Tag: Kingdom of God

Seeing the wounds Jesus shows us

David Herbert2 Comments

A sermon for the 2nd Sunday of Easter – Year C for two small churches. The gospel for the day is John 20:19-end.

The Incredulity of St Thomas by Caravaggio – or should it be called Jesus showing Thomas his wounds?

I love preaching that brings Scripture to life—and that brings Scripture back to life.

That’s a line I’m going to repeat each week to remind us that every time we open Scripture together we are bringing it back to life.

This morning we return to John’s Gospel, still caught up in the wonder of that first Easter day (John 20:19-end). It’s a story only he tells.

John himself brings scripture back to life.
Particularly we see the influence of the creation story from the 1st chapter of our scriptures.
We can see that in the way that he tells us the time.
On the evening of that first day of the week.
It’s like last week’s gospel reading which began: Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark. (John 20:1)
We are still on that first day which was like the first day of creation, when, according to Genesis 1:2, earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep.
That’s the time in today’s gospel. It was the first day of the week, and it was evening.
In other words, darkness was forming.
Taking our cue from Genesis, John’s readers can expect God’s wonders on this new day of creation.

Thomas wasn’t with the disciples when Jesus came on that first day, the day of resurrection.
It was the other disciples who had to let him know that they had seen the Lord.
Thomas told them that he would never believe “unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side”.
It is this I suggest we focus on in our worship today.

Thomas is the patron saint of those who are blind because seeing wasn’t enough for him.
He needed to examine Jesus’s wounds by touching them and feeling them.
And the wonderful thing on that second Sunday, the first day of the week following, was that Jesus came and stood among them again and showed Thomas his wounds.
He welcomed his touch. He guided his hand. He let him explore his body.
Thomas is the patron saint of those who struggle to believe what they can’t see—or even what they can.
He shows us that resurrection faith isn’t just about seeing.
Sometimes it’s about touching, questioning and wrestling with God.

Jesus showed Thomas his scars. He wants his disciples to see them.


In the Last Supper, he took a loaf of bread and he broke it.
He wanted them to see his body in the brokenness of the bread.
“Take, this is my body,” he said. (Mark 14:22).
Then he gave them a cup for all of them to drink from.
In that cup he wanted them to see his blood.
“This is my blood of the covenant poured out for many.”
Even before he was wounded he wanted to show his disciples the wounds he was going to suffer.
And in today’s gospel, in one of his resurrection appearances, he invites Thomas to have a look at those wounds – to examine, inspect and see with his hands as well as his eye.

Thomas recognises Jesus through his wounds, just as Jesus wanted him to.
And this is how we come to know Jesus.
Just as Thomas encountered the risen Christ in his wounds, so too we encounter him today in the bread and wine of the Eucharist.
Every Communion we have with Jesus we have this invitation to examine the wounds of Jesus. Every time the bread is broken we are invited to see the brokenness of the body of Christ and to feel that brokenness in our mouths.
Every time we take this cup we are invited to taste the blood of Christ shed for us.

What is it that Jesus showed Thomas?
What did he want his disciples to see?
What does he want us to see when he shows us his wounds, when he invites us to see his body and his blood?

The first things we see are the wounds to his hands and feet where the nails were driven into his body by the hammer blows of empire.
Then, if he turns we see the wounds of the whipping scored into his back for being the scourge of empire and religion.
Then we see the scars on his head where they pressed the crown of thorns and added insult to injury, to press home the point that this “pretender” was nothing.

The rule of the kingdom of God is that the last, the lost and the least come first and those who are first in the kingdoms of this world come last.
The rule of the kingdom of God turns the rules of the world upside down.

In the wounds of Jesus, his disciples see a man who embodies that rule of the kingdom of God. In the brokenness of his body, in the bloodshed, we see a man the religious and political capital tried to reduce to nothing.
The plots against him and his crucifixion were intended to humiliate him and his followers – to make them least, last and lost – GONE for ever.

The problem for them was that the rule of the kingdom of God puts the least, last and lost – those lost and broken by the ways of the world – first.
When Jesus stood among his disciples, first without Thomas, then with him, he was the living proof of the fundamental rule of the kingdom of God.
Here was the humiliated, crucified and killed one.
You can’t get more “least, last and lost” than that.
Here he was, “the first fruits of those who have died”, Christ raised from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:20).

This is what Jesus showed Thomas –
the scars are the living proof of the rule of the kingdom of God.
Jesus stood among them as living proof of the rule he’d always followed,
that puts the last first and the first last.
Here is the one they put last made first.
This is what Thomas saw. This is what he said:
“My Lord, my God” – the rule of the kingdom of God realised in those few words.
“My Lord and my God” – Jesus comes first for Thomas.

So Jesus stands among us still, not with condemnation, but with scars.
What do we see? What difference does it make? Does Jesus come first?

Jesus doesn’t shame Thomas for his questions. He meets him in them.
He doesn’t rush belief. He invites it — gently, patiently, personally.

And he does the same with us.
To all who doubt, who ache, who long to see and touch and know — he says,
“Here I am. Peace be with you.”

He doesn’t hide his wounds. He offers them.
He lets us trace the pain and the mystery of a love that suffers with us and for us.
And in that wounded, risen body, we find our hope.

This morning, he says again:
“This is my body. This is my blood.”
This is how I choose to be known.
Look closely. Taste carefully.
And, if you are among the broken,
do not be afraid.

Inspired by love and anger – a sermon for Passion Sunday

David HerbertLeave a comment

A reflection on our own passion (or lack of passion) for Passion Sunday. The readings (Jeremiah 31:31-34 and John 12:20-33) are below. It’s St Patrick’s Day, 2024, and we’re in two churches in the heart of England, in rural Warwickshire. The quotes from Cole Arthur Riley are from her book, Black Liturgies.

Today is known as Passion Sunday. 

I have given this sermon a title – Inspired by love and anger. They are words of a hymn from two members of the Iona Community, John Bell and Graham Maule. (Hear it sung here)

The author of our first reading, Jeremiah was inspired by love and anger to hope in hopeless times when his people had lost everything – their home, their land, their institutions and their identity. At great cost to himself, he reiterates the promise of God to make himself known in a way that people could relate to. They would know God by heart, not by head and teaching or by law and obedience. He promises to write his law (or rule) in the heart of his people – the rule of God, self-imposed by God, the only rule of God, that he will only love, and that we will only know him in his love – in his passion. From that point the relationship between God and his people becomes an affair of the heart – where all our passions stir.

Jesus has this rule of God in his heart, living his life with this rule, and passionate for this rule of God’s love to be the rule of life on earth, just as it is in heaven. He taught his followers to make that our constant prayer. Thy kingdom come, on earth, as it is in heaven.

And as he resisted the temptations of an easier life so he insisted that we who are his followers should follow him in similar all-consuming passion, resisting the temptations of an easier life, to passionately engage with the rule of God for our lives – that rule being, only love.

Normally, on Passion Sunday, we would focus on Jesus’s passion without questioning our own. Jesus’ passion is well known. 

But what of our own passion? Are we passionate? Are we inspired by love and anger? Are we passionate for the kingdom of God, in the way of Jesus? Are we passionate for, and compassionate with those who are always counted first in the kingdom of God who  as a rule in the world are counted last or least, or not counted at all and get lost and disappear? The rule of God is that they come first.

Or are we too preoccupied and too easily distracted? Or, are our passions just about our selves? Or, has our passion become too domesticated so that our passion stays at home never reaching beyond our front doors?

Or have we been worn down and out by a hopelessness leading us to believe that there is no point in our passion because we can’t make any difference or we can’t change anything? Has our experience embittered our hearts?

Have we become numb? The opposite of passion is apathy. Apathy literally means without feeling, without passion.

Or have we never been helped to direct our passions? Have we ever had friends to help us safely explore the things of our heart – both the love and the anger?

Or have we become too nice for that sort of thing becoming the sort of people who never get angry? I looked up the meaning of nice. Apparently it is from the Latin nescire. Nescire means not knowing or ignorant. Nice became a word in Middle English to mean stupid?

How do we help one another to be more than the nice people we undoubtedly are?

Jesus wasn’t nice. He was fiery, fierce and furious – as we see in what happened when he went to the temple in the last days of his life, turning the tables on the moneychangers and condemning the religious authorities for their exploitation of the poor – the very people who come first in the rule of God.

We only have to listen to what the spirit says to the churches to realise that nice doesn’t even cut the mustard.

Hear the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, to the church of Laodicea (revelation 3:14-22): “I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were either cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth. For you say, “I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing.” You do not realise that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind and naked.”

We need to what what the spirit is saying to the churches.

Nothing good comes from being nice. Nothing changes if we remain apathetic. Nothing comes from being lukewarm, If we aren’t passionate and compassionate.

Passion is never served cold. It is heated by love and anger. Anger, rage and fury are part of our created order. They are very much part of ourselves. And they are very much part of our passionate selves. 

Those counted last and least as a rule, those usually discounted and lost need the anger, rage and fury of those who have taken the rule of God to their heart. They need that encouragement from fresh hearts.

It is anger, rage and fury which wins wars, defends the abused and bullied, defeats fascism, establishes justice, rights wrongs – it is never done cold and it is never done by being nice. It’s how the rulers of this world are driven out.

We have a problem. We are schooled to be nice. In the playground we were told to be nice, particularly to those who weren’t nice. We have demonised anger. Who wants us to be nice? Powers that be do. Controlling people do. They prefer us not to know. They don’t want to hear us. They don’t want our disruptions and protests. They want to keep us in the dark – the very place Jesus doesn’t want to keep us. His whole mission was to shed light in our darkness.

Cole Arthur Riley puts it like this: “Happiness and sadness and even fear are met with tenderness, understanding; they are permitted to speak without constant scrutiny. But anger we require to use the back door – to come and go quietly without attracting too much attention to itself… The oppressors of this world have told you to play nice, be civil. They tell you to control yourself. But by this they only mean they want you easy to be controlled.”

She confesses “We have exalted being nice and calm as a pinnacle of character, repressing that which stirs our souls so deeply we must shout” and she prays to God to “release us from the kind of niceness that only serves and protects the oppressor”. 

There is so much wrong, so many things are broken. There’s plenty to be furious about. How are things going to change without our fury, anger and passion? 

We can’t take it all on, but we can let love lead us. (Hatreds can also make us angry – they’re the furies we don’t want. They’re the furies we will fight with a passion).

I suspect that few of us are any good at being angry or furious. It often comes out wrong, doesn’t it? We often finish up only hurting those we love. This isn’t surprising because we have repressed anger. We’ve kept it hidden and not given it voice. We haven’t kept up our practice.

Here we can practice that love, among friends, through our prayer, learning all the time how to be angry better, how to balance anger with love, how to live passionately in the rule of God which is only love, how to live compassionately with those Jesus always counts first.

Can we help one another redirect our passion to join the passion of Jesus for the rule of God, and so that our whole lives are inspired by love and anger?

Jeremiah 31:31-34
The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt – a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

John 12:20-33
Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus’. Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.
‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say – “Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this very reason that I have come to this hour. Father glorify your name.’ Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’ The crowd standing there heard it and said it was thunder. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to him.’ Jesus answered, ‘This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

Redressing the power of kings – a sermon for coronation weekend

David Herbert6 Comments

A sermon for Easter 5 (A) for St Mark’s, Leamington. May 7th 2023.

The Gospel reading is John 14:1-14.

Who has seen the most coronations? (The maximum is going to be 3, dating back to 1936). I’ve seen two and remember just one. Like many families we got our first TV to watch Queen Elizabeth’s coronation.

Our scriptures are very sceptical about monarchy, probably because these scriptures come from the heart of a people who have been repeatedly traumatised by imperial power. There will be a whole range of positions on the monarchy represented here this morning, from those strongly in favour to those of you who would line up with the anti-monarchist protesters. That whole range of positions can be traced back as far as the time of the prophet Samuel.

The memory of the people of God always goes as far back as the time they were held in Egypt, to the prince known as Pharoah and the memory of how oppressed, exploited and persecuted they were by him. He was always demanding more from them. More bricks, more bricks, more bricks to build his pyramids of power. This Pharoah isn’t named but that doesn’t matter, because, as one wise scholar of these scriptures says, “when you’ve met one pharoah, you’ve met them all”.

The people of God remember injustice, their history of persecution, their repeated exile, their holocaust – and they/we rejoice that God joins them/us in their/our struggle.

There was a time when Israel was governed by prophecy. Israel wasn’t like the other nations, until the elders came to the prophet Samuel asking him to appoint a king because (and this sounds really childish) everyone else has one.

This is 1 Samuel 8: 

All the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel saying: “you are old and your sons do not follow in your ways; appoint for us then, a king to govern us, like other nations.’

Samuel prayed about this, and he heard God saying, “don’t take this personally, they have not rejected you, they have rejected me from being king over them.” Then God told Samuel to warn the people about kings and their ways.

So Samuel warned Israel about kings – basically saying that they’re always on the take. “He will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and be his horsemen … he will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields, grain, vineyards and orchards. He’ll take 10% of your grain in tax. He will take your male and female slaves, and the best of your cattle and donkeys. He will always be on the take, and will always be taking the best.

“Never trust princes” says the psalmist in Psalm 146. Never trust princes, nor any human power, for there is no help in them, speaks the psalm. There are so many people across the world lost, displaced and hated by the powers that be who know the truth of the psalmist – who this morning, like us, on this 5th Sunday of Easter, will be breaking bread, defying their princes as they commit their lives, their trust and their hopes to God, simply because, in the words of Psalm 146, it is the Lord their God who:

  • gives justice to those who suffer wrong
  • Bread to those who hunger
  • Looses those who are bound
  • Opens the eyes of the blind
  • Lifts up those who are bowed down
  • Watches over the stranger in the land
  • Upholds the orphan and widow
  • Turns the way of the wicked upside down

These are all God’s people – those who suffer wrong, who are hungry, bound, blind, bowed down, strangers in the land, widows and orphans – learning from first hand experience, and guided by the wisdom of ages that princes can’t always be trusted even though they are often charming.

That is why what we saw in yesterday’s coronation was a redressing of the power of kings. We saw King Charles being undressed and then being dressed up with the regalia binding him to the kingship of God, and binding him (and us) to those who have been let down by kingdoms and empires.

Here’s how they hemmed him in, how they redressed his power with prayer.

First they gave him spurs, symbols of military honour and chivalry, praying that he may be a brave advocate for those in need.

Then they gave him the kingly sword that it be not a sign and symbol of judgement, but of justice, not of might but of mercy.

Then the bracelets of sincerity and truth, tokens of the Lord’s protection.

Then the robe, that he may be clothed in righteousness and garments of salvation.

Then the orb, set under the cross, that the kingdoms of the world may be seen under the rule of God in the cross.

Then the ring

Then the glove, praying that he will hold authority with gentleness and grace.

Then the royal sceptre

Then the crown that he may be crowned in gracious favour

The whole thing was a dressing prayer for the king, praying for the power of God in his life, so that he comes into his power not to be served but to serve.

The meaning of the word religion goes back to binding. Religion means to be bound. In the coronation service we saw the king being bound by those who are leaders of our religious communities. Our bishops and other faith leaders binded the monarch, as they have repeatedly done over the centuries.

I’m not a chess player but I know the rule of the game is that the king cis bound to only move one square at a time. In fact, he can’t even move as far as the lowly pawn. He relies on the defence of his queen, his castles, his knights, his pawns – and yes, his bishops. The game is set up with the bishops sandwiching the royal couple.

Bishops are anything but straightforward. The rule is that they move diagonally, criss-crossing the board. In yesterday’s service we didn’t see them moving diagonally, we saw them moving diaconally binding the king to the gospel, binding him and his kingdom to the broken hearted, captives, the bruised.

Today’s gospel hasn’t been chosen because it is coronation weekend, though it could well have been. It is the gospel appointed for this Sunday in Easter. In it Jesus addresses those troubled by the state of things and all that they are having to endure. He says, do not let your hearts be troubled, trust in me. He is not talking to the troublemakers. He’s talking to the troubled.

In my Father’s house, he says, there are many dwelling places. This he says to a people whose land is occupied and who have been continuously displaced by others who have wanted their lebensraum or living room. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?

My Father’s house is the kingdom. It is the place of longing as we pray for the kingdom to come on earth, as it is in heaven, and it is the place where God longs for us, for our be-longing. Different versions of the Bible translate the many dwelling places as many rooms, or as many mansions. The meaning is the same – that there is so much room that has been prepared for the troubled in heart. It is positively palatial.

This is the metaphorical space we enter as soon as we submit to Jesus as the way, and the truth, and the life, when as his beloved disciples we lay ourselves close to his heart, when we join with him in communion. And this is the place we come to when we pray, when we are troubled by whatever is going on which has a different way, truth and life.

Just as they do in chess, so in yesterday’s service (and I presume in their daily prayer) the bishops were walking diaconally the many spaces, the many rooms, the many dwelling places made ready for us by Jesus for the broken-hearted, the wronged, the bruised.

Maybe one or two of you are more used to coronations then me but I admit to being very moved and surprised by the binding of the monarch, and I ask myself why I am so surprised.

Is it that we have neglected prayer for the queen or the king? Surely our scriptures teach us to pray for kings because their feet are feet of clay. It is because they can’t be trusted that we need to pray for them.

Have we neglected to pray for our bishops, to bind them to their diaconal ministry of gathering the prayers of the people, to hearing and resounding their cries?

Have we neglected to pray for others who have all the power in the world to ruin us? Have we become indifferent to the gross inequalities of this nation and kingdom, much of which is rather close to the home of our king and his family?

When we pray in Christ we pray in the dwelling places made ready for us by Christ. There we may know what is on the heart of the King of kings, what is the prayer of the King of kings. Surely it is this: that the only way, the only truth, the only life for any kingdom is the way of Jesus, and any other way, truth or life is a travesty of justice.

When we pray in Christ we build capacity and room for others to breathe. This is our service. When we serve one another we join with Christ who came to serve, not to be served. These are the very foundations of the royal house Jesus shows those who are troubled in today’s gospel: a palace fit for the King of kings and all those he loves, in which there is so much board, so many spaces, and more than enough room for everything except any other way, truth or life.

As in chess the king needs the binding protection of our prayer, so, for now and for as long as he reigns we pray for/with Charles, for/with his family, for/with his advisers and ministers, for/with those who suffer wrong, for /with those who go hungry, for/with those who are bowed down, for/with those who are refugees, that together we may be saved from the ways of the wicked and the wrongs of the kingdom.

Small Kindnesses – where holiness dwells

David Herbert1 Comment

Small Kindnesses

I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk
down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs
to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you”
when someone sneezes, a leftover
from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die” we are saying.
and sometimes, when you spill lemons
from your grocery bag, someone else will help you
pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other.
We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot,
and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile
at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress
to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder
and for the driver of the red pick up truck to let us pass.
We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only those brief moments of exchange.
What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here
have my seat.” “Go ahead – you first.” “I like your hat.”

This is a poem by Danusha Laméris from her first collection, The Moons of August which was chosen by Naomi Shihab Nye as the winner of the 2013 Autumn House Press Poetry Prize. Naomi Shihab Nye has also written a remarkable poem on Kindness.

I like the language of kindness, of kith and kin, that in German children are kinder, that kindness is the making of humankind and that humankind should be qualified by kindness. By themselves small kindnesses are rarely remarkable in the sense that they are newsworthy, but they make our days and open the door to the greater kindnesses of friendship and community. Small kindnesses are usually intuitive, born by habits of the heart grown in rich cultures of difference and longing. In one place the bus stop is a silent waiting room of isolation, in another, like Glasgow, it’s a meeting place. Why the difference? What are the differences in the habits of the heart of both places?

Danusha Laméris asks the question, what if these small kindnesses are the true dwelling of the heart? Should we be surprised when everything about the kingdom of god is small? In two tiny parables Jesus explains the kingdom of God. “He said, ‘What is the kingdom of God like? And to what should I compare it? It is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in a garden; it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made nests in its branches.’ And again he said, ‘to what should I compare the kingdom of God? It is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.” (Luke 13:18-20)

So in a simple touch, a smile, a whisper or a word might be folded the holy – just a single seed planted in our lives. There probably isn’t anywhere else for the holy to dwell.

Preparing for responsible companionship

David Herbert4 Comments

Theological perspectives have changed. Tonight I am meeting with our “Readers’ Council” to hear their concerns about their “Continuing Ministerial (Professional) Development”.These changes in theological perspective will be very much on my mind.

Reader ministry in the Church of England was “revived” in 1561 and in 1866 to minister in poorer parishes “destitute of an incumbent” and to cope with the population explosion in cities in the early 19th century. They had a different point of view from the clergy. The Bishop of Bangor (in 1894) saw the advantage of “Christian men who can bridge the gap between the different classes of society” – And the Dean of Manchester  recognised that most Readers were “more in unison with the masses with whom they mixed”. Although the Diocesan Readers came from the professions, the Parochial Readers were described as ‘the better educated from among the uneducated’. Nowadays Readers and clergy train together both before and after licensing and ordination. I have been ordained long enough to remember that this was not always so, and to remember that the idea that Readers and clergy could train together seemed preposterous. Now we take it for granted and appreciate the advantages of learning together.

This movement of theology is reflected in many of our traditions. From a Roman Catholic perspective, Ilia Delio traces the development of theology from the preserve of the priest in his academic study to a vast lay, creative and inter-disciplinary movement. This huge paradigm shift is dated back as recently as the 1970’s when only 5% of theologians were non-priests. That figure has grown to over 60%. Theological education is now well beyond the control of the institutional church. Diarmuid O’Murchu lists features of this shift in his book Adult Faith:

  1. Theology is no longer reserved to the academic domain.
  2. Theology has gone global, even beyond the boundaries acknowledged in multi-faith dialogue.
  3. Theology has become quite multi-disciplinary and interdisciplinary. “The contemporary lay theologian seeks to address the here-and-now of evolutionary creation … [casting] a wide net within a contextual landscape … [seeking] dialogue with partners in various fields of learning, transcending wherever possible the dualistic distinction between the sacred and the secular” (O’Murchu, p66f).
  4. Lay theologians do theology in a vastly different way from their clerical counterparts, who “prioritise the church, its traditions, teachings and expectations” (O’Murchu, p119)
  5. Christian theology has become radicalised as theologians “sought to realign Christian faith with one pervasive theme of the Christian Gospels: the New Reign of God”. (O’Murchu). Christian life is increasingly seen as “empowerment” and “called to be a counterculture to all forms of destructive power … facilitated not by some new benign form of hierarchical mediation, but by dynamic creative communities.” (O’Murchu).

For O’Murchu the “Kingdom of God” is “the companionship of empowerment” with theology being the “servant wisdom” of that companionship, so that “theology once more becomes a subversive dangerous memory, unambiguously committed to liberty from all oppressions and to empowerment for that fullness of life to which all creatures are called.” (O’Murchu, p65).

Theology has changed. In many traditions theology was thought to have been the preserve of the clergy. Readers and other lay ministers helped to open those boundaries, but their tendency remains to “prioritise the church, its traditions, teachings and expectations.” Now we increasingly realise that theology goes beyond the church (why has that taken so long?). Our shared “ministerial development” is to realise this, to overcome the tendency to prioritise the church and to engage with the “companionship of empowerment” wherever that is found.