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The cross plunged into the earth of a God loved world

A year ago I spent an enjoyable day or two romping through Wesley for Armchair Theologians, by W J Abraham. The Armchair Theologians series published by Westminster John Knox Press provides accessible introductions to significant figures in the history of Christian theology. So far such people as John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards, Aquinas, Karl Barth are already published. So is Bonhoeffer for Armchair Theologians, by Stephen Baynes and Lori Hale, which I'm now reading. One of the features of these books is the illustrations which range from the funny, to the didactic to the occasionally trite. But in this volume there are one or two that are deeply moving, and several others that carry a powerful ethical payload.

The text itself is accessible but not patronising, and some of the the theological chapters have surprising depth in a book intended for those looking for a starting point in their encounter with Bonhoeffer. The quotations from Bonhoeffer, placed in carefully explained context, and Bonhoeffer's own words remain some of the most powerful statements we have of Christian discipleship in a world the Church cannot and should not escape:

"There are not two realities, but only one reality, and that is God's reality revealed in Christ in the reality of the world… It is a denial of God's revelation in Jesus Christ to wish to be 'Christian' without being 'worldly', or [to] wish to be worldly without seeing and recognizing the world in Christ."

All of which raises for me, as so often in my reading of Bonhoeffer, troubling questions about approaches to mission that tend to see Christ as present in the church, absent from the world, and therefore the Church's mission to take Christ to a needy world. Actually, Christ is already there and the Church needs to catch up with Him, and discover ways of incarnating, embodying and offering the love of the living God in Christ through practices that are themselves Christlike – such as peacemaking, brokering reconciliations, expressing imaginative gestures of redemptive love, acts of mercy and compassion as contradictions of other ways of doing business. Bonhoeffer is not only right, he is so right – God so loved the world, and the Cross was plunged into the same earth out of which humanity is made. And the Church is never more faithful to Christ, than when it finds those places in our world, and in its local communities, where in the name of the crucified Lord, it too is lifted up in loving surrender, arms outstretched to embrace the world and announce God's love – and on a cross plunged into the earth of a God-loved world.

5 March 2010
The difference between a waste of trees and a fair price for nurturing the tree of knowledge

OK. I'm not saying I won't buy any more books. That would be like saying I'm not going to breathe for the rest of my life. But a conversation the other day had me saying something I didn't know I thought. Amongst other things, the difference between primary and secondary – no, not schools – sources. Primary and secondary sources. In mid-discussion I found myself saying the tidal wave of theological books has become wearisome. That I'd rather spend a month reading a few volumes of a really original if difficult writer than wade through serial doses of derivative, pragmatic, market hyped, Christian celebrity authored, allegedly indispensable but definitely transient stuff that has the remarkable built in capacity to make God boring. The difference between primary and secondary is the difference between original and derivative, between temporary fashion and permanent value, between a contribution to the publisher's sales figures and a contribution to knowledge, between what is a waste of trees and what might just about be a fair cost of nurturing the tree of knowledge.

Then I had another conversation about a slim book that is worth half a dozen books three or four times its length. I found myself saying that most of the really, I mean "really can't live without it" kind of books that I own, could fit in one six shelf bookcase 30 inches wide. Now don't press this too far. I'm not ready to start proving myself right or wrong about this yet. But in the past few days I've talked with College staff and/or students, University staff, and a friend on the phone about half a dozen books that are what I would call primary, original and permanent value. And none of them are big.

Life Together by Bonhoeffer is a massive book, of just over a hundred pages; it remains seminal in any discussion of what Christian community under Christ should look like. John V Taylor's The Go-Between God, written against the context of charismatic renewal and the need for a balancing statement on pneumatology, is one of the truly original and creative volumes of the last third of the 20th Century. W. H. Vanstone's Love's Endeavour, Love's Expense is simply the best book on pastoral theology and the nature of love that I have ever read or ever hope to. Nicholas Lash, Believing Three Ways in One God is the distilled essence of modern theology, self-consciously constrained by theological tradition and responsible biblical reflection, and yet pushes the edges in order not to confine God to what we think are acceptable theological limits imposed by our ideas of soundness. Denise Levertov's Collected Poems, the textured weaving into words of the text of her life; and the two collections of R S Thomas, whose arguments with and about God, and with his own heart and many of the ways of a world both daft and beautiful, provide some of the finest spiritual writing I know.

All of which concentrates the mind when you are moving house. Thin books are easier packed, carried and read. Thickness of book and word count, primary source of originality – interesting criteria for pruning a library…..

4 March 2010
Learning from mistakes

I like this. One of those clever wordplays I wish I'd thought of myself.

Image ‘YIP Day 70 – More Few’ by Auntie P from Flickr, used under Creative Commons.

3 March 2010
The call of God and who we are – “What I do is me – for this I came.”

Hopkins is one of my canoncial poets, and the poem below an example of sublime poetry that in the act of reading slips ineluctably into prayer. And prayer in language that enables us to articulate longings usually too deep within us, and too elusive, to be brought by our own words to the light of God's day.

Years ago I read Bernard Martin's biography to gain a sense of context; in fact I came to understand why Hopkins' poetry delivers such a potent word of summoning towards that which I longed for. Christian vocation isn't always to a task or role – it is to being, and to authentic being at that. To be that which it is our God given nature to be, in all its unique peculiarity, its precious and unprecedented once-for-allness. When Augustine exulted in God's love as loving us as if we were the only one to love, he too sensed the miracle of a love that draws us to that place where, in accepting who we are, we say to God, "What I do is me – for this I came."

And far from an endorsement of the aggressive and selfish individualism pervasive of our culture and invasive of our relationships, Hopkins' poem is a celebration of what it means to surrender to the true self God made us to be. The sonnet form of fourteen lines is my favourite poetic form – in such disciplined brevity, and care for structure, Hopkins delivers one of the most expansive expositions of why it is God made us – "what are human beings that you care for them" – Hopkins' answer centres on Christ, and on our calling to be Christ-like.

As kingfishers catch fire

As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies
dráw fláme;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each
hung bell’s
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its
name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves—goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying Whát I do is me: for that I came.
Í say móre: the just man justices;
Kéeps gráce: thát keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God’s eye what in God’s eye he is—
Chríst—for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men’s faces.

1 March 2010
Not good enough!
One gold medal from an entire Olympic event.
Nearly £6 million pounds invested.
And all we have to show for it is one gold medal.
What about value for money, eh?
Why are we floating around on a sea of mediocrity, eh?
How come when our athletes do their best it looks ordinary? Tell me that? How come?

The above rant isn't mine. I changed the font colour not to indicate red for anger but to disown the comments. Young people from a temperate climate country, that at a national level invests minimally in winter sports, are subjected to this kind of uninformed criticism by punters, politicians, commentators, news reporters and everyone else who has an opinion but little talent. And our own TV news networks lead the way. And I listen to them spouting forth indignation, and wonder if any of them has ever been good enough to get down a hill on a wee plastic sledge without falling off.

So here's what I think. Amy Williams won a gold. Rightly we celebrate that as a great personal and sporting achievement. Our other athletes didn't win, some didn't perform as well as we know they can. It happens. Did they not try? Were they complacent? Did they give the training regime a body swerve? Was it their fault and should we blame them for not being better than their best?

Och for goodness sake. Why don't we celebrate effort as well as excellence? Why is encouragement of those who pour huge chunks of their lives into their sport such a hard thing to say but such an important thing to hear?

This ritual humiliation of those who don't bring home the medals,

this wingeing and whining about poor performances,

this constant narking at folk who happen to be two seconds slower than the medal winners at skiing down an alpine slope at speeds of up to 90 kilometres,

this head shaking dimissiveness of a bobsleigh team who in a split second lose control and risk life and limb as their machine hurtles around, over and past them.

Just stop it.

Anyway, if it's the money that's a problem then instead of the Government's minuscule £5.8 million, why not ask Wayne Rooney, Peter Lampard, and any three other top earners in the Premier league to double the amount by donating 3 month's wages over the next four years. Snowboarders and skiers, curlers and sledgers, don't get the celebrity status and money professional footballers do. Instead they show dedication, enthusiasm, discipline, live with disappointment, strugggle for funds and equipment and sponsorship, love their sport and do it for reasons other than money.

So don't give me it – and don't give them it. Instead, why not just thank them that they have represented their country well and with dignity.

Rant over – till the next time British media have a go at athletes whose skis the same reporters and commentators are not worthy to unloose!

Right, feel better now!

28 February 2010
“Going about doing good” – would this be a counter-cultural form of Christian witness?

I've just slowly re-read H R L Sheppard. Life and Letters. There is in the Church of England, an entire tradition of pastoral theology, impressive, humane, cultured, compassionate, shrewd, theologically subtle, liturgically enriched, open to ridicule by some but not by those on the recieving end of such spiritually enhanced friendship. Not only in the Edwardian years when Sheppard was such a warm and energetic witness to Christianity in action.

Geoff Colmer recently reminded those who need reminding of the equally remarkable Michael Mayne, another of those lovers of God whose faithful costly work in the Church and amongst the community is a labour of love for God and the world. Prompted by Geoff (see his blog at January 22 here) I went looking for more about Michael Mayne and found the Times Obituary. It is a wide ranging and admiring pen portrait of a pastoral theologian who never wrote a book on pastoral theology – he simply lived it.

How else explain a man who arranged the 50th Anniversary Commemorative service for El-Alamein, and had the sons of Rommel and Montgomery doing the Bible Readings?

How else explain a priest whose involvement amongst those with Aids, and their carers, his chairmanship of various charities dedicated to the care of those who suffer, was exemplified in a reputation for meticulously prepared chairmanship and intentionally informed leadership?

And how else explain a man who wrote several books out of the depths of his own suffering, and from the breadth of a profoundly cultured and humane scholarship in literature, science and spiritruality, books that are masterpieces of spiritual insight and pastoral reflection, not least on his own suffering and the rich meaning he discerned in his own living?

Susan Hill, in Howard's End is on the Landing, her autobiographical trawl through most of the books she ever read or that inhabit her overcrowded bookshelves, singles out the writing of Michael Mayne as amongst the most significant spiritual writing she knows. It was her who put me on to Michael Mayne, and increased my personal indebtedness to an increasing cluster of Anglican priest theologians immersed in pastoral vocation that embodies the care of Jesus for folk.

For all our anxious chatter and strategising about mission, and our frantic (at times frenetic) searches for relevance, impact, innovation and hoped for durability of church as we know it, there is something impressive, too easily understated and overlooked, about lives of exemplary priesthood, publicly demonstrable goodness in Jesus' name, thoughtful and patient understanding of the surrounding culture as a disposition of loving attentive witness, borne before the world and born in prayer. We too easily underestimate the salt and light of a good life, radiant with a humanity that reminds people of the sheer attractiveness of Another who "went about doing good".

27 February 2010
Mary Oliver’s poetry – a tonic for the heart – and the conscience

Need a poem. Here's one.

A prose poem – but the distinction is about form, not substance.

This is a poem. Actually, this is a really good poem.

………………………..

What I have learned so far

Meditation is old and honorable, so why should I

not sit, every morning of my life, on the hillside,

looking into the shining world? because, proper-

ly attended to, delight, as well as havoc, is sug-

gestion. Can one be passionate about the just, the

ideal, the sublime, and the holy, and yet commit

to no labor in its cause? I don't think so.

All summations have a beginning, all effect has a

story, all kindness begins with the sown seed.

Though buds toward radiance. The gospel of

light is the crossroads of — indolence or action.

Be ignited, or be gone.

(Mary Oliver, New and Selected Poems. Volume Two, Page 57).

.

26 February 2010
Why speling maters in bizness deelings

Just received paperwork relating to our mortgage.

The forms relate to an earlier phone conversation to ascertain key details.

"Please check and confirm the written details are correct", I'm instructed.

Amongst the details was the full title of my job.

Just to be certain I had been asked on the phone to spell out my work role.

Ok. That's easy. P-r-i-n-c-i-p-a-l B-a-p-t-i-s-t C-o-l-l-e-g-e

Got that? Principal Baptist College. Good.

So why am I now described as Principle Battist Collage…….?

Now a man of principle I believe myself to be

A battist sounds like the kind of person England need in their cricket team

And collage sounds more like arts and crafts than a form of theological education.

Oh and I am classified as my wife's wife – and she as my husband.

Glad we were asked to confirm and check.

Question – are they better at maths than spelling?

25 February 2010
Christ the Wisdom of God, and the repository of all the treasures of wisdom

When it comes to browsing in the Bible, after the Gospels I most often find myself in that supermarket trolley of good advice and wise counsel, the book of Proverbs. One of the words I enjoy saying, and reading, and hearing, is "wisdom". Just pronouncing it somehow conveys a reassuring sense of the world being made OK, of good decisions, of careful considerate behaviour, of something as good, beautiful and true as the knowing smile of a good friend.

Information informs and knowledge enables understanding. but then, when understanding and human experience flow together, the resulting confluence is wisdom, that deep way of knowing and being known that forms character, transforms lifestyle, and conforms us to the image of Christ. Paul knew about Christ and wisdom; he hoped the Christians of Laodicea would receive "all the riches of assured understanding and have the knowledge of God's mystery, that is, Christ himself in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."

My own take on wisdom is profoundly Christological. The Word God utters, the knowledge of the Holy, the incarnate truth that is human life articulated in its surrender to God, the experience of the Creator accommodating to the creature, and thus understanding from within the truth of our humanity and limitation, this is the "loving wisdom of our God." And if indeed it is so that Christ is the wisdom of God, the source and repository of divine understanding and the finally uttered truth of who God is, then all wisdom is tested by Christ, and no wisdom is alien to Christ in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom."

So whether I am reading the book of Proverbs, or Pirke Avot that marvel of compression embedded in the Mishnah, or some of the great wisdom statements of other faith traditions, I recognise a certain ethical tone, a spiritual accent, an echo, perhaps slightly distorted, that is deeply resonant of the Wisdom of God. Wisdom is not disqualified from our consideration because it is uttered by another faith tradition whose dogmatic framework and doctrinal constructions are incompatible with Christian theology. "All the treasures of wisdom are hidden in Christ", the eternal Word subsumes the wisdom of the ages, and so in that incarnate life, crucified and risen, the wisdom of this world is converted into the currency of a quite other way of thinking, acting and being.

So when I come across words like the following, from the ancient Chinese wisdom tradition of LaoTzu, I listen respectfully. And if I do, I am attentive to that which resonates with the uttered words of Jesus, who lived a life which was the uttered Word of God:

Fill your bowl to the brim and it will spill.

Keep sharpening your knife

and it will blunt.

Chase after money and security

and your heart will never unclench.

Care about people's approval

and you will be their prisoner.

Do your work, then step back.

The only path to serenity.

Or as Jesus said, "Seek first the Kingdom of God and his justice, and all those other things will find their proper place."

24 February 2010
Pastoral theology as honouring care-givers

Renita Weems again – this time on a society that has its values upside down.

"We are bereft because we lack traditions that elevate caring for children, the aged, and the informed to meaningful venues for encountering spiritual wisdom. Our society views caring as an impediment that squanders our potential and ties us down. It demeans mothering, underpays day-care workers and teachers, and penalises adults who take time off to care for aging parents….A society that spurns the work of caregiving cuts itself off from learning about life itself. Relegating all the caregiving that faces us to spouses, nannies, housekeepers, maids, live-in nurses and paid personnel threatens to make us overestimate our strengths and can blind us to our own vulnerabilities. We miss the work that can help to civilise us."

Question: What would change in the way the Church functions, and in the way the world sees the Church if, as the Body of Christ, it gave priority to caregiving in a reversal of the priorities of our culture?

23 February 2010