First Sunday of Christmas, 31 December 2017
Queen Camel (Together at Ten), West Camel Methodist Church
Those Christmas films you see on TV - by which I don’t mean Mary Poppins and Singin’ In The Rain, but rather those modern, made-for-TV romantic dramas with titles like Marry Me at Christmas, My Christmas Love, A December Bride and so on. They’re produced by the Hallmark Channel - the same people responsible for those greetings cards with the gushing messages - and like those cards they flood the market at this time of year. [1]
Have you seen them? The plots of these films vary slightly but the outcome is always the same - the young woman who began in an unhappy relationship or - even worse - unforgivably single, ends up finding Christmas romance. Woe betide if you’re the actor playing the work-addicted boyfriend or the Grinchy husband at the start of the film, for your days are numbered, you’re about to be replaced by someone with the time and the inclination to suck up and celebrate the joy of the season.
Now these films may be improbably romantic but at their heart is a belief in something substantial - in this season we believe in transformation; transformation through loving relationships.
My favourite present this year was a book by Michael Rosen called Bah! Humbug! It’s a retelling of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, written for teenagers really but with great emotional intelligence, so engaging that I’d finished reading it by Boxing Day morning. Harry Gruber is playing Scrooge in his school production of A Christmas Carol and his Dad Ray, a workaholic, disappoints as he usually does by disappearing from the school theatre part-way through the play to attend to something in the office. The two stories brilliantly weave together until, just like Scrooge, Ray Gruber has an epiphany and, faced with the choice to either return to the office with some essential data from his home computer or to go back to the play to support his son, he uncharacteristically chooses his son. Both Scrooge - the mean-spirit who becomes excessively generous, and Ray Gruber - who re-sets his work-family priorities, find their relationships transformed. [2]
Now this meme, this theme running through our culture, is of no surprise to Christians for whom the key story - at this, and every time of year - is of God coming to earth to transform our relationships with him and others. What may be a more surprising thought is this: that the Hallmark films and Dickens’ and Michael Rosen’s Scrooge stories demonstrate that our culture has got it - it’s got the gospel message, it’s embraced it, it’s absorbed it and integrated it and turned it into these retellings which have different characters but precisely the same spirit.
What I'm saying is that without the gospel there would be no Scrooge - for his transformation story connects by a holy thread back to pregnant Mary’s song of praise, in which the proud are humbled and the lowly are lifted up and the hungry are filled with good things - just as they are in A Christmas Carol.
Without the gospel there would be no Hallmark romances - for they firmly grasp the gospel truth that only by embracing the spirit of love which yearns to break into our world, can our sadness turn to joy, our darkness turn to light.
Before we bemoan the decline of Christianity in our culture let us consider this suggestion: that the gospel story has so much filtered through that we can find it everywhere - albeit in different shapes and forms.
It's instructive, at this turning of the year - as we face a year of change in our churches, both you and I with my move north in the Spring - it’s instructive to see how Christianity never stands still for long, it constantly evolves. For Christianity is a walk with Jesus. And Jesus never stood still for long: his followers had to keep looking for him - in their homes, on the beach, up a mountain, in the city, around the sharing of bread, fish, wine. After he had risen he continued to reveal himself to them in these ways. “And so their journey cycled on: seeking, finding, losing, seeking, finding, losing, seeking… The journey of the Church has been ever thus.” [3]
Maybe the Hallmark meme and the Scrooge meme are signs of our society having originally found the gospel, embraced it then lost it a little, now starting to look for it again.
And maybe another prevalent theme of our time demonstrates this too. The focus our culture places on the victim and the victim’s story. The victims’ perspective could almost be said to be the defining perspective of our times. Those victimised for their colour, their sexuality, their gender, their class - all are finding a voice. Most recently, following sexual misconduct allegations against film producer Harvey Weinstein, women the world over painfully revealed themselves as victims of sexual harassment, and the ‘#MeToo’ hashtag movement went viral. [4]
And this intelligence of the victim goes right back to the heart of the gospel - to the victimisation and execution of Jesus by those who felt challenged by him: those clinging onto the power of their legalised religion, or the authority of their military might. Jesus’ crucifixion revealed something previously hidden to humankind, something which the Pharisees and Romans of today still work hard to conceal: that ‘Human society is a violent place, which makes victims, and the revelation of God is to be found in the midst of that violence, on the side of the victims.’ Christianity is unique among all religions in being essentially a story told from the victim’s perspective - in which the victim ultimately triumphs - through suffering and self-giving love. [5]
The ‘#MeToo’ movement was a revelation of the victim, a succession of stories told from the victims’ perspective. It was generally received sympathetically, opening people’s eyes to some hard truths and producing apologies from some penitent men, and so it could be said that the victims ultimately triumphed - through suffering, through their self-giving desire to save others from that which had harmed them. This suggests a gospel moment in our times. That the actress who triggered the ‘#MeToo’ movement called it “in equal parts heartbreaking and inspiring” surely carries echoes of Calvary to those who have ears to hear. [6] And eyes to see how these women’s stories, and their reception, have sparked off a transformation in human relationships.
Of course the ‘#MeToo’ movement was not received uncritically. Messages which carry the seeds of the Gospel never are. And the Gospel is easily distorted. The strongest objection is the criticism that “we are all victims now”. “Wherever you look there is someone with a grievance,” said Philip Stephens in the Financial Times. “Political leaders, bankers, corporate bosses and the plutocrats of the hedge fund industry have joined the poor and disadvantaged among the swelling ranks of the oppressed…. For the populists of the far right, victimhood is the beginning and the end of political strategy,” he continues, “Britain is the helpless victim of hard-working incomers from eastern and central Europe. And everyone, of course, is a dupe of the established political elites.” [7]
In our complicated world how can we find the gospel truth and live in its light? I suggest that we simply journey on, and at every twist and turn keep searching for Jesus who always goes on ahead of us to meet us. Our journey cycles on: seeking, finding, losing, seeking, finding, losing, seeking, and if we are prayerfully alert to how the gospel message is being received and used then we should know when we come across fertile ground for loving relationships, for we will find Jesus there; and we should know when we find his message being used for divisive, hateful, purposes, and be aware.
Remarking on how some evangelical leaders were "uncritically accepting" of things being said by the US president and his allies, [8] Paul Bayes, the Bishop of Liverpool, this week said, “Some of the things that have been said by religious leaders seem to collude with a system that marginalises the poor, a system which builds walls instead of bridges, a system which says people on the margins of society should be excluded, a system which says we’re not welcoming people any more into our country. Whenever people say those kinds of things, they need to be able to justify that they’re saying those things as Christians, and I do not believe it’s justifiable.” [9]
Now before I leave here we will journey through Lent together, and in our Lent Meetings we will be considering the affirmation of Paul in Galatians 3.28, that “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” We’ll be asking ourselves the question,
“[Do] we believe in an inclusive church - church which does not discriminate, on any level, on grounds of economic power, gender, mental health, physical ability, race or sexuality. [Do] we believe in Church which welcomes and serves all people in the name of Jesus Christ; which is scripturally faithful; which seeks to proclaim the Gospel afresh for each generation; and which, in the power of the Holy Spirit, allows all people to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Jesus Christ.”? [10]
Our journey with Jesus continues; seeking, finding, losing, seeking… Our traditional churches are fragile and fading just now; which puts us on the vulnerable road of remembering that we are not heirs to God’s kingdom by entitlement, but rather, we are his adopted children by his love. And as members of his adopted family let us joyfully recognise that the gospel is still vigorous and active out here in God's world. Let us learn and re-learn to share our journey with others quite different from ourselves, to being open to being transformed by God through these unforeseen, uninvited, loving relationships.
Notes
[1] Hallmark Channel: Christmas.
[2] Michael Rosen, Bah! Humbug!: Every Christmas Needs a Little Scrooge.
[3] Marcus Peter Rempel, Life at the End of Us Versus Them, Kindle Android version Location 4501.
[4] Wikipedia: Me Too (hashtag).
[5] James Alison in Knowing Jesus, Chapter 2, introduces the concept of ‘the intelligence of the victim’. I have referenced it in previous sermons including Mary’s song of great reversal (Devon, 2012) and The Beatitudes - Christianity with its eyes wide open (Somerset, 2014). See Paul Nuechterlein, James Alison on "The Intelligence of the Victim”, and An Excerpt from James Alison's "The Joy of Being Wrong: Original Sin Through Easter Eyes", from the Girardian Lectionary website, and all James Alison's work.
[6] Alyssa Milano quoted in Wikipedia: Me Too (hashtag).
[7] Philip Stephens, We are all victims now. Financial Times, 16 February 2015.
[8] Bishop of Liverpool criticises Christian Trump supporters. BBC News, 28 December 2017.
[9] Harriet Sherwood, Evangelical Christians 'uncritical' in support for Trump, senior bishop says. Guardian, 28 December 2017.
[10] From the Inclusive Church statement of belief. The Lent 2018 series of meetings will be based on the Inclusive Church Small Group Studies.
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