Category Archives: Pentecost

FUNCTIONAL ATHEISM?

Posted on by
8

image: 06 One Market Place Pinnacle DB.jpg

MY FORMER COLLEAGUE Esther Foss and I were forever exchanging notes about books when we were working together, and it was and still is surprising that we often found ourselves, quite independently, “singing from the same hymn sheet”. The other day I wrote about the sense I have that churches need to “loosen their grip” a bit more, to “let go and let God” …

The fullness of the Life of God has been engaging with growth action planning since before Adam was a lad – and without a great deal of help from us whole new worlds are constantly springing into being. We’re caught up in the act of co-creating with God, of course, but we do well to remember that it takes us a while to catch up with the sheer energy of God; it takes us a while to reckon with the fact that the Holy Spirit’s gift is patently intended for EVERYBODY – inside and outside churches and other religious bodies; it takes us a while to reckon with the Spirit’s gifts in people we think decidedly unqualified. And therein lies the Source of my greatest comfort and consolation as a Christian disciple and a parish priest. The universe is buzzing anyway. And I’m not controlling it.

Buzzing | Simon Marsh

Esther and I share a common regard for the wonderful Quaker writer and teacher Parker J Palmer. Now working in different parishes, in different dioceses, and not having seen each other for a while, it was great to read a note from Esther this morning:

When the church gets it right, when she is true to her identity as Christ’s body on earth, it is always down to the Spirit. And when she gets it wrong – as she often does – it is because we – clergy and people – have fallen into the trap of trying to go it alone.

The Quaker writer Parker J. Palmer calls this “functional atheism… the belief that if anything decent is going to happen, we are the ones who must make it happen.” (Let your life speak p.88)

Esther Foss

The creative, creating Spirit of God is still at work, changing people’s lives, calling them out of the places of darkness into hitherto undreamed of glory and joy and light and service and fulness. Esther’s very well aware of that fact, as I am, but goes on …

… So why are our churches so often half empty, you might ask. Well, not to put too fine a point on it, God is not restricted to the church! And neither should we be. If we look at that reading from Acts we see that the apostles got out of the upper room and into the market place. And when we get out and look about we see that his Spirit is everywhere too.

I feel myself freshly commissioned: to look for and to celebrate the signs of God’s Spirit at work in the Church … and everywhere else as well.

BUZZING

Posted on by
6

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability Acts 2

MY COLLEAGUE David Stoter and I chatted for ten minutes after yesterday’s three consecutive celebrations of the Eucharist here. “The whole place is buzzing” today, David said. And it was. Bramhall Parish Church is never exactly a sleepy-sort-of-a-church but yesterday, indeed throughout the weekend, the place was “buzzing”.

A lot of good things have been happening and more are converging. David and I both articulated that we “don’t quite really know why”. And I’ve been pondering that thought since, delighted about the “not knowing” … and in the early hours of this morning something “clicked”. It’s Pentecost next Sunday, I thought, half asleep, and was jolted awake. It’s Pentecost next week … and we’re not in control. The outpouring of the very life and breath of God is what’s continually changing us here, “from glory into glory, till in Heaven we take our place”.

I remember smiling, twenty years or more ago, when I heard a friend speaking about her church family

“Oh! we do get ourselves in a pickle. We pray “Lord, renew us, set our hearts on fire” even whilst we’re anxiously trying to channel the Holy Spirit through the control centre – you know, the Church Council. And She will insist on listing where She wills! The Holy Spirit’s constantly dishing out gifts to every Tom, Dick and Harriet – and each in their own language! The Holy Spirit’s absolutely no better behaved than Jesus was when it comes to our rules …”

But churches come alive when we loosen our grip a bit. Green shoots are appearing all over the place in and around St Michael & All Angels Bramhall. The fullness of the Life of God has been engaging with growth action planning since before Adam was a lad – and without a great deal of help from us whole new worlds are constantly springing into being. We’re caught up in the act of co-creating with God, of course, but we do well to remember that it takes us a while to catch up with the sheer energy of God; it takes us a while to reckon with the fact that the Holy Spirit’s gift is patently intended for EVERYBODY – inside and outside churches and other religious bodies;  it takes us a while to reckon with the Spirit’s gifts in people we think decidedly unqualified. And therein lies the Source of my greatest comfort and consolation as a Christian disciple and a parish priest. The universe is buzzing anyway. And I’m not controlling it. As the late, great Welsh priest and poet R S Thomas put it so well in his Pilgrimages, God is

… such a fast
God, always before us and
leaving as we arrive.

We’d exhaust our little energies if we tried to keep running after God. And there’s no need. Pentecost illustrates for us that the gifts are generously dispersed anyway. God “keeps up with” us. So I can rest a little easier. I can encourage my fellow pilgrims to rest a little easier too. For all the evidence before my eyes is that the fire of God’s love draws no distinction between divers peoples. To each is given their own language and life “as the Spirit [gives] them ability”. The saving work has been done. It’s ours to celebrate that fact. All we need to do is open the doors of our hearts, homes and churches as widely as possible, eyes wide open to the beauty, grace and potential in human persons, making sure that everyone knows that all people are invited to the Feast of Life – in precisely those hearts, homes and churches, always.

From time to time, of course, we become irritated. Overwhelmed. Anxious to get a grip on the reigns again, to take control. I’m too easily irritated by those (especially so called “Christian”) people who are apparently quite certain that if only all humanity would follow their particular religious traditions then the world’s ills would disappear. But Pentecostal fire is ever intent on warming such irritations out of our systems. The more irritated we become the more persistent the “calling in the night” that suggests (have you noticed?) that we

enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them: for you Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him - Matthew 6, v 6-8

ALMOST SPELLING ‘HOLY’

Posted on by
Reply

WRITING ABOUT stained glass fragments “blown apart in wars” and haphazardly reassembled later, the priest poet David Scott, in the second stanza of his A Window in Ely Cathedral, tells of

A leering bit of face with twisted lips,
a bit of beard, and letters almost spelling ‘holy’,
a sheaf of corn, a leaf, and then the sun dips,
lighting Mary in her simple glory.

Piecing Together
 A Window in Ely Cathedral,
stanza 2 of 3, page 29

In the economy of God there’s something afoot. I can feel it in my bones. The downtrodden, the dispossessed, the shattered, the fragmented and the forgotten, wherever they are in the world, are raising their voices. They cry for the reconciliation, resurrection and restoration of a humane humanity – for people of every race and nation, and of every creed (or lack thereof), or “class”, or colour. Too much has been blown apart by wars and for too long. But days wear on, the sun dips in her course, illuminating that which speaks of life’s real glory, and is thereby truly holy.

This is exciting. This is the stuff of the reign of the Source of all of our lives, to whom we have prayed, and with whom we have yearned, in every time and place, in every political and religious tradition, for so very long. Whether we’re speaking of ordinary Libyans standing up to be counted, intent on “occupying” their own entitlement to a bit of their own space as human beings; whether we’re speaking of Occupy New York, or Occupy London, or occupy-a-space-in-the-queue for fresh air, or clean water, or a bowl of rice, something is most assuredly afoot. The sun dips, lighting Mary in her simple glory, and because at evensong we’re rather quieter than usual we may hear her softly say and pray

he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seat: and hath exalted the humble and meek

Come Christ-Mass this year the stable and the tent will not be featured only in hand-picked and glossy Christmas cards. Tents and stables are being raised up alongside cathedrals and churches. Tents and stables are being raised up in our dreams and in our slowly-awakening hearts. Here are opportunities to catch real glimpses for the possibilities of life’s glory, opportunities that are thereby truly holy. Some amongst us, nonetheless, will not look any more kindly upon such fragmented opportunities than they would ever have looked upon the teenage mother in the stable of Bethlehem.

But something of and from the divine is afoot. The leering bit of face with twisted lips, a bit of beard, and letters almost spelling ‘holy’, must give way to the sun’s dipping

lighting Mary in her simple glory.

ADULT FAITH … AND BELONGING

Posted on by
Reply

I’VE RETURNED time and time again in the last couple of years to the writings of Diarmuid O’Murchu in the quest I’ve engaged in all my life: the search for Adult Faith. In his book of that name O’Murchu quotes the late John O’Donohue:

Our modern hunger to belong is particularly intense. An increasing majority of people feel no belonging. We have fallen out of rhythm with life. The art of belonging is the recovery of the wisdom of rhythm.

John O’Donohue, cited by Diarmuid O’Murchu

Adult Faith, Growing in Wisdom and Understanding, page 139

I’ve witnessed a spiritual hunger in young and old alike in the past thirty years – along with a reluctance to partake of a “spiritual” diet grown old and stale (albeit that the kind of theological staleness I’m thinking of is too often dressed up as “contemporary”, or “for the young”, or “modern”). Many would rather remain hungry than have to suffer indigestion wrought by leave-your-brain-outside coercion. Me amongst them sometimes. O’Murchu, though, whets my spiritual appetite in these early years of the twenty-first century in much the same way that John Robinson reawakened interest, debate and dialogue mid-way through the twentieth.

There is a tendency in all the great religions to pass on religious wisdom through doctrines and creeds, with emphasis on knowing the verbal formulations. Adults are judged to be religious if they can pass on those beliefs to future generations just as they have been passed on to them. But this transmission is often lacking in internalized understanding; the neophyte learns the formula, and frequently is unable to apply it to daily life in an integrated way.

The bigger challenge is the realisation that we are all endowed with an inner transparency for the holy, for the mystery we popularly call “God”. We are programmed internally in the power of living spirit, always inviting us to attune more deeply to the Great Spirit who infuses the whole of creation. Whether we adopt a religion or not, we are innately spiritual and will remain so throughout our entire lifespan. For contemporary adults, this awareness is quite widespread and is raising formidable challenges for the meaning and place of formal religion in human living.

ibid. page 14

It was precisely Jesus’ own raising formidable challenges for the meaning and place of formal religion in human living that attracted me long ago to follow him. I’m still attracted, and still formidably – albeit willingly – challenged. When we’re able to rise to Jesus’ challenge to rid ourselves of outdated and outmoded shibboleths on the one hand, and perpetually to align ourselves with Divine Mystery on the other,  we begin to roll away the stone from the tomb. And in doing so begin to glimpse new ways of belonging, in an altogether more “catholic” universe. We wean ourselves away from the life of the “whited sepulchre” and find ourselves nudged towards the joy and belonging of perpetual resurrection.

MAXIMILIAN’S BAPTISM

Posted on by
Reply

THE FULL HOUSE for the joy-filled Baptism of Maximilian this morning gives me (another) opportunity to head up this post with my very favourite account, by a simply wonderful narrator, of Jesus’ Baptism! But more than that, it’s always such a joy when our House for the Church is full of people come to celebrate the goodness of God and the richness of the gifts we revel in. And there’s no greater gift to a family than that of an infant. Nor, perhaps, any greater responsibility laid upon older shoulders. Bringing infants to Baptism in and into the House of the Lord provides glorious opportunity for all of us to reflect upon the giftedness and gratuitousness of our lives, upon our hopes and our aspirations, what – in co-creating with, and in, and surrounded by God – we want to make of our world, our humanity, our society, our church – for Maximilian, for ourselves, and for God.

“I baptise with water”, said John the Baptist. One who will come after me will baptise with Holy Spirit. And so it came to pass. Today and every day humankind is baptised “new every morning” by the Spirit of Divine Grace and Love. Perhaps that’s why Maximilian and his wonderful parents were smiling so much in our sacramental celebration of the fact this morning. Perhaps that’s why people had travelled from far and wide to celebrate the gift and the treasure. Yes! – wherever and whenever humankind is “baptised” in the Spirit of God we can rest assured that the Source of our Life continues to turn the world upside down. “Whoever has seen (this human) me has seen the Father” said the anointed Jesus to Philip. And this morning he might have said “whoever has seen Maximilian has seen the Father”. What a joy, what a commission, what a responsibility – this living of the Life and Love of God in and through each one of us, dear created people.

DIVINE PARENT,
Mother and Father, Sister and Brother of us all,
in company with Jesus,
in the power of your Spirit,
with prophets, priests and royal leaders,
and with every woman, man and child
upon the face of the earth,
we bless you for the gift of life and of abundance.
And as we bless you we also ask
your blessing for ourselves that we may be
inspired, strengthened and encouraged daily
to share that life and that abundance
throughout the world.

JC

Posted on by
Reply

WHAT A FANTASTIC MORNING! Two gorgeous youngsters baptised at 10.45 and another three at 12.30. On mornings like this you just can’t beat being a parish priest! And when the gathered assembly is swathed in smiles and real, warm welcome is extended to all, the priest included, it feels great to be alive – and I’m immensely grateful to the team here, under Jenny Hunter’s affectionate leadership, who make all the arrangements for these occasions. The Spirit of God visited St Michael & All Angels Bramhall in many and divers ways on this, the Feast of Pentecost.

New every morning is the love
Our wakening and uprising prove;
Through sleep and darkness safely brought,
Restored to life and power and thought …

John Keble

Two young chaps, beautifully (and I mean beautifully) suited and polished, were wearing very splendid cufflinks, obviously given to each of them as gifts on this, their special day. Engraved cufflinks. So I asked the lads to show them to all present. Each proudly did so. One pair bore the initials DC and young D was pleased as punch. So I asked his brother what his initials stood for: JC. Then, with the wise compassion of the very young, with loud and clear voice that made my Pentecost forever memorable, J shouted JESUS CHRIST. Priceless. (Though Mum told me quietly – ;) – he’d been practising a bit!)

How the Spirit of God warms us. And that warmth makes us thankful, and hopeful, and ever ready to extend welcome for all.