The news at this time is dominated by one thing and that is the ongoing situation in Palestine. Palestinian Lutheran, Rev Munther Isaac has spoken a number of times since December 2023 about how Gaza in particular has become the “moral compass for the world” and how too many in the western church in particular have failed to stand up to the oppressor in the context of Palestine, and allowed the state of Israel and succesive Israeli governments to ride roughshod over both international law and the people of Palestine. Just this week we have seen further horrors emerge from Gaza including the so called “Flour Massacre” where over one hundred hungry Palestinians were shot at and killed by Israeli forces, we have witnessed international journalists writing to the Israeli government in order to be allowed to enter Gaza to report directly from it, and we seen South Africa and other nations leading a charge of genocide against Israel in the International Court of Justice.
Today (1st March) is the World Day of Prayer, and not surprising the Christian worlsChurch is being invited to prayer for Palestine, the programme was written by a group of ecumenical Christian Palestinian women in response to the passage from Ephesians 4:1-7, and so today I join in prayer with them:
Liberator God, you call us to love and the the pursuit of peace. Help us to open our hearts and minds to these possibilities even in the toughest of times. Help us not to turn our faces away from the suffering and the pain, but to reach out in compassion. Help us to not fear speaking the truth to those who oppress even when it might come at cost to ourselves, and help us to take the side of the oppressed.Amen
The Life on the Breadline exhibition in Sheffield moves into its second week, and it continues in its attempt to focus thoughts around poverty and church responses to it. On Friday night I was lucky enough to chair an Ask the Panel session with a group of policy makers and leaders to explore some of the issues, the panel comprised: Rev David Bussue (SACMHA & Church of God of Prophecy), Cllr Fran Belbin (Deputy Leader of the Council), Shelley MacDonald (National Energy Action) and Colin Havard (Community Development Co-ordinator-SCC).
The fact that poverty exists in UK in 2024 in undeniable (see footnote link to JRF report 2023), the fact that much of this poverty is linked to the continuing support of “austerity” policy by the Conservative Government is also backed up by the Life on the Breadline research itself. The debate therefore stems around responses to these facts from both policy makers and parts of civic society such as church, faith groups and others where a collective response can be developed.
One central point of discussion was the idea that poverty could somehow be resolved by “increasing the size of the pie” – the political argument that only by economic growth can those at the “bottom” see their living standards raised – contrary to this view is the idea that regardless of “the size of the pie” it is the slices that need to be redistributed more fairly. Our economy and therefore, our society is out of balance with the wealth of a small billionaire elite seeing massive growth whilst the poorest face greater and greater hardship, from the cost of housing, food, fuel and the like outstripping massively any increases in incomes.
As to the Church response to these issues, we were called to be a prophetic voice of challenge, of protest and of hope. If the gospel is not “good news to the poor” it is not the Gospel. Therefore the Church needs to overcome it’s historic reluctance to enter into “political” debate and find it’s voice; importantly however that voice needs to be grounded in listening to the living experiences of those in poverty, those who are struggling, those who too often are rejected and marginalised.
Voices like these, collected in conversations last week by Gavin from Church Action on Poverty (one of the groups featured in the research) who came over to Parson Cross to talk with some of the people attending Community Food Hub:
“It’s been getting harder with prices. Budgeting is harder and harder. Everything is up, and I am diabetic and have to have certain things. It’s hard.”
“The low benefit levels are a big issue for people around here. Reaching a realistic level of income is important for people. We need to see an uplift in benefit levels, and support the real Living Wage.”
“When I do a bit of shopping, everything has gone up, hasn’t it? Just… everything. I got my cost of living payment today, and I am trying to save it for as long as I can.
“I wouldn’t say I live on the breadline but I’m on benefits, and I have to make it stretch as far as I can. It’s harder and harder.”
“Everything is about just, managing, with everything going up, and the cost of living. I am on my own now, and because I’m on a meter I have noticed my bills have jumped again since January. It’s gone up a lot. That has taken away food money, just for trying to keep warm. And that’s not having it warm all the time – I am sitting just in my kitchen, the one warm room.”
“I spoke to my gas company about keeping warm, because I’m asthmatic, and if it’s cold I start coughing. They said there were food banks I should go to for support!”
These are the voices that must be heard, by the Church, by policymakers and politicians, and by the whole of society- only when we honestly engage in conversations about real lives and real people rather than economic ideology and numbers on spreadsheets can we hope to shape policy and practice that makes a real difference to peoples lives.
The final question to panellists at the Life on the Breadline event was whether they thought we would see an end to poverty in UK in their lifetime – whilst there were degrees of hopefulness across the panel the mood was perhaps summed up best in these words “we’ve got to believe we can”
Only if we believe something is possible do we ever stand a chance of making it happen, without that belief there is no hope and we fall into a cycle of depair and powerlessness, Church and other faith based organisations must become part of building this belief, of establishing the hope that we can end poverty within a generation in the UK and build something better and fairer for everyone. In an election year, that really should help to focus our hearts, our minds and our prayers.
It’s been a while since I last wrote anything for this blog but as we are moving into the Lent season once again now seems a good time to press “reset” and pick up the blogging habit once again.
This Lent, Sheffield Methodist District are hosting (in Sheffield & Barnsley) an exhibition entitled Life on the Breadline. The exhibition is based around the findings of a report of the same name by Dr Chris Shannahan, Dr Stephanie Denning and others looking at the effects of austerity on people in poverty in UK, and importantly how Church and other faith organisations might choose to respond.
The exhibition itself comprises ten large panel with words, photographs and art work detailing and explaining both the research itself, and a number of case studies that informed it.
“[The] case studies demonstrate that poverty comes in all shapes and sizes – food poverty, low pay, insecure zero-hours work, poor housing, homelessness, holiday hunger, fuel poverty and rising levels of debt. Like a perfect storm, these different aspects of poverty, when combined with a failing Universal Credit system and a culture that blames people living in poverty for being poor, come crashing down on our heads like some inescapable wave.” Dr Chris Shannahan
As well as the exhibition itself, there is space created to help us think, reflect and enter into a conversation about the conclusions and the questions it asks of us as individuals, and as Church and other faith groups, especially in this an election year. Additionally the organisers will be hosting an Ask the Panel and Inter Faith forum events. Hopefully as part of my Lent discipline this year I’ll be adding some more reflections and reports about the exhibition and the conversations as they develop.
My Dad served in the Royal Artillery throughout the Second World War, he spent most of that time in Burma (Myanmar) when I was young he spoke very little about those times, but as he grew older he did speak more about some of the horror he’d witnessed, though I know he left many more still unspoken. The one thing he did talk to me about when I was growing up was “remembrance”. Remembrance Day was something that caused him very mixed emotions; he could not bear the “poppy brigade”, I don’t mean as individuals, he was not so petty, but as a group and as a mindset. War, he said, should be remembered for it’s human cost and tragedy, for the waste, and the horror. The very point of remembrance for him was to remind everyone of us for every generation that all war is failure of humanity not a thing to glory in. Now he wasn’t a pacifist, he was clear that evil (like that of the Nazis – even though ironically he spent most of his time fighting the Japanese) needed to be opposed, but he was clear that the war he fought was because the world had not acted in time to stop the Nazis gaining power.
So that’s my family history lesson completed, but they are lessons that have stayed with me throughout my now sixty odd years, every year Remembrance Day raises those same emotional dilemmas for me, this year however those issues have taken on new significance and taken even deeper root. As I write this article the war in Palestine that began on 7th October in the aftermath of horrendous attacks from Hamas and the imprisonment of over 200 Israeli men, women and children by them. In response the Israeli Government has unleashed a devastating war of seige and bombardement that has so far led to the death of approximately 9,000 people over 3,000 of which are children. The United Nations (UN) calls for ceasefires or pauses to allow additional humanitarian relief in have been rejected, and UN staff, hospitals and schools are amongst the casualties of war. The world has seen millions, in countries across the globe, march in the name of a ceasefire and in support of Palestine with calls for international efforts to redouble to create a just and lasting peace settlement in the region. But still the war continues. Meanwhile here in UK, the Home Secretary has labelled the anti war marches as “hate marches”, and today was joined by the Prime Minister and others saying they would not allow anti war marches to be held on Remembrance Day.
Jesus said: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God” Matthew 5.9
So this is my prayer:
The violence and terror meted out by Hamas members last Saturday was terrible and far beyond any legitimate resistance to the oppression and occupation experienced by Palestinians.
The violence and terror meted out as we speak by the Israeli Government is also beyond any legitimate reaction.
Innocent civilians are, as usual, seeing their lives destroyed by those who use to levels of violence to supposedly further their cause.
I pray for an immediate ceasefire on all sides ….
I long for a peace that brings an end to generations of violence in Palestine / Israel, a recognition that the Israeli state is imposing a force of occupation onto a population who have lived in those lands for generations and an acceptance on all sides of the right for Muslims, Jews, Christians and others in that region to live together in peace once more.
“Peace is not the product of terror or fear, peace is not the silence of cemetaries ….” Archbishop Oscar Romero
“Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. …” James 5. 1-20 ESV
This week the news in the UK is that the current Conservative Government is planning to bring in laws to further limit public protest and workers rights in instances of strikes, it wants to give police powers to prevent action from taking place even before it has happened in order they say to minimise “disruption” and allow people to continue with their day to day lives, and forcing minimum work levels on workers unions in the case of industrial action, atop of the barrage of existing restrictions.
The Governments recent obsession with curtailing protest has been focussed on these two main areas; Organised Labour / Trade Unions and Street Protests (particularly it seems the tactics of groups protesting against the Climate Crisis such as Extinction Rebellion and Just Stop Oil). The background to a rising level of protest is clear and stark; the sudden “Cost of Living Crisis” and the increasingly obvious fact that we are heading towards an ever greater climate crisis for the planet and the likely geo-political fallout from this crisis. It seems increasingly likely that the next 10-20 years will be increasingly unstable, unpredictable and generate much hardship for millions of the worlds peoples, both here in the UK and across the globe. This Government and others elsewhere it seems are preparing for a time of growing discontent and unrest.
In this context, how are we as Christians (as followers of Jesus) meant to respond? Are we to join with the Government in with the clamour for laws that allow “business as usual” to continue for those who simply want to get on with their day to day lives? Are we to sit or kneel quitely and passively and pray that God will resolve all this if we patiently stay away from the fray and don’t take sides? Or are we to stand up and speak out for the right to protest and take action that deliberately are designed to disrupt?
Clearly most Christians would agree that any protests should be “peaceful” that is “non violent” – but do we as Christians believe protest should cause “inconvenience” or “disruption”? Did Archbishop Tutu and others for one moment demur from protests that disrupted or inconvenienced the evil apartheid regime of South Africa, of course not such disruption was essential to its overturn. Or indeed Rev Martin Luther King and the protests against white supremacy and segregation in the USA, whos protests directly challenged the existing rule of law of the time as a means of demanding change. Even the example of Jesus overturning the table of the money changers in the temple more than hints at disruption and inconvenience as an in your face challenge to power and injustice.
For me, I cannot quitely or passively stand by whilst the powerful attempt to amass more power in the name of stopping “a disruptive minority”. Be clear lines are being drawn, the climate crisis is being driven by the economics od greed and a system that benefits the richest and most powerful, most of us are merely parts in the global machine that worship money, markets and consumerism. Peaceful protest and our ability to speak truth to power is all, we who aspire to serve God, have available to us if we are not happy to simply remain passive players in service and in thrall to mammon, and as Jesus pointed out (Matthew 6.24) we cannot serve both.
This week two young women have appeared in court charged with criminal damage to the frame of Vincent van Gogh’s painting Sunflowers. Two tins of tomato soup were thrown over the painting at London’s National Gallery on Friday, although the gallery later said the painting itself was undamaged and had been put back on display. Their action was part of the fourteenth day of “continuous disruption” by the environmental protest group Just Stop Oil.
Now I’m not wanting an argument about the rights and wrongs of throwing soup on the glass that covers a famous painting, but I do want to say this.
The world is facing a climate crisis that threatens the very existence of habitats and lives (including humans) and society as we have known it. “Earth’s wildlife populations have plunged by an average of 69% in just under 50 years, according to a leading scientific assessment, as humans continue to clear forests, consume beyond the limits of the planet and pollute on an industrial scale.”*
My generation (I am 62 next year) have consumed, squandered and destroyed an unimaginable amount of resources putting at real risk the future of our children and grandchildren, and untold number of species. “Despite the science, the catastrophic projections, the impassioned speeches and promises, the burning forests, submerged countries, record temperatures and displaced millions, world leaders continue to sit back and watch our world burn in front of our eyes,”**
What are young people meant to do?
They cannot vote for change, because no mainstream party close to power is willing to make the drastic changes necessary, and when they explode with anger they are criminalised, locked up, told to behave or shut up.
Vincent Van Gogh once said: “Keep your love of nature…..”*** he added “There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.” maybe if we began to truly appreciate these things the world might become a better and more beautiful place. And one final word from Van Gogh: “It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to, the feeling for things themselves, for reality is more important than the feeling for pictures.”****
This week has seen a nation struck by grief; on the 8th September we heard the news of the death of Queen Elizabeth II at the age of 96, in the same week Chris Kaba a 24 year old, unarmed, black man from London was shot dead by the Metropolitan Police (an action that has now turned into a homicide investigation).
The death of a loved one is never easy, no matter what age, what reason or what circumstances preceeds it, grief is painful. For days following her death we have seen minute by minute coverage of every detail of the past monarchs life, and the historic “nation shaping” nature of the change it will bring. Without doubt the death of a Queen is significant, and the proclamation of a new monarch (King Charles III) is important too; but so too is the story of a young man shot and killed by police on the streets of this nation, it is right that neither are forgotten.
Both these families will mourn and grieve this week, both will face challenges as they move forward through the coming months and years, both will carry memories of the ones they have lost. Through these times they will be aided by the love that surrounds them, the love of family and friends, of community and justice, and the love of God.
These two families are but two of countless others in our nation, and across the world will be facing such loss at this time, for all those who grieve and mourn I pray:
God of love and mercy, embrace all those whose hearts today overflow with grief, unanswered questions and such a sense of loss. Grant them space to express their tears. Hold them close this day and all days.
As this week draws to a close I’m reflecting on the liberating power of mutuality, “the sharing of a feeling, action, or relationship between two or more parties”. These things have been drawn into focus by a conversation about Pytor (Peter) Kropotkin* and a gift of some Kendal Mint Cake from one of the regular visitors to our social cafe.
In 1902 Kropotkin wrote a series of essays titled; Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution in it he wrote: “under any circumstances sociability is the greatest advantage in the struggle for life.” So much of what has been built in my work and ministry of the past twelve years has been grounded in the essence of mutuality, the idea that ones own liberation or well being is unreservedly bound up in the liberation and well being of others.
It involves choices on our behalf; not to be self serving but to look to the needs of others as well as your own, it’s about giving and recieving. It means stepping away from wanting to act as “saviour” to others but instead acompanying others on a journey through which you all make new discoveries and find points of growth and grace. It’s about allowing yourself to share and admit vulnerabilities and mistakes, so that we might be healed and learn – but also so that others may accept those things in themselves.
This central idea of mutuality is also at the heart of the Zulu concept of Ubuntu – where the well being of each person is fundementally linked to the well being of others, and indeed the environment we all share. To exploit any part of this mutual relationship would be to damage all parties, it is so far from so much of the dominant ideologies of current thinking where individualism and the self centred libetarianism of the likes of Ayn Rand.
As we move into Holy Week the idea of mutuality also perhaps offers us an insight in Jesus crucifixion, death and resurrection. The journey to the cross is both individual and collective, each person bound up completely in the story; we see the public display of communal triumph in the Palm Sunday arrival in Jerusalem, we witness Jesus calling the disciples to eat and drink together in remembrance of him (not simply to remember their own individual memories – of course they will do this as well) but to share together the mutuality of Gods love; freely given and freely recieved.
Even at the moment of death, when Jesus seems truly alone and foresaken – at that moment it seems like a defeat for the individual that is Jesus. Yet even on the cross we are pointed to mutuality, Jesus is crucified alongside two others – and in the very moment of death Jesus reaches out to offer that grace filled moment of shared well being when he says: “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
Of course the story doesn’t end on the cross; but even the story and experience of resurrection can be seen not simply as Jesus personal victory over the grave, but as victory to the mutual witness and understanding of his resurrection, and possibilities of liberation that such shared understanding could provide.
*Pytor Kropotokin – a Russian anarchist philosopher from the early part of the twentieth century.
This weekend (20th March) marks the Spring Equinox it’s thepoint of perfect balance on the journey through the Wheel of the Year. Night and day are of equal length and in perfect equilibrium – dark and light, in balance. The year is now waxing and at this moment light defeats the dark. The natural world is coming alive, the Sun is gaining in strength and the days are becoming longer and warmer. Or as Ann Ridler writes in her poem called Spring Equinox:
“Now is the pause between asleep and awake….”
The past year has been somewhat different to what we’ve known before – a year dominated globally by the Covid19 pandemic, whilst in the background lurks perhaps an even larger threat to humanity a global crisis of climate change. It’s been a year of constantly shifting seasons – not just in terms of the weather but also in our moods; although sometimes the two have seemed linked. How much easier did it feel in the initial days of lockdown when the sunshine was out and we could spend our days sat in the garden or somewere else outside, so much more positive (despite the sadness and fear the surrounded us) then those latter days of winter restrictions, locked away in our homes railed against the darkness and cold of winter.
We’ve felt the harsh despair of a new virus with no known cure, threatening all our very lives – the loss of so many of our loved ones in nursing homes and beyond – the isolation and separatedness we’ve felt from each other as the need to stay safe kept us from physical contact on so many ocassions. But we also know joy and hope and inspiration; from the demonstrations of admiration for our Health and Care workers – the great many of inspirational stories of people being community and offering support to each other – right through to the great hopes set for the roll out of a vacination programme that will hopefully provide some kind of global solution to this pandemic. Despair and hope it seems have been both felt in almost equal degrees.
As we celebrate Spring Equinox this year it is perhaps worth giving thought to this time of balance in nature to try and make sense of a world that at times has felt completely out of balance. In the UK alongside Covid19 we’ve still not healed the very wide and open wounds caused during (and to an extent by) Brexit, wounds that have at times felt like they are opening even wider as we face the reality of so many peoples experience as highlighted by Black Lives Matter, and latterly by the reactions of many women to the murder of Sarah Everard and the response to their protests in its wake.
“No person, no place, and no thing …..” wrote Louise L Hay “….has any power over us, for we are the only thinkers in our mind. When we create peace and harmony and balance in our mindswe will find it in our lives.”
At this time I’m reminded of the well know prayer of St Francis and the call that it makes to God that we should become the force and means of balance in the world at large:
“Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace; Where there is hatred, let me sow love; Where there is injury, pardon; Where there is doubt, faith; Where there is despair, hope; Where there is darkness, light; And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine [Creator], Grant that I may not so much seek To be consoled as to console; To be understood, as to understand; To be loved, as to love; For it is in giving that we receive, It is in pardoning that we are pardoned, And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.” Amen.
I love running ….. I didn’t always used to, in fact I still remember frosty school days in Leeds in the 1970’s with teachers yelling at the “fat boy” as I plodded (usually in last place – or somewhere near to last) over the muddy park; “Hurry up lad …. get a move on”, running certainly was NOT my thing back then. It wasn’t really until about ten years ago that I started to run and learn to enjoy it. At first I was just jogging around Parson Cross* where I lived at the time, then I moved onto Park Runs in Hillsborough* my regular 5k seemed both a real achievement for a man in his fifties and just about my limit. It wasn’t until 2019 and an ill fated April Fool when I “joked” I’d run 10k for the first time – news that illicited such joy and praise from so many people I love that it left me feeling I needed to actually reach out for this new goal (I also felt so bad that I had to end the joke early and come clean). So it was that in December 2019 I ran my first “official” 10k for charity. Since then I’ve been regularly running 8 -10k in a morning around where I live again, and (most days) love the feeling of doing it.
As well as running, I’ve never been a great one for new year resolutions, I kind of can’t ever see the point. The rare ocassions I’ve set them for myself they seem to have melted away long before the end of January, even if they survive the first week. This year however, perhaps because of Covid19 and another national UK lockdown, and partly because I just wanted to I decided I would set myself a New Year challenge, not a resolution but something to aim for. As it’s also my sixtieth birthday this year, I been thinking of marking it with some special event – a celebration if you like, and as I’ve never been a great party animal I decided I would set myself a running challenge and try raise some cash for charity. So it is that on 6th January (Epiphany) I announced my intention to run #60kat60 – the idea is to run 10k each day over the six days between my birthday at the end of April and my wife Angelas a week later – all in support of Stop Hate UK**.
As I say I’ve learned to love my running, but that doesn’t mean that I find it easy or that I’m even good at it, I’m certainly not the fastest but I’ve learned that the time isn’t eveything. It’s not that I’m totally disinterested in the time (I still hope that I’ll finish eack 10k in just under or just over an hour) but the time isn’t the thing – the run itself is. It’s one thing that I wish my teachers yelling at the fat boy in the mud has taught me – there’s a pleasure in doing it, a pleasure in pushing yourself, a pleasure in completion.
I’m no sports psychologist, but I’ve learned that running any distance is at least partly about mindset. There are somedays I struggle even to get out of bed (in fact theres some days I just don’t) and there are other days when I can’t wait to get out and run. Sometimes whilst running I’ll hear myself saying “you’ll never do this today – cut it short” and there are other times I feel like I could run all day. But more than anything, running allows me to, and has helped teach me to live in and live through each moment. Running in Sheffield in particular means you have to learn to deal with hills; I’ll be honest again some days I actually enjoy the uphill bit – but most days they are just damned hard work, a time of gritting your teeth, pushing on and just getting it done – but there’s also the downhill parts when you can lengthen your stride, breath in deep and enjoy each step. It can become a bit of a metaphor for life I guess, we all will face those uphill times of hard slog, where every day seems to be a struggle – but hopefully there’ll also be those times when we find respite – and it’s so important to find joy in those times (no matter how fleeting) as they so often give us the strength to cope with the next hill or next obstacle.
For me running has become a time of prayer, but also it has become a kind of prayer. A sacred time when I actually feel closer to creation and creator, and have more of a sense of my place as a piece within that vast and unfathomable story. I usually run just before first light, it’s my favourite time to run, at that time it feels like my run in someway becomes part of the awakening of the day – the unfolding of what might be; as I run I’ll often unpack things in my head, it offers a space for me to listen to the world around me and to God, many times I’ll also end up singing in my head, or repeat words as a mantra or prayer something like this:
Run with me Jesus,sense the cold morning air on my cheeks.
Run with me Jesus,enjoy every breath I draw in deep.
Run with me Jesus,listen to the blackbird, robin and owl as they sing their dawntime song.
Run with me Jesus,feel the satisfying strain of my legs as they take step after step.
Run with me Jesus.all the way until the distance is complete.
What would I do if I couldn’t run any longer ? I don’t know, there’ll be a time no doubt, and I guess I’ll just have to embrace that too, but while I can I am grateful and while I can I’ll run.
pioneer thoughts 