Sermon 21/09/08
Preached at the Eucharist at St Catherine’s, Catherine-de-Barnes at 11am on
Sunday 21st September 2008 - Trinity 18 – Proper 20 – Year A
Readings: Jonah 3: 10 - 4:11 Philippians 1: 21-30 Matthew 20: 1-16
In 1987 I joined British Gas as employee. At that time in British Gas there used to be an annual pay negotiation. The unions would argue that gas workers should get a pay rise to give them parity with what was earned by staff in telecoms or the electricity board. The management would argue that a more appropriate comparison was with council workers and the water board, and gas employees already received more than what theses groups earned. In the end a compromise was always worked out, but to achieve this, the management and unions had to put aside their chosen comparisons and focus on what made sense for the gas industry.
We know that comparison with other people is a very common way of determining appropriate pay in the working world. But we also know from today’s gospel reading that this is NOT how the kingdom of heaven works! In the parable there were some workers who had started work in the early morning, some had started at 9, some at noon, some at 3 and some at 5. At 6, when everybody finished work and was paid the landowner chose to give each one the normal full daily wage. It is very, very easy for us human beings to understand why the people who started work first thing in the morning might find that frustrating. The landowner has been very generous to some people, who started work late. Those who started early might well hope that he will be generous with them too. In fact he pays exactly what was originally agreed, which felt like a fair wage when it was agreed, but now suddenly it feels very stingy because other people have done a lot better.
But Jesus tells us that this is what the kingdom of heaven of like! The truth is that God gives out his gifts just as he pleases to each different person. We should not make comparisons between different people, because if we do we soon start to think, “It’s not fair!” And it is certainly true that on a comparative basis life can be very “unfair”. This “unfairness” is most obvious in the way people are born. Some people are born rich, beautiful and intelligent. Others are born poor, ugly and stupid. Some people are born into good families, are loved by their parents and grow up secure and happy. Other people are born into miserable family situations and grow up believing that nobody is out to help them and everybody is out to exploit them. But “comparative unfairness” is not just about birth. As we grow up, some people land good jobs, and buy into the housing market just before a housing boom. Other people struggle with jobs and get caught in negative equity traps on their mortgages. Some people enjoy good health, some people have poor health and some people die young from accidents or terrible diseases.
And religious gifts are not dished out equally either. Why should God have a “chosen people”? Are they any better than the rest of us? Why did God choose the Blessed Virgin Mary to be “blessed among women” (Luke 1: 42)? Why was Jesus born in Bethlehem and not in Catherine-de-Barnes?
If we think in comparative terms we can quickly start to see God as very unfair. We can even start to feel resentful or indignant towards God. But of course we know we should not think about God in this way. So why is it that God seems so completely unconcerned about fairness from a human perspective? Well this is something of a mystery which we need to ponder over time. But there is a big difference between the justice of God, and our human notions of fairness, especially comparative fairness. I would like to set out a few pointers to help us ponder the mystery.
First of all there is something very personal about our relationship with God. Each of us is completely unique. Each of us is loved by God in a way that exactly and perfectly matches our uniqueness. For each of us God has a plan, a route to eternal life, and this plan, this journey is very specifically ours; nobody else can walk the journey for us, nobody else can experience God in exactly the same way as we do. So the challenge for each one of us is not to grumble about the gifts that God has evidently given to other people, but rather to discover and make the most of and to rejoice in the gifts that God has specifically given to us personally.
Secondly, in the Church, the body of Christ, the community of Christian people the gift that God gives to one person is not solely for the benefit of that person but is for the benefit of the whole community. We all need to use our gifts for the benefit of the others. The one who can welcome, should welcome on behalf of us all. The one who can pray well should pray well on behalf of us all, the one who can make tea and coffee should do it for us all. We need to develop a culture of giving, of sharing. When we get to heaven I suspect that we will find that our gifts and good fortunes will be so perfectly shared among us that we will not pause to worry about which individual God originally gave them to.
Thirdly, as human beings we are created for eternal life. The time we spend on this earth is relatively brief, and although things might seem unfair in this earthly life they might look very different over all eternity. Jesus says, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven, blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled, blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh,” (Luke 6: 20-21). St Paul teaches that the sufferings of this present life are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed (Romans 8: 18) and Peter preaches that after we have suffered for a little we will be restored, supported, strengthened and established by God (1 Peter 5:10).
Fourthly it was through his passion and death that Christ reconciled us to God. When we approach our sufferings in fellowship with Christ in his sufferings then they become immensely valuable. Through fellowship with Christ in his sufferings we can hope for fellowship with Christ in his resurrection and new life. Even if some people seem to suffer more than others in this life, we should not assume that they are less blessed. In fact the opposite might be true. Surely Jesus suffered greatly, and surely he is greatly blessed.
And I believe that we can use these four pointers to align our own lives with the kingdom of heaven, and to make our communities more like heaven. In particular we make our own contribution by seeking to walk the path that God has planned for us personally, discovering all its beauty and potential. We should not worry, but rather should rejoice, if God appears to have given other very attractive looking paths to other people. And we must also work on that culture of giving. The good things we have been given are given to us for the benefit of all. We need to be generous in giving and in receiving. Let’s not be too proud or ashamed to share in the good things that God has given to others. Rather, let’s give thanks and rejoice when this happens, because we start to make earth look more like the kingdom of heaven that Jesus described.
Showing posts with label discrimination. Show all posts
Showing posts with label discrimination. Show all posts
21 September 2008
07 September 2008
Equality and non-discrimination
Preached at St Alphege, Solihull at Evensong 6.30pm, 7th September 2008 - Trinity 16
Readings: Isaiah 35: 4-7a Psalm 108 James 2: 1-17
This morning in church, in our observance of Racial Justice Sunday, we reflected on unjust discrimination against people from other races.
But then the theme of discrimination came up in the church news last week in a completely different way. A newly form group called “Accord” accused Faith Schools of discrimination in the selection of teachers and pupils. I found myself wondering what it means to be a faith school if it does not mean that at least some members of staff and pupils come form the designed faith. A ballet school must necessarily select people who are interested in ballet. Surely a faith school must do the same? But in the perception of people like Accord there is a particular difficulty of discrimination arsing from faith.
And then in our scripture reading today we heard St James warn against unjust discrimination against the poor.
So it seems like an appropriate moment to reflect around this theme of equality and non-discrimination, in the Christian understanding.
The equality of dignity of all human beings arises above all from our creation. God, in his great wisdom and love, has created human beings to share in his image and likeness (Gen 1: 26-27, 5:1 James 3:9). We are created for a great destiny; to share eternal life with God, through Christ. We are called to grow into the likeness of Christ (1 Cor 15:49, 2 Cor 3:18), the likeness of God. Whether or not people are aware of it, we are all called by Christ (John 12: 32, Matt 28:19). We are all created sons and daughters of the same heavenly father. Through Christ we have the possibility of fully realising that potential as fellow heirs with Christ, inheritors of God’s glory (Rom 8: 13-17).
So, all human beings share a common dignity. All are called to share in the life of heaven. Therefore each human being must be treated with great respect and afforded great value because of the presence of God, and the further potential presence of God in each one. And this dignity is equal among all human beings because it is one and the same dignity which is held in common; the share in the image and likeness of God.
And this has consequences in our attitude to other human beings, which are well illustrated in our reading from James this evening. We heard James emphasise that the Church must not show favouritism to the rich over the poor. He says tells us not to make distinctions among ourselves or make judgements about one another. He says that acts of favouritism suggest a failure to truly believe in the glorious Lord Jesus Christ. He reminds of the beatitude, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20). He grounds all this in the commandment, “Love your neighbour as yourself” and says that this commandment is broken if we show partiality. He says we should speak and act as those who are to be judged according to the law of liberty. He reminds us of the importance of an attitude of mercy, because the mercy that we show to others is the mercy that we will receive.
In the passage we read, James is particularly concerned with the poor; that there dignity be preserved (vv 3-5) and that their basic human needs for food and clothing are satisfied (vv15-17). But this need to preserve human dignity applies equally to all human beings who are likely to be discriminated against. We think especially today of people of different races, but we could also think of the very young, the very old, people with disabilities of different kinds, the uneducated, foreigners or people from different religions. As Christians we try to seek out, honour and develop this basic human dignity in all people. It is important even in people who wilfully damage the dignity of themselves or of others through greed or sex or drugs or violence or deceit or neglect. We might not agree with their actions, but we still value them as human beings and recognise that, like us, they are created by God, and like us, they are called to heaven, and like us their getting to heaven depends entirely on the grace and mercy of God.
My guess is that this understanding of the basic human dignity of all people is unlikely to cause problems for the supporters of Accord. But there are other aspects of it that they might find more difficult. In particular we must not think that our dignity as human beings a static thing. It arises from our creation as human beings who are called to share in the life of God. It is God’s call to us and his hope for us that is the source of our dignity. We are called to develop our relationship with God and to move ever closer to him. We are called to move from sin to righteousness. We are called to grow in holiness. We know that are human bodies are destined to die, but that we are called to life in the Spirit (c.f. Romans 8: 9-11).
And this call of God has consequences which sometimes are quite wrongly construed as inequalities. For example, God call is very personal to each one of us and the callings are quite different. It uniquely and precisely matches the way we have been made, our personal fulfilment and our personal contribution to the Church and to the whole body of humanity. We try to follow God’s calling for us in our everyday life in society and also in the life of the Church. As St Paul explains, “And in the church God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, and those speaking in different kinds of tongues. … But eagerly desire the greater gifts.” (1Cor 28-31) Over time the roles we are called to move on and develop. Hopefully we mature, grow closer to God and offer better and purer service to the life of the whole Church. Paul talks about some gifts being “higher” than others, but this is not about having dominion over others, rather it is about serving others; the wider the scope of service to the whole church, the higher the gift. It is when gifts are properly used for the service of others that we are able to see most clearly that the diversity of gifts and the diversity of roles does not compromise our equal dignity as human beings.
Also this call to righteousness means that we value and celebrate our efforts to become better people, and to correspond better to God’s aspirations for each one of us. And when we try to follow God in this way it does introduce a certain tension into our life. We find ourselves trying to behave like saints, when manifestly we are sinners. This is sometimes quite wrongly construed as hypocrisy, as though it would somehow be more honest and better to fail to journey towards God and to rejoice in our inadequacies and sinfulness. Of course our own human efforts to become holy are in themselves completely futile. We fail and fail and fail again, but our efforts are still very important and significant because they express our desire to move towards holiness. As we fail and confess our sins and start again, so we create a humble space in which God’s grace and mercy is able to work, taking us forward not as we would expect, but as God has planned for us.
[The call to holiness therefore means that there are certain values, behaviours and attitudes that are helpful to us personally, to the church and to wider society. These we seek to promote. Similarly there are other approaches which are rebellious against God, unhelpful and destructive. These we would seek to move away from. What groups like Accord sometimes find difficult is that promoting certain values can feel like discrimination in favour of people who display those values and discrimination against people who don’t. Needless to say, I do not accept this. It seems to me that seeking to remove discrimination by removing values ultimately removes the very reason why we want to avoid discrimination. All sense of right and wrong, and all sense of justice disappears.
So what are the valid ways of promoting equality and non-discrimination? Well certainly it is to “Love your neighbour as yourself”. Certainly it is to recognise and rejoice in the dignity of each human being. Certainly it is to want the good of that human being, and want to help them on their journey towards God, even if they are currently very far from God. But we must not allow desire for equality to force everybody to be the same, or to exercise the same roles in society. Rather we should rejoice in diversity and encourage the people who are “greater” to focus more completely on the service of others. Neither should we allow the desire for equality to stop us from saying that certain behaviours are “good” and desirable, and others “bad” and undesirable. Rather we should redouble our efforts to promote that which is good, whilst retaining and attitude of great mercy towards those whose behaviour is “bad”.]
Readings: Isaiah 35: 4-7a Psalm 108 James 2: 1-17
This morning in church, in our observance of Racial Justice Sunday, we reflected on unjust discrimination against people from other races.
But then the theme of discrimination came up in the church news last week in a completely different way. A newly form group called “Accord” accused Faith Schools of discrimination in the selection of teachers and pupils. I found myself wondering what it means to be a faith school if it does not mean that at least some members of staff and pupils come form the designed faith. A ballet school must necessarily select people who are interested in ballet. Surely a faith school must do the same? But in the perception of people like Accord there is a particular difficulty of discrimination arsing from faith.
And then in our scripture reading today we heard St James warn against unjust discrimination against the poor.
So it seems like an appropriate moment to reflect around this theme of equality and non-discrimination, in the Christian understanding.
The equality of dignity of all human beings arises above all from our creation. God, in his great wisdom and love, has created human beings to share in his image and likeness (Gen 1: 26-27, 5:1 James 3:9). We are created for a great destiny; to share eternal life with God, through Christ. We are called to grow into the likeness of Christ (1 Cor 15:49, 2 Cor 3:18), the likeness of God. Whether or not people are aware of it, we are all called by Christ (John 12: 32, Matt 28:19). We are all created sons and daughters of the same heavenly father. Through Christ we have the possibility of fully realising that potential as fellow heirs with Christ, inheritors of God’s glory (Rom 8: 13-17).
So, all human beings share a common dignity. All are called to share in the life of heaven. Therefore each human being must be treated with great respect and afforded great value because of the presence of God, and the further potential presence of God in each one. And this dignity is equal among all human beings because it is one and the same dignity which is held in common; the share in the image and likeness of God.
And this has consequences in our attitude to other human beings, which are well illustrated in our reading from James this evening. We heard James emphasise that the Church must not show favouritism to the rich over the poor. He says tells us not to make distinctions among ourselves or make judgements about one another. He says that acts of favouritism suggest a failure to truly believe in the glorious Lord Jesus Christ. He reminds of the beatitude, “Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God” (Luke 6:20). He grounds all this in the commandment, “Love your neighbour as yourself” and says that this commandment is broken if we show partiality. He says we should speak and act as those who are to be judged according to the law of liberty. He reminds us of the importance of an attitude of mercy, because the mercy that we show to others is the mercy that we will receive.
In the passage we read, James is particularly concerned with the poor; that there dignity be preserved (vv 3-5) and that their basic human needs for food and clothing are satisfied (vv15-17). But this need to preserve human dignity applies equally to all human beings who are likely to be discriminated against. We think especially today of people of different races, but we could also think of the very young, the very old, people with disabilities of different kinds, the uneducated, foreigners or people from different religions. As Christians we try to seek out, honour and develop this basic human dignity in all people. It is important even in people who wilfully damage the dignity of themselves or of others through greed or sex or drugs or violence or deceit or neglect. We might not agree with their actions, but we still value them as human beings and recognise that, like us, they are created by God, and like us, they are called to heaven, and like us their getting to heaven depends entirely on the grace and mercy of God.
My guess is that this understanding of the basic human dignity of all people is unlikely to cause problems for the supporters of Accord. But there are other aspects of it that they might find more difficult. In particular we must not think that our dignity as human beings a static thing. It arises from our creation as human beings who are called to share in the life of God. It is God’s call to us and his hope for us that is the source of our dignity. We are called to develop our relationship with God and to move ever closer to him. We are called to move from sin to righteousness. We are called to grow in holiness. We know that are human bodies are destined to die, but that we are called to life in the Spirit (c.f. Romans 8: 9-11).
And this call of God has consequences which sometimes are quite wrongly construed as inequalities. For example, God call is very personal to each one of us and the callings are quite different. It uniquely and precisely matches the way we have been made, our personal fulfilment and our personal contribution to the Church and to the whole body of humanity. We try to follow God’s calling for us in our everyday life in society and also in the life of the Church. As St Paul explains, “And in the church God has appointed first of all apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then workers of miracles, also those having gifts of healing, those able to help others, those with gifts of administration, and those speaking in different kinds of tongues. … But eagerly desire the greater gifts.” (1Cor 28-31) Over time the roles we are called to move on and develop. Hopefully we mature, grow closer to God and offer better and purer service to the life of the whole Church. Paul talks about some gifts being “higher” than others, but this is not about having dominion over others, rather it is about serving others; the wider the scope of service to the whole church, the higher the gift. It is when gifts are properly used for the service of others that we are able to see most clearly that the diversity of gifts and the diversity of roles does not compromise our equal dignity as human beings.
Also this call to righteousness means that we value and celebrate our efforts to become better people, and to correspond better to God’s aspirations for each one of us. And when we try to follow God in this way it does introduce a certain tension into our life. We find ourselves trying to behave like saints, when manifestly we are sinners. This is sometimes quite wrongly construed as hypocrisy, as though it would somehow be more honest and better to fail to journey towards God and to rejoice in our inadequacies and sinfulness. Of course our own human efforts to become holy are in themselves completely futile. We fail and fail and fail again, but our efforts are still very important and significant because they express our desire to move towards holiness. As we fail and confess our sins and start again, so we create a humble space in which God’s grace and mercy is able to work, taking us forward not as we would expect, but as God has planned for us.
[The call to holiness therefore means that there are certain values, behaviours and attitudes that are helpful to us personally, to the church and to wider society. These we seek to promote. Similarly there are other approaches which are rebellious against God, unhelpful and destructive. These we would seek to move away from. What groups like Accord sometimes find difficult is that promoting certain values can feel like discrimination in favour of people who display those values and discrimination against people who don’t. Needless to say, I do not accept this. It seems to me that seeking to remove discrimination by removing values ultimately removes the very reason why we want to avoid discrimination. All sense of right and wrong, and all sense of justice disappears.
So what are the valid ways of promoting equality and non-discrimination? Well certainly it is to “Love your neighbour as yourself”. Certainly it is to recognise and rejoice in the dignity of each human being. Certainly it is to want the good of that human being, and want to help them on their journey towards God, even if they are currently very far from God. But we must not allow desire for equality to force everybody to be the same, or to exercise the same roles in society. Rather we should rejoice in diversity and encourage the people who are “greater” to focus more completely on the service of others. Neither should we allow the desire for equality to stop us from saying that certain behaviours are “good” and desirable, and others “bad” and undesirable. Rather we should redouble our efforts to promote that which is good, whilst retaining and attitude of great mercy towards those whose behaviour is “bad”.]
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
