Being Church

Sunday Sermon - summary (Proper 18) Romans 13. 8-14 & Matthew 18.15-20

On paper it was a good sized vibrant congregation in an affluent suburb. Yet it hit the headlines not for its potential success but for the resignation of the young priest. The front page of regional tabloid read 'You lot are awful'! On the last Sunday the priest placed a damming editorial in the parish magazine which was subsequently leaked to the press. It hit the nationals a few days later. Journalists were able to come in and stir things up further with anonynmous quotes "he's reduced the congregation from 400 to 30" , "we're glad to see the back of him" and 'he was more interested in what happened in India parish link than here'. With division over doctrine this evangelical church tore itself apart. Church mediators were brought in unsuccessfully and the priest began to be signed off for stress. It was a shame that (a) he had to put in his article in the parish magazine clandestinely and (b) that there wasnt an attempt at serious reconciliation from the aggrieved group in the pews. The greatest shame was that a capable priest left ministry. I would like to underline the word 'left' a hundred times.

Years ago, I was at a jubilee anniversary of a Kent RC priest. He was (is) a bit eccentric, very much someone who tows the party line, loves the latin rite, etc. Yet people love him in the parish and liberals and conservatives get along and wave to each other through the clouds of incense. At this Mass he preached one line which was something like this - "If in 25 years of ministry I have wronged anybody then I truly apologise and however long ago this was would be willing to make up." I was dumbfounded.

A recent Church of Scotland ministries report said that congregation more and more are relying on mediation to try and repair divisions. It is a terrible shame if things get to this point. No doubt the pressures of a fast-paced aged with lots of change add to this. Churches in my experience experience disunity over doctrine, architecture, liturgy, leadership and youth. A good example might be a congregation divided over the removal of pews or the introduction of a woman priest. Sometimes these divisions have their roots in long long history. Other times the division is more to do with a clash in mission values.

The words of Christ in Matthew's gospel call us to consider what it means to be a congregation at peace with each other. The emphasis is to be proactive even when we feel we are wronged. The alternative is let things boil under the surface and for cliques to develop and their to be a lot backbitting. Whatever the wrongs or rights of any conflict Christian communities have a very serious commitment to being places of love, peace and harmony. To quote the song "We are one in the Spirit" - "And they'll know we are Christians by our love." Or to use the words of Terullian, the most cutting of early Church fathers, "See how those Christians love each other." This love will say more than any hundred carefully crafted sermons or beautifully arranged liturgies.

No wonder Paul says put on Christ, put on the armour of light. If we are not different, then God help us, everything is in vain.

A final story, a cautionary tale from thirty years ago. After some battles a church decided not to introduce the sign of the peace. Too many people within the pews loathed this new ritual. Above the church porch was a sign to inform visitors that this rite was out of their liturgy it read "There is no peace in this church."

1968

Sunday 31st August 2008 Romans 12. 9-21 Matthew 16.21-28

I was born in the age of new revolutions, new ideals and new liberty. 1968! French students nearly brought down their goverment, Martin Luther King spoke of seeing the promised land, and masses protested against the Vietnam War. Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Roy Jenkins, pronounced that we lived in permissive society, and the old morals and certainties of the past seemed to many very outdated. Now was the time to live day by day and make love not war. Yet the Age of Aquarius never arrived; the Prague Spring was broken by Soviet invasion, the student strikes came to nothing, Martin Luther, Bobby Kennedy, were assasinated, Nixon was elected.

Beyond the 1960s the age of ideals seemed far away, if not something comical and farsical. In Britain next ten years seemed even bleaker, with fuel crises, three day weeks, and strikes. When my grandparents returned from two years in Belgium, the collapse of the value of the pound decimated what little savings they had. The saving grace was that the hey days of the 1960s had meant that they had quickly payed off their mortgage.

Another ten years down later and I was starting university and my generations version of the 1960s was in full swing. The Berlin Wall collapsed and with it the Soviet presence and the spectre of World War Three. TV and Computer technology was changing the way we thought of the world. Round the clock news meant we could watch minute by minute the first Gulf War unfold. The media or medium was becomming the message and institutions, political parties, and even royality, had to wake up to a new reality.

Our attentions were caught on a new kind of free marketism which taught us that if you wanted a job you had to study very hard and think less of changing the world. With no guarantees of employmet we became studius. Noses to the grind stone and less protesting, and no student sit ins.

Within that period of late 80s, early 90s, I began to be nagged by a feeling of vocation. Yet like many of my generation, I felt, and still do feel, a stranger in the Church, an outsider looking in. At Sixth Form, few of my classmates had anything to do with Christianity. Over a generation the church which had confidently planted new buildings seemed to be wobbling. A generation before most middle class Britains went to church and a good section of their children went to Sunday School. I went to Canterbury to study computing half thinking I would find answers. in a place of pilgrimage. I did make lots of Christian friends. But I found the Cathedral to be something of a Disney park (sorry) lacking warmth. And at that time , 1988, the student chaplaincy, which one would have expected to be bursting, had about 20-30 members.

At the end of a Decade of Evangelisation, three years ordained, I personally wondered where we we where spiritually as a nation. The "decade" seemed a daft idea, a bit like the BBC having a day of broadcasting. It was not helped by national leadership on the millennium which seemed to want to take Anno Domini out of it and make it a secular knees up, a bit like 'community sing-song' in Brave New World. The new century dawned in all kinds of visions and ideals and things seemed up-beat. Then on September 11th New York American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175 changed our mood of optism. A new iron curtain seemed to be rising which tore across civilisations, religions and cultures.

I can see much of the optimism of 1968 in Romans 12 but I think that the reality of being a Christian (and growing a Christian presence) has to be rooted in discipleship. (Matthew 16) It's easy to claim rights or speak of love and tolerance and forget sacrifice and duty. The apostles, like Peter, probably expected some kind of snap revolution which would bring down the Romans either by blood or flower power. Jesus' path to Jerusalem indicated another, more profoud way. Love, to paraphrase McCartney, 'may be all we need', but that love has to be rooted in the Cross of the Saviour. Has the Christian community in this country really appreciated this over 40 years? Or was it something that we tried to jettison so as to make the message more user-friendly? Time will tell.

Each generation has its own challenges, joys and grief. The baby boomers of 1968 are now approaching retirement and they have their own legacy, good and bad. People like me now find myself sitting at desks actually incharge of something and thinking 'How does this work?' and 'What can I say of any use?' and 'Am I middle aged?' Beyond all my pessimism and efforts to rubbish 1968, I find a sacred place within and without which prompts me to see that God will not abandon us and the Body of Christ, despite it efforts, will succeed.

Hope Cove Weekend

The Hope Cove Weekend starts on Saturday just as the August Bank Holiday swings in. I'm told this is the busiest weekend of the year. The church is holding a very informal half-hour service at 11am on Sunday down by the Hope and Anchor. Why not come and join us.