The adventure of tentin

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compost capitalism

The occupations of Occupy London are, according to their website, “about social justice, real democracy and challenging the unsustainable financial system that punishes the many and privileges the few”. But the juxtaposition of the protesters’ camp and St Paul’s is challenging those of us on the inside of the Church of England wearing the vest of vested interests.


saint paul's [1]The juxtaposition highlights the challenge that has faced Christians down the centuries. Juxtaposed is the soft and the hard, the fixed and the flimsy, the playfulness of the tent and the seriousness of established tradition, the movement and the institution. These contrasts are not new. Paul, to whom the Cathedral is dedicated, was, as Giles Fraser pointed out, a tent maker and missioner of no fixed abode. Tonight a friend who is beginning to explore the Christian faith emailed me her puzzlement that “God and religion don’t seem to match”. What has been happening in London seems to be another replay of this mismatch. (Is it either the grace of God, or prophetic imagination and energy that makes more of a match?)


capitalism is a kind of slaveryMadeleine Bunting has written of the spatial aspect of the paradigm shift represented by the protest. For her, the protest is about “seeding questions in thousands of minds, shaking certainties and orthodoxies so that there is space for new alternatives.” It is about “taking key symbolic public space … to use it for conviviality, living, learning and participation.” To me that sounds exciting, and something which Christians should be engaging with. In fact, it represents the very heart and aspiration of Christian practice. Conviviality, living, learning and participation are fundamental to the intention of Christian liturgy.


The British Jewish community seems to have responded to the protest positively. In the statement they have published today, they “welcome the movement’s openness, pluralism and commitment to imagining a more just world.” Their statement includes a reminder that “the Jewish heritage includes a long tradition of reshaping society to help the least fortunate, from the teaching of prophets like Amos and Jeremiah, to Rabbi Hillel, to modern figures such as Abraham Joshua Heschel and Naomi Klein.” The church shares the same Jewish heritage, but the juxtaposition and apparent conflict of tent and Cathedral suggests the ease with which an institution can forget its origin as a movement of liberation.

Preaching for a change

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Sermon for today – in which I have chosen to go with theappointed Old Testament text (Exodus 33:12-end) for preaching this morning. The OldTestament is often neglected in our thinking – but I hope you will see whytoday’s reading is important to us, and not only to us, but to all the peopleof God.

Jacob wrestling with angel by Rembandt
Can I remind you that thepeople of God were named Israel, by God after Jacob’s sleepless night of wrestling with the angel of God (or withGod)? After that match Jacob is called ISRAEL – and the name Israel means “onewho wrestles with God”, or “one who is straight, direct with God.”

Jacob wrestled with God.

The people of God wrestlewith him, struggle with him, and are straight and direct with him. This line ofthought suggests that we are not called to be mildly submissive to God, butthat God actually wants us to struggle with him, be direct with him, and begrown up with him. He wants us to get to grips with him.

This straightness anddirectness is reflected in the prayer of the People of God – which might aswell start with “I want to be straight with you God”, in a spirit of challenge. Our reading from Exodus showsMoses engaged in this sort of conversation which consists of challengingdemands.

We are told that “the Lordused to speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend.” In our readingwe have the privilege of overhearing that conversation in which Moses isnegotiating with God.
We may take it for grantedthat God answers prayer – but in this passage we have the foundation of thatfaith which Scripture wants us to take for granted.

Black Moses

Speaking face to face, as onespeaks with a friend, God hears Moses’ prayer and answers it in the mostpositive way. He doesn’t just answer Moses’ prayer, but gives more than Mosesdares even to imagine – and it isintended that we get used to that, and take it for granted, so that we may toowith trust let God get to grips with us so that he can know our mind and whatis on our heart.

Thebackground to Moses’ demands is that God had told him that he wouldn’t go withthem to the Promised Land because he was so angry with the people for breakingthe agreement that they had.
“Go up to a land flowing with milk andhoney; but I will not go up among you, or I would consume you on the way, foryou are a stiff-necked people.” (Exodus 33:3).
Mosesinsists that God must accompany his people. He recognizes that the relationshipwith God is more important than the real estate of the Promised Land.
Theanswers to Moses’s prayer in these chapters of Exodus are outrageouslygenerous. He is prepared to start again and offers new tablets of commandmentsto replace the agreement and commandment that the people had broken.
Mosesand the Lord stood together on Mount Sinai – as friends so that Mosesunderstands just how God is going to fulfill his part of the bargain, hispromise to his people.
Thisis how God summarized the characteristics of his behavior with his peopleduring that conversation with Moses:
The Lord passed before him, andproclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow toanger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast lovefor the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin,yet by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the parentsupon the children, and the children’s children, to the third and fourthgeneration.” (34:5-7).
Whilethere is mention of punishment the emphasis is on God’s forgiving love. Theguilty aren’t cleared, but the consequences of their guilt only reach to thethird and fourth generation, while steadfast love reaches to the thousandthgeneration – in other words – forever. This is how God is going to be forever:merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love andfaithfulness, keeping steadfast love to the thousandth generation.
We have to remember howdifferently God is promising to behave. He had been so angry with his people(and justly so, according to the text) – but now, in response to the demands of his people, he isgoing to be so slow to anger. In response to one of us humans, God changes hismind about his behaviour. In future his behaviour is going to be governed bysteadfast love and faithfulness.
In the section of the storywhich we read this morning we have the summary of God’s response to Moses. “Mypresence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”
All of us can find rest inthe knowledge of the manner of God’s promised presence, particularly when thatpresence is governed by steadfast love and faithfulness. This is how God iswith us. We don’t need to worry that he is any different. We can trust in hisforgiving love. We don’t need to be afraid – the Lord is here, unconditionally.
Moses makes one request toGod that God does not agree to.  Moseswants to see God face to face. God’s response: “You cannot see my face; for noone shall see my face and live.” (33:20)

Instead, we have a ratherpuzzling response.
“Thereis a place by me where you shall stand on the rock; and while my glory passesby I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my handuntil I have passed by; then I will take away my hand, and you shall see myback.”

WakeSeeing the back of God israther strange. Most people see this as “the WAKE of God” – just as we see theripples and waves in the wake of a boat, so we are given sight of the effectsof God’s love. Seeing the back of God is seeing where God is and has been.

So far, I have mentioned onlyhow God is governing his behaviour in covenant with his people. I haven’t mentionedwhat he promises to do. He said “before all your people I will perform marvels,such as not have been performed in all the earth or in any nation. (34:10).

Seeing the back of God isseeing the wake of marvels, seeing the work of God. And the work of God ismending the broken – the broken in this case, being the very heart of therelationship between God and his people.

Seeing the wake of God isseeing where God is going. Seeing the wake of God is being able to follow hiswork of mending. Seeing the wake of God is being able to follow him and joiningin his most marvellous work of remaking broken relationships, and SHALOM.

Even in this way, Godresponded to Moses request, but gave him, once again, more than he could everdream of. Which is better? To see God face to face, or to be able to followhim, in his wake, and love him for all his ways?

Replacing repairs

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Untitled
Cobblers used to be in high demand

Oh dear. “The car’s knackered, we’re going to have to walk”. That was the response of someone whose car had broken down near to us yesterday. He put a brave face on the diagnosis from the RAC man (diagnosis took ten seconds!). I would have at least kicked the tyres. We had our own breakdown the other week. Our two year old washing machine was going to cost £290 to repair – the exact cost of a new replacement. It seems that everything is getting very complicated, and it becomes increasingly difficult to see what’s gone wrong. The problem with our washing machine was the electronic control board, as is the case with most broken equipment these days. Replacing is replacing repair. I used to be a regular visitor to the TV repair man with our Ferguson TX. Where is the TV repair man now?

One of the features of childhood evenings was watching my Mum darning holes in socks, referred to as “doing the mending”. Is it a lost art? Have repairs been replaced? Repairs are easier when you can see how pipes and wires have come apart and how they can be re-paired.

mendingThis quote from Dag Hammarskjold captures the wonder of mending and repair.

Forgiveness is the answer to the child’s dream of a miracle by which what is broken is made whole again, what is soiled is again made clean.

Brokenness featured in conversation yesterday. Relationships are easily broken. Fortunately we get well used to re-pairing ourselves from our temporary separations and breaks. But occasionally, the hurt is profound and the damage irreparable, and the longer it persists the more difficult the repair becomes. It’s as if the broken ligaments of the relationship wither till there is nothing to be re-paired. A stitch in time saves nine.

We may be able to forgive, but that may not be enough to re-pair. Surely a re-pair is impossible without something to throw a line to, something to hold on to – whether that be a word, a gesture, or understanding and remorse?

(Feigned) Remorse
There’s remorse, and then there’s remorse!

A local headteacher was telling me about a small child in his school who had kicked one of the older children. “He showed no remorse” was the head’s comment. That is a problem that child is going to have to overcome. If he doesn’t become remorseful how can those he hurts ever forgive him. What a tragic life he has in front of him unless he can learn remorsefulness. Remorse is what we can get hold of when we want to forgive and be re-paired. Instead of reparation, remorselessness brings separation.

It may be that life is too complicated for us to see how it is broken. It may be that things have become a lot more reliable. It may be that in a blame culture we have to insist that we don’t break, that we are reliable, and not liable. It may be that our business in a consumer culture has lost the hard work and deep satisfaction of repair. It may be that we can’t see how we are broken.

My shoes

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I leave aside my shoes – my ambitions,
undo my watch – my timetable,
take off glasses – my views,
unclip my pen – my work,
put down my keys – my security,
to be alone with you, the only true God.

After being with you,
I take up my shoes – to walk in your ways,
strap on my watch – to live in your time,
put on my glasses – to look at your world,
clip on my pen – to write up your thoughts,
pick up my keys – to open up your doors.

Anonymous

Grit and worry

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“Perhaps a teacher should be like the grit that gets into the shell of an oyster, How does it fell for the oyster? An irritation? A pain? Whatever effect, the result may be a pearl, beautiful or misshapen, but a precious object nevertheless.A learner has to worry at the thing. Many teachers provide the pearls ready-made. Students are asked to value them highly for what they are, to store them in their bags. But they are borrowed, put into a bank. It is the pearls the students make themselves that they really value, that matter tor them, and that will have a significant effect on their thinking, behaviour and self-esteem.” David Minton in Teaching Skills in Further and Adult Education, 2005 (p 46)

Doesn’t anybody stay in one place anymore?

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Having helped my son and his girlfriend into another new flat this weekend I have yet another new entry in my address book for him. It’s nothing new – this is my third son, and each of them has managed to collect what seems to be dozens of postcodes. Back in 1971 Carole King (it’s the 40th anniversary of the album “Tapestry) asked the question “doesn’t anybody stay in one place any more?”- just at the point when I was beginning my own wanderings through university and my first three postcodes in Sheffield.

The expectation is that we will keep moving and that if we can’t find work we will “get on our bikes” – or in the case of Ellesmere Port where I now live, “get on the canals” (there is an estate named after Wolverhampton that serves as a reminder of the migration from the West Midlands at the beginning of the 20th century). As we’ve gone on the pace of movement has increased – I find it strange, but laudable, to think of doctors and dentists serving the same community throughout their careers (often from the same room and chair).

Gerald Schlabach reflects on the Benedictine vow of stability – and recalls the wisdom of Scott Sanders in Staying Put: Making a Home in a Restless World (Boston: Beacon Press, 1994). Sanders thinks that modern culture is wrong in implying that “the worst fate is to be trapped on a farm, in a village, in the sticks, in some dead-end job or unglamourous marriage or played-out game.” “People who root themselves in places are likelier to know and care for those places than are people who root themselves in ideas.”

When I visited a grieving family in a tiny farm labourer’s cottage and heard that the lady who had died had never slept any where else, and that she had never travelled further than the market 20 miles away I did think that “this person has never lived”. But maybe we spread ourselves too thin in a state that is not stable. She may not have gone far (how we love that phrase “you’ll go far”) but she may have lived deep.

Creation

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Our God and Father, you have revealed to us the secrets of the earth, the sea and the sky.
You have enabled us to discover the animal, vegetable and mineral resources of this planet.
Teach us now to use them wisely, effectively and to the benefit of us all, so that we may in unity enjoy the riches which you have provided, in justice, peace and prosperity; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Gordon McPhate, Dean of Chester Cathedral.

Every picture tells a story

David Herbert10 Comments
D-day for dissertation – now done and dusted – and looking far better for being wordled. Are they words that ring true? Already I am wishing I told it straighter and more to the point. Or are they generative words?

Monument in honour of Paulo Freire, Esplanada dos Ministérios, Brazil

I came across this monument of Paulo Freire – with the writing on the wall. For Freire words were generative. “To speak a true word is to transform the world”, whereas, if a word is deprived of its dimension of action … the word is changed into idle chatter, into verbalism, into an alienated and alienating ‘blah'”. (Freire, 2000, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, p.87)