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by Raj Patta.

The Methodist Church’s Advent and Christmas campaign for 2024, ‘Hush the noise: Join the love song this Christmas’ is based on the popular carol It came upon the midnight clear. Since Christmas generally is loud with so many expectations, one of the objectives is to hush the noise and listen to the love song that the angels sang some 2000 years ago. This hymn captures the meaning and relevance of Christmas across the generations, and has drawn me to reflect deeply on its significance.

To being with, is this hymn really a Christmas carol? Why do I ask this question? Well, this hymn finds its place in all the hymnals in Christmas section, and in Singing the Faith, this hymn is under the title ‘The incarnate Christ: Christmas.’ But, I notice that there is neither a mention of God nor the birth of Christ in this hymn. The only reference to the story of Christmas in this hymn is when the angels came to shepherds singing ‘peace on earth and good will to all people’. The theme of the angelic choir is interwoven into the writer’s context, and for that very reason it qualifies to be a Christmas carol. This is a peace song and a love song that the world today is sorely in need of.

When this hymn was translated into my native language Telugu, the translator (a Christian missionary who learnt Telugu) Bernard Lucas changed the first line to ‘the night the saviour was born.’ For Lucas, the hymn looked very secular and it was in order to make it more Christmassy he made this interpretative change – he ‘Christmasised’ the hymn into our local context. Ever since then it has been one of our favourite carols in Telugu.

The hymn was published on 29^th December 1849 in response to the Mexico-US war. Edmund Hamilton Sears’ public theology is best understood by seeing the angelic choir’s ‘peace on earth’ against the scrouge of war, which dominated his times and his public sphere. Sears explains his context with multiple phrases: a ‘weary world,’ ‘on sad and lowly plains,’ ‘a space of babel sounds,’ ‘woes of sin and strife,’ ‘the world has suffered long,’ ‘man at war with man,’ and ‘men of strife.’ On the one hand the context was dominated by war and on the other hand there was poverty and slavery and Sears found meaning in the angelic choir’s song of peace relevant to his context. I also reckon that after celebrating Christmas in 1849, Sears wanted to continue message into the rest of the year and into everyday life situations, for Christmas is relevant throughout the year not just on the Christmas day.

Sears shares the story of the angelic choir who bend near the earth to bring good tidings of great joy to all people and that the world is longing for peace. In stillness the suffering world is waiting to hear the angels sing that heavenly peace. The blessed angels’ song brings music in the midst of the cacophony of Babel sounds. Sears also explains that the reason that the world is not able to hear the angelic love song is because of ‘man at war with man’, and so invites us to ‘hush the noise’ to hear the angels sing. The best part for me in this hymn is the words of hope in the final verse, where the new heaven and new earth as foretold shall come owning the Prince of Peace as king, then the world will repeat the song which the angels now sing.

The God of It came upon the midnight clear is a God of peace and justice, sending angels to sing and strive for peace on earth, offering goodwill to all of creation. In our attempt to hush the noise, we are invited to repeat with the angels singing ‘peace on earth and goodwill to all God’s creation’ and strive towards peace in this world filled with wars, conflict, poverty, slavery, exclusion and hatred. And those that work as peace makers are the angels today, those carolling peace in action are the angels in our midst.

The God of It came upon the midnight clear also invites us to acknowledge that Christmas is not the birth anniversary of Jesus Christ, which we as Christians commemorate year after year, but Christmas is an opportunity to recognise that Jesus Christ is being born every day into our contexts offering hope, peace, joy and love. This hymn proclaims that Christmas is not just a thing of the past, but is an event in the present where God in Jesus is taking birth the rubbles and troubles of the world and more specifically in today’s contexts of poverty, exploitation and marginalisation. The story of Christmas is very radical, unsettling the very idea of God who reigns from the realms of transcendence. Instead, God came down to pitch God’s sanctuary among creation, being born as a poor baby, born in a manger as there is no place in the inn, and then having to flee as a child refugee. May we as church also be willing to pitch our tents among communities offering a place of sanctuary by sharing the love of Christ with people around us. This hymn offers a challenge to 21^st century Christians of to be bold and creative in singing the faith creatively and relevantly for our times in the public sphere. Sears responded to the story of Christmas by offering a song of peace for the world. What is our new song this Christmas in response to the signs of our times today?

by Sheryl Anderson.

The Times newspaper currently runs a series called News in Pictures. On Wednesday 27^th November 2024 it included a wonderful photograph[2] of the sunrise through the limestone arch of Durdle Door in Dorset. This iconic photographic shot is known as “through the keyhole” and, because of the angle of the sun, it is only possible to capture it on clear cloudless mornings between November and January. For me this picture was very timely as I was leading a pre-Advent ministerial retreat reflecting on the Advent Antiphons. 

The Advent Antiphons are a series of poems in Latin believed to have originated in Italy in or before the sixth century. In the Roman and Anglican Church they are sung at Vespers before and after the Magnificat between the 17^th and 23^rd December so there are 7 antiphons in total and each antiphon is based on a different title for Jesus taken from the Old Testament — titles like Emmanuel, Key of David, Dayspring, and Wisdom. Methodists come closest to them when we sing the hymn “O come, O come, Emmanuel.” This hymn gathers together these titles giving voice to the Israelites’ longing for the Messiah, as well as our own longing for Jesus to come — both at Christmas and into our own lives.

On Wednesday 27^th November we were reflecting on the fifth antiphon, O Oriens, often translated as ‘O Morning Star’ or ‘Dayspring’. In Luke 1:78 we read: “Because of the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us,”[3] This is a translation of the Greek word  ἀνατολὴ [anatolé] which primarily refers to the act of rising, particularly in the context of celestial bodies like the sun. It is often used metaphorically to denote the east, (hence ‘the Orient’) as the direction of the sunrise or the dawn, symbolizing new beginnings or hope. But where does the notion of ‘Dayspring’ come from? What is ‘Dayspring’?

The poet Malcolm Guite has written a series of sonnets reflecting on the antiphons. In his book “Waiting on the Word”[4] Guite points out that the traditional poetical metaphor is to compare the span of our lives to the passage of the sun: the dawn equivalent to our birth and our old age the ‘sunset years’. However he suggests that although this may be chronologically accurate, spiritually the reverse is the case. Our lives begin in spiritual darkness, with our backs to God. In classical church architecture the font is traditionally placed by the door, which faces west. The symbolism is that we are baptised into Christ’s death and subsequently move eastwards, turning towards that rising, that beginning; turning towards God.

Guite explains that one of his sources for this notion is C S Lewis’s book “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader”. In classical literature there is an idea that at the end of life the ‘heroes’ undertake a magical journey to the blessed isles which are always located in the west. Lewis turns this on its head by suggesting the Dawn Treader journeys eastwards, towards sunrise.

For me, this is the best image I have for my understanding of growing older in life and in faith. In my own experience, and apparently in the experience of many of my contemporaries, my faith has become richer, more sophisticated, more wonder-ful, as I have got older. The longer I contemplate God and what God is like, the more I perceive that God is both more complex and simpler than I can describe. This image has also given me a creative, positive way to think about the inevitable prospect of my own death. If the Christian life is about transformation then a way of thinking about that is as a journey of continually turning around toward the source of light and life that is always flowing towards us. Thus Paul writes to the Romans, ‘Our salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed’[5] and to the Corinthians, ‘Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day’[6].

It is no coincidence that the fifth antiphon, O Oriens, is sung on the 21^st December, the winter solstice, the shortest, darkest day of the year.
O Morning Star,^[7]
splendour of light eternal ^[8] and sun of righteousness:^[9]
Come and enlighten those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.^[10]

If you look at the picture of the sunlight streaming through Durdle Door you will notice in the foreground the reflection of the rising sun creating a path of light coming towards you across the water. This is the ‘Dayspring;’ a pattern of light on water that is warm, welcoming, life-giving; showing us the way home.

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[1] Wesley, Charles, Christ whose glory fills the skies, no 134 in Singing the Faith

[2] https://www.thetimes.com/article/5ebb23c2-284e-44e8-b79f-a50c95eb5186?shareToken=349197b2dc77d0748e3d4313b3eeea81

[3] NRSV updated edition

[4] Guite, Malcolm, Waiting on the Word, Canterbury Press, 2015. pp79-82

[5] Romans 13:11

[7] 2 Corinthians 4:16

[7] “the dawn from on high” (Lk 1:78)

[8] [Wisdom] is the brightness of eternal light” (Wisdom 7:26, Douay-Rheims, following the Vulgate)

[9] “the sun of righteousness shall rise” (Mal 4:2 (Hebrew 3:20))

[10] “to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death” (Luke 1:79)

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by Dave Markay.

I am now a dual citizen. It’s a new status, as fresh as the crisp, unbent and as-of-yet unstamped British passports my wife and I now hold. After a few weeks of statelessness, during which the Home Office held our original documents, we are now in possession of passports from both our birth-country and our adopted-country.

Thus, our travel pouches thicken. Our embarkation rituals shift. On all future questionnaires, when the drop-down box asking nationality provides space for only one country, we will pause. More than a choice of which box to tick, dual citizenship poses fundamental questions of identity: To which state do we belong? Where is home? To whom is our allegiance?

We are aware of the privilege of being considered ‘dual nationals.’ Yet we are also relieved to have completed many years of paperwork, references, interviews, and exams. For the ‘Life in the UK’ test, we studied Capability Brown and the rules of cricket.[1] (So, you can ask us about the Hansard, William of Orange, or which information must be printed on a dog tag, but if your ball rolls over to us in the park, we will throw it back to you in a style closer to baseball than cricket! Such are the layers of multiple belonging.

The thirty new citizens in our ceremony group had been encouraged to wear ‘formal attire from our homeland,’ so the kurtas, saris, and kente cloth accentuated our varied backgrounds. Relatives assembled and clapped, knowing the complicated pathways and stories behind their loved one’s oath. When it came time to pose for pictures, there were many tears. It is no small thing to change one’s status, or address, or loyalties.

We have found a new appreciation for our immigrant forebears, who must have also pondered questions like Is the old country home, or is it here now? Do we keep the unpronounceable surname, or shorten it to blend in? Where are our roots? Does family include new neighbours? Perhaps you, too, know what it feels like to have a foot in two lands, a heart in several places, an allegiance to more than one kingdom?

My guess is that our Methodist family tree includes many who asked similar questions. Mr. Wesley clocked many miles on horseback, crossed oceans, and learned a new language. He was known enough in some places to have a guest room with his name on it, and distrusted enough in other locales to have eggs thrown at him. Missionaries like Coke and Asbury made multiple-entry visits to the colonies, probably turned heads with their accents and manners, may have learned how to hold a fork with either hand, encountered both hostility and welcome, and when a war of independence began, were forced to take sides. Other Christian sojourners like Olaudah or Zinzendorf would have experienced the exclusion of prejudice and the embrace of cross-cultural Christian friendships.

Those among us who are itinerant, may recognise (is that word spelled with an ‘s’ or a ‘z’?) those sentiments. Is not the term stationing a description of transience? It involves one from the outside, being dropped into a community of insiders. Moves can be exhilarating and isolating. One who is stationed knows the perplexities of arrival, the warmth of welcome, the confusion of interpretation, the joy of new community, and the eventual pain of departure. Abraham, Sarai, Moses, Ruth, Naomi, Jesus, the magi, Paul and others knew what it meant to perambulate, all the while keeping an eye on the heavens for orientation.

With two passports in hand, I recently rediscovered a text by an early Christian disciple. Mathetes was a Greek writer and Christian apologist who lived in the 2^nd century. In his Epistle to someone named Diognetus, he reflected on what it meant to hold another kind of dual citizenship. Listen to the way he describes followers of Jesus and their relation to place:

“But, inhabiting Greek as well as barbarian cities, according as the lot of each of them has determined, and following the customs of the natives in respect to clothing, food, and the rest of their ordinary conduct, they display to us their wonderful and confessedly striking method of life. They dwell in their own countries, but simply as sojourners. As citizens, they share in all things with others, and yet endure all things as if foreigners. Every foreign land is to them as their native country, and every land of their birth as a land of strangers. … They pass their days on earth, but they are citizens of heaven.…”[2]

In August 1989 my wife and I had our US passports stamped at Manchester Airport, were met by some friendly Circuit stewards, and driven to what would be our home for the next probationer year. The grass out front of the manse in Goole was freshly cut, and alongside a cake on the kitchen counter was a stack of welcome cards from as-of-yet unknown parishioners. One, from a Local Preacher named Betty Chant, included an index card with a handwritten verse of scripture: “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God”.[3]

We have made several moves since then, and we still have that index card. In fact, it’s in the same drawer as our passports.

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[1] Life in the UK Test, Practice Questions, London: Red Squirrel Publishing, 2016.

[2] ‘The Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus,’ translated by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson. From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1. Edited by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1885.

[3] Ephesians 2:19 NRSV

by Tom Wilson.

If love was easy, would it be so much fun?
I think we were born to try.
It’s the scary and the hard things that are worth fighting for
I think we were born to try.

I quoted these lyrics, from the song “The course of True Love” by the band The Gentlemen at a Peace Conference, organised by Leicester’s Ahmadiyya community, whose motto is “love for all, hatred for none.”

The theme of the conference was “Love Thy Neighbour.” I was reflecting on how it is easy to love the neighbour who is easy to get on with. The one who takes in a parcel for you, lends you their hedge trimmer and so on. But what about the neighbour who is hard to love? The one whose dog keeps you awake to 3am? The person at work who is always gossiping about you behind your back?

It is easy to love the lovable, but what about the irritating, the annoying, the downright rude?

If love was easy, would it be so much fun?
I think we were born to try.
It’s the scary and the hard things that are worth fighting for
I think we were born to try.

Jesus told a story about neighbours. When I worked in Liverpool, I retold it in a primary school:

“One day, a Liverpool supporter was beaten up and mugged. He was left lying in the gutter while the thieves ran off with his phone. As he lay there hoping someone would come and help him, the Liverpool manager walked past. But he had an important press conference to get to, so he just kept going. Not so long after that one of the players walked past. He had a physio appointment he couldn’t miss, so he also kept going. Then an Everton supporter saw him and stopped. He made sure the man was alright.”

At this point the kids in the school were all clear – that would never happen. In their worldview, football rivalry was tribal, identity defining, or as one Liverpool manager out it, “They say football is a matter of life and death. Actually, its more important than that.”

This story I told in primary school is, of course, a light-hearted way of making a point that Jesus makes quite forcefully. He tells Christians to love their enemies and pray for those who persecute them. Then he tells a story, which explains what he means. The story of the man who was mugged, found in Luke 15, is a profound and provocative meditation on boundaries, inclusion and costly self-sacrifice.

Jesus lives out these values. As a Christian I believe not only that his death deals with the mess of my life, but much more than that, Jesus died for me when I was estranged, in rebellion against, far from God. When I was God’s enemy he chose to reach out and offer me friendship.

Maybe you’re fortunate enough to not have any enemies, just to have people you find irritating. But Jesus wants you to pray for and care for them as well. In the Bible there’s an encouragement to not just love with words but with actions and in truth. Love is a choice, and it grows as we do it – the more love we show to others, the more we can learn to live well together.

In wedding sermons, I often suggest that love is more of a plant than a cake. A cake is finite – if I get more, you get less. There’s only so much to go around. Once its cut and eaten, it is gone. But plants keep on growing. With the right conditions, suitable nurture and so on, plants keep growing and keep giving fruit, blessing others.

If love was easy, would it be so much fun?
I think we were born to try.
It’s the scary and the hard things that are worth fighting for
I think we were born to try.

by Michael Wakelin.

‘I am the Lord’s servant’, Mary answered. ‘May your word to me be fulfilled’.
(Luke 1:38)

There can be few texts whose interpretation has changed more in the past 50 years than this! It is not a statement of pious, compliance but rather a radical ‘yes’ to being part of God’s work of salvation.

Among the problems the Church faces in getting its message across are the numerous examples of where we mess up, and the common misunderstanding of what we are about. And we only have ourselves to blame. Being a Christian is less about being perfect or having everything sorted, and more about recognising the call to be changed and to trust the God who keeps looking for us when we get lost.

‘I wish to begin again on a daily basis. To be born again every day is something that I try to do. And I’m deadly serious about that’. (Bono)

‘When I say, “I’m a Christian,” I’m not shouting, “I’m saved!” I’m whispering, “I get lost”. That is why I chose this way’. (Maya Angelou).

The 2021 census showed how the religious landscape has changed in the UK. It is richer and more diverse, and while many profess no religion, over half still believe in God and practise some kind of faith. They just do not align to a particular religion.

But with this diversity has come another challenge to the Church – the secular world is stealing our values and priorities and communicating them better than we are! The time has come to recognise allies, and the Church should divest itself of its religious garb and sanctify and embrace the new expressions of faith and spirituality that are shining like a rich kaleidoscope of colour all around us.

John Hull spoke of us having moved away from Christendom to embracing Christlikeness, which suggests that our message and our methods should mirror his. We must preach the real Jesus, and show that we are hungry and thirsty for justice and righteousness, devoted to ending slavery and oppression, however it manifests itself.

This will involve shouting truth to power, standing alongside the single parent with no support and campaigning to fight the ludicrous inequalities that enable food banks to exist and giving a second chance to those that have messed up and made bad choices. It means reducing our own materialism, and saving the planet by our environmental choices, taking the lead with other faith groups in our stewardship of God’s creation.

What we must say is that the world as it is, is not as God intends it to be, and that the words and actions of Jesus contain the clues to how a transformation might begin.

For reflection:

Who are your allies amongst the newer expressions of spirituality? How are you working together?

A Remnant Church doesn’t sit well with a model of Christendom, but the trappings remain. How might we better embrace Christlikeness?

Susanna Wesley said there are two things to do about the gospel. Believe it and behave it. How might one better reflect the other?

This year’s SPECTRUM Conference, What role for the Remnant Church? was held at Swanwick in mid-May and was led by Michael Wakelin and Elaine Lindridge, two speakers who have both written publicly of their growing conviction that some long-held beliefs and practices of Christians and the churches are in urgent need of close scrutiny and critique. Articles are in the form of discussion papers based on their session notes, with editing by Keith Albans – we are sharing them periodically on Theology Everywhere. Also see Time for a New Reformation and Reimagining Faith.

by Elaine Lindridge.

‘Truly I tell you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it’ (Mark 10:15). In the hymn, Says Jesus, ‘Come and gather round,’ developing the theme of a childlike faith, Leith Fisher asks: ‘When was it that we first forgot that questions helped us grow, or lost the openness to ask and learn what we don’t know?’ (Singing the Faith, no.510, v.2).

It is 40 years since the Sea of Faith movement began, in response to Don Cupitt’s TV show and book of the same title. And while it has led many to feel liberated to explore matters of faith and challenge cherished creeds, it has also given rise to others trying to shut down such explorations, assert their orthodoxy and load guilt onto those who pursue them.

Leith Fisher’s statement that ‘questions helped us grow’ does not simply apply to children – it applies to all who want to walk the way of Jesus – but the memory of a minister criticising the voicing of doubts and deep questions still burns after 40 years!

Brian McLaren’s book Do I stay a Christian? describes itself as a ‘guide for the doubters, the disappointed, and the disillusioned’. In the first part he outlines reasons to answer ‘No!’ and in the second part he similarly explores why you might answer ‘Yes!’ The final part addresses the question ‘How?’

The process of reimagining faith involves deconstructing that faith – but whether it also involves reconstructing it is an open question. It might also involve reimagining doubts – seeing them not as obstacles, but as an invitation to re-examine whether the original question was the right one. This is particularly true when we explore Jesus’ miracles, the virgin birth and the resurrection.

One sadness in many churches and fellowships of Christians is that folk find it hard to be honest, for fear of seeming to have put themselves outside of the camp. And yet if we are followers of Jesus and engaged in a pilgrimage of faith we will change and be changed as we travel and as we grow.

In one of his final chapters, Renounce and Announce, McLaren describes ‘coming out’ as a gift which our LGBTQ siblings have given us. In ‘coming out’ an individual announces that ‘you have thought of me one way, but I have come to understand myself in a different way, and I want to let you know’. He then encourages us to consider how we might ‘come out’ as the pilgrim we are now.

For reflection:

• Some argue that reimagining and deconstructing our faith is like opening a can of worms, whereas Socrates suggested that the unexamined life is not worth living! What testimonies do we have which may cast light on this?

• ‘Doubter’ is such a loaded word! Are there Bible stories or doctrines where doubts have led you into fresh understandings?

• Does the language of ‘coming out’ feel helpful? Can you imagine contexts in which it might be used?

This is the second paper from this year’s SPECTRUM Conference, What role for the Remnant Church? which was held at Swanwick in mid-May and was led by Michael Wakelin and Elaine Lindridge, two speakers who have both written publicly of their growing conviction that some long-held beliefs and practices of Christians and the churches are in urgent need of close scrutiny and critique. Articles are in the form of discussion papers based on their session notes, with editing by Keith Albans – we are sharing them through the year on Theology Everywhere; see also Time for a New Reformation.

by George Bailey.

This article continues a journey I have been traveling this year into the theology of environmental ethics, and its relationships to our theology and spirituality of salvation and holiness. See here on Theology Everywhere for earlier stages on the way (though I am not yet claiming to have a joined up account of all the ideas in these three articles!) – Capitalocene, new materilaisms and solidairty and Growing Resurrection.

Over the summer I was able to do some reading into critiques of capitalist models of economic growth, and some proposals for how escaping the need for constant growth could contribute to a significant and positive response to the climate crisis – pursuing the aim of an economy that maintains a steady state of equilibrium and so ceases to have an ever-increasing negative impact on the environment. Efforts have been made over the last 25 years to explore this potential for a postgrowth society, to be worked towards through a period of degrowth, arriving in time at a Steady State Economy,^[1] with a primary aim throughout being the ongoing improvement of human wellbeing.

Degrowth is a provocative term, and to some extent intentionally negative in order to challenge the dominant assumptions. Alisa et al. defend the degrowth agenda against the criticism that it is overly negative – it also offers an optimistic and radical vision for the future:

‘On the constructive side, the degrowth imaginary centres around the reproductive economy of care, and the reclaiming of old – and the creation of new – commons. Caring in common is embodied in new forms of living and producing, such as eco-communities and cooperatives and can be supported by new government institutions, such as work-sharing or a basic and maximum income, institutions which can liberate time from paid work and make it available for unpaid communal and caring activities.’ ^[2]

Degrowth is not simply about decreasing economy activity to reduce environmental impacts, but also taking more helpful decisions about how resources are used to most effectively improve human wellbeing. Milena Büchs and Max Koch analyse the arguments in favour of a postgrowth society and the steps that might be required to pursue it. ^[3] They propose that a key aspect of this is the recognition that core societal values (which have their roots in post-Reformation Protestant Christian spirituality) have developed in association with the economic growth paradigm, and that these will need to be changed to achieve a Steady State Economy.

‘Core societal values and orientations such as “achievement”, “upward mobility” and “social position as result of own work and merits”, which are of crucial significance for the maintenance of the growth paradigm, have their structural basis in the specifically historical features of the capitalist production and accumulation process that present themselves as natural features of economic activity.’^[4]

This is the point at which, for Christians, critical analysis of some key doctrines and the theological and practical expressions of them becomes vital – in order to understand the role of our theology in shaping our core economic and environmental values, and how we might change them.

The shortest, simplest, and yet also most profound, contribution I have read so far on this topic is from the early 1980s by Henri Nouwen – The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life.[5] Nouwen is significant as a theologian who wrestled with questions of spiritual pride and the drive to succeed within the Church and the academy, and in the latter part of his life followed a personal path out of high-profile academic leadership and into caring ministry and solidarity within a L’Arche community, a vocation that is often overlooked outside of one small network of personal relationships. He proposes the term ‘downward mobility’ to describe this theological turn from upward progress and growth as the central metaphors of the Christian life. He calls on people to resist the temptations within Christian discipleship which can distort the concept of growth: ‘The problem is not in the desire for development and progress as an individual or community, but in making upward mobility itself into a religion.’^[6] The alternative downward way that Nouwen offers is shaped by the way of the cross of Jesus Christ, but also enabled by the Spirit which fills those who follow this way.

‘The way of the cross, the downward mobility of God, becomes our way not because we try to imitate Jesus, but because we are transformed into living Christs by our relationship with his Spirit.’^[7]

Too often our theology of spiritual growth, reasonable and sensible in itself, can be skewed into an assumption of the need for ‘upward mobility’ which shapes our economic decisions in ways that ultimately affect the environment negatively. Assuming that constant growth and ‘bigger is better’ are helpful in the spiritual life can lead us (even if in unintended, unseen ways) into abusing and damaging the planet more than might be justifiable even within our own environmental ethics. What we need are positive actions in pursuit of ‘downward mobility’, which might seem initially to make little economic, or even spiritual, sense. Perhaps the key way to grow in Christian spirituality and maturity is actually to grow smaller.

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[1] This term has a long historical background from John Stuart Mill onwards, with various interpretations possible – see analysis of this development in Herman E. Daly and Joshua C. Farley, Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications (Island Press, 2004), 54-56.

[2] Giacomo D’Alisa, Federico Demaria and Giorgos Kallis, “Introduction” in Kallis, G., G. D’Alisa, and F. Demaria (eds.), Degrowth: A vocabulary for a new era (Routledge, 2015), 3.

[3] Milena Büchs and Max Koch, Postgrowth and Wellbeing: Challenges to Sustainable Welfare (Palgrave Macmillan, 2017).

[4] ibid., 17.

[5] Henri Nouwen, The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life (Darton, Longman and Todd, 2007); originally published as a series in Sojourner magazine, 1981.

[6] ibid. 26.

[7] ibid., 44.

by Philp Sudworth.

This continues ideas from last week… read Part 1 here.

Faith must also be seen through the dimension of time.  Traditionalists contend that the Christian faith was “delivered once and for all” and is thus immutable.  This denies the clear evidence of how faith changes over time.  A living faith will, like all living things, grow and develop, adapt to its environment and evolve.  We can see a progression from Abraham’s relationship with the God of the mountains, through the jealous tribal God of Moses, and the one universal God of Isaiah to the Father God Jesus taught to his disciples.  We can also see Christianity developing from the pre-Nicaea years, through the mediaeval church and the Reformation to the Evangelical Revival and the Second Vatical Council.  The movement from inter-denominational rivalry and bitterness to ecumenical co-operation has occurred within my lifetime. The inter-faith movement is still in its infancy.  Rather than having the final revelation from God, Christianity is still in a process of development – and so are the other religions.

We might expect that descriptions of God and his actions would in 21^st century Britain reflect our current understanding of the cosmos and the natural sciences, of biblical scholarship and of psychology and sociology – without detracting from our respect for the way faith was expressed in earlier times.  Yet the emphasis on traditional beliefs, rather than on relationships and on compassion, makes it difficult for churches to adapt to the knowledge explosion of the past 250 years.  They are slow to respond to changes in language and culture and appear to be locked into first century thinking.  This makes them seem irrelevant to everyday life.  

While Christianity is expanding rapidly in some African and Asian countries, due in no small measure to adaptation to local culture, churches in Western Europe have a communication problem, resulting in falls in attendances, and a loss of credibility and of social influence.  Preachers struggle to balance a God of love and reconciliation and healing with one whose demand for justice must be satisfied and a price paid.  The belief that all humans are corrupt and that those who don’t believe church teaching are deservedly condemned or “lost eternally” is associated all too often with the kind of judgmentalism that Jesus opposed so vigorously in his day.

All this is justified on the basis that it is in the Bible.  Yet as long ago as the third century Origen pointed out that there are different levels in scripture and that if we restrict ourselves to the simple literal level we can miss the spiritual meaning.  For many the bible acts as a mirror in reflecting their own hopes and fears, prejudices and priorities.  Oscar Pfister, a Calvinist pastor and psychoanalyst, said: ‘Tell me what you find in your bible and I will tell you what sort of man you are.’[1]  Churches need to revise the images they use, learn from science the concept of standing on the shoulders of giants and recognize that questioning ideas and building on the past are integral aspects of a living and developing faith.    

As individuals we should also be open to faith development at a personal level over time.  Professor James Fowler has postulated[2]that there are stages in faith development that reflect the long-recognized stages in intellectual, social and personal development.  Religious leaders are often very effective at helping their members to move through the early stages of faith development to the point of commitment. Many seem far less skilled in supporting those who are ready to progress further.  A friend of mine described attending church as like being kept down in Class 2 year after year and always repeating studies at the same level.  Some people leave formal religion because they outgrow the image of God from their childhood and they have never been helped to progress beyond that level of understanding to one more appropriate to their stage of maturing spirituality. As J.B. Phillips recognized over 60 years ago,[3] these people are rejecting a “God who is too small”.  There is an understandable reluctance among many religious leaders to accept the questioning of doctrines.  This is more likely to be seen as a loss of faith or as a challenge to the church’s authority than as a necessary part of progressing spiritually.

Professor Fowler suggests that the final stage in faith development is a universalizing faith that transcends the limitations and conceptions of one’s own tradition and culture and is ready for fellowship and co-operation across faiths. The few who achieve this stage are “grounded in a oneness with the power of being or God” and their visions seem to free them from the paradoxes and polarities for a passionate spending of the self in love and a commitment to overcoming division and oppression that anticipate an in-breaking of God’s commonwealth of love and justice. Challenging existing power bases is never easy.  Since such people work across and beyond existing religious traditions, they can be seen as subversive of those structures which promise the security of salvation and God’s protection.  They may even suffer the consequences of this through being ostracised or worse.

What these people have realized is that faith is about far more than assuring one’s own survival and salvation and gaining God’s favour during this life; that in a true relationship of love, one is more concerned about what one gives than what one receives.   They have recognized that it is more important that someone’s beliefs are inclusive, life-affirming and healing and that they live these out and allow God to work through them than that they share our beliefs. We face a range of evils within our world, including serious political, ecological, humanitarian, and economic crises; and religious fundamentalism is one of the problems. It is important to appreciate that all those whose lives are contributing to the furtherance of the realm of God and to the defeat of evil – even if they don’t understand it in those terms – are our allies. 

If God is Spirit and has to be worshipped in spirit and in truth, we are never going to encapsulate him in a catechism. Let’s get back to a proper emphasis on those dimensions of faith which are focused on love of God and love of others.  After all, those first Christians who had a strong enough faith to die in the Colosseum had never heard of the Trinity or the Nicene Creed and many were illiterate and never read any of the books that would later be included in the bible.  But their trusting relationship with God and their loving compassion, not only within their own fellowship but to all those in need, showed that they had a faith worth having and others were readily attracted to join them.

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[1] Pfister, O., Christianity and Fear (Allen and Unwin,1948)

[2] James Fowler, Stages of Faith (Harper & Row, 1981)

[3] J.B. Phillips, Your God is too Small (Epworth Press, 1952)

by Philip Sudworth.

Faith is often presented as a matter of religious beliefs, of accepting specific ideas about God.  Yet faith is much more active than this; it is so much more than an intellectual assent to religious propositions. It is more a spiritual adventure than a state of mind; a vision and a way of life rather than a creed.  Faith is not static; just as we progress intellectually and emotionally, we develop spiritually.

Our induction into faith is often at an early age through family, school or festivals.  Children are told, “As Catholics we believe …”; “We do this because we are Jewish.”  Belonging to a religion becomes a mark of identity that includes them within the group and sets the group apart from others.  It may become a focus for social as well as spiritual activity.  At this level, faith is a matter of tradition and of socialization. Unless faith develops beyond this, it risks becoming a form of tribalism – the in-group against the outsiders.

Faith moves beyond a cultural context or measure of self-identity to become part of what we are as individuals through personal religious experience. This may be an identifiable incident, but equally it may be a gradual awakening. It leads to an inner transformation and commitment to a continuing relationship of love, trust and faithfulness. This experience is as unique as we are as individuals.  This is not just a one-off event; it is a journeying together with God or the divine spirit in a developing relationship.  As with all journeys and relationships, we go through highs and lows and gain different perspectives as we find ourselves in new situations. 

The nature of our faith is most clearly revealed in how we make it into a practical reality in our lives.  It is evident in the kind of people we are at home, at work and in our neighbourhoods and how we respond to community and world needs.  This dimension is our response to the call to discipleship and to participate actively in God’s work in the world.  The golden rule at the heart of most religions on how to treat others is essentially the same. As Albert Schweitzer put it, “All living knowledge of God rests upon this foundation: that we experience Him in our lives as Will-­to-Love.”¹ 

The dimension of faith that pre-occupies many religious people is beliefs – the words with which we try to describe our experience of God in order to make sense of it and to share it with others.  We need to know the limits of such descriptions.  Humans are too complex for us to know even ourselves fully, so how can we comprehend the creative force that formed the billions of people and innumerable other life forms on this small planet which orbits one of trillions of stars?  All attempts to describe God or the way God interacts with humanity are inadequate; they are our best efforts with the concepts and the language we have available. 

Inevitably we resort to metaphors and picture language and talk as if God thought and acted like a human being.  But too often people forget that this is what we are doing.  Despite St Augustine’s warning, “If you understand, then it isn’t God,”² we find church leaders speaking of God as ineffable but at the same time telling us exactly what we must believe about him.  Metaphors become confused with historical truth and are then proclaimed as essential beliefs. So, what started as a wordless experience of love and trust, of commitment and faithfulness, and of giving oneself becomes a matter of doctrine and of the eternal rewards we are promised for holding the right beliefs. 

This emphasis on how we articulate our faith leads us to judge people by whether they express their spiritual experiences in the language we expect and in terms of our beliefs rather than valuing people for the way they love and live in relation to God and to others.  Yet, when asked “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus responded with the two great love commandments.

The stress on beliefs can make religion divisive and exclusive.  People are seen as either ‘believers’ or ‘non-believers’ (and our beliefs are the only standard); they are ‘saved’ or ‘lost eternally’; they are ‘with us’ or ‘against us’.  It leads to seeing those who experience God in a different way as peddling a false message. This assumption that two different ways of expressing a relationship with God must be in conflict with one another is a failure of the imagination.  Within Christianity, in the concern about which doctrines lead to salvation and to a place in Heaven, many have lost sight of the emphasis in the first three gospels on bringing in the kingdom of God on earth and on eternal life – life in all its fullness – commencing in the here and now.

Part 2 of these reflections will follow next week

¹  Albert Schweitzer A. – Out of My Life and Thought. (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1931)

²  St Augustine – Sermon. 117, 5: (PL 38, 673.)

by Michael Wakelin.

This year’s SPECTRUM Conference, What role for the Remnant Church? was held at Swanwick in mid-May and was led by Michael Wakelin and Elaine Lindridge, two speakers who have both written publicly of their growing conviction that some long-held beliefs and practices of Christians and the churches are in urgent need of close scrutiny and critique. Articles are in the form of discussion papers based on their session notes, with editing by Keith Albans – we will share them through the year on Theology Everywhere.

“I can’t stand your religious meetings.
    I’m fed up with your conferences and conventions.
I want nothing to do with your religion projects,
    your pretentious slogans and goals.
I’m sick of your fund-raising schemes,
    your public relations and image making.
I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music.
    When was the last time you sang to me?
Do you know what I want?
    I want justice—oceans of it.
I want fairness—rivers of it.
    That’s what I want. That’s all I want.

Amos 5: 21-24 in The Message paraphrase

In the 2021 Census, 94% of respondents answered the voluntary religion question and, although it remained the most common answer, only 46.2% had described themselves as ‘Christian’, a 13.1 percentage point fall since 2011. In contrast, the second most common answer was ‘No religion’ – up from a quarter of respondents to around two-fifths.

Writing in The Times, Janice Turner responded by suggesting that Christianity ‘is blandly everywhere and therefore nowhere’ and young people prefer to identify as more interesting things.

The most visible representation of Christianity is not God or the Gospel but the Church, and while we may protest that its image has not been helped by ‘the media’, we have been shooting ourselves in the foot for decades with scandals, secularist attacks and a perceived obsession with sex! Sociologist and theologian, Prof. Linda Woodhead suggests that religious institutions such as the Church ‘have had their day … they have harmed, not healed … they have become a barrier and not a bridge’.

Society needs good Christianity, so how might we get back to what we should be?

Five areas of change

Get rid of Jesus! – or the picture of the blonde-haired Jesus that still hangs on the vestry wall! That image epitomises a bland easy-going figure, far removed from the edgy, rebellious Jesus in the Bible. We need to get back to the steely challenge of the real Jesus.

Get rid of the need to be popular – that was never a priority of Jesus! How is it that we have allowed church growth thinking to dominate, as if size matters most? John Hull wrote of the move away from Christendom towards Christlikeness – and a Church which is more of fringe movement than part of the establishment may be a better model.

Re-introduce Jesus to young people – Somehow the idea of Jesus, the very name ‘Jesus’ has become one of the most instant switch offs. And yet the Jesus of the gospels is a character typical of all that Gen X, Y and Z find interesting. He was on the fringes of society, with intriguing friends who enjoyed an edgy party. He mocked the establishment, poked fun at the pompous and spoke truth to power.

Get rid of the ‘Christian’ speak – we don’t seem to have twigged that the language we use amongst ourselves sounds odd and meaningless ‘out there.’ In his book Agent of Grace, Bonhoeffer wrote, ‘It is not for us to prophecy the day when people will ask God that the world be changed and renewed. But when that day arrives there will be a new language, perhaps quite non-religious’.

Movements such as Extinction Rebellion and other secular organisations have stolen the Church’s moral and ethical imperatives and have developed a new language to express Gospel ideas. We need to follow their example.

End the sexuality debate – it has played into the hands of those who want to marginalise us, and has got completely out of proportion. Amos 5 reminds us that there is much more in the Bible about justice, and we need to put things into perspective.

Conclusion: Society needs Christianity, but we need to get the relevant, dynamic, challenging, engaging Christian story out there. What kind of Church might make that possible?

For reflection:

‘Christianity is blandly everywhere and therefore nowhere’ – is that a fair critique? Examples?

What might you add to or remove from the list of five areas of change?

‘There will be a new language, perhaps quite non-religious’. What might we learn from secular organisations in how to express and embody the Gospel?