Sermon given on 20th October 2019

Readings: Genesis 32: 22 – 31   Luke 18: 1 – 8

Yesterday, with the eyes of the world upon us, a decisive victory was won: a victory which will restore our credibility on the international stage; a victory which will have an important bearing on our future standing among our neighbours; a victory which was clearly right and proper.

I am, of course, referring to England’s triumph against the Aussies in the Rugby world cup – a welcome distraction from anything else that may have been going on back home!
And if “perseverance” was a hallmark of that particular match – and of certain individual players within it – it’s also an underlying theme in the various readings set for today.

Firstly, there’s Jacob – who struggles all night against the unknown challenger, whom he then understands to be God himself. In doing so he wins the stranger’s blessing – achieving through sheer determination and perseverance what he had previously tried to win by deceit:
you’ll remember that he had cheated his brother Esau out of his birthright by deceiving their blind father, Isaac into giving him his blessing instead. And he’s only alone at the beginning of this struggle because he’s sent the company ahead to try and appease Esau before the brothers meet. And so he has to earn his redemption by his own perseverance.
And then Luke gives us the parable of the judge and the persistent widow. The judge in question is not exactly diligent – he’s not much bothered with the woman’s concerns, but he is evidently unsettled by here, to say the least. She’s keeps pestering him: one translation has him saying “I will grant her justice, otherwise she will keep coming at me” and, in Nicholas King’s typically blunt translation, “if I don’t grant her justice, she will give me a black eye”!

Whatever the cause of her grievance and the strength of her case, clearly this poor widow is not going to give up.

And I want to just step away from the story for moment – to run a bit further with the notion of perseverance – which, in other people, can be both admirable and severely irritating.

Saint Teresa of Calcutta – whose anniversary of beatification was also celebrated yesterday – once famously caused mayhem in a Lindon Marks and Spencer’s food hall.
Having filled a trolley to the brim, and having allowed the cashier to process all those items, she then simply stood and repeated, loudly that the food was for the poor. Eventually the harassed woman on the till called her manager and the harassed manager agreed to donate the goods that this persistent nun had selected. Good news indeed for the poor – perhaps not so much fun for the staff involved – and no doubt absolutely infuriating for the people in the queue behind her!

And that brings into focus the twin questions of “motivation” and “method” – something very much in public debate around some of the protests taking place just now.

Archbishop Justin gave an interesting perspective to all this during a radio interview this week: speaking in the context of the Extinction Rebellion protests affecting the capital, he said that as a Christian, he believed passionately in the right to freedom of expression and freedom of belief – but that part of that Christian belief is that we need to show proper respect for the dignity of all people and proper respect for all of God’s creation.

As a result he was clearly in favour of the right to demonstrate – he was clearly in sympathy with the aims – the motivation – of the climate protesters.
On the other hand, preventing people getting to work, making them late to collect children from nursery, preventing patients getting to hospital for crucial appointments and so on – that was a failure to respect the dignity of fellow human beings, so while he could applaud the protesters’ motives he could not approve of their methods.

And he went on to apply exactly the same principle to other running sores in our society – the protests that are still taking place outside some schools in Birmingham, relating to the content of certain lessons;
demonstrations taking place outside, or near to abortion clinics;
personal attacks on members of parliament and public officials.

Standing up for our deeply held convictions – and “persevering” when challenged may well be admirable, but protestors must always consider the effect any demonstration or “direct action” will have on other people – children and vulnerable adults included.

There is a balance to be struck then between freedom of speech and respect for others’ dignity. That balance, the Archbishop suggested, has currently been lost – and on that point at least I am in full agreement with him!
Coming back to Jesus’ parable – and, again, the questions of motivation and method are important.

In this story, it seems, we are not meant simply to identify ourselves, or the disciples, with the persistent widow and the judge with God. This judge is NOT worthy of the title, let alone comparison with God: he is not really interested in justice at all, just in a quiet life.

Yes, he does the right think in the end, but only to avoid the black eye! In this case the method has a good effect – acquiring justice and making the judge do his job – if only this once.

But it’s that final verse – which doesn’t initially seem to follow – that is perhaps the key to what’s going on in this story.
“And yet”, asks Jesus, “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

Suddenly we seem to have lurched from semi-humorous admiration of the power of the “battleaxe” to stern questioning about the second coming of Christ.
Where did that come from?

Perhaps Jesus is asking his disciples what they are going to do with the faith that apparently now motivates them:
will they end up like the lazy judge – doing the right things only when they are called to account, remembering Jesus’ teachings only when challenged to do so – OR, will they be like the persistent widow, passionately concerned for justice to prevail, deeply committed to proper respect for the dignity of all God’s people and all God’s creation?

That I think is the challenge Jesus is issuing to his hearers.

And so to us, and how we can best live out our faith – how do we stand up for what we believe in, how do we remain faithful to our Christian calling, without unduly alarming or inconveniencing anyone else?

Two thoughts.
There is a real strength in lives marked by quiet, faithful, perseverance that can be every bit as compelling as noisy demonstrations and public grandstanding.
And if we can allow ourselves to be guided always by the
the genuine desire for justice and respect for all life – then surely we can trust that we are on the side of the angels.

Address given at Bishop Wordsworth’s Grammar School – 18 October 2019

Reading – Psalm 8

For the last two weeks I’ve been living and trying to work surrounded by the mess and the noise caused by two electricians – replacing all wiring in our house.
And I would not recommend that experience to anyone!

And so, in the middle of last week, when I had a day off work, I took myself off to the Odeon – largely to get out of the house for a few hours, but also to see if it might give me some ideas for what to you all this morning.
There was a not massive choice of films, midweek, and I ended up going to see “Ad Astra” – a vaguely futuristic film – for which the reviews were mixed: somebody had posted “I still can’t decide whether or not I liked this film” – so my expectations weren’t that high.

Actually, I thought it was fine – and it DID give me something to think about. And just in case any of you might be thinking about going to see – I promise you there will be no “spoilers” this morning – because the line that caught my attention wasn’t even spoken by an actor it was written on the opening frame before the story line even began. “The near future”, it read, “a place of hope and conflict”
Now bear in mind that this was just about the beginning of the Extinction Rebellion protests in London, and that Greta Thunberg had just been giving the UN Leaders a hard time over Climate change.
And bear in mind the fact that today’s assembly comes just as the latest “crunchpoint” in Brexit talks comes into focus – and I thought the twin-themes of “hope and conflict” might be on our minds!

For some people it IS a sign of hope that people are making a stand and bringing climate change to public attention through direct action – and some of those members of the public are thoroughly fed up with the disruption to their daily lives, as we saw yesterday, and THEY are ready to protest about the protesters – there is conflict.

For some people, Brexit offers the hope of a new dawn in our nation’s life – new opportunities for trade – new freedom from the influence of other countries. For some people that same prospect – of life outside the EU – represents a worrying loss of security – financial loss – even loss of influence IN those other countries. And again, the result is conflict – reflecting different visions of the future..
Back to my lonely popcorn fest at the Odeon – and the basic idea of the film was that, when we find ourselves in these messy conflict situations, our natural response is to look “to the stars” (ad astra) – to look for someone or something beyond us to come and sort it out for us.

In the world of politics, we’re told, we live in a new age of strongmen – Putin, Trump and Boris. People seem to want strong leaders who don’t care what other people think of them and will push their own solution forward. And it does seem that, when all is chaos around us, a lot of people will follow leaders like this – no matter what they come out with – simply because they seem “strong”.

That’s not necessarily a good thing!
And I’m not getting into politics here (I know that at least some Y9s can have strong opinions on such things!) – but there is a danger that people with very clear ideas and a strong sense of their own correctness MAY actually not have noticed much outside their own little world of experience – and may not really understand the bigger picture, or the effect their words and actions have on other people, in other parts of the world.

And the basic point of ad astra is that the solution to our own problems – the solution to our worlds problems – is NOT somewhere out there; is not someone out there, but starts with ourselves. Every country, every organisation is made up of individuals – every conflict boils down to individual convictions and individual choices. And the resolution of those conflicts can only come when we learn to trust our own instincts AND to recognise that not everybody sees the world in the same way that we do.

The picture that’s been staring out at you while I’ve been speaking is one of those that prompts a different response from different people.

It is just a collection of stars and planets and space clutter – that we can all see. But some people also see different images within it – the most obvious being a large face.
What you see depends on how your brain works – or possibly on how awake you are after all these words!

Just as in the real world – some people will look out at the universe and see only random events – random things that exist purely by chance; some people will look out at the same things, and recognise patterns and universal laws and a beautiful logic to everything – and some people will see the imprint of God behind all that.
Same world – same universe – same cosmos – different reactions from different people.

And that only becomes a problem – only causes conflict – when we fail to recognise, or respect, those other insights – when we other people’s views as a threat to our own.

There is no magic solution out there – there is a wonderfully chaotic mix of different ideas and experiences around us, that can produce hope just as easily as conflict – that can make our own world that much bigger and more awe-inspiring.

From the Christian tradition that I choose to belong to there is a mantra that says:
“Look up – look out – look within.”
Look up and see the stars and the vastness of the universe, look up at the mountains and the amazingly complex life-systems of our own world;
look around you and listen to what other people are noticing – to what other people are going through in their life;
and notice your own feelings, your own ideas, the things you’re not sure about: what is going on in your head and your heart?
Then piece it all together and see what you get.
The basic instruction in all that is – keep “looking”.

Don’t just accept what you’ve been told is true;
don’t believe every single news feed or post that pops up on your phone;
don’t assume that presidents or prime-ministers or anyone else necessarily see things better than you do;
don’t just listen to the people who agree with you.

Keep searching for truth, when what you see and hear is confusing; keep searching for answers to the problems you recognise; keep searching for the things that you can do to help turn conflict into hope.

Sermon preached on 6th October 2019                                                                                    (Readings: 1 Chronicles 29: 6-19 & John 2: 13-22)

I haven’t had chance this year to make my customary trawl through the Visitors book to see people have made of this place – but I did have a quick glance at Tripadvisor to see if there were any notable comments online. And I’m just going to read just two of them – that caught my eye mainly because they were totally misplaced!

The first spoke in glowing terms about this “unusually grand parish church”. Which is not unreasonable, except that it had been posted on the site for Old St Mary’s – which may well have been very beautiful, once upon a time, but even then was hardly exceptional!

But then on the site for this church came the only post with a negative rating, which said,
“Pretty much a waste of time. You don’t get anywhere near it and the tours cost a fortune. If the weather is bad you will know a new level of suffering.”

Well I was pretty dumbfounded by that – you can get pretty close to most things here, our church guides (as far as I know!) do not pass the hat round for a tip, and the weather is hardly more of an issue in here than it is anywhere else.
And then {our Parish Secretary} Christine Matthews said – do you think they’d been to Stonehenge? And then all became clear – this post is also in the wrong place, but ruining our ratings!!

By any measure we do have a remarkable Parish Church here – pretty unique even today – even moreso back in 1845. There are many precious artefacts and works of art in this building – which is why last year we were designated as a Major Parish Church, alongside the likes of Bath Abbey, Wimborne Minster and Christchurch Priory. Compared to them, we are really quite small and modern – but significant nevertheless.

As always, at Dedication, I’d like to go back to basics and consider why this is all here: what possessed Sydney Herbert and Countess Ekaterina to spend such huge sums of money on creating this building?

I’d like to think that the answer lies partly in David’s description of the Jerusalem Temple: for David the opulence of God’s house is seen as a reflection of God’s own generosity, and it is built in order to inspire others to give freely in return.
And those sentiments are echoed here,
not only in the external inscription, on the Cloister, which describes this place as “The Lord’s Temple”, but also the less than subtle inscription on the gallery – taken form the reading we heard – “All things come from you O Lord, and of your own do we give you”.

If we stick with our Scripture readings for a moment, we also have to square what is here with Jesus’ own reaction to the Second Temple in Jerusalem. He was not amused to find money changers in his Father’s house – clearly they offended his sense of that building’s true purpose.

It’s worth reflecting perhaps, that the problem is not money itself: I really don’t think we need to worry too much about our postcards and tea towels.
What annoys Jesus is that the Temple authorities have made it impossible to enter the House of Prayer without first buying the live offerings necessary for ritual sacrifice.
In 1st Century Jerusalem – you simply had to pay to pray.
That’s what incensed Jesus.

And, Jesus also distinguished between the literal, stone Temple and the living temple of his own body – and, by extension, the metaphorical “body of Christ”, the Church.
And so we’re reminded that, however grand our places of worship may be, they are only ever temporary “visual aids”, pointing us to the greater and eternal glory of God.

It’s worth remembering too that this church has not stood unchanged since 1845: the central mosaics that dominate the Altar now, were only added in the 1920s. Like the Holy od holies in Solomon’s temple, which was covered I gold, the apse is meant to speak to us of the beauty of heaven – possibly something which this community needed in the years following the First World War.

And in less dramatic ways, this building has evolved in ways that were intended to make it more comfortable – heating, lighting sound systems and a toilet.
None of them of great theological significance – but important in making it easier for some of the people of God to come and worship here.

As you know, this time next year we will reach our church’s 175th anniversary of dedication – and we intend to use that occasion to launch an appeal to help us equip the building for our work now, and for future generations.
And that’s providing one of the biggest challenges that our PCC has faced for some time: what is realistic target and scope for our ambitions?
What should our priorities be if we can’t do everything we’d like to? And I would urge you to pray – whether or not you are a member of PCC – that we get those decisions right.

We’re told that there’s not much point spending large amounts of money of conserving our precious artefacts unless and until we’ve replaced our current heating system. And that presents another set of challenges – how much can we realistically expect to spend on a heating system; what would actually keep us warm as well as preserving the building; and can we do anything to reduce our impact on the environment?
And that’s before we even get onto the question of facilities – whether or not we are equipped to cope with increased numbers of visitors, or the varying needs of those who come here for services or other public events.
Behind all those aspirations and decisions lies a dilemma which many churches have faced – whether it’s better to invest in “mission” (to spend money in order to make new things possible and so to connect with more and more people) OR whether to invest time and energy in more focussed “mission activities”, in order to bring in more people who we then hope will bring the money with them.

In truth, I think we probably need a bit of both – to use what we have been given wisely, and con fidently, so that new live may flourish here; and, at the same time, to be smarter and more persistent in inviting people to come and see what is already here – within this stone temple and among this living temple that we form together.

However we decide to do that, I hope that we can focus our efforts NOT simply on maintaining the building, or on restoring it to what it was – the whole project could then become simply a millstone and a barrier to growth. Instead I hope we can be inspired by what is here, by each other, and by God, to find a clear vision of what we need this building to do for us now, and of what it can be with, a little imagination and, perhaps, a hefty dose of determination.
Such a vision, I suggest, will be centred on Christ’s own vision of the Temple as a house of prayer.
I remember clearly the first time I came into this building through the Cloister door – to be met yet another text, painted above the arch – the text which would have greeted our patrons as they entered through that same entrance:
“My house shall be a house of prayer for all the people”.

If that was Christ’s understanding of the Temple, and if that was Sydney and Catherine’s ambition for this place, then we’re in good company if we make it ours too!

Whatever we aim for, and whatever we ultimately manage to achieve, let us hope and pray that we can do our bit to make this truly a place where many different people can come, and marvel at what is here and,
whether they worship among us or not,
to make sense of the Divine presence in their own time
and in their own way.

May this building be always a house of prayer for all people, and may God raise us up as living temples to his glory. Amen.