from the edge

Monday 28 October 2013

Between Times


We waited and it never happened. After all that careful storage of dustbins in the greenhouse, along with other potential missiles lying about in the garden, the hurricane passed us by. Spring and Autumn have always been unpredictable times. Allowing for the anomalies of climate change, they are still thought of as transition periods between the more predictable seasons of summer and winter. They are ‘between times’.


There are two ‘between times’ in the Christian year. One of them falls towards the end of the calendar year and the other at the end of January or in early February. We are coming into one of these ‘between times’ now. It is known as the Kingdom Season. It precedes Advent, as it corresponds, in a calendar sense, to the season of Epiphany which precedes Lent.  The Kingdom Season is a time of preparation for a further time of making ready – making ready for the coming of God’s Son into the world and of his embracing of the human condition.


What is the Kingdom? Jesus speaks of it often, and yet it is easy for it to be relegated to the realm of hopes and dreams, a kind of Nirvana. But the kingdom for which we pray when we say ‘thy Kingdom come’ is about the grittiness of life in the present and about the uncertain future which we all face.  Both are as real as the humanity which God embraced in Jesus. The Kingdom is about making real the presence of Jesus Christ in the here and now. It is about creating real hope in a seemingly hopeless world. It is about the things which can be changed when we human beings put our knowledge and gifts to the service of God, rather than using them to prolong or sustain the fantasies which keep us going – which make achievers and ‘do’ers’ of us, rather than people who appear to be doing nothing, who seem to have failed and are written off as a burden on society. The reverse side of success is not failure. It is shame.


The Kingdom Season is therefore a time for taking a second look at our immediate surroundings, because this is where the Kingdom of which Christ speaks is being shaped. It is shaped by the people we fail to embrace, or even notice, most of the time. They are the elderly person who passes by every afternoon on some routine errand which is the high point of their day. They are the Big Issue seller. Whatever views a person holds about how the Big Issue operates, or about those who work a particular patch, selling it day after day in the streets is not the way most of us would choose to live our lives. If we are fortunate enough to work from home in a beautiful part of the world, sometime between 5 and 7pm on a weekday evening, we might think of the millions travelling uncomfortably on trains and motorways as they return from another day spent doing a dull or unrewarding job. All these people are the Kingdom waiting to happen. They are the Christ we must embrace.

Monday 21 October 2013

In Good Company


The pressure to be at the cutting edge of what is inappropriately termed social networking can leave little time or emotional energy for real engagement with others. It is hard to survive, let alone thrive, in a culture of relentless communication, or at least in what passes for communication, because the kind of communication being offered is not sociality in the fullest sense. Millions experience loneliness on a daily basis, even if they possess a smart phone, and loneliness amounts to failure, especially if you are young.

Real sociality begins in the textured relationships of family and in deep friendship. It is in these contexts that trust is learned. Trust involves knowing another person and allowing ourselves to be known by them. We can only do this by engaging with them in real time and as real people. In the contexts of family and of deep friendship we learn the truth about ourselves and, as a result, learn to understand and have compassion for others. The most valuable friendships are often trans-generational. Older people have much to teach and much to give, and the same is true in reverse. Older people want to learn and receive from younger generations because in so doing they remain connected to society. Older people are often excellent listeners and on the whole pretty un-shockable. They know that human nature does not change all that much over time and that we all make the same mistakes, usually for the same reasons. This giving and taking of wisdom across the generations is real sociality.

Through understanding and compassion, learned by spending real time with another person, in real life, rather than ‘following’ ‘friending’ (or unfriending’) them in a virtual world, we also learn what sacrificial love entails and why it is necessary. Sacrificial love is not about making oneself into someone else’s passive listening post. It is about actively ministering to the loneliness in that person by hearing them in their humanity. In other words, by knowing how to befriend them in the fullest sense. In the social world of networking, we are consumers of a fabrication of friendship but seldom the beneficiaries of the real thing. Fabricated friendship does not minister into loneliness. It helps to briefly assuage it at a certain level but loneliness returns when the iphone or computer is turned off.

There is nothing new about loneliness. In one sense it is part of the human condition, which is not to say that we should try to ignore it in ourselves, or be indifferent to it in others. It is just that most of us don’t know how to deal with loneliness – our own or anyone else’s. Our unconscious response to the loneliness we sense in ourselves is to go online as quickly as possible, so as to reassure ourselves that we belong through the familiar but delusory panacea of emails and social networking sites. When it comes to the loneliness of others, if we notice it at all, we often have nothing to say – other than a quick facebook comment. Deeper connectedness can be hard to establish or maintain if we are not used to doing it in real time. Relating to the lonely person is like not knowing what to say to someone who has been recently bereaved. Lonely people are in a state of permanent bereavement. Like the suffering servant in the book of Isaiah, they are ‘cut off, from the land of the living’ (Is.53:8). What can we do to connect with them?

I do not think we can do much to lift the burden of loneliness from another person until we have learned the value of solitude and silence. Solitude is not loneliness. It is the way in to a deep connectedness first, with God, and subsequently with others. In actively embracing solitude, and in valuing silence, we learn what it means to be in good company, the company of God himself. Silence is not about the absence of noise, any more than solitude is about the absence of people. They both are a way of making space for God at all times and in all places. We carry this rich silence around with us, along with the steadiness of mood and purpose brought by solitude. Silence and solitude are within us. They teach us to communicate, so that we can hear and be with the lonely, even if we have never met them. They transform the way we engage with social networking because they allow the loving kindness of God into its loneliness.

Tuesday 15 October 2013

Courage and Filial Love


Where does courage come from? What would it look like in you? Christiane Amanpour’s interview with Malala Yousafzai and Malala’s father (CNN Sunday, October 13th) showed us courage – what it can look like and how it is nurtured. Not everyone will experience being shot on the school bus, so it is tempting to think that Malala’s steadfastness, grace, humility and passionate compassion is somehow unique to her. In a sense, it is, of course, because of the circumstances and because of her own giftedness as a human being. But we are all gifted human beings. We can all be brave if we know where and how to look for courage in ourselves.

It took at least two other people to nurture Malala’s gift, her parents and probably other members of her extended family. We only caught a glimpse of her mother on the programme but Malala’s relationship with her appears to be quintessentially normal – a healthy loving relationship which any young adolescent girl might have with her mother. But Malala’s father seems to have had the greater influence over her life so far, although the word ‘influence’ barely does justice to the courage he must have had to draw on, in order to raise his children with such integrity and unswerving loyalty to truth.

Truth is what drives courage because truth proceeds directly from the love which is of God. Christians see this love in the person of Jesus and in the relationship of trust which he had with the Father. When a person is loved unconditionally by their parents they will be experiencing something of God’s love. It will have taught them to tell the difference between what is true and what is a lie, especially when the lie is dressed up as true religion. They will learn to feel passionately about truth and about the freedom needed for truth to prevail over lies. These are the lies which deny and obscure God’s love for his people, and all people are God’s people, whatever religious path they follow. So a lie is recognised for what it is because it jars with the kind of truth which proceeds from the unconditional love of God. 

Malala will have learned through the courage and integrity of her parents, especially of her father, how to tell the difference between what is a lie and what is true. Her upbringing will have taught her that perverted religion goes against love. Where religion systematically crushes the life out of people, it cannot be true and should be resisted with everything one has to give. This is courage. Even the smallest degree of courage involves holding to the kind of truth which is life giving and therefore of love. It comes at a price. It is not just a matter of doing the right thing, because courage is more than a virtue to be honed and developed through hard ‘character building’ work. It is about laying claim to our full humanity in whatever testing circumstances we may be in. Malala’s testing circumstances were not what most of us have to face on a daily basis, unlike those who are caught up in the cross fire of war or of lawless anarchy. 

Our own testing moments are often so small that we fail to notice them and only later regret not having spoken the necessary word, or taken a decision which might have cost us personally, in order to prevent an injustice at work or in family life. When we are required to show courage it is our humanity which is being tested and our humanity is known in the fullness of our love and in the integrity of our faith.  In the integrity of her own faith, Malala resisted threats, intimidation and lies so that others might know what courage looks like, and where to find it in themselves when they need it.


Wednesday 9 October 2013

Sofascape


Downton Abbey and Homeland are back. I have been trying to hold on to the plot lines of both for some months now. As a result, I only have a tenuous grip on what is going on, which at times is problematic, especially with Homeland. Fortunately, I also have an ever patient husband who not only fills me in on the plot but, incredibly, is able to record two or more programs at once. He can even fast forward the ads when we’re watching the ‘live’ showing. This is something I’ve never been able to get my head round, with the result that when he’s away programs which ought to last an hour take twice as long and I end up going to bed before they’ve finished. I’m determined to get on top of this before he goes away again. 
On Sunday, we were faced with two defining questions (they would define the evening and how we would be feeling by the end of it and possibly for some of the following day), which of the two to watch first – Downton or Homeland? We went for Homeland, as I didn’t want to risk the appalling prospect of something going wrong with the recording gizmo. A bird in the bush is worth – well, something. The following evening we watched Downton which, in any case, had been preserved for us by a universal device ‘out there’ somewhere which enables you to watch programs you might have missed. This is something I haven’t got my head round yet and I must admit, it worries me. In fact, it’s a concern which ranks third in my ‘life’s urgent to do tasks’, after making sure our wills are up to date and planning our funerals. The idea of being condemned to living alone on a diet of Come Dining, My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding (and others of a similar genre), and a range of same-ish talk shows is too awful to contemplate.
But then there’s always the news, that part of the evening when we connect with a world which somehow carries on against all odds. I have no problem getting on to my favourite news channels – CNN’s Amanpour followed by the second half of Channel 4 – back to CNN if Channel 4 is not up to par, but back again to Channel 4 in time for the weather and that interesting little reflection on faith and ethics which follows.
After that, it’s a case of processing the news through  cooking.  One of the reasons why programs like Downton Abbey and Homeland are significant is that they allow us to process reality through non reality.  Downton hails back to a golden past, although it was golden only for the very few. Their lives were serviced by, and entirely dependent on a majority who, in different ways, were the ‘below stairs’ population of an entire nation. Downton is also a microcosm in which to experience the concerns of patriarchal privilege. With the sudden departure of her personal maid, who will dress the Duchess of Grantham?
 Downton’s world is also heavily sanitised. This, we all know, and are prepared to go along with because of the costumes and location, perhaps, and the great one-liners given to Maggie Smith. But also because it occupies the imagination in such a way as to allow space for the much harsher world which existed for some, and which continues to exist now in other parts of the world. At the same time, it reminds us of how much less stressful life could be if we could expect courtesy to shape the way we relate to others, instead of having to legislate for it. 
Downton provides us with an imaginative space in which to process reality. Homeland  does the same thing, but in a different way. It shows us a contemporary America that is fast becoming something of the past. In a curious way Homeland is beginning to feel more ‘dated’ than Downton because in the reality which we currently inhabit, it is becoming plain that America can no longer afford to maintain its Lone Ranger persona in the world. Homeland gives us the chance to take this reality on board, paradoxically, by taking us into the world of espionage and counter-terrorism in a way which seems all too real. So Homeland gives us some mental space in which to come to terms with how power might function in the future in the light of what are still recent memories. It also offers us a slightly different way to pray. Prayer can now be shaped and given substance with the help of a television drama which reflects something of our collective fears and paranoia and of our fascination with violence. This in turn helps us to begin to pray into the realities we are currently faced with. We might begin by praying for America and its future. 

Thursday 3 October 2013

The Beginning of the Academic Year - The Right Way to Learn


It is the beginning of the academic year. The new student is both bewildered and excited. He or she must decide what courses or papers to do, and discover whether the room-mate is quite what they’d hoped for, where are the best places to hang out with friends and, finally, locate the Chaplaincy which many who never thought of themselves as religious may later find to be a home from home, a real stronghold.

Having been a mature student myself, I have found that the defining moment in a person’s first week at university comes with their first lecture, or supervision or tutorial. At the end of it they know for sure whether or not they are in the right place doing the right thing. If the course is right, and the place is right, a certain bond of understanding will have established itself between those who are taught and those who teach. This is because the purpose of good education is to ‘lead out’ (from the Latin ‘educare’), to free a person into real creativity. The person teaching is therefore entrusted with a great responsibility. Their task is to connect with the student in the realm of understanding, which is not always the same as knowing a great many facts. Teachers are asked to convey something more than information to those they are serving. Their task is one of ministry. They minister to the unique person in ‘leading’ or ‘drawing out’ the best of that person. 

Good teachers change lives, because they sense, or ‘intuit’, how to connect with those they are teaching at the head-heart level where a person’s real longings and dreams for a better life and a better world are lodged. It is here that the imagination is first awakened in childhood and it is in knowing how to rekindle that imagination that a teacher connects with a pupil or student and enables that person to learn. Real thinking begins with imagination. So learning is not just a matter of acquiring information, but of discovering what it is that we are really seeking in the context of classroom or lecture hall. In doing so, we know immediately whether the course we have chosen is right for us. If it is not right, my advice to a new student would be to seek out a wise and trustworthy teacher and ask for their help in changing courses. Time dedicated to study and training are usually a once in a life time opportunity, a gift, even though we pay for it, which is not to be wasted on the wrong subject. 

In an age where education is fast becoming a commodity and students are no longer learners, but consumers or clients, the ability to learn, and later work imaginatively is vital. A course which is geared to a particular profession needs people whose imagination has been developed so that they can apply what they have learned for the betterment of other human beings, of society and to the survival of the planet. They need to have learned disciplined imagination. This is the point of all those essays and lab experiments.

Disciplined imagination enables us to engage with the wider purpose of a loving Creator. So academic work, or any kind of professional training, is the most important gift we can give to anyone, because it will equip them to participate in the re-making, the re-creation, of God’s world. We are training them to be agents of his mercy, his redemptive love. A lawyer working on a case, a doctor treating a patient, politicians and those engaged in commerce and finance will all be part of this process. Each is given the means, through their education and training, to work for justice, or healing, or fair and honest standards of trading and financial transactions.

Two things emerge from this. The first is that no one can learn and later apply wisdom to their work if they are primarily concerned with their own advancement or personal benefit – the ‘what’s in it for me?’ attitude which has crept into all areas of public and commercial life, especially since the 1980’s. The same is true, paradoxically, of talent or gift that is sacrificed or compromised out of pragmatism or a misplaced sense of duty.

The second is every bit as important as the first. It involves accountability, being willing to take responsibility for one’s work and for its effect on others. Ultimately, we shall be accountable before God for the way we have used the gifts he has given us, including our own professional skills and intelligence. Part of that accountability involves how we think of those who we have been trained to serve. Are they simply clients, or consumers from whom we benefit personally? (whatever we may tell them or, for that matter, tell ourselves.) Or are they our own kin, part of the human family, whose wellbeing matters to us? Their wellbeing will include getting value and quality for the services they pay for and truthful integrity from those they elect to govern them. Learning to be responsible to God, to other members of the human family and to the planet itself is the purpose of any study and of any work. Nothing must get in the way of it.