now call evangelisation. Recently I have thought that the Church of England needs to change its focus. I appreciate that some of this is happening with the Mission Shaped Church agenda and Fresh Expressions. However, I wonder if all of this still too congregational its philosophy. I suspect that we need to move 90% of our energies into discipleship rather than congregational life. I would foresee three priorities for growth.

(1) Families. Here I propose we need to create a national network of Christian families. What I am about to say may sound rather exclusive but the these families are to be standard bearers. At the heart is the idea that the first church we experience is not a building or even the congregation but a Christian family. This little church - or domus is KEY to the formation of future generations. At present the Church of England does not recognise formally the family as a church. I propose that the fulness of a 'little church' is a family of two practising parents who pray daily together. To join the national network families would have to register go through a period of formation or noviate.

(2) Work. We now need urgently a recognised order for Christians in work or higher education. Members would be excluded from involvement in parish life to prevent burn out. They would follow a rule of life which must involve daily prayer. These people would be visibly Christian. I'm not sure how this is done but the order must quickly be recognised as wearing a Christian symbol. This must be accepted as valid as anyone's else religious atire, eg headscarf, turban, etc. We need so R&D which can come up with something as powerful as the prayer mat. Adoption of a five-fold daily prayer office for example would mean that employees would have to give us time to pray at work. (I have called this 'work' but in reality it could include anyone, employed, unemployed, retired, etc.)

(3) School. These are our biggest resources and we must further their Christian formation. I suggest that primary schools are formally invited to create a network of schools who admit children to holy communion. We need the Eucharist to be celebrated regularly within our primary schools.

For all three networks I suggest that three bishops are ordained to have special jurisdiction over each network. In other words each network is a Anglican equivalent of a personal prelature which operates at a provincial level. These bishops would not have diocese as we understand it but be the Ordinary for these groups. If we can have pioneer priests why not pioneer bishops?

Pentecost Thoughts

When preparing for a sermon I often note down lists of thoughts. Sometimes they are disconnected, other times they form a pattern. With Pentecost Sunday coming there is so much that can be said. Here are some of my random notes:

• Are you part of the New Creation? God through Christ is transforming this world - do we want to be part of that transformation? The great danger is that our spirituality is fixed solely on our own spiritual survival AND therefore we lack any concern for the world around us.
  
• Britain's Got Talent got huge ratings and massive hits on youtube. Has does God equip his Church with talent? I think sometimes when we consider 'gifting' and the Church we tend to think that its all about doing things 'in church' on a Sunday. Life in the sanctuary of Sunday worship is important but not as pivitol as the life we live out Monday to Saturday. What gifts does God give us to live out our Christian life in the real world?
  
• Romans 8. 26: Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. I suspect that the Holy Spirit can do little in us until we admit our weakness. The best prayer surely starts by not knowing how to start? The Church will only get somewhere when it is on its knees. In some cases when we look at Church decline in the UK - maybe the Father is bringing us to our knees. Have we not, as churches, become too focused on our own abilities? That confidence, or smugness, has prevented the Spirit from breaking through. Maybe this is a bit harsh - but I sense that we to regain confidence in God's power to resurrect the Church in Britain.
  
• Romans 8.26b The very Spirit interceeds with sighs too deep for words. If our critics say that we have nothing to offer the world in terms of "spirituality" then what about that sentence? It is a mighty blow for blow argument. God's Holy Spirit wants to rest so deep within in our hearts if we let Him. That relationship will be one beyond words, a connection which is physical, emotional, mental, spiritual.
  
• The image that comes to mind is of a wind-chime. That we are the chime and God is the wind.
  
• Somehow we need to relay that deep spirituality of Romans 8.26 to those outside the boundaries of the institutional Church. People need to know that the well runs very deep - if not infinitely deep.
  
• Spiritual giftedness is something that mainstream churches tend to shy away a bit. I want to consider this for a bit. The clergy maybe are suspicious of losing control to the laity? We have grown up in such a materialistic world view that I suspect churches are worried that talking or experiencing spiritual gifts may be too unpalatable for people outside.
  
• Spiritual giftedness is not some hidden talent we have. It is not like people who claim to be clairvoyants or mind readers. Surely its about how God's Spirit uses us for a ministry? I think that is the essence of the gifts of the spirit which Paul lists. They are there for a purpose and not for vanity.
  
• I knew a lady, who was a hospital cleaner. She had a gift that she barely recognised. Her gift was in being able to be the voice of God's comfort in specific situation. She transformed (I should write this in bold TRANSFORMED) several people's lives by a sentence. Depression literally fell off one person, guilt, anger, ebbed away. And yet, her own life, was one of pain, failure and the loss of a son who suddenly died in his forties. Somehow she was content in God's presence. Its really difficult to explain, but she was, is, a transforming personality.

• The more we relax into the stream of the Holy Spirit consciousness, the more we see the world through His eyes. The more, he prays in us. We begin connect with the heart of God and understand what He gave up on the Cross.
  
• I believe these gifts are for our work in the world and not so much in the Church. That is why is crucial that most active Christians turn attentions away from the inner workings of the church. We must be amateur ecclesiastics not professionals. The Spirit will look after the Church must better than we ever will.
  
• A high-up cleric (I wont say who) recently said that the Church must be made fit for mission. I want to give another point of view. We are fit for mission!!! We dont need massive reorganising. We need deploying. Saying that we must be 'made fit for mission' is saying that we are not fit for mission. In other words we ready or not good enough. I wonder what the average age here is in Salcombe parish church and benefice. Say it is a modest 50. A practising Christian will have gone to 50 x 52 Sunday services in his or her life. Thats 2600 hours of training. An average degree has 3000 hours. Basic training in the army would probably have 1000 hours. So including all the Bible Study groups, special meetings, reading, retreats, how can we say that the Church, including our church, is not fit for mission?
  
• When bishops and priests talk of mission here what they mean is a reconnection of the Christian message and the Church with the nation. Just in case you wonder. It's not about going off to work with folks in other continents.
  
• Some spiritual gifts I believe can also be less obviously supernatural. Many of the Old Testament prophets spoke up for justice, for what is right. They instinctively were led to see a structural evil in the world around them. From their passion for justice flowed imense energy and insight.

Well, that a few nuggets to work on. It's 10.43 and Susan Boyle has not won BGT. I cant help but feel she was built up over a few weeks and then cruely pounced on by the media. Hopefully she will have a brilliant singing career.

120 in a Room

There's a really challenging book by Michael Budde (1997) with the title 'The Magic Kingdom of God - Christianity and Global Culture Industries'. I appreciate that you may be switched off from the title but stay with me on this one. Fr Michael is an American priest and lecturer who was hired by the Catholic bishops in a certain state the 1990s to create a strategy to rededicate efforts on confronting poverty in the States. I sensed that what they wanted to buy into was a new lobbying initiative or perhaps a special conference on the subject. I'll give you words..

"I told them that they should attempt to take every parishioner in their state
on an intensive retreat, with follow-up programs upon their return.
Nothing the Church could do would benefit the poor people more, I argued, that
to energise, and inspire."

He felt that without attempts to convert the baptised the stranglehold on self-interest and isolation. Religious indifference, he said would continue to "throttle" church attempts to deal seriously with poverty in a global capitalist order. He was fired.

The days from Ascension to Pentecost mark the period in which the first believers stayed together in one room and waited, and waited, and waited. The Acts of the Apostles tells us there were 120 of them. Imagine that! 120, in one room. You can see from Big Brother episodes what a dozen people are like in fairly nice house, so 120 in one room is something else.

The crucial thing is that they didnt just get the Holy Spirit after Jesus left. It wasn't instant. They had to endure these ten days. Sometimes were have to submit ourselves to God in this way. We have to sit and wait. We have to offer the time we have to Him who made time. In doing so we are acknowledging what we receive is His gift and not our right. The simple act of waiting is a process of purification.

I was trying to think of a mission strategy one day and a priest friend of mine said this to me 'pray them in Father'. Secretly I scoffed at what sounded like a pious solution. But for years now that phrase has stuck. 'Pray them in.' We've been challenged to grow by 25% in two years in this diocese. How are we going to do this? Its great to have lots of strategies for church growth, well certainly need to wise-up. But what this priest is telling me is that the MAJOR work will be done in prayer. Let me repeat that - the MAJOR work will be done in prayer.

This might sound a bit scary, if not daunting. It is a bit like when we read John 17 (which we do at the Sunday Gospel today) and think that prayer of Jesus at the Last Supper is really long and complicated. We then begin to say to ourselves, 'I could never pray like that.' Or maybe we think to ourselves, I'll leave that sort of prayer to the vicar and the people who are experts in that sort of thing.

Prayer is not so much about words, but about what we dare to give to God. The prayer of waiting, like those early disciples, is the prayer of entering into quietness, silence, boredom, and fear that God will not respond. Just a sort of sponsored silence. It is then, in his own time, that God smiles on the patient and works his miracles. Consider if a congregation like this (Malborough - this Sunday) we went into ten days of prayer. Maybe we even locked ourselves up in this building. How would we expect to be changed at the end of it? What vision would God give us for what we do with the Gospel, let alone the biggest building in the South Hams?

The caterpillar never becomes a butterfly unless it goes into its cocoon.

I dont know if those 120 in that Jerusalem room had the slighest inkling of what coming. But I know that if they hadn't stayed - nothing would have happened.

How to clear a Restaurant

It used to be said that a cleric collar was the perfect way to clear a railway carriage, since few want to sit next to a clergyman/woman. I'd like to add to that- "two full of beans" toddlers and a cleric collar ensures total success in clearing some restaurants.

Pentecost - The Second Big Bang

When astronomers examine the cosmos they now believe they can see see the debris of the Big Bang explosion which threw matter all around the universe at its inception. ( In one sense all matter in the universe is part of that debris.) The manner in which galaxies and vast nebulea have been thrown around testify to the enormous amounts of energy that was released.

When we celebrate Pentecost we are remembering a second act of creation, another sort of 'Big Bang'. God the Holy Spirit descends upon the apostles and those in the Upper Room and they are given power to testify to the good news of Jesus Christ. So powerful and profound is the experience that 'tongues of flames' are seen resting upon them. Within a short space of time the number of believers increases into the thousands and soon the message is carried around the world.

Many people have described this feast, often called Whitsun, as the birth of the worldwide Church. In my large parish we used to buy a big cake and put thirteen candles on it and have it after the service. Pentecost over the years has sadly become the Cinderella service and we are in danger of losing its potency. For me it particularly special since I was ordained priest on Pentecost Sunday. For others it can be a time to renew their faith or make a new faith commitment.

Astonomers use powerful telescopes to see the evidence of the Big Bang. Much of this evidence is remote and needs a lot of computation. But for Christians the 'Big Bang' at Pentecost has more visible after effects, lives are changed and transformed. Lets hope that others will see from us that God is alive and active, in our explosive generous love.

Daniel
Vicar

Celebrating the Vigil

Saturday's evening service (6.30pm) is called the Easter Vigil. It's a new service for many Anglicans and heralds the official beginning of Easter. If you havent been before come and see. In this candlelit service we hear well known stories from the Bible, renew our baptismal vows and the receive Holy Communion.

If we could travel back in time to the fourth century we would find God's Church at the cusp of massive growth in the dying days of the Roman Empire. After a period of horrific persecution the Church was legalised by the new Emperor, Constantine and believers found new freedoms. Many in the church however were unsure as to how to deal with the large numbers of pagans seeking baptism. Was it simply fashion or were they genuine? Some felt that all this populism was diluting the historic faith and went off to the desert looking for a 'purer' exercise of discipleship. The Easter Vigil is a product of that time and is well documented by for example, St Ambrose.

For candidates for baptism this was the highlight of their spiritual journey and the occasion in which they were baptised. It was at this service that they were anointed and heard the Bible stories of salvation. The evidence is that the liturgy went through the night. Men and women were baptised fully into baths in separate rooms. They were then presented dressed in white to the overseer (bishop) who lay hand on them to confirm and seal the work of the Holy Spirit. They then were finally initiated via Holy Communion. Up until then none of them would have seen the Eucharist since it was done in private. In fact much of their journey was carefully planned exposing them bit by bit to the service. In the Orthodox Church they still dismiss the catechumens after the sermon with the words 'The doors the doors'. (There is a story that Metropolitan Anthony, the Russian bishop in London, had a chill in the cold church and intoned; 'The doors the doors - shut the bloody doors!')

Now we find ourselves in Britain in a less religious more secular country and the rites of the Church need to accomodate this. Large sections of the population remain unbaptised and common language of the Faith is becoming less and less familiar. On this Good Friday in Salcombe we had our procession with wooden cross around town. As we moved to Chapel End a young lad shouted out. "Has someone's died?". I replied 'Jesus'. He promptly ran back into the house 'Mum's Jesus is dead!'. I added, shouting over the fence, 'Dont worry on Sunday he rises?' According to researchers in this field we are now talking of three generations of de-churched people. The task for us is really challenging.

The Easter Vigil calls us to use our imagination, to rediscover liturgies which enchant. It also calls us to take seriously the task of journeying with people seeking faith.

Good Friday Blog

Sorry folks its been a while since I blogged.

'I hate Jesus of Nazareth' was one of those lines you dont easily forget. A fellow and rather loud student burst into our common room, made the comment and ran off. This was 1993 and I had set up Franco Zeferreli's TV-movie in the seminary common room during Holy Week. (You know the one with Robert Powell - isnt he now in Holby City rather than the Holy City?) It was obsviously not to everyone's tastes and some staff made grunted comments that I was competing with the programme of liturgies they had set up. I had put this on because I felt that our ceremonies and rites had become a performance. Our endless rehearsals were almost too perfect, too anodine, too precise and I wasnt get much out of it.

Films like 'Jesus of Nazareth' or 'The Passion of the Christ' remind us that if we as Christians are not touched by the story of Good Friday then we are in trouble. It is all too easy for us as clergy and all those involved in preparing liturgies to be get so caught up in the planning and the details that we dont get anything out of it.

I recall as a deacon in my first year of ministry collapsing on the sofa Good Friday afternoon. It was 1998 and I was exhausted from the packed programme our busy parish had to offer. I channel hopped until I got to BBC1 where they were showing Ben Hur. Again, one of my favourite films, it goes on a bit, but it powerfully puts over the story of the Cross. At the point of crucifixion (Charlton Heston was saying something profound) the camera pans in on Jesus in agony, dying, thunder, lightning. Then to my initial annoyance a ticker tape runs underneath, with a news item. C'mon BBC, get this off! Not now! But I read closely. 'Northern Ireland peace talks concluded with agreement'. 'By his wounds we have been healed' says Charlton Heston/Ben hur. (I feel weepy even writing this.) And suddenly, that was it! Good Friday touched me, lanced me, threw me at Golgotha. Wham Bam!

And that, and many other thoughts , lead to believe that this, not Christmas, or Easter, is the greatest day of the year. We talk of being 'moved'. 'Being moved' speaks of a powerful emotional experience. It's a good expression, because it shows that being touched emotionally is not just a feeling but about doing something with that. In Good Friday, God through Jesus, moves us so that we can move. Martin Luther King said that love without power is mere sentiment. The power of Good Friday is what God does for us.

Yet, if we are not move, nothing will move. If we are not touched by the Gospel then how can we expect anyone else to be?