Told you so!

Sermon for the Sunday after Ascension 

It always seems

a bit odd to hear Our Lord's words

after we have witnessed

His Ascension into Heaven.

Indeed, 

what is most jarring

is that we have been hearing

his words

on the night before He dies.

And today,

the Sunday after Our Lord ascends,

we hear Him tell His disciples

that they will be killed 

for their witness to His truth.

And, having said that, 

He says,

"But these things have I told you,

that, when the time shall come,

ye may remember that 

I told you of them."

Does that mean

that during the oncoming tribulation 

that our beloved apostles endure,

the memory of this night

pops into their heads

with Jesus saying,

"told you so!"?

[PAUSE]

People who say,

"I told you so!"

are usually berating us

for not following their advice. 

"Told you so" comes with

an air of smugness

and satisfaction 

that misfortune has come upon us

because we haven't followed

someone's advice.

But we don't see that in Our Lord.

So why does He effectively say

"Told you so"

to those whom He loves

as they suffer for His sake?

Clearly He doesn't mean it like that.

Clearly, he wants them to remember 

that He has not forgotten them.

In a few hours, 

Our Lord will be dead

hanging on the cross

and it will be easy for 

the disciples to forget 

the promise of Resurrection

amid the sorrow and anguish.

[PAUSE]

But remembering 

is an activity that

we don't fully appreciate 

these days.

Remembering is not just

being able to recite your phone number

or a thousand digits of pi.

Remembering is

 literally a re-membering

- a putting back together

of an event.

For the disciples,

remembering Our Lord's words

is absolutely vital.

It is their calling,

their witness, 

their testimony of all

that Jesus says and does

in their sight.

In their persecution, 

they remember that

Our Lord told them so

and that His promises are true.

And they remember

that they have received 

the Holy Ghost,

Who proceeds from the Father

Who us sent by the Son

who comes to us

with strength - 

cum forte -

for us to use to proclaim 

the Word of God.

[PAUSE]

The night before Our Lord dies

is a night to remember, 

to piece back together,

and we do just that here in the Mass.

We are re-membering

what Our Lord told us to do.

And in re-membering 

the Last Supper

we are given the presence 

of Christ Himself 

in the Holy Sacrament

so that we, too,

like the Apostles,

may go out and tell the truth

about Christ.

And, as we increase in faith,

and see the work of God 

at our hands,

as we suffer our persecution, 

our temptation, 

our repentance,

our humiliation, 

our cross,

all for His sake, 

we will see Our Lord in His glory 

pointing to our place 

in His Kingdom

and saying,

"Told you so!"

Anglican Catholicism and Homosexuality

 

Where Anglican Catholicism stands on Homosexuality 

Asking for a beating

Sermon preached at the Cathedral Church of St Augustine of Canterbury on Rogation Sunday

Are you ready to get up

and beat the bounds, today?

Ready for a nice little walk 

around the parish?

Beating the bounds

occasionally happens today,

but not so much

and definitely not in its

traditional form.

Usually during

Rogationtide

or on Ascension Day,

the parish priest

is supposed to lead his people

to the edge of the parish 

and walk around it.

Along the way,

a group of boys,

usually choirboys or servers,

are supposed 

to beat the boundary stones

with green branches.

Often, rather than 

just beating 

the boundary stone,

it would be the boys

that were beaten

instead.

Perhaps that's something 

we could reinstate?

[PAUSE]

But why?

Why beat the boys?

The maim reason,

it appears,

is to ensure that

the next generation 

knows where 

the parish boundary is.

By beating the stones,

or beating the boys,

a clear memory of where

the parish ends

is reinforced.

This is important 

because it reinforces

the parish's legal identity

and the priest knows 

where his care ends

and the neighbouring priest's begins.

Beating the bounds

 establishes the neighbourhood.

But now you see the problem. 

Where is our boundary?

[PAUSE]

Parishes are supposed 

to share boundaries

so that there are no gaps

between where one parish stops

and another starts.

That way, 

the whole country 

can be sure 

that every community 

can find its Christian needs

met by the Church

through local priests.

If parishes have 

to cover the country,

where's our boundary?

Half of Kent?

More?

The Diocesan boundary

is the coastline of 

the British Isles!

How are we expected

to beat those bounds?

[PAUSE]

Our smallness

does sometimes seem

to be overwhelming. 

We have a big task to do

as Christians 

and so little time,

so few resources

to do it.

And we feel swamped.

We're not getting any younger

and the world is getting darker.

Let's just make sure

that we are honest 

with ourselves here,

about this.

We are small.

The task is great.

We feel swamped. 

What are we going to do?

[PAUSE]

Let's change the question

a little bit.

Instead of saying,

it's all too much,

let's say,

"this looks hard,

but what can we do?"

Let's not focus 

on our shortcomings

or on the size of the task.

Let's focus on

what we can do,

what we are doing,

what we're good at.

And make sure

that we do these things in Faith. 

[PAUSE]

We see the disciples

talking with Our Lord,

the night before He dies.

And there are only twelve.

One has gone off to betray the Christ.

The others will run away 

and say that they do not know

this Man from Nazareth.

Such failure!

Such fragility!

Such smallness!

And yet,

eleven come back

and see their Master

raised from the Dead.

And they understand. 

They see things clearly.

They know their mission.

Eleven in Christ

become the Church

because they have Faith.

And they now know what to ask for.

And how to ask.

No longer will they ask

to be the greatest

or to sit at the right hand

and left hand of Christ in glory.

Nor will they ask

not to avoid tribulation. 

They ask for blessing.

They ask for forgiveness 

for themselves 

and for their enemies.

They ask for the Truth to be known 

through them.

At their asking,

they receive the sacraments 

to give to the people of God

even as God Himself

fed multitudes with so little.

[PAUSE]

And we are so little.

It doesn't matter

for we trust that God knows

what He is doing,

and if we should find ourselves 

in tribulation,

we should not fear

because Christ has overcome the world. 

It is the World's influence

that tells us that 

because we are small

we are insignificant. 

Tell that to St Augustine 

who lands on these shores

and reinvigorates a Christianity 

that has been sidelined

following the end of

Roman occupation.

The disciples do what little they can

in Faith.

St Augustine does what little he can do

in Faith

We do what little we can do

in Faith. 

And in being faithful

we find ourselves praying 

in the Name of Jesus

and our prayers 

will be answered

- not in a worldly way,

but a Heavenly way.

[PAUSE]

Our bounds are too big

for us to beat, 

but in Christ 

there will be no limit 

to what will come

from what we truly do

in His Name..

Anglican Catholicism and self-righteousness

 

How do we eradicate self-righteousness in our society?

Wrong, wrong, wrong!

Sermon for the fourth Sunday after Easter

Have you ever

been sent to

the headteachers office

for being naughty?

How did you feel?

Scared?

Ashamed?

Or 

Defiant and smug?

[PAUSE]

Most of us 

of a certain age 

dread even the thought 

of being sent to the head's office.

The mere threat 

Is enough

to ensure that we

behave ourselves. 

These days,

things seem different. 

Teachers, the police

the judge, even the King himself

are not people 

of whom we are afraid

or even respected.

What's gone wrong?

[PAUSE]

Our Lord says,

that the Holy Spirit

will reprove

- that means say what's wrong

- the World of sin, righteousness 

and judgement. 

The Holy Ghost 

will tell the world

why it is wrong

about what sin is,

what righteousness is

and what judgement is.

It is because 

the World is wrong

about sin, righteousness 

and judgement 

that being told 

that you've done wrong

is an affront to your dignity. 

We don't like being told

that we've got things wrong,

but now

instead of being ashamed,

we believe ourselves to be so right

that we can challenge

whoever thinks we're wrong

even God Himself. 

While going to the head's office

is supposed to be a sign

of a grave fault,

it is now a place to stand up

and say that it is the Head

that has it wrong

and you are being punished

unjustly.

[PAUSE]

The World has it 

wrong about Sin

because it doesn't believe 

Our Lord's teaching about 

what sin is.

Our Lord tells us that 

remarriage after divorce 

is adultery,

that even lasting is adultery.

But the World says

that divorce is no sin

and that pornography is okay.

Our Lord tells us 

to love our enemies

but the world likes

to put feuds on display

in the papers or on the telly.

Our Lord tells us to go the extra mile.

The World tells us to go the extra mile

and then demand payment. 

The World is wrong about what sin is.

[PAUSE]

The World lives by the rule

"do what you want 

as long as you don't hurt others."

And so the World 

teaches us to be self-righteous

because it refuses

to believe that Jesus

is the Son of God

and thus the true judge

of righteousness. 

Self-righteousness 

is in direct opposition 

to the Kingship of Jesus.

We are not the source

of the rule of what is good.

To do what we want

except hurting others

does not take into account 

that what we want will 

ultimately hurt others 

without our knowledge.

That hoarding wealth

is depriving others. 

That having a second house

lying empty 

is depriving someone

of somewhere to live.

That paying a woman

to bear a child

which will be taken away from.her

is putting a value

upon both motherhood

and the life of the baby.

And then there's Abortion

which the World says

doesn't hurt anyone

because it says 

that the human foetus 

is not really alive

and so the rule about 

not hurting people

doesn't apply.

Nowhere

does the World see 

that Righteousness 

is not a thing of the World 

but sits at the Right Hand

of God the Father.

The World has got it wrong

about what righteousness is.

[PAUSE]

And woe betide us,

if we should hurt people

by telling the truth.

How awful of us Christians

to be so mean

as to oppose the marriage

of two people

of the same sex!

How awful of us Christians 

to refuse to join in

Pride Month

or wear the rainbow!

The World refuses

to be judged.

It has been sent 

to the Head's office

in its state of 

self-righteousness smugness 

full of indignation

and fury

about being judged

by the One

Whose authority 

it rejects.

So the World tells people

that because Christians 

say what sin is

they must hate people.

The World wants to convince

people that the judgement of God

is to punish,

to condemn

to cast into Hell.

Instead of a God

who becomes Man

in order to bring back

all to God.

The judgement of the World

is to punish

and push God away

and, in so doing,

locking the doors of Hell

from the inside!

The judgement of God

is to put right,

renew, restore, realign, redeem

refresh, resurrect.

The Prince of this World

is judged and found lacking

bur refuses to accept 

the judgement that will put it right.

The World is wrong about judgement.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

[PAUSE]

We Christians are right

to believe in God 

and to accept His moral standards

and to live lives

which seek His righteousness first.

We cannot be self-righteous

because that way leads

to worldly thinking.

We must be humble

in matters of judgement 

and generous in believing

the best in people.

While we may be wrong at times 

as individuals, 

we must remember 

that Christ in His Holy Church

is not wrong

and will always draw us back.

[PAUSE]

Now that you've knocked

on the Head of the Church's door, 

what will happen when you go in?

Dressing up as Anglican Catholics

 

What does it mean to play "dress-up"?

Just a sec

 

Sermon for the third Sunday after Easter

A little while?

The word Our Lord uses 

is mikron.

 It's a moment, a passing thought, 

an insignificant length of time. 

Our Lord might as well have said, "just a sec!"

For the apostles, that "just a sec!" 

is three days of fear, worry, 

horror and despair: 

three days which will 

change them radically.

 Yet, for the rest of us,

 our suffering goes on for years. 

It's not a second; 

it's not a micro amount of time. 

It hurts and it lasts 

seemingly forever!

In the world around us, 

we still see the effects of pain and hurt

 ricocheting backwards and forwards 

as one person,

or one people, 

seek justice for the agony 

that they are feeling. 

They want the pain to stop, 

and pain is not something 

that goes away when the body heals. 

An injury can leave the body 

with a weakness, 

and then there are 

the mental, physical and spiritual scars 

which never seem to leave. 

And so, 

many seek retribution,

 to inflict pain and suffering 

on those whom they think 

caused their sorrow.

Don't the apostles 

have emotional trauma?

 They surely can't forget 

the betrayal on Thursday, 

the blood on Friday 

and the buried on Saturday. 

They surely cannot forget 

the eyes of God Himself 

dimming into death, 

even if those eyes are now 

once again

bright and bursting with 

Life and Truth and Love. 

And the Lord says, "just a sec!" 

Isn't that a dismissal 

of all that the disciples 

have gone through?

[PAUSE]

Many people call God 

to account for 

all the heartache, misfortune 

and injustice in the world. 

"Why would a good God permit evil," 

they say, 

sometimes with 

eyes filled with their own 

hurt and outrage,

sometimes with 

the sneer of cynicism 

and even hatred for God, 

sometimes with 

an air of dismissal for any belief 

that we hold dear.

"Just a sec!"

To answer why 

our God permits evil 

is beyond our understanding. 

To know the true answer to this 

would be to know the mind of God 

and our minds are too small 

and imperfect for that. 

We can only know 

the answer to this 

when we are perfect,

and we are not perfect now. 

And what would the answer do? 

Convince the atheists and cynics? 

No. 

Some people will never be convinced, 

but God loves them so much 

as to respect their free will 

to make that choice: 

but that choice is there, 

and it comes with 

pierced hands, 

pierced feet, 

pierced head, 

pierced side 

and scourged back. 

There are wounds 

on Our Lord that never go away.

[PAUSE]

Never go away? 

That seems strange. 

Just a second or two of sorrow 

and then joy?

 Even with those wounds? 

Even with all that agony 

on the cross: 

an agony that we choose 

to remind ourselves 

with the crucifix, 

this image of our Saviour bleeding and dying?

 If we keep a crucifix, 

are we not holding on 

to sorrow and pain and death?

Of course we are! 

The fact that Our Lord keeps 

His wounds for us 

even in Eternity as 

the Lamb-that-was-slain 

means that His pain for us 

means something. 

This means that our pain, 

the pains that we suffer here and now, 

mental, physical, emotional, spiritual, 

are all met in the cross. 

We see them nailed to the cross 

on our crucifix with Our God. 

Our Lord suffers pain

because we suffer pain. 

Our Lord suffers injustice 

because we suffer injustice. 

Our Lord suffers humiliation, 

because we suffer humiliation. 

Every sorrow that 

we go through in life 

is met in Jesus, the Man of Sorrows. 

He doesn't just meet them 

on this world 

passing from moment to moment, 

but He meets them in Heaven 

where there is only the Eternal Now. 

In saying "a little while," 

He is firmly consigning 

the pains and miseries of life 

to this passing world, 

nailing them there so that

 they do not define the lives of those 

who are suffering in Him. 

He tells us that 

our suffering matters enough 

for Him to suffer and live 

with the effects of our suffering, 

but that our suffering will end: 

it will not accompany us 

into Eternal bliss with Him. 

In that sense, 

to ask "why does a good God permit evil?"

 becomes meaningless 

because the evil passes away 

as we journey in our lives 

to become perfect in Christ 

- a perfection which is only reached 

through Christ. 

We have to endure sorrow, 

and some of us must 

endure it very sorely, 

but we see the crucifix 

and Our Lord on the cross 

knowing what we are going through 

by direct experience. 

He is not comparing His suffering 

with ours, 

but sharing in our suffering 

so that we might share in His joy. 

"Just a sec"?

While God is not comparing 

His suffering with ours, 

He is showing us a taste 

of the Eternity He is offering us. 

The crucifixion matters to Him 

but is a cause for joy to Him in Eternity

 because through it we are saved, 

not a cause of sorrow 

because of the agony He went through.

 Sorrow passes away, 

but joy is Eternal. 

And us? 

We have to allow our sorrow to pass away, 

or at least permit God to take it away 

when He will. 

Some sorrow is very hard 

to let go of, 

but God says clearly 

that it is not part of our perfection in Him. 

Yet, if we use our sorrow 

to direct us to joy in Christ, 

we have the means of letting it go 

through God's gift of hope.

This is why we glory 

in the cross of Christ,

 for by that cross, 

Christ has overcome the world. 

This is why we venerate Christ's cross 

and our own crosses that we bear. 

Alleluia!

Is the Anglican Catholic Church woke?

 

What does "woke" mean in the first place?

Crooks and Bishops

 

Sermon for the second Sunday after Easter

We’ve all felt threatened
when the bishop reaches out his hand
for his crosier.

That large wooden
shepherd’s hook looks
as if it could do some
mighty damage
and, often,
you may wonder legitimately
whether it is used for dragging
an errant dean
or archdeacon out of the pulpit
in the middle of
their very boring
“blah blah blah” sermons.

Of course,
you know that
the crosier is a symbol
for the pastoral office
of the bishop. 

It is a form of
the shepherd’s crook
used for
managing the sheep,
pulling them out of danger,
protecting them against predators 

and,
while not used for grabbing
and clonking hungry wolves
on the head,
it serves as a walking stick
to steady the shepherd
over hill and dale.

Today,
as we reflect upon
Christ the Good Shepherd,
we think of how appropriate it is
for bishops to carry the crosier.

They have to embody
the life of the good shepherd
and not that of the hireling.

The shepherd invests himself 
in the welfare of the sheep,

even lying down,
in front of the doorway
to the sheepfold
acting as a door
keeping sheep in
and dangers out.

Hirelings 
have no investment in the sheep
whatsoever.

Their only concern 
is that they get their pay
at the end of the day
and go home.

The Good Shepherd does not,
but lives his life
with the sheep in his care.

Only the shepherd 
needs the crosier
for he uses it 
to demonstrate 
his investment in the sheep.

The hireling
does not care if
a sheep gets injured
- there are others.

The hireling
does care if a wolf enters the scene
because he then scarpers
leaving the flock 
rather than confront the evil.

The hireling 
needs only a simple stick 
to steady himself,
but then, 
he wouldn't need to wander
in treacherous places
where he might fall down.

The hireling 
is not worthy of a crook.

The hireling 
is not worthy of a crosier.

[PAUSE]

We can be sure
that a bishop who wields
his crosier well
will grab us
when we go astray
through his sound learning
and concern for our spiritual growth. 

He will stand up
and clonk evil on the head
with the authority given to him
through the Apostles
by Our Lord Jesus Christ,
and he will use the strength
of the Good Shepherd
to steady himself
on the rough terrain of life. 

As Psalm 23 says of Christ,
“His rod and staff comfort me.”
and He has given that staff
to us in the crosier.

[PAUSE]

We must,

therefore ensure that 
we choose our bishops with care.

We will see their suitability
by what they invest 
of themselves in the Church.

We shall see them
in how they are prepared
to lay themselves down
for the sheep 
entrusted to them.

To them will be given 
the crosier

and this crosier is not given
by men
but by God
for the bishop to exercise
authority over the Church.

The crosier is passed down
from bishop to bishop
just as the authority is passed down
from bishop to bishop
beginning with the Holy Apostles
and their great commission 
to make disciples of all lands.

[PAUSE]

We pray for our bishops

in the onerous nature 
of what has been entrusted to them.

They may fall
like any one of us
but the good bishop
will pick himself up,
dust himself down
and start all over again
seeking the good of his flock.

The hireling will not.

If a hireling falls,
he will cover it up
pull rank 
and blame everyone else.

[PAUSE]

The hireling is a crook.
The bishop holds a crook.

That's the crucial difference.