Category: Uncategorized

by Jo Cox-Darling.

I found myself inadvertently attending the steering group of a Public Health roundtable on end of life care, death, and dying – seeking a community-wide, holistic development of bereavement resilience.[1] 

I was asked, if as a society, each community is prepared to help by, ‘people being ready, willing and confident to have conversations about living and dying well and to support each other in emotional and practical ways’ – then what part might the church play in that?

I left wondering what a bereavement resilient church might look like – as a ‘church’ we are both a community venue, and a group of faithful, broken, volunteers, seeking glimpses of God in the shards of life. Over the last 2 years, I’ve been using a community organising change methodology to explore this.[2]  Having listened to professionals and the community at large, a group of grief-experienced volunteers have built a suite of resources available to the whole community. 

The Theos research into death and dying concludes:

‘In a modern and pluralistic society, the Church is rightly one of many voices in this conversation, but it is well-placed to make a positive and much-needed contribution – not only because of its practical assets and historical engagement in this area, but also because of its continued theological witness […] The interplay of grief and hope in Christian theology also holds space for the many complex emotions people feel as they face dying and bereavement – and ultimately, gives theological voice to our intuition that grief is really about love.’

The space provided by death to forge meaning-filled connections with people is one of brokenness, vulnerability, raw emotions, curiosity, kindness, and trauma: the very places that Jesus was to be found.  We pressed into the question of what it means to be a bereavement confident church, a place which offers death-confidence and open-hearted compassion to all.

In our local situation where the Church now has little part to play in the rituals of death, (funerals are largely taken by celebrants) we noticed that there remains opportunity for relationship building which goes far deeper, and lasts much longer, than the funeral planning itself. 

In partnership with our local hospice, we learned about the ‘Death Café’ movement, which helps people become informed about end of life, death, and bereavement care.[3]  We heard their firsthand experience of attempting to pilot something in our village – the negative response being so damaging that the entire campaign was cancelled. 

People don’t like talking about death.

People don’t mind talking about health and wellbeing, though – so we hosted the Primary Care Trust’s annual wellbeing roadshow…on the theme of bereavement. This was a cross-sector, open event, including contributions from anyone involved in death, dying, and bereavement care.  The church worked hard to be a safe, hospitable place.  We built trust in both people and the church as a community venue – which led to memorial services with local funeral directors, other PCT themed roadshows, and the beginning of a wellbeing hub outside of clinical spaces.

We also reviewed our own funeral care and memorial service provision.  We researched what other churches offered, audited of all of the poems and music used in funeral services, and posed the question ‘what do you wish you knew about planning a funeral?.’  As a result, we:

• Produced a booklet of prayers and poems entitled ‘The Gift of Grief.’ 
• Collated resources from organisations, making them available around our buildings.[4]
• Our craft group began crocheting Forget-Me-Not brooches[5] for memorial, and prayer shawls for healing.[6] 
• A memory tree is available at the village Christmas fayre for the names of those loved and lost, which are then presented at…
• … a memorial service using a Blue Christmas theme.
• Christmas cards are sent to every bereaved family.

We asked social prescribers, public health, and the Integrated Care Board what it would look like if our volunteers became amongst the most trusted bereavement self-care specialists in the area. As a result, we were asked to start a bereavement café that others could refer folks to, and we now run a weekly drop-in café with peer to peer support.

Around the same time, a young adult in the community died, raising questions for many about the power of prayer, the existence of God, and the ‘right’ way to respond to the family in their grief and trauma.  

The volunteer leaders realised that if they were to be resilient, they needed two things… 

1. to be supported to do their own bereavement work, before they could offer support to others.  We engaged with The Bereavement Journey,[7] and have courses to support people taking their next steps in the grief journey. 
2. some basic training in bereavement support, which we sourced through Care for the Family’s Bereavement Care Awareness training. 

The circuit meeting has requested all local church councils to consider committing to the Bereavement Friendly Charter[8] and to embed their own practices in a shared and strategic fashion: so that the Methodist Church becomes a place of inclusion, justice, growth, and connection for all who have been bereaved.

Finally, using the resources of AtALoss, we have also engaged in political action, writing to our MPs to support the Early Day Motion – which has led to the All-Party Consultation on Death, Dying and Bereavement – bringing the experience of death and dying to the heart of government policy making.[9]

In Lent, we are reminded that we are but dust, and to dust we will return.

Ashes to ashes.

Dust to dust.

At Easter, we know that death is not the end of the story, and that the world can change because of, not despite, our experience.

If we can get our care and compassion right for the community, building bereavement resilience, perhaps we can be more deeply resourced for those moments of death and resurrection within our property and policy making – as well as within the precious lives of our people.

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[1] ‘Ambitions for Palliative and End of Life Care: A national framework for local action 2021-2026’, National Palliative and End of Life Care Partnership, https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/ambitions-for-palliative-and-end-of-life-care-a-national-framework-for-local-action-2021-2026/

[2] https://www.corganisers.org.uk/what-is-community-organising/our-framework/

[3] https://deathcafe.com/

[4] This includes The Good Grief Trust, National Bereavement Association, National Association of Funeral Directors, At A Loss, and the Local Health Authority.

[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvOyZaB-H6A

[6] https://www.shawlministry.com/

[7][7] https://www.thebereavementjourney.org/

[8] https://www.lossandhope.org/app/uploads/2022/04/BFC-Charter-1.pdf

[9] https://www.ataloss.org/appg

by Jo Cox-Darling.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that we are all going to die.

In this first of two contributions to Theology Everywhere some of the issues around current trends in the death industry are explored.  The second article will tell the story of a local community seeking to discover what bereavement resilience might look like in practice.

Death is an ultimate fact of life, yet it’s surprising how distant people have become to death, dying, and the impact of grief in daily life.  The death knoll to the church’s involvement in all stages of bereavement has been tolling for a while. 

Much can be placed at the door of our under-researched experience of Covid lockdowns.  Those who were deemed vulnerable were kept at a distance from the rest of society.  Care workers were expected to make impossible decisions about who received treatment options and who did not.  Locally, temporary mortuaries were constructed out of sight of communities. One of the largest of these temporary mortuaries was a refrigerated hanger at the end of the runway at Birmingham airport.  Aeroplanes were replaced by ambulances taxying the dead to their final destination. 

Every day people were given the instructions for survival – and survive we did, intoxicated by the fear of becoming another statistic in a global pandemic. 

In Covid, we learned that funerals accommodating more than a handful of people wasn’t necessary, and that it can be easier to let the dirty business of death be done by other people.  We become protected from the contagion of grief which can be so incapacitating and overwhelming – and if we protect ourselves, then we’ve learnt that we are also protecting others.

An unexpected consequence of this clinical, politicised, approach to death has led to the huge rise in Direct Cremations.

The 2025 Sunlife Cost of Dying report revealed that 20% funerals are now Direct Cremations[1] – sold (widely on daytime advertising slots) as being an economic and compassionate alternative to expensive funerals, direct cremations are completely unattended cremations.  With the awareness within both the industry and wider society that some sort of death-ritual is a psychological (perhaps even spiritual) necessity, the National Association of Funeral Directors suggest that ‘pure’ direct cremations could be as low as 11%[2], with the difference being influenced by the addition of a reflective space, post-cremation memorial, graveside service at the burial of ashes, or even a wake.

The physical processes of death and dying continue to be clinicalised and professionalised.  Palliative care professional Dr Kathryn Mannix, in her book With The End In Mind to note:

‘The death rate remains 100 per cent, and the pattern of the final days, and the way we actually die, are unchanged. What is different is that we have lost the familiarity we once had with that process, and we have lost the vocabulary and etiquette that served us so well in past times, when death was acknowledged to be inevitable. Instead of dying in a dear and familiar room with people we love around us, we now die in ambulances and emergency rooms and intensive care units, our loved ones separated from us by the machinery of life preservation.’[3]

In 2023, 72% of 18-24 year olds had experienced the death of a loved one but only 33% had physically seen a dead body.[4]  This lack of lived experience of death and dying continues to lead to a lack of engagement with grief and bereavement – which in turn has an ongoing detrimental impact of the parasympathetic nervous system and the general wellbeing of people across all sectors of society.[5]  This had led to Theos producing an animation which explores simply what happens naturally to a body during the death process https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayMhA1pRLeY

As the Sunlife research concludes, ‘Brits still don’t like talking about death.’[6]

If the Theos research about attitudes to death and dying is right, and that:

‘…ours is a society which keeps death at arm’s length and out of sight. Many of us experience bereavement without direct exposure to death, and most do not feel well-prepared for our own deaths… We are increasingly likely to grieve for others behind closed doors too: religious or not, we think a funeral should celebrate the life of the deceased and hold space for mourning together, but less than half of us (47%) now say we want a funeral at all. Financial pressures…made greater room for market forces to shape how we grieve. The result is a significant realignment in British grieving practices…[including] openness to emerging “grief technologies” among the young.’[7]

I want to argue that the Church has a responsibility to begin to understand the missional needs that are now apparent to us.  Dying isn’t often a shared experience for families.  Funeral services are no longer the purview of the ordained.  Death rituals are no longer assumed part of community life.  As a consequence, we are all suffering – unable to pay attention to our bodies, our psychology, and our spirituality. 

Public health and healthcare professionals continue to grapple with the need to become a bereavement resilient society[8], the church still has much to offer into this space and sector.

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[1] ‘Cost of Dying’, Sunlife, https://www.sunlife.co.uk/siteassets/documents/cost-of-dying/sunlife-cost-of-dying-report-2025.pdf

[2] https://www.nafd.org.uk/2024/01/15/nafd-highlights-the-impact-of-inflation-and-importance-of-talking-about-funeral-wishes-in-response-to-cost-of-dying-report/

[3] Kathryn Mannix, With The End In Mind, London: William Collins, 2017, p.2

[4] Love, Grief, and Hope’, Theos, https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk/cmsfiles/Love-Grief-and-Hope.-Emotional-responses-to-death-and-dying-in-the-UK.pdf, p.14

[5] https://www.oprah.com/health_wellness/how-your-body-really-processes-grief

[6] Cost of Dying, p.34

[7] Ibid. p.xii

[8] ‘Ambitions for Palliative and End of Life Care: A national framework for local action 2021-2026’, National Palliative and End of Life Care Partnership, https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/ambitions-for-palliative-and-end-of-life-care-a-national-framework-for-local-action-2021-2026/

by John Lampard.

There are not many books which get a review in both The Church Times and The Financial Times, but The Divine Economy: How Religions Compete for Wealth, Power and People by Paul Seabright (Princeton University Press, 2024) achieved this unusual honour.

The thesis of the book is in the title. Seabright looks at religious organisations (mainly Christian, but not exclusively) as though they were the same as any other commercial organisation, which wanted to succeed in today’s world. It does not look at theological issues as such (although they are often close to the surface) but the effect churches have in a social setting.

A theme often revisited is, ‘Why do poor people give money and help to richer people?’ Seabright instances a young Ghanaian girl, Grace, who earns a pittance selling pieces of ice to motorists stuck in traffic jams in Accra. On a Sunday she donates more than a tithe to a church with a wealthy pastor, who is bedecked with gold jewellery. On a less dramatic scale the same question often went through my mind when I received the collection plate at a church I served in the 1970s, in a very rundown area of Leeds, containing many (then very poor) pensioners. Although we as a family felt we were just scraping by, our standard of living was considerably higher than many in the congregation.

Seabright suggests that Grace ‘benefits’ from an opportunity to dress up, to be treated with respect, to find friends (and possibly a suitable husband), she can sing and express herself, act as a ‘greeter’ and be responsible for younger and more vulnerable people than herself. I also think of a village chapel where many of the women who had known each other for years, and who were in service as maids etc, called each other ‘Mrs’ because the church was the only place they received that respect from others. Perhaps treating people with ‘respect’ is one of the most powerful evangelical tools available to the church.

Perhaps the most penetrating insight of the book, at least to me, is that it looks on church organisations as ‘platforms’ rather than as organisations. The word ‘platform’ conjures up today the digital universe of social media, search engines and apps, but Seabright argues that platforms, ‘Are organisations that facilitate relationships that could not form, or could not function as effectively, in the platforms’ absence.’ It occurred to me, as I read Seabright, that Mr Wesley was ahead of his time in creating a connexional ‘platform’ which was more about relationships, with travelling preachers and class leaders, rather than an organisation. A platform facilitates relationships into which people can opt in or out as they wish or as they feel the need.

Seabright uses the idea of the platform to examine three areas which a platform understanding can address. First, what are the needs in individual human beings which religious movements address?  Time and again he comes back to ‘purpose.’ ‘Human beings find purpose in activities that have a collective dimension.’ And religious organisations (unlike other purpose-creating organisations such as political parties) ‘have access to historical traditions, and stories from those traditions, that give them a powerful edge.’

The second series of questions are organisational. For example, why do different religious movements flourish, split, or die?  Seabright concludes, ‘they turn around questions of mission, of structure, of strategy, and of message. The way in which religious movements make these choices bear a marked resemblance to the ways that secular businesses do.’

The final questions are about the use of power. One insight I found particularly illuminating was the way in which religious organisations are more eloquent about the need for the sacrifice, that violence strategies require, than secular organisations. They can articulate the need for sacrifice (and Christian organisations have an advantage here with the centrality of the Cross) more successfully that a political organisation, which may need to base its appeal to ‘country.’ Think of the Crusades, the churches on both sides in World War One, and the Russian Orthodox Church today. Perhaps one of the reasons the churches struggle today is that sacrifice (giving, service and commitment) are not popular in a culture of me, me, me.

I am, in conclusion, aware that a contribution to Theology Everywhere, which is about a book which is not about theology, may seem an odd choice. But my grounding in the sociology of religion has been a constant insight into the theology I have tried to proclaim, and the church leadership I have tried to offer.

by Philip Turner.

‘It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, while the sun’s light failed’^[1]

When the sun should have been at its most radiant, Matthew, Mark and Luke are united in recording that the noon-day light is replaced by darkness at the time of Jesus’ crucifixion.

Without light it is near-impossible to see. ‘God is ignoring me,’ said the woman I was supporting in the hospital where I work as a chaplain.  Doctors had told her she had cancer and, with her husband recently dead, she now sensed her own life was at it’s end.  ‘I pray but God isn’t there,’ she said ‘but when I used to pray I knew God was there.’  How might we see when it feels like light has failed?

The contemporary experience of living on earth today might also be likened to a failure of light.  Putin’s territorial ambitions.  Genocide in Gaza.^[2]  12 million Sudanese refugees.^[3]  Global temperatures soaring past the critical 1.5C threshold.^[4]  Foreign aid diverted to pay for military spending.  We live in times where it can be difficult to glimpse light.  Yet, the noon-day light should be burning bright.  Never before has there been so many Christians on our planet as there are today.^[5]  So why is there darkness after noon?

Looking to Moses and the prophets^[6] could suggest that God is the bringer of darkness, perhaps to dazzle us with how much the world is misaligned with God’s kingdom.  This may be true, but it does not in itself offer hope for the cancer patient: it does not offer hope in a world where so much feels outside our control. 

In the darkness of the afternoon when Jesus hung on the cross Luke offers two avenues that are hopeful, if not necessarily comfortable.  The first is the example of Jesus who, in the noon-day darkness, articulates an active and embodied faith: ‘into your hands I commend my spirit’.^[7]  When we can no longer see, we can only trust in God’s vision, and stretch out our hands to be led.^[8]  The second is a reminder that trust in God can spring up beyond belief boundaries, like in the centurion who, as part of Rome’s military machine, seems to have developed eyes suited for seeing in darkness.  Where might we find such people today: the people who praise God, because in darkness they have seen the flame of God’s love?^[9]

Both avenues require surrendering the current way we see, in our own life, in the life of our churches and in the wider world.  Tomáš Halík, a Czech Catholic priest, philosopher, and theologian, draws on analytical psychology to suggest that the noon-day crisis is where the image of ourselves we have worked hard to create begins to crack, inviting us to root ourselves more deeply, and let our ego decrease so that the Christ within us may increase.^[10]  It is a book that challenges the way Christians have often unconsciously made the Christian mission colonial, where we seek more people like us, or more people to become like us.  Darkness might describe non-egocentric mission, the mission of the crucified Christ.

Perhaps Jesus’ followers today are called to the task of acknowledging how dark the afternoon can seem, but also that it cannot last.  Halík notes that evening must follow the afternoon, and in the Bible the evening is when a new day begins.^[11]  A new day that is rooted in surrender, because what Easter celebrates is not resuscitation, but resurrection: a transformation into a new way of being.

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^[1] Luke 23.44f.

^[2] UN Special Committee finds Israel’s warfare methods in Gaza consistent with genocide, including use of starvation as weapon of war, 14 November 2024 [https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/11/un-special-committee-finds-israels-warfare-methods-gaza-consistent-genocide]

^[3] Sudan war: A simple guide to what is happening [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-59035053]

^[4] January 2025 sees record global temperatures despite La Niña [https://wmo.int/media/news/january-2025-sees-record-global-temperatures-despite-la-nina]

^[5] Tomáš Halík, The Afternoon of Christianity: The Courage to Change (University of Notre Dame Press, 2024), p.60.

^[6] e.g Exodus 10.22, Amos 8.9

^[7] Luke 23.46

^[8] John 21.18

^[9] Luke 23.47.

^[10] Halík, The Afternoon of Christianity, p.31-33

^[11]Halík, The Afternoon of Christianity, p.211

by Karen Turner.

Each week I bake a cake and bring it to campus at the University of Bath and theological discussion ensues, like sugar-fuelled magic, where both the questions and the answers are student-led.

One topic this week was whether or not people thought the Bible (or parts of it) might be ‘the word of God’. The various answers given by the students were probably not that different from the answers you would get from a random sample of Methodists.  Some wanted to throw out the tricky bits, or even the entire Old Testament, while others protested that ‘God wrote every word in it’.

After a few moments, Ethan spoke up.  ‘I wonder if we are in danger of limiting the Bible to our time in history, when the Bible is for all time?  What I mean is, some bits of the Bible speak to me and some don’t.  But what if those bits spoke to people thousands of years ago in ways I can’t understand today?  And anyway, even in the span of a human lifetime, the same passage at different times might speak in totally different ways.’

His comment caught my attention. I was just back from a few days of silent retreat where I recognised my own foolish impulse to try to squeeze the Logos into a box.  As a chaplain, I’ve felt drawn to John the Baptist; a person speaking from the wilderness, pointing to Jesus, offering a way in from the edge.  So on the retreat I chose to spend time with the first chapter of John’s Gospel, where, in my mind’s eye, John stands near the river alone, as his companions leave him and follow Jesus. The message I expected to hear was that John loves people and lets them go on to better things.

But instead I found myself with more questions than consolation. I read on to chapter 3:

After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he spent some time there with them and baptised. John also was baptising at Aenon near Salim because water was abundant there; and people kept coming and were being baptised^[1]

The only reason given for Jesus and John baptising at the same time (and this after John very clearly sent his own disciples to follow the Lamb of God^[2]) is because of the abundance of water. The parallel baptising doesn’t make sense. It’s messy. It feels like an awkward timeline oversight that someone should have edited – especially since it isn’t mentioned in the other gospels.

Why is the untidiness there? What would it feel like to stand between them on the riverbank at that point of timeless incongruity?  John offering ‘the way of righteousness’^[3] as people come out to find freedom in God’s forgiveness and a new start, knowing all the while that this baptism isn’t the whole story, but carrying on.  Meanwhile Jesus is also baptising.  The waters are abundant.

John had such a prolific ministry that, later on, as far away as Ephesus and Corinth, Paul encounters people who had received the ‘baptism of John’.^[4]  Priscilla, Aquila and Paul fill in the gaps and explain about the baptism of Jesus and they receive the Spirit.

Before and after.  Decrease and Increase. End and Beginning. Die and live. How does the timeless God meet us in our time captivity?  David Ford writes that the whole Gospel of John ‘can be read as an education of desire’.^[5]  What are we looking for?  Are we ready for this baptism?  John knows what it will mean.

If there is ever a sense that Christ is present ‘at the still point of the turning world’^[6] in scripture, they are moments that jar us from our sentimental or even logical assumptions. God’s love breaks out of my boxes.  God is on the move in ways we cannot predict and throughout time in ways we cannot fully understand.

Last month I attended the confirmation of a former Bath student who, in his testimony, spoke movingly of the way he had found a home in his local Methodist church^[7] because his doubts were welcomed. He asked me afterwards if I could have predicted his faith journey.  ‘In all honesty, no,’ I replied.  God was at work in ways I could not see. God is always at work in ways we cannot see.  Let’s go where the water is abundant and work out what it means afterwards.

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^[1] John 3. 21, 22, NRSV.

^[2] John 1.29, NRSV.

^[3] Matthew 21.32, NRSV.

^[4] Acts 18 and 19.

^[5] David F Ford, The Gospel of John p. 54.

^[6] T S Eliot, Four Quartets, ‘Burnt Norton’ p.5.

^[7] Castle Street Methodist Church, Cambridge seems like a community of abundant water.

by Richard Clutterbuck.

When I invite a Methodist congregation – usually in a service of Holy Communion – to recite the Nicene Creed with me, there’s often a sense of surprise. It’s as if this is a strange and eccentric thing to do in an act of worship. So, we might not expect Methodists to be in the forefront of the celebrations for this year’s 1700^th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea. What does it matter that 318 (according to legend) bishops and their assistants assembled in a corner of the Eastern Roman Empire to thrash out a formula for teaching Christian doctrine? As a student once said to me in an Early Christian Doctrine class, “Why bother, these people are all dead, aren’t they?”

I do need to acknowledge that the historic creeds (the Nicene Creed and the Apostles’ Creed) have had a mixed reception in Methodism. Its more evangelical members might think that the councils and creeds are unnecessary; after all, we have the Bible, so what more do we need? Liberals, on the other hand, may find the idea of councils too controlling and creeds too restrictive; “don’t let anyone tell me what to believe!” John Wesley, as so often, sends a mixed message. He was always a staunch defender of the basic tenets of the Nicene Creed, such as the doctrine of the Trinity, in spite of their many contemporary critics. On the other hand, Wesley omitted the Nicene Creed from the communion service in his version of the Book of Common Prayer, edited for the newly-independent Methodist Church in the USA.

So, why should we celebrate Nicaea? I could suggest a number of reasons. One would be our solidarity with other Christians, past and present, what Jurgen Moltmann called ‘the ecumenism of time’. Another might be the conciliar method of bringing together Christians with different points of view to find a common understanding – something that, at its best, Methodism has done with its conferences. But asked to give just one reason, I would say this: Nicaea gives us an answer to the question, why bother with Jesus? The creed of the Council of Nicaea is shorter than the version we commonly recite as the Nicene Creed (it’s rather light on the Holy Spirit) but it shares the same emphasis on the drama of God’s action in creation and salvation. Jesus, the person who walked the lanes of Judea, taught in synagogues,  gathered disciples, performed miracles, suffered and died at the hands of religious and imperial powers, and (so his followers believed) rose from the dead, is one with the God who created the universe and works for its salvation.

“We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of all things, visible and invisible;
And in one Lord. Jesus Christ, the Son of God…”

The clauses that follow make it clear that not only has everything that exists come into being through God’s creative care, that same God’s saving love for humanity finds its expression in the Father’s Son, Jesus Christ. Famously, Nicaea introduced the word homoousion (of the same substance) to talk up the unity between the Father and the Son, and to refute the claim of Arius (an influential priest in Alexandria) that Jesus was part of creation rather than one with the creator.

If that seems a strange point of view to us, it’s surely because the European Enlightenment sparked a series of attempts to get behind the councils and creeds to a ‘real Jesus’ who could be recovered from their theological formulae. So, the nineteenth-century gave us the ‘Jesus of History’ movement, with multiple attempts to write the life of Jesus, usually with an emphasis on his ethical teaching and example. More recently, the ‘Jesus Seminar’ painted a picture of Jesus as the wandering prophet, a thorn in the side of the powerful. While these movements have given us a lot that’s helpful and challenging, they don’t give us a reason for putting our faith in Jesus, making him the centre of our belief and worship as well as the inspiration for our practice. It’s this that Nicaea does, admittedly in the language of its day, but nonetheless as a genuine call to faith and affirmation of salvation.[i]

What we teach still matters. We might look for different language from that of Nicaea, but we can still share in its faith.

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[i] It wouldn’t be right to claim her as a supporter of my point of view, but I am deeply indebted to one of my fellow-contributors to Theology Everywhere, Frances Young, who is taking a leading part in some of the celebrations of Nicaea this year. Her two recent volumes on Scripture the Genesis of Doctrine (Eerdmans 2023, 2024) shed fresh light on the early church and the complex relationship between the Bible and Christian teaching. In particular, Frances emphasises the importance of teaching in early Christianity. The early church, she says, often looked more like a school for learning than a traditional religion. What you believed really mattered; it wasn’t just a matter of fulfilling the right rituals. This teaching, she tells us, both depended on a dense and creative reading of scripture and developed its own lens for interpreting the Bible. See, also her “A Song for Nicaea” in the bulletin of the Methodist Sacramental Fellowship.

by Sandra Brower.

Epiphany is a good season to think about the relationship between Jesus and John the Baptist. ‘Epiphany’ means ‘manifestation’ or ‘appearance’ – we often associate it with an ‘aha’ lightbulb moment. The lightbulb moments in our lives are moments when we see something clearly, more clearly than we’ve seen before. And often these revelations aren’t produced by intensive thinking or pondering on our parts – they just come to us… in the moment.

Good fires bring light and heat in the dark and cold. And heat has the power to soften. About seven years ago our family spent Christmas in Eswatini, and one of the highlights was visiting Ngwenya Glass, where recycled glass was fashioned into all sorts of beautiful objects. There were massive stoves where the glass would melt and become malleable.  And we saw the workers take the molten glass from the fires and mould it into exquisite objects. The fires in the glass factory enabled the crooked to be made straight and the rough made smooth.

Eureka moments, in Scripture, are more often than not, associated with the Spirit of God. John says that while he baptizes with water, someone more powerful would come who would baptize them with the Holy Spirit. Throughout Acts, as people begin to follow Jesus, the disciples ensure that they have received the Holy Spirit; there is no New Testament conception of a follower of Jesus who does not have the Holy Spirit as their guide.  What does it feel like to have the Holy Spirit as a guide? It feels like a kindled heart. John the Baptist speaks about the baptism of the Holy Spirit being like a baptism of fire. His language is harsh. Even the crowds find him confusing for they ask him: ‘What, then, should we do?’  

The hymn, Come Down, O Love Divine, speaks of hearts kindled by a holy flame, and how that flame freely burns, ‘till earthly passions turn to dust and ashes in its heat consuming.’ It’s John the Baptist language; it speaks of the purifying nature of fire, of how the Holy Spirit guides us to do the right thing. To the crowd’s question, ‘what, then, should we do?’ John answers: ‘Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none, and whoever has food must do likewise.’ It’s not rocket science, but our lizard brains are often centred on self and not others.

When Jesus was baptised by John, a voice from heaven says, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved’. But what do we make of the Holy Spirit descending on him?  I mean, it’s not as if the Spirit hasn’t been with the Son all along. They are together in creation, the Spirit is there at Jesus’s conception, and has been with him as he grew in strength and wisdom, and the Spirit continues to be with Jesus throughout his ministry, guiding him and teaching him all the ways of his Father in heaven. So his baptism is not the first time that the Spirit shows up in his life. But the voice says something else in that moment: ‘with you I am well pleased’.

Right after the event of Jesus’s baptism, the rest of the chapter talks about the ancestors of Jesus, through his earthly father’s lineage. The Gospel of Matthew starts with Abraham and names all the generations to Jesus, son of Joseph – husband of Mary. Luke starts with Joseph – husband of Mary, and traces Jesus’s lineage beyond David to Adam, son of God. While it might be boring to read, it is included to emphasise that Jesus is not only the Son of God, he is also the Son of Joseph and Mary. He is human. The Father is well-pleased with Jesus because of what he does for us. Taking on our baptism at the beginning of his ministry is rich with meaning. One of the early church writers, Irenaeus, spoke about how Jesus passed through every stage of our human life, owning it and bearing it. The miracle of Christmas, that is revealed to us in the season of Epiphany, is that we – just as we are – can be the dwelling place of God’s Spirit because of Jesus, who becomes one of us.

Approaching Lent, and perhaps having celebrated its start with ashes on our foreheads, let’s remember that a kindled heart leaves ashes behind. When we feel convicted, when something is tugging at our hearts – that is good news! Because it means that God is dwelling close to us. Hearts of stone are hard to move. But kindled, malleable hearts, speak of a soul that is yearning for God, yearning for grace, and yearning for love. Don’t be afraid of the fire.

by Tom Stuckey.

“He went and hanged himself.” (Matt 27:5)

This is not a very promising text. It would not be wise to conclude your sermon with the words of Jesus, “Go and do likewise”.  There were 6,069 suicides in England and Wales last year; the highest since 1999. That is about 19 a day. These suicides cover persons of every social/democratic category. Of course a few hit the headlines. In January 2023 Ruth Perry, the headmistress of a Caversham School died by suicide after a destructive OFSTED Report. Then there were the three celebrities who ended their lives following the experience of participating in the popular TV ‘Love Island’. Going further back there were the tragic deaths of Amy Whitehouse and Whitney Houston.[1] Were these two so severely damaged by fame, fortune and the expectations of others that an untimely death was inevitable? Sometimes reasons are obvious but not always so.

Judas, the disciple, is an enduring enigma. As far as we can ascertain he was high up in our Lord’s affections. He was probably lying next to Jesus at the last supper. How else could Jesus have acknowledged him as the betrayer without the other disciples hearing (Matt.26:25)? It has been suggested that Jesus not only gave him the choicest morsel of food but may even have placed it in his mouth (John 13:30). It was love’s last appeal, but tragically Judas had drunk so much darkness into his soul that this token of love was received as wrath. None of the other disciples suspected his dark designs as he left the upper room on the night of betrayal. He was a trusted companion, sent on a special mission by Jesus (John13:29-30). Alan Mann thinks that many today unconsciously take Judas as their role model. ‘He typifies the post-industrial self . . . the intimacy Judas craves is purely for his own satisfaction and that others are expendable.^’[2]

Both Jesus and Judas die “hanging on a tree” (Acts 5:30, 10:39, 13:29). In the eyes of the law both are cursed. The contrast between Jesus and Judas could not have been greater. The life and death of Judas demonstrates the “down-side” of God’s justice, enacted in wrath. The death of Jesus demonstrates the “up-side” of God’s justice, enacted in love.

 Judas is the antithesis of Jesus.[3] While the Jesus narrative is one of coherence, his is a narrative of incoherence. Judas slips into the “nothingness” of isolation because he cannot maintain relationships. Jesus takes “nothingness” away from people, absorbing it into his own relational identity with the Father. Judas dies because he has based his whole life on an illusion and, losing all sense of self worth, suffers from chronic shame. He cannot confess, because confession would sink him further into shame. He cannot pray, because self-absorption has robbed him of the capacity to know anyone other than himself. He has distanced himself from the corporate world of relationships to such an extent that, when Jesus offers him a token of love, he turns away. The life and death of Judas is a negation of at-one-ment. He kills himself because he knows he is already dead. His suicide is the ultimate act of self-harming in a desperate attempt to feel something. Jesus and Judas represent two polarities; one walks the path to heaven, the other the path to hell!  We have the same choice. 

In Dante Alighieri’s epic poem The Divine Comedy there is this inscription over the doorway of hell.

Justice it was that moved my great creator. Divine omnipotence created me and highest wisdom joined with primal love.[4]

Is Dante suggesting that divine justice, power, wisdom, and love have created hell? Jesus and Judas illustrate the inseparable relationship between light and its shadow. Some argue that Dante’s inscription points to the choices people make since love gives us the independence to freely decide on either path. I believe God is more directly involved in that because of his love for the world, he makes himself accountable for the “nothingness”—which is the hell of his “non-creating”. Judas chose the path of “non-creating”. In his quest for absolute affirmation he copied the fall of the angels and dies on a tree. Jesus chose the path of creating. In his quest for justice he is obedient unto death and dies on a tree.

Jesus does not climb the tree like Judas; he is lifted up. In the Gospel of John, Jesus is not only lifted up on the cross, but he is raised up in resurrection. His cross becomes the new tree of life—not a tree of death. Thus Wesley can sing, ‘Thy love on the tree display unto me, and the servant of sin in a moment is free’.[5]

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[1] Amy Winehouse was found dead on 23 July 2011, and Whitney Houston on 11 February 2012.

[2] Alan Mann, Atonement for a ‘Sinless’ Society. Paternoster, 2005, p125.

[3] I am greatly indebted to Alan Mann’s reflections on these respective narratives of coherence and incoherence. (Mann, 107-131).

[4] Wilson, Dante in Love, Atlantic,2011, p.209.

[5] MHB 200

by Josie Smith.

In January, rather to my surprise, I achieved my ninety-fifth birthday. The oldest inhabitant at my church is 106, and the next in line is 98, and you have only to read the obituaries in the Methodist Recorder to discover that Methodism does longevity rather well on the whole.

What about some Thoughts to encourage you youngsters, then?   A friend of mine less than half my age told me that he couldn’t imagine how it feels to be So Old.  There I have the advantage – I know how it feels to be his age, because I have been there.   I told a young friend at church recently that the nice thing about ‘being a has-been’ is that ‘you once were’.  Her witty response lifted my spirits. ‘You’re not a has-been’ she said decisively ‘You’re very much Current Affairs, you are!’ My church is a good place to be – everyone counts, from the youngest regular attender whose age can be measured in weeks, and though I might appear to be a fragile antique, my input to discussions and decisions is not only sought but heard, and even acted upon when it accords with ‘the feeling of the meeting’.

What then does it feel like to be 95? It’s thirty years since I retired from my last Proper Job, with the Home Mission Division as it was then, and since then it’s been voluntary work of various sorts, and following my interests. And now I have slowed down.

A sort of balance sheet might be in order.   

Aspects of being Very Old: BAD – energy levels and physical strength are (only just) adequate for me to live more or less independently. It takes me four times as long to do anything as it used to, and I need two sticks to walk. (Try carrying anything while both hands are thus occupied!) I gave up my car around my 93rd birthday when I was awaiting complex surgery and using my accelerator foot became too painful. I am recognised to be housebound now, which brings me to GOOD – if I need a Covid jab or a blood test the medical people come to me, and appear to enjoy meeting a non-standard nonagenarian. I do have a regular lift to church on Sunday mornings, which is much appreciated, but our services are live-streamed – GOOD – so that I can take part from home if necessary.

But BAD – Ageism! I keep getting invitations through my door to move to one of the several local care homes, where I should ‘find new friends with whom I have a lot in common.’ Who says? ‘Being Old’ does not guarantee having a lot in common with everybody else who is old, merely because we were born a long time ago – though the requirement to love my neighbour is always part of the deal. One of the things I loved doing as a freelance broadcaster was to visit care homes and talk with some of the residents. What rich and varied lives they had led, and what entertaining stories they told. Many of those voices live on, safely archived in the history department of the local university.

BAD also is the assumption that old = lonely. I love people, but I am also perfectly content if I don’t see anyone for days. I enjoy my own company too. And that of a houseful of books. I am very deaf, so find radio a trial (difficult for a has-been broadcaster to confess that) and always need subtitles – often hilariously ill-translated – for my rare bits of television watching. I can’t hear the telephone ringtone, and even if I could, I can’t move fast enough to reach it before it takes a message instead.

GOOD – I can tell people I love them without embarrassment, which in a religion which is built on love is positive – and at 95 unlikely to be misunderstood. GOOD – My understanding of ‘the World, the Universe and Everything’ is constantly evolving. My present church, an Anglican/Methodist Ecumenical Partnership, provides enough challenge to keep me on my toes. GOOD – I recognise that other faiths have an angle which adds to my own faith, and though I can no longer be an active Local Preacher I do get my turn leading intercessory prayers and reading for services. Even a bit of Am. Dram. if I can do it sitting down. We had a Christingle service on Christmas Eve in which I was the both the Narrator and the chief of the flock, called Ram (suitably clad in a sheepskin) and all the children were shepherds and Magi and Angels as we told the Nativity story from the point of view of the sheep.

And I can view the end of my life with equanimity. I have difficulty in understanding when people bring me ‘sad’ news of the death of someone at a ripe old age after a rich and fruitful life. It is the natural ending of the state of existence we call life, and it can be approached with joy. We as Christians surely know that.

Being alive has not all been sweetness and light for me. I have survived early bereavement, cancer, sepsis, a cracked skull and a fractured femur, as well as lots of minor ailments, accidents, other broken bones and what are known as ‘surgical procedures’. I have been at enough deathbeds to know that it is often a relief when it comes. Death is revealed not as an enemy but as a friend.

So onward and upward, friends! Whatever the state of the world (and of those with the ambition to control it) God will be with you on the journey.