Sin is life unlived

Posted on 09/07/2010 by Rambling Rector

I watched Chocolat on TV the other day. I’m not that keen on chocolate—I like salty things more, always have—but I liked the film. Profoundly spiritual, you might say it’s a story of redemption by chocolate. In case you don’t know, the story goes something like this. A freethinking woman arrives in a repressed French town and sets up a chocolate shop. A woman without a man, a woman from outside the community—that’s already enough to scandalise the locals, most of whom are of the ‘my family have lived in this village since 1568’ mindset. (Sound familiar?). She has—horror of horrors—an illegitimate daughter who is bright and cheerful. Can it get any worse? Yes it can, and it does: worst of all is that she is passionate and enjoys life. Some people just don’t like others having a good time. It comes as a big shock to the ladies in the film who enjoy ill health. It threatens the mayor’s power who does his best to ruin things for the newcomers, and who terrorises the parish priest into saying only what the Mayor approves. The newcomer uses her chocolaterie skills to make friends. She becomes a confidante. Over the delights of chocolate, people start talking to her and each other about their dreams and fears, joys and sorrows. Repression lifts, new life dawns. There’s a great moment near the end when the Mayor himself falls victim to his sensual humanity by pigging out on chocolate, falling asleep in the chocolate shop window. It’s reminiscent of the downfall of the odious killjoy Mr Bulstrode in Middlemarch, and quite as satisfying. Perhaps the best bit of the film is when the camera cuts from a scene in which the consecrated wafer at Mass is placed on the communicant’s tongue to the next scene when a chocolate delicacy is placed on the salivating tongue of a customer. That says it all, really.

The story is about liberation from small-mindedness, from ties that bind. It’s about allowing ourselves to be led into a place of wide vision where we take delight and create delight for others. This is Hebrew salvation: salve, save, salaam, shalom (the words are all related), wholeness, security, peace. Chocolate liberates the gutsy love of life in that French community, and this is what the Christian Gospel is all about. It’s what the consecrated wafer at Mass can do for us—if we let it, or maybe I should say if we stop preventing it. Why is it that so many people think the Christian message is all and only about ‘that shalt not’? This is a terrible reflection on churchgoers, some of whom in the past, and maybe in the present, do nothing but finger-wag and criticise others. I apologise for them. I pity them. I’ve said it before, and I say it again, paraphrasing early Churchmen, God became human so that humans might become divine. The glory of God is a human life lived to the full. Dumitru Staniloae, a 20th century Romanian theologian, writes: ‘the glory to which man is called is that he should grow more godlike by growing ever more human.’ And again, ‘Love for God, or more strictly, thought taken for God, represents a continuous contribution toward more and more authentic relations among humans.’ These authentic relations come from talking to one another about our dreams, our fears, our joys, our sorrows. In the words of the priest in Chocolat: ‘we can’t go around … measuring our goodness by what we don’t do, by what we deny ourselves, what we resist, and who we exclude. We’ve got to measure goodness by what we embrace, what we create … and who we include.’ Yes, yes, yes! As we prepare for Well dressings and carnivals and fairs and summer holidays, it’s good to remember that Our Lord came so that we might have life, and have it in abundance. Enjoy what the Divine Lord provides for you, and help others to do likewise. Sin is life unlived. What is your chocolat?

Vulcan, Gaia and Homer

Posted on 09/05/2010 by Rambling Rector

In April, Susan and I were getting ready for our hols to see family in Texas. We were to be joined at Newark airport by ‘our’ Ed from Dublin. There were plans for a road trip into Colorado, visits here and there, and—by no means unimportant—at least one Texan steak. Rarely had so much hope been pinned on so short a holiday by so many. There was, I have to confess, a certain smugness in me: ‘ha ha, suckers, we’ll be having a good time while you lot are suffering from politician-itis’. Well, girls and boys, the day before we were due to depart a volcano erupted. And kept on erupting. You can guess the rest: no US trip for us. Who’s smug now? It was like a bereavement, and one that had to be grieved for, but we had it easy compared to some who were stranded in less than comfortable surroundings, and others who had to make their way home by all sorts of means—exciting maybe but doubtless expensive. What did I learn from this? I suppose what I should have learnt is not to be smug. No chance. It was good for me to have it thrust in my face that pinning all my hopes on some event in the future is foolish: it may not happen. Many of us spend too long regretting the past and looking forward to the future, so we miss out on the present. To living in the present is to live out of time—no before, no after, just now. That is eternal life: quality of life, not quantity.

Let’s imagine the planet is alive. It needs to let off steam from time to time, its volcanoes being just like pores on our skin that every now and then shove out secretions. Volcanoes as blackheads, or pustules. Now, if God created the cosmos—and Holy Scripture tells us God did—and if God said ‘it was very good’— and Holy Scripture tells us God said just that—volcanoes must be part of God’s plan. Oh, what a surprise! The world does not revolve around humanity, and certainly not around me (a hard lesson, that). Uncertainty rules in your and my lives just as much as it rules in subatomic physics.

If you don’t like my fantasy, maybe you prefer a story from the author of the Sherlock Holmes stories. In When the world screamed (you can read it on the web), Conan Doyle saw the earth as a living creature that took unkindly to engineers drilling eight miles into its surface. Now in 2010 we have warnings of the potential hazards of drilling into the seabed, with the possibility of the drill releasing pressure under the earth’s crust and causing a cataclysm that wipes out species left, right and centre. We have, too, the reality of oil slicks in the Gulf of Mexico. As Sugar Kane (M Monroe) said in Some like it hot (has there ever been a better film?), ‘it makes a girl think’.

One heartwarming result of the volcanic eruption was the insurance companies suddenly discovering a belief in God. What’s the relationship between the laws of nature, which we haven’t yet fathomed, and God? Are they the same? Read John 1 in the cultural context of the time. Obviously, since God created the cosmos, God also created its laws. Is God more than this? What is the cosmos in? In my humble opinion, we can only deal with these issues in metaphors: scientific metaphors like black holes, spherical universes, big bangs, expanding universes, and theological metaphors like creation, and eternal, and Divine Wisdom, and Divine love. As someone trained as a medical zoologist, I see no conflicts, but rather lots of connexions. Life is all about consequences of action or inaction—‘just stuff that happens’ as that well-known theologian Homer Simpson says—and Christianity is not so much about what happens, but rather about how we cope with it, with ourselves and with each other as it happens.

What future for the church?

Posted on 09/03/2010 by Rambling Rector

Look ahead 10, 20, 30 years. Who will be in church for regular services? Will it still be open? Early Christians met in each other’s houses, so why did churches develop? One of the reasons was to have enough space as numbers grew, and to have a place common to all where skills could be harnessed to the glory of something bigger than humanity. A drawback of meeting in people’s homes was that the hosts started to claim that they were more important because they were the host. Issues of possessiveness crept in (too much ‘self’ again). That’s why many clergy, myself included, don’t like meetings to be always in the same person’s house, and why church things shouldn’t be kept in people’s homes except as a last resort. Churches, church halls and vicarages are neutral territory, open and available to all. How can we make them more available? In days gone by, churches were used for public meetings, dances, entertainments, fairs, parties, and so on. Some still are: it’s good to see churches used for concerts, teas, community events. But … what will church services be like in 10, 20, 30 years’ time? Will there be any? Will the church still be available for weddings and funerals? What do we need to do to secure the church’s future as a centre of Christian spiritual sustenance? Does anyone care?

As a priest, I’m always conscious that because of their experiences, many people see me as a finger- wagging killjoy. Some people see me as divorced from reality, living in my own little world, experiencing daily two-way communication with an imaginary friend. Some people see me as a danger to society for all sorts of reasons. Perceptions like this influence the future of church. I suspect that a fair number of people don’t come because it intimidated them—or worse—when they were young. We cannot ignore these perceptions if the church is to survive, let alone prosper. What do people think we get up to? Perhaps they think we sacrifice virgins on the altar—after all, we eat flesh and drink blood, do we not? Lots of people say that church is full of hypocrites (please join us: there’s always room for one more). But if they came, would they be welcomed without being pointed at? Would they be able to hear? Would they be uplifted by the liturgy and the music? Would they get a glimpse of heaven?

Rights and responsibilities

Posted on 09/03/2010 by Rambling Rector

I heard a woman on the radio recently saying that we should work shorter hours. I wonder how well farm animals would take to being left to their own devices (do they have devices?) until the farmer had had his (or her) beauty sleep, leisurely shower, gelled his (or her) hair, and finished a fry-up and cafetière. It’s easy to point out the holes in the idea. But maybe there is something in it, after all. If we worked shorter hours, the lady said, we’d have more time to tend our families so there might be fewer family breakdowns and child-rearing problems. We’d have less money to waste on things we don’t need; we’d consume less so there’d be less waste and environmental damage. We’d be better citizens, more mindful of our place in society, and less concerned with me, me, me. You can see her argument. It’s a timely call, as Lent is upon us, to reassess the way we live and think, and to chuck out what we don’t need any more, in order that new ideas have room to sprout in our hearts and minds, just as they are doing in the earth. Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden is about just this. Look what happened when Mary and Colin were forced to ditch their prejudices and fixed false beliefs—when they were forced to confront reality. If you haven’t read the book or seen the film, I recommend you do.

Being less concerned about me, me, me is what part of the Lord’s Prayer is about. The phrase that goes ‘lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil’ might just as well be translated ‘save us from ourselves and the demons that tempt us’. It’s pretty powerful stuff, and spot-on psychologically. Save us from ourselves. Writing about the Lord’s Prayer—taught by a Jewish teacher to his Jewish mates—makes me wonder about its future. The days are long gone when Vicars could expect people at weddings, funerals or baptisms to know it, in any translation. It has not routinely been taught in non-Church state schools for 30 years or so. What can we do about it? If parents want their children to know the Lord’s Prayer, it’s up to them to teach it, or else come to church with the children. Responsibility shifts to the individual family. This is the reverse of what’s happening in matters of health where personal responsibility is so often rejected on the assumption that the health service will look after us. ‘It’s my right to get drunk if I want to’ (I’ve heard it said), and presumably ‘I’ have a right to expect the medics to cope with the fatal, messy, bloody, and desperately unpleasant liver disease that I give myself. Absolute rubbish. I wonder how this squares with Christ’s teaching that we should take responsibility for ourselves.

Resolutions, earth to liberation

Posted on 09/01/2010 by Rambling Rector

I don’t know what to write. I asked she-who-must-be-obeyed for ideas. She said ‘write about new year resolutions, and how if we’ve made any and already broken them, we might like to try making some that are realistic.’ Or words to that effect. Why do we set ourselves unreasonable targets? Wouldn’t it be better to accept ourselves for what we are, and set reasonable targets? In my last letter I wrote that the best Christmas present would be to accept ourselves and each other as we are. To be aware of our own gifts and skills and faults and failings means that we have our feet firmly planted on the earth. The Latin word for earth is humus (as any gardener knows), so this is humility. It has nothing to do with grovelling. Rejoice in your gifts and skills, and be aware of your failings. And then, look carefully at how your qualities affect what you do, and how you do it. All this is part of mindfulness.

If you watch Gavin and Stacey (and if you don’t, you should) you see a group of people, at the same time both ordinary and extraordinary, who simply accept each other for what they are. They don’t try to change each other, and they don’t force each other to do what they don’t want to do. Many of us are assailed by the expectations of others who want us to do what we are not comfortable doing. We are fools to try and satisfy them. It never works when we try and force a square peg into a round hole: we end up harming both peg and hole. Of course, we live in an imperfect world, and we sometimes have to try and please the boss if we want to be paid, and so on, so there are bargains to be struck, but there comes a point when we have to accept that peg and hole are just not compatible.

This is not all about self. We need to be aware of the relationship between self and society. We all have our part to play, so we can’t just do what we want without considering our impact on other people. Most of society’s problems result when what ‘I’ want takes precedence over what anybody else wants— ‘because I’m worth it.’ What a load of rubbish! But when we succeed in matching the peg to the hole and play to our strengths, we are able to let the divine light in each of us shine out to light the way for others. ‘And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.’ (Marianne Williamson). If you’ve got it, flaunt it—for the benefit of the world!

How many Christmas presents have already been chucked out? When will we realise that fulfilment is an attitude of mind, and not a product of a new kitchen, or a new 3-piece suite, or anything we buy from St Tesco’s or St Asda’s? Eternal life is what I’m talking about. Eternal does not mean everlasting, and neither does it mean life after death. It means timeless, outside time, independent of time. It means living in the present moment, not fretting about past or obsessing about future. We can’t control the future—we are not in control of anything, and the sooner we realise that, the better. We can’t control our biological processes and as we see from recent events we can’t control the weather or what is happening on or beneath the earth’s crust.

Accepting that I can control nothing is liberating. It frees me from trying to be in control and perfect— which is just as well since I am an imperfect muddle. It frees me from trying to impose my will on others—which is just as well since I might be wrong (a hard admission, that!). It’s a recognition that I’m human and will one day shuffle off this mortal coil. This is what Ash Wednesday is about: ‘dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return.’ Some people think this is gloomy. Not for me. I think Ash Wednesday is a wonderful festival of being human. To be reminded of our mortality reminds us to put the past to bed, stop fretting about the (uncontrollable) future, and to get on with the here-and-now, moment by moment, allowing each other to shine for the good of all and the glory of the Creator. I do not find this at all easy. Maybe I need to stop trying.

All I want for Christmas is …

Posted on 09/12/2009 by Rambling Rector

The Church of England has advised us to stick to cash this Christmas in order to deal with the so-called credit crunch. Without ranting on again about the greedy money merchants who largely got us into the mess, it’s worth remembering that we’re all susceptible to seductive advertising, and tempted to spend more than we can afford. At least I am. If I stick to cash, I can’t spend what I haven’t got. And we don’t need to buy each other expensive things. Last month, I asked you what you really, really want, and suggested that our wanting new things, or a new job, or a new relationship might be pointing to more fundamental needs: a search for a spiritual home, coping with disappointments and lost opportunities, or the need to accept yourself—just as you are. Maybe that’s the best Christmas gift you can give yourself: to accept yourself for what you are, warts and all. And maybe that’s the best Christmas gift you can give someone else: to accept them for what they are, warts and all. We are all human.

Being human is what the Christmas story is all about. At Christmas, divinity meets humanity. Heaven meets earth. Drop down, ye heavens, from above. The divine enters fully into every aspect of human life. Think of the mess of the birth: Mary, Jesus, baby, blood, umbilical cord, placenta. No sterile wipes, gas- and-air, midwives. If the mess of being human is good enough for the Holy Family, it’s good enough for holy you and holy me. We have no need to be ashamed of being human. We have no need to feel ashamed of our human urges, human emotions, human despair or human joy—all this is part of the divinity of living human life to the full. Our job is to channel our human urges and emotions, our despair and joy, into ways that increase the sum total of delight in the world for ourselves and for others. Because we’re human, we make mistakes, but there’s another part of the Christian story that deals with that. At this time of year we celebrate being human. As St Irenaeus said, God became what we are, in order that we may become what he himself is. … The glory of God is a living person and human lived to the full is the vision of God. The Christmas Gospel tells us that we all have the power to become sons and daughters of God. Relax into being yourself. Get rid of the ‘shoulds’ and ‘oughts’ (too much butter leads to hardening of the arteries, and too many ‘oughts’ leads to hardening of the ‘oughteries’), and be yourself, bringing as much delight as you can into the world.

For me, it is the joy of celebrating human-ness that powers worship: human creativity leading to good sounds, good sights, lovely smells and ordered liturgy and ritual, all directed at something bigger than I can comprehend. Ordered rituals say something that words and thoughts are unable to reach. If you were brought up, as many of us were, to think that church is about obeying rules for no good reason, then I’m sorry. Do you remember playing with model cars in your sandpit, or whatever the equivalent is for girls? Well, the church’s rituals are, amongst other things, about liturgical play in a divine sandpit. Maybe all this is one reason why churches are full for Carol Services and Midnight masses.

Remembrance 2009

Posted on 09/11/2009 by Rambling Rector

November and remembrance go together, unfortunately and sadly. Remember the stupidity of warfare. Remember how killing never achieves anything other than increased bitterness. Maybe what we really, really want is forgiveness. We need to forgive the wrongs of others. Let go of them, without retribution. Resentments in you and me don’t hurt the person that did us wrong—they hurt ourselves. They grow inside, a cancer of the mind, making us bitter and twisted. As surely as any malignancy, they destroy us. What’s the point in that? And we need to forgive ourselves for the daft things we’ve done. If the Divine Lord is a headmaster who insists on the punishment fitting the crime, then I’m give up this vicaring malarkey and become a pagan. I like Cardinal Hume’s image of God: someone into whose ear you can whisper all the things you’re afraid and ashamed to tell anyone else, and know that you will not be rejected. Like the gracious father of the two sons (one ‘prodigal’, the other mean). So whisper your shame and regrets, throw the past behind you and move on, resolved to withstand evil.

The poppies of Flanders fields appeared because the trenches and tanks of warfare churned up the ground and provoked dormant seeds to life. We can hope that the turmoil of confronting grief and resentments will allow dormant seeds to flower within us. Who knows what wonderful things might result? This is healing. It’s not about medical cure, but about accepting the truth of the situation we’re in and gathering strength to move on. This I know for certain: we can’t move on until we acknowledge the reality of where we start from, and identify what we really, really want. And that takes me back to the beginning of this month’s ramble. Jesus said what do you want me to do for you? Ask and you will receive.

Harvest gifts

Posted on 09/10/2009 by Rambling Rector

It’s easy in Derbyshire to see the fruits of the earth as harvest, and farmers and gardeners as heroes. And so they are. But let’s remember too that our minds have a harvest: stories, art, sculpture, music, well-dressings—craftsmanship of every kind. Harvest of the intellect and skills and effort. And tending the sick and injured, and teaching those who want to be taught—harvesting of souls and minds. Over the last few months at Barlow church we’ve acquired a beautiful new (to us) cope which you’ll see at funerals, a votive candle stand and thurible—harvest of embroiderer and metalworker. And now both church have seats, toys and a table for children to use at the back of church. This is preparing for a harvest, planting seeds for the future, without which the church is certain to fade away.

Harvest festivals were invented in the nineteenth century by a Cornish Vicar who wrote the Cornish ‘national’ anthem (A good sword and a trusty hand, a merry heart and true; King James’s men shall understand what Cornish lads can do …). He saw that church was largely irrelevant to the people, and used Harvest as a way of bringing them back together. Nothing much changes. Any ideas on connecting church and local community today?

Enjoy all the fruits of harvest. Enjoy life. Have trust. Have hope. And help your enemies to do likewise: this might involve showing them the truth.