One of my favourite walking or running paths takes me past the new Episcopal church in Westhill. An ultra modern, multi-purpose community building that now sits on the outskirts of the town, looking towards the distant hills of Clachnaben and Cairn O Mount.
At one point walking past I had one of those moments when random impressions and ideas, past thoughts and inner conversation, all come together and coalesce in an image. I took the camera this morning on my more causal take it easy walk with occasional bursts of slow jogging. So I took this picture
The juxtaposition of pylon and cross, both made of steel, both based on the intersection of horizontal and vertical, and, in Christian theology both charged with power to transform and energise – these are some thoughts that coalesce in this image, at least as I saw it. "This the power, of the cross…." is one of the established and rightly more durable songs from the Townsend collection. It affirms in strong language and a powerful and singable tune, the Christian conviction that in the cross we see not the weakness but the power of God made perfect through weakness.
The violent imperial repression of ideas Rome feared, made the cross the chosen instrument of control by terror – when it comes to terrorism no one is better placed to terrorise than the powerful holders of weapons, power and ideology. Then as now. But the framing of the cross against the background of pylons suggests one or more reflections on green theology, the cost to the earth of our energy hunger, the ruining of creation by our manufacturing and consumptive obsessions. And yet. The renewal of creation lies at the centre of the Christian vision of the future; the earth groans awaiting its redemption, creation is about more than human beings, and redemption is about more, much more, than my wee precious unique and eternal soul!
Which is my main hesitation with one line of Townsend's brilliant hymn; I cannot sing "Oh to see my name, written in his wounds…For in your suffering I am free." Not because it isn't true, but because it isn't the most important truth about the cross. Should any of us who have begun to understand the scale and depth of the love of God ever ever be comfortable with the first person singular "I" as the centre of our understanding of the Gospel? Oh to see the wounds of my brothers and sisters in Northern Iraq….. Oh to see Gaza's wounds and Israel's wounds and the wounded earth, and "Oh to see the famished dehydrated children of so many nations…Oh to see their names, written in your wounds, for through your suffering they are free…"
Yes the cross is personal, because God has made the renewal of creation, the redemption of his purposes, the freeing of all creation, yes including me, personal. And yes I am invited to embrace that love, to engage that purpose, to surrender to that vision, to give in by giving myself away to this ridiculously extravagant and scandalous God whose Love dares to be crucified and defy the powers of empires that terrorise. "Death is crushed to death, life is mine to live, won through your selfless love…" He dies that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for Him who died for them and was raised again.
This the power of the cross! That photo makes the connection. Every time I run past this church, from the downward slope I see this image, power and love. In that one line Townsend's hymn, in seeking to make it personal, in my view steps over the line of allowing our personal experience of blessing to eclipse the scale of what took place on the cross. Oh to see their names, our names, all names, written in his wounds….This the power of the cross. That I think restores the scale and eteranl perspective of the Gospel.
Here's a couple of pictures of Westhill Episcopal Church
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