More of a party…less of a nightclub

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This weekend has been full of parties. I love parties and find any excuse to hold them. In the last year I have had a 20th wedding anniversary party, a New Year party,  two birthday parties and numerous informal parties just because it’s the weekend.

So this weekend I thought I was going to 2.5 parties – about the right number. A 40th, a 50th and a school reunion (.5 because there were only 7 of us and I knew everyone there.) It turned out by the end of the weekend that I realised I had been to 4 parties – a 40th, a 50th, a school reunion and a Eucharist.

Dragging myself out of bed on Sunday morning I realised that the reasons I wanted to go to church were very similar to the reasons I wanted to go to parties.

  • I liked the host and wanted to spend time with them
  • There was something to celebrate
  • There were people I wanted to see
  • There was a chance of conversations that would enrich my understanding of the world
  • There was a meal involved

I had never before thought of church as a party. We don’t do bands and dancing at our church, people rarely dress up and the gathering is carefully ordered. I once went to a church that ostensibly felt and looked far more like a party and  the first chorus we sang included the line ‘We are all dancing on God’s dance floor.’ This somehow grated with me although I could not get the metaphor out of my head. But I think now that the reason it grated was it suggested Church is a nightclub rather than a party.

Nightclubs are not like church should be because:

  • You often have to pay to go in
  • You only really talk to the people you went with
  • There is no real shared focus to the gathering
  • You are not really celebrating anything (unless you are having a party in a nightclub)

While there are great things about the dance scene, fundamentally by going to a nightclub you are consuming an experience. Hopefully at a party you are creating something together and enacting something about generosity, community and trust.

One of the best parties I went to recently featured a band playing a set in someone’s front room. That evening, hosted by a fantastic couple of people, enacted so much generosity, community and trust that it somehow changed those of us that went – a little bit like they way you can be changed by church.

This couple opened their home to anyone who wanted to see the band – they left their door wide open in an area of Birmingham that is often associated with poverty and deprivation. They gave any money raised to a local charity and they baked fantasic cakes for those at the gig. They trusted the weather enough to move all their sitting room furniture into the garden and then provided those of us outside, watching through the window, with warm blankets. They welcome each person as if they were old friends and provided an environment where friendships were naturally created and deepened. It wasn’t God’s dance-floor but it was most certainly God’s party.

Jesus promised to show up when two or three gathered in his name. At the best gatherings God seems very present – wherever they happen and whoever is at them. My guess is that God likes a good party, especially those that enact generosity, community and trust and make spaces for friendships to flourish.

For Such A Time as This…

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This phrase is taken from a crucial moment in the story of Esther in the Hebrew Scriptures when she is persuaded that she must use her royal position to speak out for justice and the end of threat – even though it may cost her everything.

It is also the title of a report presented to General Synod in 2001 presenting the case for a renewed diaconate, for people who want to be permanent deacons to be supported, trained and encouraged throughout the Church of England. It even has an outline job description. Sadly the report was not accepted by synod – but 14 years later we find ourselves still in a time described in the report as a kairos moment. Just like Esther’s time, this time of ours is, as the report says: “…a significant, pregnant moment, a decisive moment in God’s time.”

This morning we all woke up to a significant shift in our political landscape. The party of traditional  liberalism has all but disappeared, the party of fear-mongering had polled 13% of the vote. We know that, in cities like Birmingham, we face five years of cuts, the poorest and most vulnerable people will feel the squeeze of austerity measures the most keenly and the rhetoric around immigration is unlikely to change.

In the middle of this political maelstrom, I am plodding on with my dissertation about the diaconate and I am at the interesting moment where questionnaires I sent out over the last few weeks are coming back in. Many have been filled in by deacons, one from as far afield as Sweden, some Catholics, some Anglican and some Methodist. All doing amazing jobs in many different places.

One of these deacons sent me his homily this week – it was about another kairos moment. The homily outlines the origins of the renewed diaconate in the Catholic church. Drawing on the work of Bill Ditewig, it explains how Nazism was the driver for the church to take deacons seriously again.

He says that imprisoned Catholic clergy in Dachau realised that the Church had failed to warn the people of the danger of Nazism as it began to influence the German people. The Church had become too remote and inward looking to make the connections necessary to avert the crisis. And so, at the Second Vatican Council, the German Bishops, backed by the French Bishops, called for the re-instatement of the order of deacons who would be out and about in the world, connecting with the cares and concerns of family life and wider society.

Fifty years later, For Such A Time As This argued that: “…the diaconate has been particularly important in the Church’s mission at times of acute political and social change and upheaval.

“The special role of deacons is to make connections and build bridges between the distinctive life, the koinonia, of the Body of Christ and the needs of the world.”

The Church of England is making massive attempts to be active in the public square, to engage with civic and public life and to speak out against injustice. But working on the macro level is not enough to change a culture or turn fear into trust, misunderstanding into friendship.

My research has reminded me of the massive potential for a renewed diaconate – the potential of people trained, equipped and supported to build bridges and make connections and most importantly to encourage others to do the same.

Creating trust, enabling compassion, challenging injustice, loving enemies and strengthening communities is unglamorous, painstaking work that requires patience, time, energy and commitment. It is the work of deacons and it is the work of all of us who seek to live like Jesus Christ. It is the work for such a time as this.

What kind of hospitality will we offer?

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Yesterday, half way up a mountain and in desperate need of a sugar boost, I discovered the sweets in my rucksack pocket were ‘haram’ – the word used by Muslims to describe that which is forbidden by God. I decided not to eat them as 12 out of 13 of my companions could not have shared them with me and, to the delight of my children, they have come home with me.

I could have eaten them and no-one would have minded. But somehow it felt inhospitable. I would rather go without than having something others can’t share and enjoy.

Over the last few years, as we have seen the Places of Welcome network grow and as I have experienced amazing welcome from people of all faiths and none, the idea of hospitality has become more and more central to my thinking about faith.

Hospitality is pretty topical at the moment, although the tragedy of the people drowning in the Mediterranean is fast becoming yesterday’s news. But the extreme reluctance of rich nations to offer any kind of home to the poorest people on the planet shows us how easily the practice of welcome can become squeezed out by fear that there is not enough to go around. Or perhaps by the fear that our welcome may cause us to change.

And maybe that fear is well-founded. The welcome Birmingham has given to thousands of people over many decades has caused the city to change – for the better. But I am sure there are many things that could be better if we, as a city, were prepared to change a little more. I find it quite shocking to hear that Muslim women in town during prayer time often have to pray in the fitting rooms of a department store. Or I am suprised at the limited choices people have if they want to eat in a restaurant that serves halal meat and does not serve alcohol in our city centre.

After we had climbed Snowdon yesterday we piled down to a cafe I have known for many years that serves steaming mugs of coffee and warming food for hikers. But when I arrived with my Muslim friends I looked at it with new eyes. I knew pork would be on the menu but I did not realise it has recently started serving alcohol. Nor had I thought how awkawrd it was for people to buy food in a place that did not recognise their needs. The staff and customers could not have been more welcoming to our group in their manner but the menu made it clear that Muslims were not expected to eat there.

A few members of the group played it safe with jacket potatoes and cheese, others settled for chips while a couple made a few enquiries about the oil and discovered they could go for the fish, chips and peas meal. I imagine that hundreds if not thousands of Muslim people visit this corner of Wales every year – I know of two trips that went from Brum this weekend. It wouldn’t take much to add a symbol to the menu to show Muslims what they can eat without having to ask – it is already done for vegetarians, vegans and people with allergies. And suddenly the welcome would be simple and without awkardness.

That would be welcoming without any change – just tweaking. But for those of us who come from a faith tradition that has food, hsopitality and freedom at its heart I am not sure it’s enough. It’s the approach taken at some interfaith events where the pork pies and sausage rolls are opposite the halal chicken sandwiches and samosas. At others, like a training event I was at last week, one meal is served which was described as vegan, kosher, halal and delicious – a Middle-Eastern meze of falafel, tabouleh and hummous.

Its interesting to learn the specifics of someone else’s faith but it brings deep joy when we find those ideas or beliefs that resonate with our own or deepen our undestanding. Knowing about festivals and rituals helps us to be informed about each other but discovering a shared insight or motivation builds deep friendship and trust. Our conversations about faith turn from being a buffet into a common meal.

Sometimes its giving up sweets that seals a relationship. Sometimes its just letting someone know they are expected. Sometimes its digging deeper for resonances and wisdom. Sometimes its simply tweaking your menu. All these kinds of hospitality will change us- but only for the better.

It might be more blessed to give than receive – but both are better than acquiring and consuming.

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It’s a tedious cliché to say we live in a consumer society but in the next room to me, Nigel Farage is telling the nation that the only thing that matters is control – control in this case of over the number of immigrants allowed through our borders. We want to keep some people away so we have more things for ourselves – we become like children who don’t want to share their lego.

We want to be in control of how much we earn, who visits us when, how we spend our time and who lives near us – perhaps to be sure that our things aren’t threatened and our cycle of acquiring and consuming is never interrupted or questioned.

Controlling, acquiring and consuming are quite possibly the trinity of our materialistic and individualistic society. Giving, receiving and risking are the equivalent interactions that happen in community and acknowledge our inter-dependence. I know which is more fulfilling – just think how much nicer it is to eat a meal together that someone has cooked for you than one that you have cooked for yourself and will eat alone.

I have been reading a fantastic book by Walter Brueggemann called Sabbath As Resistance – saying No to the culture of now. In the preface he says:

“In our contemporary context of the rat race of anxiety, the celebration of Sabbath is an act of both resistance and alternative. It is resistance because it is a visible insistence that our lives are not defined by the production and consumption of commodity goods…..But Sabbath is not only resistance. It is alternative. It is an alternative to the demanding, chattering, pervasive presence of advertising and its great liturgical claim of professional sports that devour all our “rest time.” The alternative on offer is the awareness that we are situated on the receiving end of the gifts of God. To be so situated is a staggering option because we are accustomed to being on the initiating end of all things.”

Initiating things, controlling their execution and having our way is part of the reward bought by material wealth, good physical health and social advantage. But perhaps we fear being on the receiving end so much that we fill our life with activity and have little time or space to be “situated on the receiving end of the gifts of God.”

When I am not knee deep in acquiring and consuming (the Boden sale was irresistible) I am immersed in a dissertation about deacons and one of the ideas that has leapt out at me is that the priest may be the person ordained to offer the bread and wine and the deacon is ordained to help people receive the bread and wine – the gifts of God.

This symbolic role at the altar is then mirrored in the day-to-day role of the deacon as the facilitator of the people of God in the world, encouraging lived discipleship in numerous and diverse settings.

It seems daft that we need to learn to receive but I know the compliments and gifts can make me embarrassed and criticism can be equally hard to take.

Prayer too can be dominated by our wanting to initiate, be productive and possibly consume. My prayers can quite often be far more ‘my will be done’, than ‘your kingdom come.’ I am trying to develop a practice of silent prayer too and turn off the constant giving of my concerns, my fears, my desires and even my gratitude to take time simply to receive – to be “situated on the receiving end of the gifts of God.”

The debate around immigration is deeply depressing. I find it incredible that people on my street are displaying UKIP posters and I wonder how that feels to friends with roots in different continents. The life of my church has been deeply enriched when it has been able to receive the gifts of God brought to it by people described as ‘immigrants.’ What would tonight’s debate look like if receiving, giving and taking a few risks replaced the self-serving and fear-inducing trinity of acquisition, consumption and control?

Word, Sacrament…and welcoming the stranger

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Here is one I cooked earlier and put in the freezer during my sad attempt at a Lenten social media fast… and as its about my favourite resurrection story it is hopefully more apt now that it was then…

I was recently at a meal when a former diocesan Bishop said he used to ask people, who were on the point of getting ordained, what they would say to someone who wanted to become a Christian. In effect, what was their summary of the Gospel and how would they point someone towards a journey of discipleship.

Although the question was not directed at me it left me feeling a bit rabbit in the headlights and unsure how I would answer a similar question without resorting to three page tracts, theologically thin cliches or totally unhelpful but nice sounding platitudes.

But the question wounldn’t go away and as I thought about it I was  struck that the story of the Emmaus Road (Luke 24:13-35)  that I have been reading slowly with friends since October through the lens of Henri Nouwen’s wonderful book With Burning Hearts is a fantastic metaphor for the the Christian journey and cycle of discipleship.

These verses in Luke’s Gospel tell the story of people converted, healed and restored by an encounter with Jesus. Like so many of us, they walked despairing, bogged down in grief, overwhelmed by the powers of the world and unable to find hope. Jesus appears and walks with them, asking to join their conversation, but they don’t know who he is. Once they have shared their grief and despair his response is to the point – and seemingly a little rude. “You foolish people,” he says, “So slow to believe all the prophets have said…” This rebuke is perhaps a point of baptism for the travellers – as they have to die to their own stories and preconceptions and be reborn with eyes and ears and hearts that can receive the Good News. It may not be polite but it may be the necessary interruption of ingrained thought patterns and narratives that makes the space for transformation, faith and trust.

Jesus then goes on to explain the scripture to them in such as way that their hearts burned within them but it is in the breaking of bread that they finally recognise him. Yet this sacramental moment of grace would never have happened if they had not  invited Jesus to their home. Word and sacrament are perhaps the expected hallmarks of Christian life and worship, the ways in which we expect to encounter Christ, but what about inviting the stranger home?

Nouwen says this about our encounters: “Interesting, stimulating and inspiring as  all these strangers may be, when I do not invite them into my home, nothing truly happens. I might have a few new ideas, but my life remains basically the same. Without an invitation, which is an expression of a desire for a lasting relationship, the good news that we have heard cannot bear lasting fruit.”

Sitting in a small communion service today I suddenly realised that the Common Worship prayer after the Eucharist resonates deeply with the Emmaus story: “Father of all, we give you thanks and praise, that when we were still far off you met us in your Son and brought us home. Dying and living, he declared your love, gave us grace, and opened the gate of glory. ”

Jesus met the travellers on the road when they were far off and he brought them home – spiritually and literally. He declared his love, gave them grace and opened the gate of glory for them by retelling the story of his life through scripture (living) and by remembering his death in the breaking of bread (dying).

When we invite Jesus into our home the gate of glory is opened and we receive grace, love and peace. When we invite a stranger into our home we are opening ourselves us to be changed, challenged, evangelised and continually converted. The long term relationships we invest in do more than change our minds and opinions – they change our hearts and our souls if we are open to God’s grace.

Reading the Gospels carefully we hear that Jesus went into many homes – friends, tax-collectors, pharisees, the Upper Room to name a few. He crossed boundaries and thresholds to open the gate of glory, declare love and give grace. And so our summary of discipleship does not end with us breaking bread with Jesus in the house in Emmaus but leads us back to the road where we now accompany those walking in despair, where we open the scriptures and invite people into the fellowship of the Church.

When my son was very little he would sometimes ask to go home – even if he was in our house. It meant he needed the security of being loved, being secure, being both safe and free, being accepted and known and in a place that he understood. He needed to be in the loving gaze of his parents just as we need to be brought home sometimes and sit quietly in the loving gaze of God.

I love the activity of being on the road and I enjoy meeting the stranger but as I approach ordination I realise too that I need to be brought home. The journey of discipleship takes us from the road back home and out again – a dance of refreshment and activity, giving and receiving, loving and being loved, praying and doing.

Or as Henri Nouwen says: “The mystery of God’s love is that our burning hearts and our receptive ears and eyes will be able to discover the One we met in the intimacy of our homes, continues to reveal himself to us among the poor, the sick, the hungry, the prisoners, the refugees and all people who live in fear.

“Here we come to realise that mission is not only to go and tell others about the risen Lord, but also to receive that witness from those to whom we are sent.”

Pick up your towel

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I am breaking my Lent fast from blogging to post the sermon I have just preached. Footwashing has become emblematic of the role of the deacon – the servant/minster but interestingly for a deacon-geek in the story in John, Jesus never uses the greek word diakon. Instead he uses the doulos which is more accurately translated as slave. I believe that rather than being emblematic of the ministry of a deacon, footwashing is the symbol of discipleship. and so tonight I preached this sermon….

I once heard it said that it was much easier to remember Jesus in the days of Christendom when civic buildings like schools, libraries, town halls and even hospitals were built to look a little bit like churches. Majestic buildings, daily acts of worship in places of education, the regular reminders of bell-ringing, the prominence of the clergy – these structures were supposed to remind us we were living in a Christian nation.

And to some extent I am sure these external props may have jogged the memory of someone who needed to remember God. I once saw a woman hurrying down the High Street here, head bowed and weighed down with shopping. But when she got to the pavement across the road from the bus-stops, opposite the Church, she paused, looked over and crossed herself. As she did so, her face visibly lightened and she continued on her way.

Our reading from Corinthians today tells us that when we take communion we both remember Jesus and proclaim his death.

Remember is a rich word for us. It literally means to put the body back together again and of course that is what we do as we gather to share in the Lord’s supper – together as the Body of Christ.
Put it also means to bring to mind, to put in focus, to shape our thoughts and imagination and to be mindful of someone’s presence.

During a recent visit to the synagogue by the Mailbox in town, the Rabbi happened to mention that when the Jewish people remember the Passover with the seder meal they leave a few drops of wine from the ritual drink. These drops are to remember the Egyptians who suffered. Their joy at the liberation is moderated by their compassion for those who suffered. Their remembering is inclusive and avoids easy triumphalism, bringing what was lost to mind at the same time as celebrating what was given.

Our post-Christendom world wants us to remember a lot of things. We are constantly reminded about the things we don’t have, the holidays we have not yet taken, the beauty we do not quite possess and the youth we need to maintain at all costs. Our consumer society wants us to be a servant – or slave – to our desires for these things – to live lives that revolve around earning and acquiring.

But the Gospel reading, which we will hear after communion, about Jesus washing the disciples feet shows us that we should be slaves to the wellbeing of the other. There is so much detail in the telling of this story that we know it is extremely significant. I love some of the contrasts in the passage.

Here is a forestaste of a couple of verses: “3 Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, 4 got up from the table,[a] took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself”. – my childhood Bible makes the contrast even more clear. It says: Jesus knowing that the Father had put all things into his power….he took off his outer robe.
Jesus is so sure of his power that he divests himself off it – literally. Unlike the robing of a monarch or a church dignitary, Jesus strips himself of the things that protect him and takes on the appearance of a slave. And so begins the dramatic story of self-emptying that ends on the cross as Jesus, poured out literally, utters the words: “it is finished.”

And that’s what we remember in communion. Jesus enacts his love in a way that costs him his whole life. Alongside the practice of footwashing today, John tells us Jesus commands us to take on this costly practice of love. Another foretaste from John 13 v34-35.

“34 I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

This commandment to the disciples to Love one another does not replace the commandment to love your neighbour as yourself or put the church above the love of neighbour. It is an intensification of the command. Love as I have loved you – choose someone else’s wellbeing over your own. Love even when it costs you your life.
I was chatting to someone recently, someone who I admire greatly as a disciple. She told me that she had chosen to fold her business rather than exclude one of the partners who had become somewhat of a dead weight. This disciple chose love over livelihood.

When we live like that we begin to remember and proclaim.

I hope you remember me beginning this sermon by saying sometimes buildings will remind us of God. But here Jesus is saying that is not necessary to build buildings with stained glass and spires. When we love each each other fully we will constantly remind each other of the loving presence of God, shown to us in Jesus’ washing of the disciples feet. We will not only remember – we will proclaim.

Listen to the end of the verse: “Then all will know you are my disciples.” Then we become the living sign of Christ’s love beyond the church. Foot-washing, we take the dynamic of the Eucharist outside into the world, reminding each other and proclaiming to those around us.

Our society needs reminders of what is eternal and what is important. Those who have chosen the way of selfless love become remembered figures – think of the martyrs and saints of both the early church and more recently – the Stephens, Francis’s, Claire’s, Martin Luther Kings, Ghandis and Mandelas.

Our culture wants us to think love can be bought and desires are met by spending money. But in reality our desires are met when we seek the fulfilment, happiness and wellbeing of others.

Jesus is clear – “If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them”. The stripped altar and bare church helps us remember Jesus’s stripping of his power and position, his self-emptying and then his death – all driven by his love for us.

This Lent I have found my small and pathetic attempts to deny myself have peeled off layers of complacency and self-deceit, revealing addictions and dependencies. But without that peeling off – I don’t think I can get ready to pick up my towel and begin to wash feet.

Our proclamation of Christ, crucified and risen, grows out of the remembering at the Eucharist but needs us to wash feet in our communities, if the world is going to be able to hear it. Jesus called us all to pick up our cross of discipleship but today I think he is reminding us that we not only need to pick up our cross, we also need to take off our outer garments and pick up our towels – today and every day.

A High view of Laity

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I am at that point in ordination training when I am being asked to think about what it means to be a priest, what it means to preside and what actually happens at ordination. We are being asked to think about how we conduct ourselves in the parish, our boundaries and our appropriate friendships. We are sometimes asked if we have a ‘high or low’ view of priesthood.

I have a half-in, half-out attitude to those conversations as someone who is shortly to be ordained but who won’t be a priest. And what I found myself saying is that I am not sure how to categorise my view on prieshood but I am clear that I have a high view of laity – the people of God.

I understand that people who are ordained have a different relationship to the Church – that is obvious, but I do not believe we have a different relationship to God. We remain part of the laity and as a whole we are called to live as what St Peter calls as a royal priesthood. We are all, lay and ordained, called to love and serve God with all our hearts, all our minds and all our souls, we are all called to be ‘living sacrifices,’ and we are all called to ministry through our baptism. We all need to think about appropriate friendships, our conduct and our boundaries.

I think priests are a really good thing and I remember in my early days working for the church getting into an argument with someone who thought that pastoral work like visiting in hospitals should be done by ‘keen Christians’ rather than someone in a dog collar. I think that for many who are feeling vulnerable and afraid the presence of a priest, despite the serious failings of the Church, gives reassurance and a sense that this person can be trusted. I think wearing a dog collar or even a cassock is sometimes a pastoral and prophetic thing to do.

I think the link between presiding over communion and presiding over a community of believers makes perfect sense. I think our fragmented world desperately needs communities of people who are prepared to welcome the stranger and love their neighbour and I believe communuion and the surrounding liturgy shapes those communities – ideally! I think it’s great that the pastor of these commmunities is formed, is accountable, is supported and challenged by a wider church.

But I think we have sometimes got ourselves to a place where we believe it is the priests who do church, who carry out mission and who articulate theology while lay people receive their wisdom, pay their collection and sit on committees. Lay discipleship begins at 10 am on Sunday and ends about 11.30am.

I know so many people who want so much more than that and who do so much more than that and who are so much more than that. I think it is time we as a church recognised and supported these people. We are starting and I am glad in Birmingham that we have had two lay conferences – sharing some of the learning and thinking that is experienced in clergy conferences with nearly 1,000 people from across the Church of England Birmingham.

But here are a few more ideas that might help lay people be recognised as Jesus’s disciples, God’s witneses in the world:

  • Find a good visual symbol that makes Christians visible in the world – when I briefly taught Islamic studies the sixth-formers in the school did not really know what a Christian might look like because they did not know if they had ever met one or seen one. They were astonished that I believed in heaven, was trying to find a rhythm of prayer, fasted and feasted and read my Bible. I can look round a room and see often who is a ‘baptised’ Sikh, who is a practicing Muslim  or who is a devout Jewish man. But as Christians we are invisible apart from our ministers. It might seem risky to be visible – we know we are not perfect and our lives may be critiqued. But that is the same for priests and that’s why we believe in grace and mercy.
  • Make good theological education and formation available to all people.
  • Stop making the saying of Morning and Evening prayer as an obligation just for ordained people. It’s a great practice but surely the point of this obligation on priests is that their praying enables others to pray too. I would love to see this rhythm of prayer made really accessible by doing more of it. Wouldn’t it be amazing if your local church was open all morning and one group started praying at 7am, another at 8am, another at 9am and another at 9.30am after school drop-off. The same thing could happen in the evening. I would love to know what the Church would look like if it became the norm for most people to gather for prayer twice a day, every day.
  • Understand that the ministry of the Church goes on in all times and places. Lay people reach so many places clergy can’t reach. In those places they can reveal the love and compassion of God in the places where love isn’t. In those places they can take what they know of God’s reconciling love to heal conflict and reveal God’s peace. In those places they can make the communion live on – sharing bread, giving and receiving hospitality and gathering people into community.

I can’t answer the question about what will happen when I get ordained. I couldn’t tell you what happened when I got married. I loved my husband before and I loved him afterwards but something changed.

But I think I am beginning to understand that the point of my ordination is not about what I do, how much I pray or how well I articulate my theology but it is all about how much I can enable others to live out their calling as disciples of Christ in a broken world.

 

Apt liturgy – the blog

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I am supposed to be writing a 3,000 word essay in Apt Liturgy by Wednesday. Sadly what I have so far is a 600 word blog. I hope it might be enough.

There is an incredibly powerful moment in the recently-released film Selma in which Dr Martin Luther-King is struggling to find an apt liturgy to help his community respond to a moment of crisis or Kairos.

King is leading thousands of people on a march campaigning for voting rights for Black Americans – it’s the second time they have set out on the march. The first time the Black protesters met a wave of state-sponsored violence and brutality which led King to call for people of God and goodwill of every colour to join him. And they did.

This time, when they reach the line of armed troopers, the order is given for the sheriff’s men to disperse. King pauses unsure if this is a victory or a trap. He needs to say something and do something that will make God present at this liminal moment. He kneels silently in prayer and the thousands of marchers kneel beside and behind him. They stay in silent prayer for a number of minutes. Then he rises, turns and walks back the way he came.

Apt liturgy is something that has probably happened in all faiths and in all times but recently Ann Morisy et al. have documented and defined it as a spontaneous response outside of church to a time of change or crisis experienced by a community of people who would welcome the offer of religious symbol, prayer and word that speaks of God.

By this definition Jesus certainly used apt liturgy. In fact the liturgies that shape our Eucharist, the last supper, the breakfast on the beach and the meal at Emmaus all fit the definition.

In his beautiful meditation on the story of the Emmaus Road, With Burning Hearts, Henri Nouwen claims that the Eucharist itself can become apt liturgy as it is infinitely adaptable. He says:
“The Eucharist, sometimes, is celebrated with great ceremony, in splendid cathedrals and basilicas. But more often it is a “small” event that a few people know about. It happens in a living room, a prison cell, an attic – out of sight of the big movements of the world. It happens in secret, without vestments, candles or incense. It happens with gestures so simple that outsiders don’t even know that it takes place. But big or small, festive or hidden, it is the same event, revealing that life is stronger than death and love stronger than fear.”

The truth of this quote was made clear to me in a telephone conversation with a Muslim friend today. As I described my bookgroup in which women of faith gather to eat, drink and through the vehicle of literature discuss life and faith, he said: “It is amazing how someone sitting on your sofa and breaking bread with you is such a significant moment.” Suddenly serving Kettle chips and elderflower juice at book group appears to be an apt liturgy.

I am not sure exactly how to define an apt liturgy but I hope understanding it more may help us respond to human communities needing the reassurance of glimpses of a loving God.

What I think I do understand so far is that it speaks of a faith seeking relationship, a faith seeking to be guest as well as host and a faith that listens before it speaks. I hope we can all learn to recognise it, lead it, respond to it  and celebrate it as it builds hope and reconciliation into our shared lives. And now back to my essay….

Learning with the public sector – what does it mean to be a 21st century public servant

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Since I have felt called to the diaconate I have become a bit of a servant-geek. (Possibly because the word deacon comes from the Greek word Diakonia which is often translated as servant.) So when I heard today that the Birmingham University and Birmingham City Council where thinking about the values and attributes of a 21st Century Public servant my geeky heart just skipped a beat.

Here is a visual representation of the characteristics identified in the report:

main themeLooking at this postcard the overlaps were immediately obvious. Weaving and Storytelling are recognised as two key roles of a deacon as both lead to the linking, connecting and bridging which is central to the work of a deacon. Networking too – enabling non heirarchical groups of connected people – is another metaphor for diaconal ministry as is navigator – the deacon at the doorway and on boundaries helping people across thresholds and into new places.

The summary of the report  outlining 10 characteristics of a deacon offers more parallels and challenges the church to hold on to some of what we have learnt over centuries while challenging more negative habits we have picked up on the way.

Here are the characteristics taken from the report about each role and compared with my understanding the role of a deacon in the 21st Century:

“1….is a municipal entrepreneur, undertaking a wide range of roles“. This seems to be about flexibility and also operating on minimum budgets. Both of these are essential for a deacon in the church and almost of the essence of the role. As the ministry of a deacon is being redefined from being about one to one pastoral care and service to the poor to having a wider and prophetic ministry, a kind of ambassador for God, the need to switch roles and modes is an essential part of the job. Improvising, responding creatively to circumstance, making the most creatively of given resources – these seem to me to be essential for a deacon.

“2….engages with citizens in a way that expresses their shared humanity and pooled expertise”. This is a challenge for us in a church which draws  clear boundaries between lay and ordained. I think the deacon has a special role to play in challenging this separation of clergy and people, expert and non-expert,  by being neither a priest or a lay person. Pooled expertise, skilled and articulate lay people, clergy that share their humanity – these are definitely the direction of travel for the Church in the current context. We see churches developing ministry teams, certificates for lay people to study theology, more lay engagement in services and new roles for people who are not ordained such as mission apprentices in Birmingham. In a favourite quote of mine, Dr Rowan Williams says, ‘There is no-one inside or outside the Church who cannot help us read our Bible with more understanding.” Lay or ordained we are all disciples (learners), church-goers or devout atheist we are all made in the image of God and have much to learn from one another.

“3….is recruited and rewarded for generic skills as well as technical expertise.”  One interviewee admits that engaging with citizens is a newish skill for people who work in local authorities. Before we laugh I wonder how many people work for the Church and yet find relationship building in their communities daunting. Deacons are called to relationship inside and outside the Church. According to the Church of England’s guidelines for those selecting someone wanting to train as a deacon has to show they have to show:
• evidence of ability to relate to people of different ages and social contexts
• an instinctive ability to get alongside people and speak their language
• pastoral skills that point to an ability to care for others appropriately.

“4…..builds a career which is fluid across sectors and services”. Many deacons will have to work to get paid. Those paid by the church could find themselves in any number of roles at any given time. The same document for selectors and vocations adviser says the deacon needs to be happy behind the scenes oiling the wheels and in the public eye leading a service, they need to be pastoral enough to get alongside lonely and vulnerable people while being able to challenge injustice and oppression and they have to be a servant without being a doormat and a leader that allows others to lead. Sounds pretty fluid to me.

“5….combines an ethos of publicness with an understanding of commerciality“. Commerciality is probably useful for a church leader who needs to ensure bills are paid, buildings maintained and vital staff get their wages but I am not sure that’s our big tension.  I think the balance for the deacon is the balance between church and world or tradition and innovation. Most deacons see themselves at the doorway. The vocations document places deacons in three places: the church, the world and the boundaries. Balancing the needs of those already in church with the needs of those who might one day come is an inevitable tension of diaconal or any outward-facing ministry. Any institution exerts a pressure – for a local authority it is commerciality, for a church it can be financial, it can be the weight of tradition, it can be theological or it can be maximising scarce resources. Which takes us on to…

“6…..is rethinking public services to enable them to survive an era of perma-austerity“. Cuts that aren’t going to go away. We’re probably all in the same boat.

“7….needs organisations which are fluid and supportive rather than silo-ed and controlling“. One interviewee said: ‘We are trying to be 21st Century public servants in 19th Century organisations.’ Even an organisation as small as a parish church can have silos – clergy, church councils, choirs, organists, Sunday-school teachers, people on the coffee rota, welcomers etc etc. They don’t all get on all of the time. I think it would be much easier to minister as a deacon in a church where these people were enabled to work together and is part of the ministry to enable these people to work together.

“8….rejects heroic leadership in favour of distributed and collaborative models of leading. Hero leaders aren’t the answer. Rather than emphasising the charisma and control of an individual, new approaches focus on leadership as dispersed throughout the organisation.” This probably my favourite. And this is what the Vocations document says about leadership :

• the ability and willingness to work in a team
• leadership gifts that reflect a willingness to be a leader who assists rather than always takes the lead, and does not unsettle or unseat others who have either long term or short term responsibilities
• a person who is capable of being a public representative person for the church, who is competent and comfortable in the public eye, whether in liturgy or the life of the world
• organisational gifts that equip and free others to do their work well

So not heroic but hopefully enabling.

“9….is rooted in a locality which frames a sense of loyalty and identity” One interviewee suggested that people above a certain pay grade should have to live locally as part of their contract. That has been our practice for some time and I think its an important principle. It is important for us that our ministry in ‘incarnational’ – that we inhabit fully our place of ministry. But how rooted are we as paid clergy? We know we can’t commit to stay for ever as individuals. That is why it is so important that we are not lone ranger heroes. Because the church is not its paid workers – it’s the whole body of people and that body will change its membership but it is there for the long haul.

Today I was talking about working in communities with public sector workers  several of whom had been in post a matter of days or weeks. They were wondering why their services were not connecting with communities. And listening to them I was suddenly grateful for the symbolism of our churches whose grand, solid buildings and soaring spires suggest (among other things) deep foundations and a rooted commitment to a neighbourhood.

“10….reflects on practice and learns from that of others” This is what the Bishop says on the day I am ordained: “Deacons are to seek nourishment from the Scriptures; they are to study them with God’s people that the whole Church may be equipped to live out the gospel in the world. They are to be faithful in prayer, expectant and watchful for the signs of God’s presence, as he reveals his kingdom among us.” If we can’t learn together and from each other our ministry will be seriously impoverished.

So what could the local authorities learn from organisations that have been training deacons or servants for generations:

  • We think deacons are formed as well as trained and taught. What values are necessary to shape the characteristics and attitudes required?
  • Deacons often weave people together as well as resources – how can people learn to be connectors?
  • So far, for me, friendship has been a key motif of my ministry and I am not expecting that to change. Jesus says we are his friends rather than his servants. Could public servants be friends with their neighbours and communities and catalysts for friendships? I believe friendships are at the heart of flourishing communities. We don’t ignore the needs of our friends and we don’t back systems that oppress them.
  • Deacons have a role at the table (the altar) in a Church service. Sharing food together leads to conversation and shared lives – that’s another way to build strong communities. How could hospitable living be a part of the life of a public servant?

Perhaps we could begin to overlap as we train and form servants fit to serve people and God in the 21st Century. Perhaps we could encourage each other not to crave slick institutions, heroic leaders and glossy programmes and perhaps we could celebrate together the invisible work of humble, rooted, committed people who might not share the same faith but most definitely share values and good practice.

Crossing over the Road

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Many people, I think, know the story of the Good Samaritan – the man by the side of the road in a deserted place who is ignored by the priest and lawyer and rescued by the unpopular foreigner. I remember learning a song that asked me if I would have walked by or would I ‘cross the road’? For me the only honest answer to that question is – it depends but I hope so.

In his beautiful reflection on Radio 4 last Saturday, the founder of L’Arche community, Jean Vanier, challenged people to cross the road. He asked his listeners to imagine a neighbourhood where all the rich people lived on one side of the road and those on the other side lived in poverty. What was needed, and what is needed in our sometimes fragmented and compartmentalised society, was for people to cross over the road. But then he added a warning – don’t go on your own – when you go to cross the road, take a few friends with you.

That is an image that will stay with me for a long time. It has already become for me an image of my ministry as a deacon. I don’t have a huge programme for mission, a single cure for inequality or a new mode of worship to roll out and revolutionize the church but I do have a feeling that crossing the road is central to our discipleship and it’s best done with a few friends.

There are many different roads we can choose to cross. My last few years of interfaith working have taken me across some perceived barriers to meet people who have shown me the incredible beauties of their faith, answered my stumbling questions and offered me friendship. It’s been a wonderful journey.

But in the last six months my work has subtly moved to focus on both interfaith work and work to build economic equality. In a way that second road seems harder to cross. (It’s interesting that a recent study in primary schools found that class [economic difference] not ethnicity or religion was the hardest barrier for children to cross.) I am really glad that I have friends who are well ahead of me on this journey.

At his recent book launch Archbishop John Sentamu said that in a strange way the consumer society is a way of creating and distributing unhappiness. I think it is also a way of creating and distributing divison and separation. Things, wealth and possessions mark us off as different from one another – they become our identity.

Meeting people of different faiths makes me reflect on what I believe, the truths that underpin my own religion and practice. I have found this hugely enriching.

Meeting people who have been sanctioned, who cannot work because of the asylum system, who live on zero hour contracts or who are paid too little to live on makes me reflect not on what I believe but what I have. It provokes me to think about my attitudes of entitlement, the waste of fast fashion, the food we throw away and the holidays we feel we need. At first sight this is less enriching.

But in her brilliant book Take this Bread, Sara Miles, reminds us that we are not crossing the road to rescue those less fortunate than oursleves, we are not coming to learn on a self-improvement programme but we come because our salvation and wholeness is bound up with one another.

She says; “I think we are being called to something harder than being conventional Good Samaritans. To understand ourselves, individually and as a church, being rescued by strangers and foreigners, by the wrong people. To understand ourselves, individually and as a church, as beaten, hungry, hurting, lost at the side of the road. Called to touch the parts of ourselves that are strange and damaged and needy. Called to receive love from people we don’t know and have no reason to trust. And only then, in turn, being called to the second part: to go and do the same thing – knowing it will change us in ways we didn’t plan and may not like.”

One of my favourite phrases about the ministry of a Deacon comes from the ordination service. It says; “They are to work with their fellow members… reaching into the forgotten corners of the world, that the love of God may be made visible.”

If the service said Deacons were to work alone, I couldn’t do it. If it said they were taking the love of God to forgotten corners of the world I couldn’t do it. But I hope that as I learn to give and receive from those I meet on the other side of the imaginary road, then the love of God may in some way be made visible.

Jesus said plenty about crossing roads, not hoarding things, sharing our resources and eating together. He didn’t send his disciples alone and he promised that wherever we go he will go with us. People like Jean Vanier, Sara Miles and the saints of the Church in Birmingham remind me that crossing roads is not only possible but it’s our calling and through crossing the road we will meet Jesus.