Déjà vu

Mary came up to me at the end of a service to ask “Why do we need to love ourselves?” Now there’s a loaded question, steeped in overtones of ‘I’m having difficulty loving myself’, so mentally I took a deep breath and then had a stab at answering her.

I began this blog in the exilic state, 4 years ago, of having been turned down for ordination by my bishop of the time. I have of late been re-visiting the issue, but yesterday my Diocesan Director of Ordinands (DDO) sat with me to impart the news that the decision still stands. No-one has been convinced of any reason to change it.

At the heart of the decision is the lack of conviction in others that I can … well … elucidate? (no) … describe? (sort of) … enunciate? (spit it out, man, spit it out!) … verbalize? (almost there: c’mon) … to whatever it is my call to ordained ministry. I am unable to explain persuasively to others what it is that I feel God is calling me to, and why. You see the problem.

I am reminded, though perhaps it is a false memory, that the protagonist in Douglas Adams’s book Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency is socially inept. When insulted by someone, he comes back with a cracking retort … about 4 hours later when tucked up in bed in his fleecy pyjamas. My memory of Douglas Adams’s art and literacy is perhaps flawed, but I am left with self-recognition of the character.

I am surrounded by loving support at this time, though that is a state I have enjoyed for a very long while. It therefore pains me to see how others are affected by my afflictions, among whom I include those who have had to rake up the past to consider how they arrived at the recommendation they did. They feel that all the evidence – or rather, the lack of it – shows that the system has worked well which has protected both someone who might be ordained, and a potential flock, from a wrong move.

In reporting to me how fully and sensitively the matter has been looked at, my DDO used the phrase ‘nebulous’ in relation to my efforts at describing my calling. It is a word I’m familiar with, being right in there in the Ed Psych’s report into my dyslexia. I have, I was told at that time, a somewhat nebulous problem with organization. That is, I find it difficult to martial ideas to a coherent argument or plan of action. I know and somehow instinctively understand more than I am able to say: so when asked something important, I incline to panic. How very frustrating, my Ed Psych told me, I must find it to have such an intellect and yet not be able to convey its machinations.

A ministry issue attaches to this problem. If I cannot describe why it is I feel that there is a tonsure-shaped hole in my ministry, a gap where a collar seems right, then how might I deal with matters of deep theological and practical pastoral concern raised by a parishioner?

Which brings me back to Mary and her softly put, slightly apprehensive, question: “Why do we need to love ourselves?” I find myself affirmed that people like Mary hear God speaking to them when I lead worship; glad that they find me approachable regarding their struggles; surprised that I can after all begin an ‘ad hoc’ dialogue on themes such as authentic love for others being present only when we can love ourselves; aware of the un-asked question that needs to be given time to emerge; and finally that I actually, substantially, care.

It is right that someone unable to articulate – thank you, Sara: that’s the word! – a sense of calling should be treated with caution when they persist in seeking ordination. I have, when all is said and done, struggled for many years with that very issue: why me, God? And thus we come to a rising tide of anger, no – frustration, within me which is fuelled not by the decision that I should not be ordained, but by my growing suspicion that perhaps the church – that is to say, people like Mary and I – has gaps in its ability to help ordinary people articulate their fears, faith, or feelings. It seems to me damningly to indict the system: a system that rightly strives to avoid ‘priming’ me with model answers to questions of discernment, but seems utterly unable to perceive that my real need is to be equipped to articulate those unspoken thoughts upon which ministry and other decisions might be based.

I have the feeling that Mary might benefit from joining the right sort of house or Lent group (she and I both). By the grace of God perhaps I may have a part in helping her to seek and acknowledge the forgiveness that seems thus far to have eluded her. But I find above all that I am deeply distressed that I have brought myself to be forbidden from entering into that sacramental ministry by which I might absolve her in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour.

I stand at the foot of the cross. And I feel, God forgive me, the weight of a hammer in my hand. I have failed my Lord, yet still he loves me. His love endures for ever. If I can persuade you of nothing else, trust me in this.

About this Blog

Are you as confused as I am about how we are meant to engage with God in this thoroughly secular world, this ‘rebellious house’?

The things I hear about, read about, think about, and occasionally preach about, scream out for theological engagement – talking about God – for talking about God is what Christians are meant to do.
Since I’m crammed full of ignorance, this blog is one way I reach out to find who God wants me to be, and what he wants me to do about it. It is my way of being seen to prepare for exile (Ezekiel 12:4).

Perhaps you too are as bemused, befuddled, and bewildered as I am. Join me for the ride!

Tweet Tweet




Temptation is just a tweet away ...


What do you think of the idea of a member of a congregation using social media during a service? Specifically, how would you feel if someone was composing tweets during a funeral?

A few days ago I heard someone say they had done just that. Part of me was appalled, and part of me was excited. The part that was appalled was thinking of issues such as ‘privacy’, ‘courtesy’, ‘taste’, ‘concentration’, ‘engagement’ and related issues that argue against sharing the contents of divine worship as it happens. The other part of me was reflecting positively on ‘accessibility’, ‘normalization’ (which is to say, that worship should be just as acceptable a topic for live chat as any other on social media), and that old chestnut ‘evangelization’.

The context for this revelation was a debate at Greenbelt 2012 called ‘Finding Your Own Digital Paradise’. The talk touched on a number of topics, from multimedia worship to multiple online profiles, the latter being held in some contempt as ‘not being oneself’.

I begged to disagree, since I believe that multiple accounts are a courtesy to those styled ‘followers’ in this online age. It is not a case of having a split personality, or of wishing to hide one’s ‘true self’, whatever that is. But this blog which I style An Exiles Baggage contains content which readers of my three other blogs may have little interest in, for example, and the same goes for my two Twitter accounts. Together with my (sole) Facebook profile, I deliberately limit the topics or genre of my communications through these identities so as to form channels which from a follower’s perspective are relatively free of noise. And noise is something we get a lot of in the digital age but with which we seem unwilling to learn how to deal.

Which brings me back to the idea of tweeting from a service. For some, including the minister, this may feel intrusive. That someone may appear focused not on the main activity at hand, but on tapping at their smart phone or tablet screen, could be distracting to others. But in a different workshop I took part in at Greenbelt, I joined an exercise in creative writing during which very loud music was played. The point of that exercise, which was something of a struggle, was that unless we can teach ourselves to write under adverse conditions, we are not worthy of the title ‘writer’.

As with creative writing, so too with church. If we struggle to engage with God in the relative peace of services of worship, tweeting, farting, or noisy children notwithstanding, then how will we ever hold on to the mantle of Jesus with which we try to clothe ourselves in the bustling secular world? It is surely not the back-pew tweeter that is the problem, but our own lack of focus as Christians.

Looking for God

In Psalm 105 verse 4 we read “Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually” (NRSV). In the context of that psalm,’ seeking the Lord’s presence’ amounts to looking at his wondrous works and recognizing all that he has bestowed on us in creation.

From the blessings of a loving family, a warm dry home, and situated in lush countryside, it is perhaps not so difficult to recognize the Lord’s presence as to stop ourselves becoming contemptuous of the familiar.

There is however more than one way in which to seek the Lord’s presence, and perhaps Matthew 25 vv35-36 expresses it elliptically. The Lord is to be found in the naked, the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the imprisoned and the stranger.

We may find it difficult to seek our powerful God among the weak and destitute, in the ‘other’. Yet He is God of all, not just a chosen few. Jesus was after all born to a young woman barely into her teens and in the humblest of situations: in an animal house, where his crib was a food box. Dressed in swathing bands, he was naked in the sense of too poor for the rich clothing we might have expected for him. He was among strangers and was soon to be exiled to avoid Herod’s slaughter. Such was the condition of his birth, and such is the condition in which we find him still.

Finding the Lord in the least of his subjects, our responsibility and our duty is clear. It is not that in order to save ourselves we must offer alms to the poor: it is that in looking after these we offer them a glimpse of His glory reflected in our compassion for them. ‘Compassion’: that gut-twisting feeling that enough is enough and we must be the change we want to see. In such acts of ministry we begin to help others to perceive the Lord’s strength and to wish to join us in seeking him continually in a blessèd unending cycle of building His kingdom on earth.

Seek his presence continually.

Choices, choices

I don't like coffee, but I understand that sometimes people who do so suffer an overabundance of the bean. I don't mean addiction; I mean when you ask for a coffee and get offered cappuccino, americano, latte and so on. You choose latte and are offered skinny or full-fat. You choose full-fat and are offered 'sprinkles'. Suddenly the choices overwhelm, and you explode into "Just give me a b****y coffee!"

I'm writing this at Greenbelt, where there is a superabundance of theology, of dogma, of worship, of talks, and of causes to sign up to or protest against. I fail in my attempt to get into a talk on new monasticism and find myself instead, irony of ironies, going to get my iPhone charged.

And I wonder: "Am I missing out because of the choices that baffle and bewilder?
Yet in the background I hear the infectious beat of Rend Collective Experiment on the main stage. I catch phrases from the talk I'm missing but will be able to catch on mp3. A 'flash mob' has just burst into 'Amazing Love' right next to me. And I find myself inspired by the artistic efforts of unsung volunteers to sign-post the venues around me.
Inspired. Look up the root of that word, and look up the Greek for Holy Spirit.
No choice. Good choice.

Stand Up for Jesus

John the Baptist's vocation in the wilderness, that place where human frailty is laid bare, is the vocation of all Christians in these troubled times. We are surrounded by doubters and scoffers, and perhaps we lack the rhetorical skills to argue for our faith.

Yet we all possess choice in how we respond to our personal form of wilderness. We can each of us choose how to relate to those around us. In this lies the ability to put forward the Christian viewpoint to its fullest measure: that we love each other as ourselves, and that we love the Lord our God with all that we are.

The Word of life which was from the beginning we proclaim to you (from 1 John 1).

Steps to Heaven

I heard yesterday of a man who wasn’t sure he wanted to go to heaven. In heaven, the man thought, he’d get to know everything, and wouldn’t that be boring.

The knowledge we have or aspire to in our lives is perhaps a red herring. Take one of the pieces of knowledge that passed me by as a bachelor and is of no use to me as a happily married man: the finger of the hand upon which a wedding band is worn in western society. I’d have to Google it to find out, but what then would I do with my new-found knowledge?

When a Sadducee asks Jesus about the man who’s six brothers each in turn marry his childless widow, and wonders who in heaven is married to whom, the reply is that no-one in heaven is married or given in marriage. It’s an activity irrelevant to the kingdom of heaven, so the question has no bearing on the truth of resurrection.

I’ve just watched a TV interview with a couple whose son died possibly as a result of mismanagement in the hospital to which he was admitted after a road accident. They wanted, as so many grieving parents, spouses, siblings and friends have wanted before, some ‘answers’. My fear is that no answer they get will have relevance to their relationship with their child now or in the time which is to come: a relationship in which they preserve his bedroom as it was in his life. For no-one in a position to give them answers in the medical or managerial circumstances of their son’s death is in a position to know the questions that underlie their grief, their 'un-knowing'. The One who might is God of the living, not of the dead, and his only answer in this age is to try to wrap them in love and thereby to chance rejection.

The 'love that will not let me go' is not a clinging desperate and somewhat forlorn love that we might have in our loss of someone dear to us, but rather a blessed assurance and hope that is bestowed on us even when we are lost to He who holds us dear. Such assurance and hope can only have relevance in the sureness and certainty of resurrection.