New jam - new jam jars...

It is good to see that the Churches in England are finally catching up with Jesus teaching on jam-jars.

In a landmark move, the Churches Legislation AdvisoryService (CLAS) has issued guidance to churches of all denominations, pointing out that EU(European Union) regulations now forbid the re-use of jam jars for selling produce at church fetes.  While it is legal to give home-made jams and preserves away in old jam-jars as personal gifts, old jam-jars must not be sold under any circumstances.  Even the great repository of wisdom and knowledge known as the WI, has confirmed this to be true.

The EU ruling is, of course, reminiscent of Christ’s famousteaching on wineskins.  “Who puts new wine onto old wineskins?” he asked.  “If you do you will lose the lot!”

Which makes you wonder – why did it take the EU to identify the dangers of putting new jam into old jam-jars?  Why did the church not recognise the problem decades ago?

The issues which worry the EU are, of course, slightly different than those that Christ drew our attention to.  The EU is more concerned with the hygiene risk of ‘old jam-jars’ .  Old bugs and bacteria might contaminate the new jam endangering those who consume it.  But the analogy still holds true when we look at the church today.

Churches have been putting the new jam of the gospel into the culturally contaminated jam-jars of the Victorian era for over 150 years and the results are all too obvious.  Young people stay away from the church in droves; deeper understanding in areas like gender and sexuality are contaminated by outdated Victorian values; and the result is often seen in virulent outbreaks of ecclesiastical nausea and vomiting.

The few young people who stay can also become infected by the same Victorian values which infuse those old jam-jars.  At best many seem to accept that this is quite normal – at worst some rise with zombie like conviction to defend views of which are un-Christian, compromised and arcane.

Yet again we find that Jesus was right.  Whether it is wineskins or jam-jars, we constantly need to put the new wine (or jam) of the gospel into the new skins (or jars) of the Kingdom of God today.

But sadly the church of today seems more attached to its old jam-jars than to the gospel.  No wonder church attendance is falling…

 

The Power behind the Throne

There is a throne in Canterbury Cathedral called the Chair of St Augustine.

It is the chair on which the new Archbishop of Canterbury will be seated when he begins his ministry.  Named after the first Archbishop of Canterbury, it conveys the authority and responsibilities of the role to the new Archbishop and the Anglican Church.  It is an ancient throne, one of oldest in existence, and when the new Archbishop is seated upon it, the Church of England will have a new leader.

I first became aware of its power some years ago when I was part of a small group who went to talk to Rowan Williams about the mess the church has got itself into on sexuality.  We met in the Archbishop in Lambeth Palace.  We met him in the hope that we could persuade him to be more proactive in promoting a new spirit of openness.  We met him hoping to re-awaken those things which he knew to be true about the gift of God at work in people of the same sex who love each other.

We should have been pushing at an open door.  Rowan Williams had gone on the record many times before he was appointed Archbishop of Canterbury in support of greater openness, acceptance and inclusion. 

But as our conversation developed, it became clear that no such commitment would be forthcoming.  Time and time again, he referred to his role as the present occupant of the Chair of St Augustine.  He talked of the weight of history and responsibility which the occupant of that Chair carries.  He talked about the need to preserve what he had been given – what had been entrusted to him.  He talked about his role as Archbishop in terms of being a guardian.  He told us that what he thought (as an individual) was irrelevant because his job as Archbishop was to hold together the great responsibility which the occupant of the Seat of St Augustine is given.

Our hearts sank.  We had hoped to meet with an anointed leader for the future - instead we found a guardian of the past.  We had met someone who had been called to leadership because of his great gifts – but then neutered by the power of the institution which had called him – the power behind the throne.

I have seen it before…

I saw it at work among the Church Commissioners when fighting to preserve affordable social housing in the Octavia Hill Estates which they owned and managed.  When I met them as individuals, I met thoughtful genuine Christians keen to listen and engage.  But when I met them as an institution, entrusted only with maximising profits, a very different persona emerged.  The power of the institution had overtaken them – they had become ‘institutionalised’ – only able to act in the way which was expected of them, putting money first and people second.

I have also experienced the corrupting power of the institution at first hand - the subtle pressure to behave in a particular way contrary to personal conviction.  I experienced it when I was a member of the OICCU Exec – the committee which ran the Oxford University Christian Union.  I was asked to take on the role of Outreach Secretary – to encourage and enable evangelism.  I came full of hope for what we might be able to do together – with fresh ideas, hopes and expectations, but I was naïve about the power of the institution.

Before we started our work, we were all taken away for the weekend by UCCF to be trained for the vital role we had been given.  We were reminded that we were being entrusted with a weighty responsibility – the continuation of many years of faithful evangelical witness to the University.  We were reminded of the tools we were to work with – the Bible and the Doctrinal Basis.  We were told that if we did our job properly, we would ensure that the next generation of leaders in the UK were Evangelical Christians who would, in turn, ensure that we continued to be a Christian Country (what a pretentious heresy that was!)  Our role was not to bring innovation or change – it was to continue the work of those who had been before and to defend OICCU against error and compromise.

And I have to say that I was taken in.  The criteria for our decisions became not ‘what seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us’ (Acts 15:28)  It was to do what was expected of us.

I remember the moment when this dawned on me.

It was when we voted to revoke an invitation to one of the most gifted and fruitful evangelists in Oxford - Canon Michael Green – because he would not sign our Doctrinal Basis of Faith.  His preaching had brought many hundreds of students in Oxford to faith in Christ.   He went on to be Professor of Evangelism at Regents College Vancouver, and came back to lead the Archbishops Springboard for Evangelism.  He wrote over 50 books on Christian apologetics and evangelism, but he wasn’t good enough to speak at our precious Christian Union because he would not conform himself to the expectations of our institution.

We had allowed ourselves to become institutionalised.

As the Crown Nominations Commission meets this week to decide who the next Archbishop of Canterbury will be, I can honestly say that I don’t know who should be appointed.  But unless it is someone who is strong enough to resist the power of the institution, I am also tempted to say that it doesn’t really matter.

What we need is an Archbishop who is courageous enough to lead us in the way of Christ. 

Jesus was no defender of the institution.  He refused to be boxed in, channelled or handled.  His concern was to bring new life – not preserve old structures, and he would not be manipulated into meeting the expectations of others.

And that is the Archbishop I am praying for…

Unconditional Joy

I recently came back from our family holiday in Polzeath, Cornwall – and it was fun!

The highlight, as always, was body boarding in the waves on this famous surfing beach.  Being picked up by the waves and propelled forward in the surf alongside other excited boarders as we raced towards the sands is nothing less than fantastic.

And as I looked left and right at others being carried along by the waves, I saw and felt something wonderful.  Unconditional joy!

It is the kind of joy that leaves everything else behind.  Whatever worries or stresses may have been around in the rest of our lives simply fell away as we sped towards the shore.  Uninhibited smiles broke across faces, divisions and social barriers fell away.  Old and young, fat and thin, cool and not so cool, all united for those few moments in the joy of riding a wave.

It was the wonderful power of unconditional joy and I think that we need more of it in our lives.

Many of us lead such complicated lives, juggling different responsibilities and spheres of life.  Work, home, faith, aspirations, expectations, joys and sorrows all mixed up inside of us – which mean that we rarely experience truly ‘unconditional’ moments like these.  It is the power of the ‘yes-but’ in the back of our minds which impinges on pure, true joy - the potent inhibition inside us that stops us surrendering to the joy of the moment - and we are the poorer for it.

I also think that Christians are particularly bad at this.  We are too self-conscious to surrender ourselves to pure joy – there is always the bit of guilt or concern for others that holds us back. 

Let me give you a trivial example – saying Grace before a meal.

I always thought that saying Grace was about thanking God for what he has given us, but so often any thankfulness is immediately followed by a reminder about all the people in the world who don’t have enough to eat. 

Now before you think me heartless or complacent, let me say that I do take seriously the needs of the hungry in the world.  As a family, we give financially every month to support aid and development.  In fact, when I left work recently to be a carer for my wife, it was the one piece of our giving which was non-negotiable, and we have gone without things to maintain it.  But why do we have to spoil the joy of sharing together in a family meal by this need to counterbalance our thankfulness with an equal dosage of guilt?

Then there are those times in church worship when the joy of God touches our hearts.  All too often, I have held back from embracing that joy unconditionally because of worrying about other people around me who may not be feeling so uplifted!   Yet unconditional joy has a unifying power – like the power of the waves at Polzeath – uniting very different people – even strangers – in a moment of pure enjoyment.

And there is also a deeper need to let ourselves go once in a while - to get lost in the moment.  As I have reflected on my experience in the waves at Polzeath, I have also found myself reflecting on another area of life where the unconditional is so important and yet so rare – Unconditional Love.

As Christians we are called to mirror God’s unconditional love for us.  The love that causes the sun to shine on good and bad people (Matthew 5:45).  The love that took Jesus to the cross, while we were still sinners (1 John 4:10).  The love that runs to meet the prodigal son and throws its arms around him without waiting for apology or contrition.

And we often pretend that we offer unconditional love to each other.  Yet so often there is a ‘yes-but’ in our love for brother, sister or stranger, than means we hold something back.  And in the process, our love becomes conditional and tainted – it becomes dependant on that person meeting our expectations in one way or another.

Conditional love is not God’s love.  Conditional love is not empowering, liberating, overwhelming, or transforming.  Conditional love does not open our hearts and wills to the love and purposes of God.  Rather, it set limits on how much we mean to God.  It sets limits on what God can do.  It seeks to steer us rather than embrace us.

And as I have reflected, I have come to realise that there is a link between Unconditional Joy and Unconditional Love, and it is this…

Until we are able to embrace Unconditional Joy,

we will be unable to offer Unconditional Love.

Or put another way, until we are ready to let go of the ‘Yes-but’ in our joy, we will be unable to let go of the ‘Yes-but’ in our love.

So I am grateful to the waves of Polzeath for giving me a glimpse into the power of unconditional joy – for the strangers with whom I felt united as we rode the waves in those moments of joy – and for the God who loves us without conditions and who longs to fill us with his unconditional joy.

Women Bishops - a Minority report ...

During Monday's Synod debate on women Bishops I witnessed an interesting spectacle.

It has long been accepted in the CofE that women Bishops are going to happen.  The only question which remains is how to accommodate the minority who still can’t accept the fact. 

Some of those are Anglo-Catholics who believe that a Bishop must (by definition) be male, but others are conservative Evangelicals who can’t accept the notion that a woman can have authority over a man (except the Queen of course, who is supreme governor of the CofE – I assume they think she is really a man!).

So the debate (which is still rumbling on) is about how to ensure that these minorities still feel welcome in the Church of England and what system should be put in place for providing Bishops to look after them.

And in the debate yesterday, we had 2 or 3 conservative Evangelical speakers pleading for a system that would mean that their minority could remain in the CofE after women Bishops become a reality.

“Will there still be a place for us?” asked one speaker, “Will we still be welcome?”

As I thought about this, the situation became more and more intriguing.  Here was a minority in the CofE, which acknowledged that they were a minority, pleading for special treatment because they were a minority.  There is nothing wrong with this, of course.  The Church should be a place where everyone is welcome, even those whose picture of God and the church is very different to the majority.  It should be a place where grace and acceptance is not dependant on having the same theological view.  Our unity should be found in following the Lord of grace who reached out and embraced the poor, the outcast and the sinner.

Yet at the same time this particular minority is the most vocal group in the fight against the acceptance of another minority in the Church – lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Christians.

When it comes to gay Christians, who (on this issue) understand the Bible differently, they vehemently deny the possibility of a special place in the Church.  They want lesbian and gay Christians to be barred from ministry unless they promise to deny themselves and bow to enforced celibacy.  They would like to see Bishops taking action against gay and lesbian ministers in relationships and Civil Partnerships instead of turning a blind eye.  They want enquiries made about their sexual conduct and public repentance for past errors as a condition of continuing in ministry.  They want to see the Church continue to deny same-sex couples who are seeking blessing or dedication for their loving commitment to each other.  And they certainly do not want to see openly gay Bishops – even if they are celibate.

Yet they plead for a ‘special place’ in the CofE with their own Bishops who will share their minority theology while at the same time seeking to exclude others.

I am sure that I was not the only one who shared the irony of the moment.

If the CofE does manage to square the circle and provide a framework which creates a space for them without undermining the authority of woman Bishops, then perhaps we ought to require of them a little grace and charity towards the minority which they have been trying to drive out. 

Perhaps a commitment should be required from them to show respect and acceptance to the minority of Christians who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, before we let them stay?  Perhaps we ought to ask them to publicly repent of their failure to love and to listen to their brothers and sisters, and in a particular, the 1500 LGB&T clergy in the Church of England?  Perhaps they need to be ready to accept that there is a place in the Church of England for gay Christians – in the pews – in the pulpit – and in the House of Bishops.

And perhaps the CofE should seek to cater for all its minorities instead of picking and choosing which ones to protect.