radref

Anabaptism in Britain

2009-12-15T14:30:00.000Z

I'm having a working breakfast today - reading Jeff McClain's post on 'Who are the Modern Anabaptists' ( http://www.strangerinthisland.com/?p=221#more-221) and drafting some reflections on Anabaptism in Britain. It was my former Professor at the University of Leeds, Haddon Willmer, who once commented that I was making a 'fetish of identity'. At the time I thought he was being unfair. After all, he is a Baptist and I am a Mennonite. He has the luxury of a more comfortable place to stand. On reflection I can see he was partly right. Perhaps it's a reaction to early persecution but there's certainly something that about Anabaptism that shouts its identity through a megaphone as a way of underlining distinctiveness.

Anabaptist 'identity' in Britain almost seems a misnomer. After all, there are so few openly 'Anabaptist' churches and organisations to carry the torch for the Tradition. The historic influence of Anabaptism in Britain is more extensive - from the Levellers, to the early Baptists and Quakers - but it's hard to say whether this web of connections actually significantly contributes to 'British Anabaptism'. If peacemaking or pacifism may be said to be the most recognisable Anabaptist commitment, then there is so little on the ground that is recognisably Anabaptist. That's another way of saying that if Christians in general increasingly have a diaspora existence then British Anabaptism does Diaspora with a capital 'D'. But that doesn't stop us hoping for the time when 'British Anabaptism' is a description of a fully embodied Tradition, rather than a scattered remnant.

Being English

2009-12-03T10:06:00.012Z

I don't shop at Tesco these days but there's a bus stop outside their Didcot branch so I get to see what Sainsbury's competition is doing. A middle sized delivery lorry was parked rather precariously near where the bus pulled in and I spent a moment or two reading the sign on the side of the van. It proudly proclaimed a list of countries where the company operated: England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Eire, France, Belgium ... you get the picture. What immediately struck me about this list was that the sequence was far from random. Starting in England and ending with the nether regions of Eastern Europe the progression ran from 'home' to 'away', presuming that for most of the people who read the sign England would be 'Home' with a capital 'H'. The end of the list presumably, comprised of wild and pagan lands typified by unruly barbarians, indecipherable dialects and savage sporting activities. In other words, most unlike England, except Liverpool (the fact that I'm an Mancunian, is of course immaterial).

I came away thinking though, that the list of the side of the van was incomplete. If England is 'home' then even within England there are places which seem more homely than others. After all we have a group of counties, seemingly clustered around London for warmth, that are described as the 'home counties'. The implication of arranging counties in this circular way is perhaps, to suggest that somewhere in the centre of that circle is a place that is so fully ENGLAND that it might be spoken of as the source of all Englishness. Maybe in some corner of Buckingham Palace there is a plaque on the floor, like the one at the Greenwich meridian, that marks the spot. I admit to a little self-indulgent irony in imagining portraits of the Queen's German relatives on the wall, looking down on the scene.

To a degree some of this seems innocuous - no more serious than The Vicar of Dibley or jokes about our obsession with the weather. But the current increasingly bitter row around, migration, race, religion, ethnicity and national identity presents 'Englishness' in quite a different light. Nor does the notion of 'Englisness' look quite the same for significant of the community in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland for whom the English are opportunists or even oppressors. Even in northern England there is a deep well of resentment that power and priveleges seem to gravitate to London and the South-East. The implication of 'home counties' is that there are some other counties that aren't 'home'. London itself is an enigma - the capital of the United Kingdom, yet also the most cosmopolitan place on earth. Behind the London of Big Ben and friendly red buses that the tourists see there is another London of fragmented and competing sects, a miriad of overapping national identities and hidden poverty.

Perhaps there is such a thing as 'Englishness' but it's far from monolithic. The England that I meet in inner-city Manchester and jostle against on the tube is something far more composite and subtle. If this is an English identity then it's not a static one. England is on the move and nobody knows the destination.

Mennonite Church Planting in Britain

2009-11-30T09:23:00.004Z

For those of you who have followed my blog it will be obvious that I'm not afraid of the occasional controversy. I still have the scars to prove it. This post again risks argument but this time with great reluctance.  I would love to see Mennonite churches planted in the UK as part of the wider growth of the Anabaptist Tradition but I am well aware that there are those in the Anabaptist constituency - some of them my friends - who would disagree with me or at least express grave reservations. I respect and understand their point of view. Britain already has an extensive range of sometimes competing Denominations and independent churches. Every wave of migration seems to add to this complexity.  Is there room for yet another ecclesiastical stall in an already crowded marketplace? Isn't there rather, a wonderful job to be done in bringing an Anabaptist influence to bear on churches of other Traditions and in public life without feeling the need to build our own little private empire?

I can of course, respond by saying how lonely it is to be a left wing Evangelical peacenik in the UK. You know the problem. The Quakers are too liberal. The Baptists aren't pacifist.  What's left seems to be the hermit life, only that would never do for a corporately minded Anabaptist.  Sorry if this seems a frivolous place to start in proposing a Mennonite church planting initiative but this isolation is deeply felt and I'm not alone in experiencing it. It wouldn't seem so bad if the absence of Mennonites (the archetypal Peace Church) was an accident of history or something peculiar to the British temperement, like cricket instead of baseball. In the beginning it was not like this ... or at least in the 16th Century it wasn't.  There were Anabaptists in Britain at that time and still would be if it were not for persecution.  These Anabaptists did not jump but were pushed. I'm not saying this to thumb my nose at the Anglicans or justify church planting as a kind of 'poetic justice' but only to affirm that the removal of Anabaptism was something unnatural, a diminution of British Christianity, rather than something that 'just happened'. Whatever else might be said about the merits or otherwise of planting Mennonite churches in the UK it cannot be said that such churches are alien or exotic. Mennonites belong in Britain as much as tea with the vicar.

Of course that's a very modest starting point.  It's much more challenging to ask whether the assertion that Mennonites 'should be here' translates into 'could be' or even 'will be'. The trouble with historical 'wrong turns' is that the offending fork in the road remains inaccessible after the fact.  As a 21st Century British Mennonite I accept that the past may be regrettable or even inspirational but only in a very limited sense retrieavable. There is always bound to be a certain amount of regret in an admission like that but mostly it's liberating. We are free to find fresh beginnings and new partnerships in a shared Post-Christendom future, perhaps even with former adversaries.  But who are 'we'? At present British Anabaptism consists of a few Mennonites and Hutterites, the Anabaptist Network and the modest ecumenical constituency sympathetic to the Tradition.  There is something to be said for embracing our marginality but this can be overstated. I believe the Anabaptist Tradition in Britain is capable of more than our current numerical strength will allow.

If it is right to ask who 'we' are it would also seem proper to to wonder who we might be speaking of when we expect 'them' to do the church planting for us. 'Them' seems to refer to anybody but us - frequently assumed to be wiser, better resourced and altogether more capable than we are. More pertinently 'they' are often assumed to be responsible (usually with the connotation of blame) for a current state of affairs and equally culpable for delay in the way things are becoming the way things should be.  However Mennonite churches are to be planted in the UK such congregations will not be planted by solely by 'them'. If 'them' includes sympathetic Anabaptist oriented mission agencies, North American or Continental European Mennonites then 'we' (i.e. British Anabaptists) and 'they' will need to work together. The list of potential partners may also include other Mennonites (e.g. African Mennonites) and non-Anabaptist bodies with whom we share common missional concern.

There is more to this post than meets the eye. As I am writing there are the beginnings of conversations underway concerning the potential for Mennonite church planting in Britain and some of the initial practicalities.  It is very much an exciting time and all the more so because development could go in a variety of different directions. At present I am struggling very hard not to attempt to steer what's happening too rigidly. It is my hope though, that whatever develops will find itself more comforably placed in an emerging church/fresh expressions setting than in more traditional forms of denominational church planting.  This post is intended to stimulate discussion so comments would be very much appreciated.

Living by Faith

2009-12-01T23:39:00.003Z

I'm uneasy admitting that I have a problem with 'living by faith'. I've still enough of my old missionary zeal remaining to feel that somehow I'm letting the side down. It's not that I don't believe in miraculous provision or in God's generosity but this week I've been remembering why I'm so grateful to get a salary for an honest day's work. It was more than twenty years ago now that my ex-wife and I were members of a missionary society, due to go to Japan. I like some of the people we came to know, so I'll leave the society anonymous. We never got to Japan. A matter of weeks before we were due to leave the mission dumped us with no explanation. In my case I had spent seven apparently wasted years in preparation. I'm not proud of the letter I sent to the mission afterwards or the two years or so we spent outside of the Christian Church as a result of the experience. Eventually a good friend told me that it was 'more important to be healed than to be right' and somehow we found our way back. We forgave the mission but for both of us the damage had been deep. I still believe that the experience played a large part in the later breakdown of our marriage.

This was a 'faith mission', where no salaries were paid and missionaries lived through the support of local churches and individual donations. It was frowned on to ask for help. Instead, missionaries and accepted candidates were encouraged to 'live by faith'. In my day even thanking donors for their help via a newsletter was disapproved of though I noticed recently that the Society made an exception for the refurbishment of its own premises. 'Living by faith' was repeatedly portrayed in the Mission as a life of joy and surprise but our experience was one of hardship and daily anxiety. I remember one week not even having enough money for a stamp to send a letter to my mother. In practice we discovered that some longstanding Society insiders had simply become adept at 'living by hints' rather than 'living by faith'. Others (the most vociferous 'living by faith' people) tended to be members of large, affluent congregations. We were neither very good at dropping hints or affluent and as a result we starved and had no social life.

If my post sounds bitter it isn't meant to. I'm trying to say how it felt from the inside. Thanking God for miraculous provision is a wonderful thing to do but I don't do living by faith any more. To turn the glorious exception into the norm is neither biblical nor sensible. Those mighty Prophets were full of faith, but I seem to remember them working for a living much of the time. It may not be true of every 'faith mission' but our own experience leads me to worry how frequently an ethos of self-sacrifice and radical dependency disguises rank exploitation. These days I'm still grateful to God and thankful for his provision - but especially on the 15th of the month when my salary goes in!

In Praise of Minor Virtues

2009-11-19T09:54:00.003Z

I'm a non-driver. Years ago I did try to learn but found I was even more terrified than I was uncoordinated. The driving instructor retired through ill health the week later. Clearly I'm quite a challenge. So, mostly I'm on the bus. Wallingford to Didcot, Didcot to Abingdon with a little bit of Wantage thrown in. Yesterday, I was sitting there on the 130 service alternating between my book and glorious views of Didcot power station when I noticed something. Without exception all of my fellow passengers - the pensioners, a woman with a pushchair, a quarrelsome couple by the luggage rack - thanked the driver as they left the bus. The virtue, of course, was 'courtesy'; quiet and unassuming but fully capable of transforming a journey. I think of it as a minor virtue - good for everyday occasions but not much use in a fight. We could have an enjoyable time adding other such virtues to the list: politeness, neatness, delicacy, etc. There's something subtle about 'minor' virtues. I wondered what the world would look like if every passenger thanked every bus driver. That's the truth behind the cliche - 'common courtesy' - something small, magnified by the ubiquity of everyday life. Contrast that with a 'major virtue', perhaps 'heroism'. Heroes are great for a battlefield and handy for pulling children out of rivers but not much use at the breakfast table. Thankfully, breakfast is more common than war. So, which is the 'minor virtue', heroism or courtesy?

2012

2009-11-19T08:57:00.000Z

I saw a film yesterday - 2012. Don't bother with the plot. You've seen it before. Planet in peril from 'solar radiation' [substitute global warming, antichrist, new ice age, alien invasion, nightmare plague or nuclear war]. Cue rampant CGI mayhem, ancient prophecies, bad Russian accents, worse Indian accents, holy fools, international conspiracies, greedy baddies (you can tell them because they're all overweight), simplistic moralising, cartoon Buddhists and the inevitable love interest. Top it all off with the perfect disaster movie hero - chequered past but basically decent; nicely ruffled at the edges but fundamentally unimpressed by the apocalypse. Bring on explosions, volcanoes, earthquakes, dust clouds, tidal waves, before - inevitably - hero saves the world. 2012 is a woeful title. Maybe they should have called it 'The Day After the Day After Tomorrow'.

Numb and Anxious

2009-11-18T19:25:00.000Z

I don't know what I expected when I first launched this blog. Sometimes I think it has become a little impersonal and that I'm too busy wrestling with great issues to bother telling you what kind of a day I've had. Today was a pleasure but yesterday was another story. What I expected to be a routine visit to the optician has left me numb and anxious. It's not every day that in so many words I'm told I could be going blind. There was plenty of detail, only some of which I understand, so I won't weary your ears with it. I have the impression though, that I'm heading downhill in a vehicle with no brakes. Still, it's early days as yet and I'm waiting for an appointment with an eye specialist.

Nonconformist Spirituality

2009-11-13T07:53:00.007Z

This is such a hard post to write because it's about something intangible - that can't be weighed, measured or bottled. To talk about Christian Traditions comparatively - their spirituality and 'atmosphere' - is bound to be rather subjective. So, here goes. It is my impression that Episcopal Christianity - Roman Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Anglicanism has an advantage over Nonconformity, at least in Britain: they find it relatively easier to communicate continuity with a deep and lifegiving spiritual tradition. Probably this is linked their respective claims to the Apostolic high ground (a kind of perceived Petrine family resemblance) and an impressive associated spirituality 'industry' including the retreat movement in Britain which is heavily weighted towards the Anglican and Roman Catholic retreat houses. Any dictionary of spirituality has a chest full of Episcopal treasures: saints, music, pilrimage, spiritual direction, liturgy, mystics, Celtic devotion, monasticism and devotional writing, to name just a few. Yet how many people could say what Pentecostal, Baptist or Methodist spirituality is? The 'dark night of the soul' is widely referred to even by non-Christians but who knows a thing about the Anabaptist concept of Gelassenheit (submission to God in community).

Now, I can hear some of you beginning to object that my observations are hardly 'rocket science'. Much of the disparity in the relative profile of Nonconformist or Episcopal spirituality is an obvious corollary of relative strength and influence: occupancy of the 'limelight' and the presence of a substantial interface between a Christian Tradition and the wider culture. There is, for example, a very good reason that we haven't heard of Gelassenheit or understand the wisdom of the Amish attitude to technology: Anabaptism was exterminated in Britain and is still barely detectable on the religious radar. For some British people their only knowledge of the Amish comes from a single Harrison Ford film. Even Methodism and the United Reformed Church have been ravaged by decline, pollarded to the point of obscurity. The local chapel is just as likely to be a carpet warehouse as a place of worship. Yet, there is more going on here than a simple game of numbers. It is as if something in Nonconformity had died. Methodism is choking on a high carbohydrate diet of bureacracy and property fetishism. Quakers seem to be more interested in Buddhism than Christianity. The 'dry bones of Calvin' are very dry in indeed!

To some degree the problem is about 'marketing'. In the U.S.A. and Canada where the Amish are strong a burgeoning tourist industry has grown up, to the obvious mixed feelings of the Amish themselves. The appeal of 'authentic' artefacts - quilts, furniture or other craft goods - and the commercialization of spirituality bear a striking resemblance to what has happened in Britain with 'things Celtic' (whether pagan or Christian) or the New Age Movement. I am sure that many of us will feel that this kind of marketing creates as many problems as it solves. Should Nonconformists wish to go down the same route we should prepare for a viper's nest of contradictions. Yet, I feel it is sad that Nonconformist riches are not better appreciated: the Methodist Covenant Service (in its original form), Puritan devotion, Quaker decision-making, Anabaptist community-mindedness or Pentecostal expectancy.

The problem is acute. In Britain Nonconformity is not yet dead but it is dying, regardless of counter-indicators such as the growth of the so-called House Church Movement or Black Majority Churches. For Methodism, despite the hopes of a few, it seems unlikely that the Anglican cavalry will ride over the hill any time soon. Signs of hope such as the excellent Venture FX programme realistically offer a potential postive impact over a timescale of decades, perhaps beyond the life expectancy of the Denomination. I have no diagnosis, only an instinct that spirituality is a key component of the cure. Years ago I remember hearing a radio interview. I paraphrase because it was a long time ago. Three contributors who had converted from Christianity to other religious Traditions gave their reasons for making the move. All I remember from the programme are the words of one of the interviewees in answer to the question 'why did you leave'. She said, 'because I found no smell of God there'. For whatever reasons many Christian churches have lost 'the practice of the presence of God'. We have come to smell of death. Mission strategy is vital but it matters more that everything we are and do reeks of life. Nonconform freely!

Distance Spirituality

2009-11-08T10:02:00.008Z

During the 1980's I was a student at London Bible College. For the class of 1982 'doing a degree' almost always meant three years in residence, whether in halls or digs. The London School of Theology (the renamed LBC) continues to receive residential admissions but for more than ten years now has also been involved with theological distance learning. LST's experience and mine reflects over twenty years of revolutionary change - the collapse of Western Christendom, ecological trauma, the advent of an internet age and an accelerating, radically individualized Postmodernity. It's enough to make anyone feel slightly breathless!

Without doubt theological education will face further challenges of its own but I have been thinking about the relevance of distance learning to spirituality, specifically the potential of retreats as a vehicle for 'distance spirituality'. For as long as I can remember there have been spiritual writers and practitioners who have sought to relocate the experience of retreat into everyday life. During the early 1990's when I worked for Leeds Nightstop my colleague from Faith in Leeds, David Rhodes was already developing 'Retreat on the Streets'. It was also at this time that I came across Carlo Carretto's nourishing book, 'The Desert in the City':

With a little imagination even a hole under the stairs , even a
garret,
can become our 'poustinia', our desert, where we can recollect
ourselves and savour silence and prayer.

Since then so much has changed but it seems to me that one of the fundamental shifts is how much more clearly we can now see that the 'desert in the city' experience now describes the normal state of the church after Christendom. We no longer 'retreat' from the centre to the margins, because we are already there.
Some rural retreat centres have sought to reach out and extend the scope of their work beyond their traditional activities. However, an exciting if scary challenge awaits such centres and the whole church. An increasing section of our society is both unchurched and sharply antipathetic to Christian Faith. I have lost count of the times when I've heard that Christianity is bankrupt and belligerent. Retreat Centres are far from perfect (I've one or two scary stories to tell) but overall they are attractive places for people outside the faith constituency as well as Christian retreatants.
Whilst existing retreat centres will continue to play an important role there is tremendous scope for the adaptation of retreats for new contexts. The advent of internet churches and online Christian community raises an intriguing possibility of the 'cyber-retreat'. The ongoing development of emerging churches might lead us to expect that some of these 'fresh expressions' will grasp the missional potential of retreats. As New Monasticism and Neo-Anabaptism gradually expand there is every likelihood that the rich vein of community-mindedness in both Traditions will generate new and culturally relevant manifestations of 'retreat'. Perhaps too, retreats will be re-imagined as a kind of 'distance spirituality' where the physical location for 'retreat' is the home or the workplace instead of an island or the countryside and 'Muhammad' (spiritual guidance, silence and reflection) comes to the 'mountain' (the retreatant). Even more important Christians must realise that the conditions which enable 'retreat' are not a given. The locked or shuttered chapel is a symbol not only of numerical decline but the erosion of silence. The creation of space for healing and quiet will demand labour, discipline and imagination.

Papacy or Piracy?

2009-11-11T11:32:00.006Z

It isn't often that Christianity makes front page news these days but the 21 October, 2009 headline in the Times, 'Papal gambit stuns Church' is an eyebrow raising exception. Pope Benedict XVI's offer of 'personal ordinariates' will enable Anglicans to enjoy full communion with the Catholic Church while holding on to certain elements of their Anglican identity. As many as 1000 'priests' might leave the Church of England, according to the Times.

So, what are we to make of this ecclesiastical bombshell? To an extent I feel ill qualified to comment. I am a Mennonite and not a Roman Catholic or an Anglican. Much has clearly been going on behind closed doors. Even the Archbishop of Canterbury was notified only at the very last moment. A great deal depends on whether this initiative of the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, previously Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the faith (i.e. the Inquisition) is viewed as an act of 'hospitality' or a kind of religious predation. Pope Benedict ruffled ecumenical feathers when as Cardinal Ratzinger he signed the document Dominus Iesus in 2000. Dominus Iesus addressed the relationship between the Roman Catholic Church and other religions and churches. That document insisted that the Roman Catholic Church is the only true church and that all other Christian denominations are not churches but merely possess some ecclesial elements. According to Liberation Theologian Leonardo Boff (himself no stranger to scrutiny by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the faith) as a result of this document fifty years of ecumenical work an inter-religious dialogue have 'apparently vanished' ('Fundamentalism, Terrorism and the Future of Humanity, p.9). In short I find it hard to believe that Pope Benedict's current initiative is anything other than shameless opportunism based on a Fundamentalist notion that Christian unity is a matter of 'homecoming' to Rome. On a personal level I also confess a good deal of irritation that amidst all this talk of 1000 defecting priests and which bishops might jump ship, the laity have merited hardly a mention. They are presumably to be transported like luggage.

Overall, my reaction is one of sadness and dismay. Just when it seems that the church is emerging with courage into a the brave, new Post-Christendom world something like this happens. I'm as keen on the importance of history as anyone but must we continue to play Reformation and Counter-Reformation as if we were stuck in a 16th Century Groundhog Day?

So, what is the best we might expect? As someone who has had a great deal to do with Methodism since the late 1970's I very much hope that the state of relations between Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism will breathe new life into plans for Anglican-Methodist reunion which stalled in 1972. The current Anglican-Methodist Covenant is a positive move but feels like a half way house. As a concerned observer I'm hoping that when one door closes another will open. Of course that might be utopian enough to be a thoroughly Anabaptist point of view!

Are retreats in retreat?

2009-11-07T20:32:00.008Z

We all need a little encouragement from time to time. My nomination for good news story of the season came from the Leicestershire based retreat centre, Launde Abbey which to date has raised more than £800,000 to avoid closure and begin essential works. Launde is a special place and I look forward to being marooned in the snow there again, as I was earlier this year. Other retreat centres haven't been so fortunate, though. So, what's going on?

Traditional retreat houses find themselves caught in an awkward place amidst some perplexing and contradictory trends. On the one hand Christian organisations are implicated in the wider crisis of the Western Christianity following the demise of Christendom. Christian voluntary organisations and retreat centres have traditionally relied heavily on the churches, whether for staff, volunteers, financial support or guests. In fact, many retreat houses associated with monastic or other forms of residential Christian community are experiencing this crisis directly in the form of an ageing and declining membership. Further, retreat centres face a challenge common to many other residential institutions - an increasingly demanding public, no longer willing to do without en suite rooms or plush facilities. This problem is exascerpated when retreat houses are extensive, expensive listed buildings in out of the way rural locations. Yet, on the other hand, perhaps paradoxically, there is convincing evidence that demand for retreats has never been higher. In a stressful, clamorous and increasingly complex world the appeal of silence and reflection is potent. For a culture which is increasingly antagonistic to religious authoritarianism the retreat seems to form a crucible in which retreatants are able to explore spirituality and personal development in a welcoming and hopefully non-judgemental atmosphere.

Provisionally, I draw the conclusion that retreats are not in retreat but rather in transition. I believe that the time of the retreat has come. However, finding appropriate vehicles for this renewed interest in spirituality seems hard as chunks of Christendom float past our windows like so many iceburgs. Just as there is an 'emerging church' there is also an 'emerging spirituality' but like the former it is sometimes easier to see what this spirituality is emerging from rather than what it is becoming.

There are perhaps clues as to the future of emerging spirituality and the retreat in the strategies of churches and other Christian institutions in dealing with their early 21st Century cultural settings. As churches are learning to exist without the trappings of privelege that existed under Christendom (e.g. favourable legal status, church buildings, a 'normative' cultural role and access to State coercion) so the retreat has begun a journey from the centre to the margins and from large residential establishments to smaller decentralized 'retreat houses', perhaps linked to creative expressions of Christian community, emerging churches or 'distance spirituality' (the counterpart of distance learning). There will always be a place for welcome in the wilderness but most of these emerging retreat centres will be embedded in local communities like newsagents and chewing gum on the pavement. Yet, they will still be places of retreat - as rooted in silence and hospitality as Launde or Lindisfarne.

Freshly Emerging from the Launde Abbey Snow

2009-02-06T15:21:00.002Z

Well, here we are again - just back from somewhere on the Tundra, a.k.a. Launde Abbey in Leicestershire. I've always been a huge fan of retreats, which should be prescribed on the NHS, though perhaps without my ghastly jokes about 'contemplative tobogganing'. It's been a fertile and encouraging few days. My modest little black notebook is stuffed with emerging church ideas.

I'm also quietly encouraged by some good news in the form of research carried out by Tearfund. According to their figures church attendance has risen from 21% of the population in 2007 to 26% in 2008. Interpreting statistics is always tricky, but this is a notable upward movement over a very short period.

Why I Can't Celebrate Remembrance Sunday

2009-11-07T12:33:00.004Z

I have sometimes been asked which aspects of the Christian faith I find most troubling or problematic. Near the top of that list is Remembrance Sunday. It's almost 20 years since I have attended a Remembrance Day service. Speaking frankly, though I love the Autumn I hate this weekend and the feeling that as a Christian and a pacifist I am in exile from my own church.

It's not that I have a problem with remembrance itself. To remember the dead - civilian and military - and recall the horror of war is a fine thing to do. Remembrance Day started out as an act of consolation and a cry for lasting peace, rooted in the carnage of the 1st World War where nearly 10 million soldiers and more than 1 million non-combatants perished. Yet over the years it has been transformed into a justification of war, however nuanced. Its focus has narrowed to concentrate on our armed services , to the exclusion of both civilian casualties, enemy combatants and conscientious objectors, some of whom were imprisoned, persecuted or even murdered. If I'm really honest it's not just the transformation of the day that makes me uneasy, but its symbolism - places of Christian worship festooned with martial colours. It does bother me that this will give offence but in all good conscience I cannot participate in a service which transforms the Church of the Prince of Peace into a conscript temple for militarized civil religion.

Blinking painful - but otherwise intact

2009-10-23T13:18:00.002+01:00

I'm a keen film buff. There will be a lot of you know what it feels like to head back into the daylight after sitting in the dark for three hours. The past few months have been very dark for me and definitely no popcorn! Little by little I'm back in the daylight, even if I'm blinking a bit. It's good to be back and blogging.

Such Fallow Fellows

2009-06-19T15:29:00.006+01:00

Yesterday I sat in a Bethnal Green park, people watching and reading - Letty Russell's 'Just Hospitality', published posthumously following the author's death in 2007. I appreciated the reflection on 'safe space'. We could do worse than shape and savour such space, then give it away extravagantly. Russell also observed that hospitality has fallen into disuse in society and in our churches (p.19). How much more of authentic Christianity, I wondered, has atrophied and withered, or (to change metaphor) is parked in some forgotten historical siding: Methodist Class meetings, every member ministry, the presidency of the whole people of God at the Eucharist and pacifism to name a few. Alongside of the ground we cultivate - our ordered and well administered plantation - is the fallow ground of riot and risk, full of overgrown paths we have long abandoned or that we never had the courage to follow to their destinations. The way of hospitality always entails a creative relationship between safety and risk - each host makes a gift of safe space and imperils that space in the vulnerability of welcome; every stranger brings the promise of blessing and a potential for danger. Often though we are risk averse, peering timidly over our fences at what might have been: such fallow fellows!

Having Something to Say for Ourselves

2009-02-22T06:55:00.002Z

We're not good at evangelism and judging by the fear generated every time the word is mentioned it's not good for us either! Maybe it's the expectation that 'evangelism' is about buttonholing perfect strangers with an invitation to a place they don't want to go (church) through words they don't want to hear. Some of the solutions to that conundrum are to do with the church - why it's uninspiring or makes people angry. But, if we thought of 'evangelism' in terms of telling our stories, that's a start. Lot's of people don't think they have a story to tell but I love the questions that Janice Price asks in her splendid little book, 'Telling our Faith Story', 1999. Church Housing Publishing:

Which people or experiences have most influenced my own faith journey?
What are the milestones in my faith journey?
When did I first become aware of God in my life?
How has this awareness developed?
What are the things about Jesus that make him special to me?
How have I experienced the Holy Spirit in my life and what difference has this made?
What difference has my faith made in my life recently?
What place does the Church play in my faith journey?
Have there been times when God has seemed absent?
How did I learn from these times?
What doubts and questions remain with me, and what certainties support me in my journey of faith?

Isn't that encouraging! We all have a story to tell.

Gold Medal for Third Place?

2008-11-25T15:52:00.001Z

Recently I attended a conference organised jointly by the Anabaptist Network and Urban Expression. The speaker Mike Frost, is the vice-principal of Morling College, Sydney. It was a good day but what stood out for me was the reference to 'Third Places'. It's originally a phrase coined by sociologist Ray Oldenburg in his book The Great Good Place (Paragon House, 1989). The First Place is the home. The Second Place is the world. Third Places are places of interaction - friendly, conversational and welcoming.

Steven Croft, Archbishops’ Missioner and Team Leader of Fresh Expressions has rightly highlighted the importance of these Third Places for mission (c.f. http://www.freshexpressions.org.uk/section.asp?id=2948). If we are to see churches emerge which are relevant to 21st Century people this is where Christians need to be.

I believe in the signficance of Third Places but when we look around us such places are under pressure. My sister was the landlady of a friendly working class rock pub in Manchester until recently. Sadly, like so many others the pub closed earlier this year. Pubs are presently closing down at a rate of nearly four a day. Similar trends may be observed in trade unions, post offices, political parties and even bingo halls. For a Christian constituency desperate for good news there must be cautions against seeing mission in Third Places as some magic solution. Hitching our wagon to another declining cause involves risk. But that's not a reason to avoid jumping in. As Christians we're in the risk business - the Incarnation and Crucifixion business. Surely, this is the time not only to find Third Places but to create them.

Anabaptism on Land Rights

2008-11-24T18:38:00.001Z

I have been writing for quite a few years now. From time to time I'll make some of this writing available via the blog. Here's something of a taster, first published some years ago in The Land is Ours newsletter:

ANABAPTISM AND THE LAND

The Anabaptist story is, in Britain a tale of unrealised possibilities. There is a gap in our ecclesiastical spectrum where Anabaptism might have been. Absent, though, is not the same as irrelevant. For anyone concerned to address housing need or land reform, Anabaptist social thought is pointed and pertinent.

In the 1530's Anabaptists, fleeing events in the Netherlands, crossed the North Sea, settling in eastern towns including Hull, Colchester, Norwich, Ely and London. Here too, they met with persecution. By around 1580 Anabaptism in England had been exterminated[1] and the incipient movement was embraced and succeeded by an indigenous Separatism which culminated in the formation of the 17th Century Baptists and Congregationalists.[2] It was not until the 1940's that Anabaptists (North American Mennonites)[3] returned to Britain to assist with post-war relief work. Some of these visitors remained, founding the London Mennonite Centre in Highgate, which continues to support an active programme of peacemaking and social justice.

"Anabaptist" originated as a term of abuse. It meant "rebaptizer", referring to the radicals' practice of believer's baptism. Although Anabaptism 'proper' ceased to be identifiable here in the late 16th Century the word was adopted by establishment critics concerned to root out the sort of lower-class dissent typified by anti-clericalism, egalitarianism, and opposition to the state church. Amongst the more radical of the 17th Century Levellers there were "communist" tendencies, which Christopher Hill speculates were influenced by the kind of Anabaptist ideas condemned in the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England.[4]

Anabaptism emerged in the early 16th Century as a number of separate movements in Germany, the Netherlands and in Switzerland. Whilst there were initial differences in attitudes towards violence, those groups surviving the century (eg: Mennonites, Hutterites,[5] etc) became known for pacifism, voluntary church membership, separation of church and state and distinctive forms of corporate life. There is an identifiable Anabaptist economic spectrum, from the fully communitarian Hutterites through a semi-communal Commonwealth model (associated with the Amish)[6], to the more assimilated Mennonites.

TOWARDS AN ANABAPTIST LAND ETHIC

Whilst Günther Franz dominated Peasant's War studies and Mennonite apologists sought to distance their forbears from associations with extremism such as the Münster uprising in 1534 and 1535, few thought that the Revolt had anything much to do with Anabaptism. Latterly, scholars such as James Stayer have challenged this view (cf: Stayer 1991). It is not that the Peasant's Revolt and Anabaptism are the same thing but that both articulate a wider political agenda. The Peasant's War failed and by 1526 only the south German Anabaptists carried on the rebels' attempts to implement the social implications of divine law (Stayer 1991: 3).

Between the objectives of 16th Century peasants and Anabaptists and the rationale of 17th Century English radicals there is substantial common ground. Continental Anabaptists and English dissenters alike espoused a vigorous anti-clericalism, focused especially on a bitterly resented system of tithes. In the Peasant's Revolt and in the agrarian programme of the Levellers and the Diggers many grievances related to the enclosure of common land. Landlords, clerical and secular, abused the poor and encroached on the traditional rights of villagers by means of restrictions on the extraction of timber, punitive game laws, extortionate rents and the persecution of squatters and vagrants. Equally, both 16th Century Europe and 17th Century England produced 'masterless men': travellers, settlers, gypsies and preachers, with loose ties to the land and traditional patterns of authority. Such itinerants played a vital role in the dissemination of radical ideas (cf: Hill 1972: 44-50) and, in Anabaptism, the furtherance of mission.[7]

An End to "Mine" and "Yours"

Anabaptist social organization is a graphic response to the peasants' clamour for land reform. The Hutterites, for example, following the precedent of the early Christian community in Jerusalem (Acts 2 and 4) and the Old Testament (ie: "There should be no poor among you" - Deut 15:4), sought to build a corporate life in which private property was abolished and any concept of "mine" and "yours" became extraneous (Klassen 1964: 70). Thus Anabaptism preserved something of the Old Testament economic ethos at a time when a Graeco-Roman inspired individualism and the profit motive were beginning to gain an ascendancy.

The Anabaptist critique of liberal capitalism was strikingly reminiscent of the early Christian response to the Roman dominium ex iure quirintium, a notion which supported unrestricted property rights leading to the accumulation of land in the hands of a few (Meeks 1989: 106). The church refused to ground private property in either nature or divinity (Meeks 1989: 106), instead insisting, biblically, that the land belongs to God and may neither be sold in perpetuity[8] nor abused as a commodity.[9] At a secondary level both the Anabaptists and the early church knew that in Israel the Lord had entrusted this land by tribes, families and households, to a "bottom-up" society in which no centralized hierarchical power originally existed (cf: Lind 1990: 215-226).

The Anabaptist Contribution

Anabaptist history, of course, has its own "skeletons". Whilst 18th Century American Mennonites responded peacefully when subjected to periodic attacks by Indians it is also the case that Mennonites, near the forefront of colonial expansion, perpetuated a land-grabbing process founded on violence (MacMaster 1985: 119,120). The colonial experience may be read quite legitimately as a conflict, not only between two ways of life, but also of two contrasting forms of land tenure. When Indians spoke of "owning" the land they meant the use of the land (ie: for hunting, fishing, etc) and not, in a European sense, the ownership of the land in itself regardless of the purposes for which it was used.[10] By this time one wonders if Mennonites or Indians were nearer the Old Testament land ethic!

Still, the Anabaptist tradition must be judged according to its best - and original - insights. Anabaptism was not afraid to risk unpopularity by insisting that land, wealth and oppression are properly matters of Christian concern. It is of the essence of Anabaptism to fight for the just and equitable use of land. Further, there is between Capitalism and this Tradition something mutually antagonistic which centres on the notion of "absolute property" as defined in early liberalism. This notion, says Anabaptism, is heretical.

Anabaptism, as we said, has been notable by its absence in Britain. The matter of the ethical use of church land and property[11] which is the most direct sphere of relevance of a land ethic, must to left to Christians of other traditions. There remain some awkward questions to be asked. The still extensive land and property of, for example, the Church of England, are terrestrial reminders of a former spiritual ascendency.[12] This ascendancy was maintained, in part, through direct or indirect complicity in the suppression of dissent, including Anabaptism. Whilst it is true that the complex legal and economic questions surrounding the disposal and usage of church land place constraints on the freedom of churches to choose ethics above profit, the question of whether the church has the overriding will to overcome these obstacles, to do the right thing or the safe thing, still remains.

As the Anabaptist tradition in Britain begins find a role again after 450 years, it is important to rediscover an authentic and relevant land ethic. It is my conviction that anyone examining the commitments of 16th Century Anabaptism will not have far to look for such an ethic. In a real sense every The Land is Ours newsletter is evidence of a tradition of dissent owing something to Anabaptist precedent.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bender, H.S. (ed). 1956. The Mennonite Encyclopedia. Vol II, pp 215-221. Herald Press: Scottdale.

Bosch, David J. 1991. Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission. Orbis books. Maryknoll, New York.

Cronin, William. 1983. Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England. Hill and Wang. New York.

Hill, Christopher. 1972. The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas During the English Revolution. Penguin, London.

Hoornaert, Eduardo. 1989. The Memory of the Christian People. Burns and Oates.

Horst, I.B. 1972. The Radical Brethren: Anabaptism and the English Reformation to 1558. Nieuwkoop: B. De Graaf.

Klassen, P. J. 1964. The Economics of Anabaptism: 1525-1560. Marton and Co.

Kraybill, Donald B. 1989. The Riddle of Amish Culture. The Johns Hopkins University Press. Baltimore, Maryland.

Lind, Millard C. 1990. Monotheism, Power, Justice: Collected Old Testament Essays. Institute of Mennonite Studies. Elkhart, Indiana.

MacMaster, Richard K. 1985. Land, Piety, Peoplehood: The Establishment of Mennonite Communities in America, 1683 - 1790. Herald Press. Scottdale, Pennsylvania.

Meeks, M. Douglas. 1989. God the Economist: The Doctrine of God and Political Economy. Fortress Press, Minneapolis.

Stayer, James M. 1991. The German Peasants' War and Anabaptist Community of Goods. McGill: Queens University Press.

[1]Cf: I.B. Horst. 1972. The Radical Brethren: Anabaptism and the English Reformation to 1558. Nieuwkoop: B. De Graaf. See also I.B. Horst "England" in H.S. Bender (ed). 1956. The Mennonite Encyclopedia. Vol II, pp 215-221. Herald Press: Scottdale.
[2]Cf: Horst 1956, 218-19.
[3]Mennonites are the descendants of the Dutch Anabaptists, named after their most prominent early leader, Menno Simons (1496-1561).
[4]Cf: Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas During the English Revolution (Penguin, London, 1975) 114. Article 38 says that "the riches and goods of Christians are not common . . . as certain Anabaptists do falsely boast" (The Thirty-Nine Articles, London, 1955, 11-12).

[5]The Hutterites found refuge in the relatively tolerant Moravia. Like the Mennonites they came to be named after their most prominent leader, in this case the tireless Jakob Hutter, who was burned at the stake at Innsbruck on February 25, 1536.
[6]Led by Jacob Ammann (b. 1644) the Amish were originally a reform movement amongst Alsatian Mennonites. Amish Mennonites began arriving in Pennsylvania in the 1720's. A fascinating insight into the world of these "plain folk" is to be found in Kraybill (1989).
[7]Cf: Bosch 1992: 245-248. Unlike Luther and other 'mainstream' Reformers, the Anabaptists recognised no territorial boundaries (Bosch 1992: 246). A combination of persecution and a distinctive theological outlook made the Anabaptists missionary minded. They restored the older Hebrew synagogical model (each church being an autonomous assembly), replacing the prevailing centralized territorial church structures of the time. Words like "dioceses" and "vicar" are all Roman terms dating back to the reorganization of the Empire in the time of Diocletian. The difference between saying "the Church of the Corinthians" and "the Church of Corinth" is crucial. The first is a statement of community (ie: the people of God sojourning in Corinth) and the second a statement of territoriality (ie: a church responsible for the pastoral needs of the people in a particular place) (Cf: Hoornaert 1989: 137-150). With each of these ecclesiologies comes a land ethic: one of sojourning and one of occupation.
[8]Cf: Lev 25: 23,24, "The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you are but aliens and my tenants. Throughout the country that you hold as a possession, you must provide for a redemption of the land".

[9]Cf: the Sabbath tradition which provides for rest and "free space" for humans, the land and the remainder of creation alike. Just as the land is not to be sold permanently, so also economic disparities are to be subject to "levelling" in the Year of Jubilee.

[10]An excellent discussion of the land ethics of Indians and colonists in New England is to be found in Cronin (1983).
[11]This is an issue addressed by the Churches National Housing Coalition. Their Church Housing Advice and Property Service (CHAPS) is providing advice to schemes involving partnerships between local churches and housing associations, aiming to provide affordable accommodation. CNHC is also aware of concern about the ethical use of church owned woodlands. A recent gathering of churches, settlers and travellers in Dorset highlighted the possibility of travellers and settlers managing such woodland.
[12]As Stephen Neill reminds us the church of six centuries ago, of which the 16th Century Anglicans were heirs, owned something approximating to one third of the land-surface of England (Neill 1965: 22).

Lights, Camera ... Fiction?

2009-04-26T08:49:00.004+01:00

I hate having my picture taken. Mum keeps a few in her bottom drawer, like incriminating evidence. Otherwise, it's just my digital experiments or a scary photo taking during a very unhappy time in Jersey where a journalist lined me up against a wall and made me take my glasses off. 'Any last requests', I was thinking. A more recent image shows me standing on the Promenade at Rhos-on-Sea. I look a little older but I like it better. Photos can airbrushed to flatter or deceive but it seemed to me that the Welsh picture was honest in a way that I hadn't expected. It was a contented photo, which said a good deal about how I was feeling. The Jersey scene was revealing too, though not in a way I care to remember.

There’s a good deal in Scripture about how we appear on the outside and what we are on the inside. Samuel is given the unenviable task of recruiting a king (1 Sam 16) but not before God reminds him of the job description. Personal qualities are essential. Brad Pitt lookalike not required. Jesus has some scathing words for religious types with shiny faces like whitewashed tombs and minds that rattle like bones (Matt 23:27). God has simple expectations – reality and appearances should match. The word for this has an old fashioned ring to it these days – ‘integrity’, which comes from the same root as ‘integrate’ and carries much the same meaning. Christians should be integrated people; our inner and outer lives in balance.

Of course, the point of doctoring photos to remove the wrinkles is to avoid people seeing us as we really are. Hypocrisy wouldn’t be tempting if we weren’t convinced there was an advantage to making others think we’re wiser, richer, sexier, holier, more beautiful or less ordinary. But, perhaps we should learn something from our own photographs. They give away more than we realize. We can focus on our ‘best points’ but somehow something in an expression or the way light and shadow falls across a face will tell the real story. ‘Keeping up appearances’ may make a good sitcom but it’s a rotten way to live a life.

Depression and Creativity

2009-04-24T10:10:00.004+01:00

I haven't been blogging for weeks but this short post took me more than an hour. Sometimes I am depressed. There's still a stigma around the subject which is one reason why I don't talk about it a great deal. If I'm honest though, the main reason I say so little when I'm down is the way in which depression isolates and stifles creativity. I don't feel like talking or even stepping out of the door, so mostly I don't. Every piece of writing or phone call is such an effort that they dwindle to a trickle. If God is in his heaven and all is right with the world the words flow easily. When God seems deaf and blind I envy Job and the Psalmists their eloquence in suffering. Most of my unease though, when I'm in this frame of mind is not aimed at God but directed inwards. I find it almost impossible to believe that I can be the same buoyant, confident, fluent person of a month ago. It's like cohabiting with a particularly vile and intemperate squatter - namely myself.

I don't know how this squares with the supposed association between melancholy and artistic achievement. The two do seem connected but so much pseudo-scientific waffle comes from people who don't know the internal world of depression. My experience is that when I'm depressed I achieve very little. Depression is a cheat, a liar and an imposter which doesn't deserve respect as the companion of 'troubled poets'.

Is the Crisis 'Economic'?

2009-04-03T04:19:00.003+01:00

Today I heard more than one journalist say that G20 leaders had 'risen to the crisis'. A pity it's the wrong one!

Does Persecution Matter?

2009-02-27T23:14:00.001Z

Of course persecution matters but I mean something quite specific. To give an example, what does it mean here and now in the 21st Century that in the 16th Century the Anglicans persecuted Anabaptists? Thankfully, these days I don't lie awake at night worrying that the Church of England are out to get me but I have to admit that even now there is an edge to Anabaptist/Anglican conversation that wouldn't be there without that savage baptism. To be frank, in Britain the Anabaptist Tradition was beheaded at birth and there is an empty space where there could have been Mennonite meeting houses, Amish communities or Hutterite colonies. The Anabaptism that does exist here must engage with radical reconstruction and exercise vivid imagination if an emerging new movement is to develop with authenticity and vitality. I know that there is a vast numerical and institutional disparity between Anglicanism and Anabaptism in Britain but I am convinced that there is something important for Anglicans as well as for Anabaptists in facing up to the significance of persecution.

What does that background mean today? For Anglicans the via media has generally been regarded as a statement of moderation - a claim to the middle ground between Protestantism and Roman Catholicism. Anabaptists have a different view and from that vantage point the claim to a via media is far more threatening. In order to make room for that middle way the road first had to be cleared, to the left and to the right. Both aspects of those 'clearances' are vividly evident in the 39 Articles.

There already has been an Anabaptist/Anglican colloquy, hosted by the London Mennonite Centre in 1994 but this meeting was inconclusive. Perhaps it's time to meet again, with a sharper focus, determined to face up to a troubled past and a shared Post-Christendom future? As I'm writing I have memories of the abolition of the slave trade in mind. There may well be a case to press for reparations but that shouldn't take away from an ongoing partnership between Anglicans and Anabaptists in a shared, though likely more marginal Post-Christendom future.

Two Cheers for Chaplaincy

2009-03-07T09:16:00.002Z

One or two of my recent blog entries seem to have started in an awkward conversation. That might be something to do with my own brand of prickly peacemaking or just a coincidence. My conversation partner on this occasion was an ex-services Baptist prison chaplain. The 'prickly' part centred on my reaction to the relationship between his church and the local R.A.F. base - either 'close' or 'cosy' depending on your point of view. The awkward part was to do with how much I like the chaplain in question - an altogether brilliant bloke!

I felt bad afterwards for blurting out my opinion with little sensitivity. But I still ended up thinking about 'chaplaincy', especially in the Armed Services. Many chaplains no doubt do a fine job but I remain deeply uneasy with a role which is not only pastoral but gives legitimacy the institution itself. Some of the same issues are also raised by pastoral care, church membership and church planting as well as chaplaincy. I am thinking about Armed Services chaplaincy but some of the same issues are raised by chaplaincy in other contexts: the sex industry, prisons, multi-national corporations, financial institutions or cruise ships. Does a chaplain to large multi-national company ratify all the activities or that organisation? How would a cruise ship chaplain best approach a largely wealthy and highly mobile constituency? How does a chaplain in the finance industry deal with opposition to usury in the early church? Can a chaplain working with prostitutes retain trust whilst also criticising the sex industry itself? To be fair on chaplains, the freedom to raise awkward issues has as much to do with the willingness of an institution to stomach criticism as it does to the convictions of the chaplain.

An army chaplain doesn't fire the rifle or order the soldier to fire but surely the presence of chaplains in an institution wedded to the use of lethal force underpins both actions. In some cases an entire national church is conscripted into a chaplaincy role, as is the case of the Church of England on State occasions. It is enough the make the Prince of Peace weep yet, I cannot bring myself to write off millions of people (and their families) who serve in armed forces around world, whether willingly or not. If the Incarnation is to mean anything then surely we should not ask 'is Christ be present?' but rather 'how is Christ present?'. The participation of many courageous women and men in Civilian Peacemaker Teams points in the right direction - to an engaged and active peacemaking which is incarnate but still refuses legitimacy to violence.

What is church?

2009-03-19T06:43:00.009Z

It was Tertullian in his Apologetics that coined a phrase widely cited by Pro-Life campaigners: "He is a man, who is to be a man; the fruit is always present in the seed." Perhaps the same reasoning can be applied to the currently controversial question of what constitutes 'church'. 'Church to be is church', perhaps? Church planter, Stuart Murray Williams summarises the options in 'Planting Churches', p.128. There are different moments at which a church may be said to begin, depending on our theological convictions - perhaps when the church has been commissioned, when it begins to meet in a public place or when the core elements of mission, worship and community are present? In animals conception may be understood as a sperm fusing with an ovum in the uterus, to form an embryo. By analogy church is fully 'church' from the moment it is implanted in situ. This is not to say - again by analogy - that the new church doesn't have a great deal of maturing to do.

Of course an argument from analogy should be treated with some caution. If Matt 5:27,28 asserts a kind of equivalance between committing adultery and thinking about it does it then follow (by analogy) that merely planning a new church is in itself 'church' - a kind of 'church of the mind'? In my view such a disembodied notion of 'church' is a step too far, although similar issues are raised by the existence of internet 'churches'. Arguments from analogy are hardly likely to take the heat out of the 'what is church' debate. When a person becomes a person is more fiercely controversial, even than the question of what constitutes a Christian church. I would tentatively suggest however, that worries about the need for 'proper' ministry and sacraments in newly planted congregations may be more to do with the insecurities of established churches than whether two or three gathered in the name of Christ are an infant church or something else.

Christendom in Motion?

2009-02-21T13:51:00.001Z

Atheist and Poet Laureate Andrew Motion has raised a few eyebrows with his call for all children to be taught the Bible from an early age. In a Guardian interview he complains that poor biblical knowledge limits understanding of a whole raft of literature, from John Milton to T.S. Eliot.

I once made the mistake of volunteering a few Scriptural references in an A-Level English Literature class. Teacher and fellow students listened politely but I was left with the impression that these days we can do George Herbert without the religious baggage. At this level Motion is correct. It is deeply inadequate to read John Bunyan, William Blake or R.S. Thomas without at least the fundamentals of biblical literacy.

Then, why does Motion's plea still make me uneasy? To some extent I struggle with the whole 'Bible as literature' project. Is it legitimate to rip the text from its' covenantal context to serve as a series of footnotes to literary criticism? Perhaps it's that the Laureate is too idealistic. For every person who will welcome his desire to enrich reading there are also others who will seize on his proposal for other reasons - Christendom nostalgia or a desire the see Christianity restored to its 'rightful place', perhaps.