Big questions

Here's the sermon from this morning's service of Holy Baptism and Holy Communion at St Gabriel's Pitsea:

Two of the biggest questions we can ask in life are ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Why am I here?’ Both questions get answered in this story of Jesus being baptised and the answers that were true for Jesus can also be true for us (Mark 1.9-15).

First, ‘Who am I?’ The answer to that question was given to Jesus as soon as he came up out of the waters of baptism. As he did so, he saw heaven opening, the Spirit coming down on him like a dove, and he heard a voice from heaven saying, “You are my own dear Son. I am pleased with you.” As he was baptised, he was immediately affirmed as God’s Son.

It is easy for us to think that that only applies to Jesus. That it was a special word spoken by God the Father especially to him and, on one level, no doubt it was. But, the Bible makes it quite clear that Jesus laid down his life to make us one with God so that, as Christians, we are Jesus’ brothers and sisters, members of the same family – God’s family – and co-heirs with Jesus of everything that he has. 

Listen to what St Paul says about this in Romans 8. 14-17:

“Those who are led by God's Spirit are God's children. For the Spirit that God has given you does not make you slaves and cause you to be afraid; instead, the Spirit makes you God's children, and by the Spirit's power we cry out to God, Father! my Father! God's Spirit joins himself to our spirits to declare that we are God's children. Since we are his children, we will possess the blessings he keeps for his people, and we will also possess with Christ what God has kept for him …”

When those being baptised are baptised, God will be saying to them, “You are my dear sons and daughters and since you are my sons and daughters you will possess with Jesus the blessings I keep for my people.” This is true, not just for those being baptised today, but for each one of us who have been baptised. Just stop for a moment to hear God saying those words to you, “You are my dear daughter or son, you are my child and since you are my child you will possess with Jesus the blessings I keep for my people.” Take a moment, to let those words sink into your hearts and minds. You are a child of God, you are a brother or sister of Jesus, you are loved, you are valued, you are blessed. Take it in and say thank you to God your Father for who you are.

The second big question was ‘Why am I here?’ and that too is answered in this reading. After he is baptised, Jesus has a time of preparation in the desert and then begins to preach the Good News from God. He had a God-given task to complete, a reason for his existence and a meaning for his life.

The same is true for us. Listen to St Paul again, this time from 1 Corinthians 12. 4 - 7:

“There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit gives him. There are different ways of serving, but the same Lord is served. There are different abilities to perform service, but the same God gives ability to all for their particular service. The Spirit's presence is shown in some way in each person for the good of all.”

The Spirit’s presence is shown in some way in each person for the good of all. So, the Spirit’s presence is shown in those being baptised in some way for the good of all. It is one of the tasks that God gives to the baptised person, to identify and nurture the gifts and talents they have been given.

And, again, this is also true for all of us who have been baptised. For each one, the Spirit’s presence is shown in us in some way for the good of all. Take a moment, to let those words sink into your hearts and minds. You have been given the abilities you need for your particular service. The Spirit's presence is shown in some way in you for the good of all. Your life has meaning and purpose because God has work that only you can do. Take it in and say thank you to God your Father for why you are here.

As we celebrate baptism today, may we realise afresh the way that our deepest needs - for love and significance – are fully met through baptism into the family of God. Who are we? We are the beloved sons and daughters of our Father God. Why are we here? To use our God-given abilities to do work for God that only we can do. Take a moment to truly take it in and then say thank you to God your Father for who you are and why you are here.

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Hannah White - Good Questions.

Meaning, significance, shape and purpose

Here's the sermon that I shared at St Andrew’s Wickford this morning:

Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who is best known for creating a hierarchy of needs. ‘This is a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, culminating in self-actualization.’ At the bottom of the hierarchy are the basic needs of human beings; needs for food, water, sleep and sex. Maslow’s model works as a hierarchy because a pressing need must be mostly satisfied before someone will give their attention to the next highest need, which includes our need for our lives to be given meaning and significance.

The stories of the feeding of the four thousand and the five thousand (Matthew 15:29-37) are stories of Jesus meeting the basic needs of the people with him but are also stories about that action having a deeper level of meaning and significance.

The people who were with Jesus had been with him in the wilderness for three days without any significant supplies of food. While some may have brought small supplies of food with them, in essence they had been fasting for much of the time Jesus had been teaching them and, for those of you who have visited the Holy Land, you will know that the Wilderness is unforgiving terrain in which to be without sustenance.

Jesus is concerned for these people and, out of compassion, meets their basic need for food in that testing environment but, just as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs suggests that once our basic needs have been met then our needs for meaning and significance come into play, Jesus’ actions here also have a deeper level of meaning, if we and they are alert to it.

We can see this if we think for a moment about the outline of this story and the extent to which it reminds us of another story. A group of Israelites are in the wilderness and are hungry because they have too little to eat. In response God provides them with bread to eat. That is the outline of the feeding of the four thousand but it is also, in essence, the story of God providing manna in the wilderness to the Israelites when Moses led them from Egypt to the Promised Land. The similarity is deliberate, whether on the part of Jesus or Mark, because through this action Jesus is seen as the new Moses for the people of Israel.

Following the parallels between these two stories through means that the people of Israel are to be seen as being in slavery once again – whether that meant the political oppression of their Roman conquerors or, as St Paul suggests, under the bondage of sin. The Exodus – the salvation of the people of Israel - began with the death of firstborn sons and, in the story of Jesus, our salvation comes through the death of God’s only Son. Jesus leads his people through water – in the original Exodus that was the path through the Red Sea, but, for Jesus’ followers, it is the rite of baptism. They go on a journey through the wilderness – where, as we have seen, they are fed and provided for – and end their journey when they enter the Promised Land – which Jesus spoke about as being the kingdom of God that he initiated but which is still to come in full.

The parallels are plenteous and very close as the people of Jesus’ day were intended to view him as the new Moses. At this deeper level of meaning and significance it is possible, from this one action, to understand the whole of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.

God is also at work in our lives to bring and to reveal meaning, purpose, shape and significance to our lives too, if we are alert to this deeper level of life and our not solely focused on the meeting of our basic needs. We all have a need and a desire for there to be more to our lives than simply the survival of the fittest; the scramble to meet our basic needs. As Maslow’s hierarchy of needs recognises, when we are in genuine need and poverty, it is very difficult to think about anything else other than survival. But, when we are in the fortunate position of having our basic needs met, we have the time and space and inclination to look around us to see the way in which God can bring meaning, significance and purpose into our lives; with that purpose including the development of a compassion, like that of Jesus, which sees the needs of those whose basic needs are not being met and responds to that by sharing at least some of what we have.

Your life is not simply about having enough to survive; the meeting of your basic needs. God wants you to see a deeper level of meaning, significance, shape and purpose to your life. Are you open to see the meaning and significance that he brings or does a focus of getting prevent you from seeing and receiving what he is already giving?

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Neal Morse - The Temple Of The Living God.

Start:Stop - Revealing meaning and purpose

Bible reading

In those days when there was again a great crowd without anything to eat, he called his disciples and said to them, “I have compassion for the crowd, because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat. If I send them away hungry to their homes, they will faint on the way—and some of them have come from a great distance.” His disciples replied, “How can one feed these people with bread here in the desert?” He asked them, “How many loaves do you have?” They said, “Seven.” Then he ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground; and he took the seven loaves, and after giving thanks he broke them and gave them to his disciples to distribute; and they distributed them to the crowd. They had also a few small fish; and after blessing them, he ordered that these too should be distributed. They ate and were filled; and they took up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Now there were about four thousand people. (Mark 8. 1 – 10a)

Meditation

The feeding of the four thousand is a story of Jesus meeting the basic needs of the people with him but is also a story about that action having a deeper level of meaning and significance. We can see this if we think for a moment about the outline of this story and the extent to which it reminds us of another story. A group of Israelites are in the wilderness and are hungry because they have too little to eat. In response God provides them with bread to eat. That is the outline of the feeding of the four thousand but it is also, in essence, the story of God providing manna in the wilderness to the Israelites when Moses led them from Egypt to the Promised Land. The similarity is deliberate, whether on the part of Jesus or Mark, because through this action Jesus is seen as the new Moses for the people of Israel.

Following the parallels between these two stories through means that the people of Israel are to be seen as being in slavery once again – whether that meant the political oppression of their Roman conquerors or, as St Paul suggests, under the bondage of sin. The Exodus – the salvation of the people of Israel - began with the death of firstborn sons and, in the story of Jesus, our salvation comes through the death of God’s only Son. Jesus leads his people through water – in the original Exodus that was the path through the Red Sea, but, for Jesus’ followers, it is the rite of baptism. They go on a journey through the wilderness – where, as we have seen, they are fed and provided for – and end their journey when they enter the Promised Land – which Jesus spoke about as being the kingdom of God that he initiated but which is still to come in full.

God is also at work in our lives to bring and to reveal meaning, purpose, shape and significance to our lives too, if we are alert to this deeper level of life and our not solely focused on the meeting of our basic needs. We all have a need and a desire for there to be more to our lives than simply the survival of the fittest; the scramble to meet our basic needs. Your life is not simply about having enough to survive; the meeting of your basic needs. God wants you to see a deeper level of meaning, significance, shape and purpose to your life. Are you open to see the meaning and significance that he brings or does a focus of getting prevent you from seeing and receiving what he is already giving?

Prayer

Lord God, we recognise the need and desire we have for there to be more to our lives than simply the scramble to meet our basic needs but also acknowledge that our basic needs do need to be met before we give our full attention to our higher needs. We ask, therefore, that as you met the basic needs of the four thousand, so our basic needs will be met in order that we give attention to our need for meaning and significance.

Inspire us to seek meaning and shape within our lives. Help us recognise the significance and purpose that you bring.

Reveal and bring meaning, purpose, shape and significance to our lives. Keep us alert to this deeper level of life and not solely focused on the meeting of our basic needs. Ensure that a focus of getting will not prevent us from seeing and receiving what you are already giving to us.

Inspire us to seek meaning and shape within our lives. Help us recognise the significance and purpose that you bring.

We recognise that when we are in genuine need and poverty, it is very difficult to think about anything else other than survival. Develop in us a compassion, like that of Jesus, which sees the needs of those whose basic needs are not being met and responds to by sharing at least some of what we have.

Inspire us to seek meaning and shape within our lives. Help us recognise the significance and purpose that you bring.

Blessing

Revealing meaning, purpose, shape and significance, developing compassion, meeting basic needs, sharing what we have. May those blessings of almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, rest upon you and remain with you always. Amen.

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The Moody Blues - Watching And Waiting.

Seeking meaning and significance

This was my sermon for last Thursday's Eucharist at St Stephen Walbrook, which can also be heard on the London Internet Church website:

Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who is best known for creating a hierarchy of needs. ‘This is a theory of psychological health predicated on fulfilling innate human needs in priority, culminating in self-actualization.’ At the bottom of the hierarchy are the basic needs of human beings; needs for food, water, sleep and sex. Maslow’s model works as a hierarchy because a pressing need must be mostly satisfied before someone will give their attention to the next highest need, which includes our need for our lives to be given meaning and significance.

The stories of the feeding of the four thousand and the five thousand are stories of Jesus meeting the basic needs of the people with him but are also stories about that action having a deeper level of meaning and significance.

The people who were with Jesus had been with him in the wilderness for three days without any significant supplies of food. While some may have brought small supplies of food with them, in essence they had been fasting for much of the time Jesus had been teaching them and, for those of you who have visited the Holy Land, you will know that the Wilderness is unforgiving terrain in which to be without sustenance.

Jesus is concerned for these people and, out of compassion, meets their basic need for food in that testing environment but, just as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs suggests that once our basic needs have been met then our needs for meaning and significance come into play, Jesus’ actions here also have a deeper level of meaning, if we and they are alert to it.

We can see this if we think for a moment about the outline of this story and the extent to which it reminds us of another story. A group of Israelites are in the wilderness and are hungry because they have too little to eat. In response God provides them with bread to eat. That is the outline of the feeding of the four thousand but it is also, in essence, the story of God providing manna in the wilderness to the Israelites when Moses led them from Egypt to the Promised Land. The similarity is deliberate, whether on the part of Jesus or Mark, because through this action Jesus is seen as the new Moses for the people of Israel.

Following the parallels between these two stories through means that the people of Israel are to be seen as being in slavery once again – whether that meant the political oppression of their Roman conquerors or, as St Paul suggests, under the bondage of sin. The Exodus – the salvation of the people of Israel - began with the death of firstborn sons and, in the story of Jesus, our salvation comes through the death of God’s only Son. Jesus leads his people through water – in the original Exodus that was the path through the Red Sea, but, for Jesus’ followers, it is the rite of baptism. They go on a journey through the wilderness – where, as we have seen, they are fed and provided for – and end their journey when they enter the Promised Land – which Jesus spoke about as being the kingdom of God that he initiated but which is still to come in full.

The parallels are plenteous and very close as the people of Jesus’ day were intended to view him as the new Moses. At this deeper level of meaning and significance it is possible, from this one action, to understand the whole of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.

God is also at work in our lives to bring and to reveal meaning, purpose, shape and significance to our lives too, if we are alert to this deeper level of life and our not solely focused on the meeting of our basic needs. We all have a need and a desire for there to be more to our lives than simply the survival of the fittest; the scramble to meet our basic needs. As Maslow’s hierarchy of needs recognises, when we are in genuine need and poverty, it is very difficult to think about anything else other than survival. But, when we are in the fortunate position of having our basic needs met, we have the time and space and inclination to look around us to see the way in which God can bring meaning, significance and purpose into our lives; with that purpose including the development of a compassion, like that of Jesus, which sees the needs of those whose basic needs are not being met and responds to that by sharing at least some of what we have.

Your life is not simply about having enough to survive; the meeting of your basic needs. God wants you to see a deeper level of meaning, significance, shape and purpose to your life. Are you open to see the meaning and significance that he brings or does a focus of getting prevent you from seeing and receiving what he is already giving?

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Delirious? - Now is the Time.

Everyone, everything, everywhere

God has a plan for all people. One where everyone, whatever their job or role in life, has meaning and purpose. Vocation is not just about church employees or priests, but about everyone, doing everything, everywhere. From those at school to the retired, whatever your age or stage, God has a place for you in his story and this day is for you!

The 2012 Vocations Day is for everyone in the Barking Episcopal Area, including those considering a call to authorised ministry in the Church of England. With inspiration and encouragement, practical insights and stories, everyone will better see their part of God’s bigger picture. There will be seminars to explore where God is in your current role. Whether you are in business, health, education or retail, from bin men or bankers all are welcome, because ‘whatever you are doing…do it for the Lord’ (Colossians 3:23).

Saturday 21st April, 9.30am - 4.00pm, St Edwards School and 6th Form College, Romford. For further information about Vocations Day 2012 please contact Justin McKenzie Tel: 020 8539 8437 justinboro@btinternet.com.

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M Ward - The First Time I Ran Away.

What is the purpose of creativity and imagination?

Dorothy L. Sayers remarked on the fact that the one thing we know for sure about God at the point that he makes humanity in his own image is that he is creative:

“[H]ad the author of Genesis anything particular in his mind when he wrote? It is observable that in the passage leading up to the statement about man, he has given no detailed information about God. Looking at man, he sees in him something essentially divine, but when we turn back to see what he says about the original upon which the “image” of God was modelled, we find only the single assertion, “God created”. The characteristic common to God and man, is apparently that: the desire and ability to make things”. (The Mind of the Maker)

She argues that it is therefore logical to suppose that creativity is a significant aspect of humanity’s being made in the image of God. Similarly:

“In his essay “The Image of God and the Epic of Man,” [Paul] Ricoeur suggests that humans are in the image of God because they too enjoy the power of creativity. Thus the image of God, creativity, gives rise to the images of man, in the sense of the images that man makes. These images constitute “the sum total of the ways in which man projects his vision on things.”” (K. J. Vanhoozer, Biblical Narrative in the Philosophy of Paul Ricoeur: A Study in Hermeneutics and Theology)

Within the Biblical Creation stories human creativity is seen in: God’s blessing of humanity which included the tasks of increasing in number, filling and subduing the earth and, ruling over living creatures (Genesis 1: 28); Adam’s working and taking care of the garden (Genesis 2: 15); and, Adam’s naming of the living creatures (Genesis 2: 20). Albert Wolters brings both sociality and creativity together when he comments that:

“Adam and Eve, as the first married couple, represent the beginnings of societal life; their task of tending the garden, the primary task of agriculture, represents the beginnings of cultural life." (Creation Regained: Biblical Basics for a Reformational Worldview)        

These two also sit together because of the development that runs through the stories. Wolters describes this in speaking of Genesis 1:

“There is a process of development and evolution as the earthly realm assumes, step by step, the contours of the variegated world of our experience. On the sixth day this process is completed with the creation of man, and on the seventh day God rests from his labors. This is not the end of the development of creation, however. Although God has withdrawn from the work of creation, he has put an image of himself on the earth with a mandate to continue. The earth had been completely unformed and empty; in the six-day process of development God had formed it and filled it – but not completely. People must now carry on the work of development: by being fruitful they must fill it even more; by subduing it they must form it even more. Mankind, as God’s representatives on earth, carry on where God left off. But this is now to be a human development of the earth … From now on the development of the created earth will be societal and cultural in nature.” 

In addition to the six day development of creation, development is also seen in: God’s blessing of humanity in Genesis 1: 28; Adam’s working and taking care of the garden (Genesis 2: 15); and the two trees that held the potential for god-likeness (Genesis 2: 9, 16 & 17, 3: 22). Wolters says of the world that “[c]reation is not something that, once made, remains a static quality. There is, as it were, a growing up (though not in a biological sense), an unfolding of creation.”

The latter point is worth expanding further. One tree held out the potential for becoming like God in having the knowledge of good and evil, the other in living forever. The former tree was banned for Adam and Eve while the latter is not. One reading of this story is that God intended Adam and Eve to eat from the Tree of Life and become like him in having eternal life. If so, this is another example of development. 

For the stories to have this development dynamic suggests creation is both actuality and possibility and that humanity has the responsibility of actualising the possible. If so, possibilities are, as Ricoeur argues, real, although unactualised. Ricoeur suggests that imagination leads to actualisation and that both are a means of self-understanding for humanity:

“Ricoeur is unwilling to dismiss human projects as unreal just because they have not yet been realized or because their conditions do not yet obtain: “It is by virtue of an unjustifiable reduction that we decide to equate ‘world’ with the whole of observable facts; I inhabit a world in which there is something ‘to be done by me’; the ‘to be done by me’ belongs to the structure which is the ‘world’.” In the case of human willing, the possible precedes the actual, for the forming of a project precedes its realization: “The presence of man in the world means that the possible precedes the actual and clears the way for it; a part of the actual is a voluntary realisation of possibilities anticipated by a project.” Moreover, in determining to do something, I likewise determine myself: “In the same way that a project opens up possibilities in the world, it opens up new possibilities in myself and reveals me to myself as a possibility of acting. My power-to-be manifests itself in my power-to-do …” The “possible” is therefore an essential component in self-understanding. I achieve self-understanding when I grasp what possibilities are open to me." (Biblical Narrative in the Philosophy of Paul Ricoeur)

This can be seen in the Creation stories when God asked Adam to name the living creatures. Names in ancient culture are descriptive of the essence or meaning of objects or people. Therefore, here God was asking Adam to be creative both in imagining the possibilities for each creature and in the forming of a name to reflect those possibilities. However, God was also asking Adam to develop self-understanding because the naming of the living creatures is set in the context of finding a helper for Adam. As Adam imagined possibilities for each creature he was also coming to an understanding of his needs as a human being and rejecting each creature in turn as a suitable helper for him. Therefore, when God creates Eve, Adam had the necessary self-understanding to recognise Eve immediately as the helper for which he had been seeking (2: 23 & 24).     

I am suggesting therefore that the creation stories depict a relational God creating a relational world with which he interacts. Within this he created humanity in his relational image to develop the relational possibilities inherent within creation; these being, as Colin Gunton suggests in The One, the Three and the Many: God, Creation and the Culture of Modernity, to develop the practical implications of relationality, perichoresis and substantiality through sociality and creativity.

God’s intention was that this task would be undertaken by human beings in relationship with him and with the rest of creation. Not only was humanity created in his image but humanity’s task was to be undertaken in his image, as though he himself were undertaking it. It is this that helps us to understand the meaning of the ban on Adam and Eve eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

God, as the source of all things, contains both actuality and possibility. In creation he actualised good, and evil remained only an unactualised possibility. Nevertheless it is real (though unactualised) and can be imagined (either through imagining the opposite of the actual or difference in the actual) and thereby actualised.

God’s intention was then to train humanity for our task of developing creation by assisting us to imagine possibilities as a means to self-understanding. This is what I noted in the story of Adam naming the living creatures. In this way God was acting like a parent telling her child not to put his hand into a fire. The child imagines the pain of being on fire and learns the lesson. God in the creation stories wished to do the same. He wished to introduce human beings to the knowledge of good and evil by imagining, under his guidance, the possibility of evil, as a means of learning the dangers inherent in actualising evil. In this way human beings could have developed into divinity by gradually developing the knowledge of good and evil and then by eating the fruit from the Tree of Life and living forever.

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Van Morrison - Rave On John Donne / Did You Get Healed?

Interrogation

The letter was waiting on the mat for Sally when she got up that morning. She knew instinctively that it was the second summons that she had been dreading. What was it that they knew about her? What was it that they thought she was doing wrong? She left the letter where it lay and went to make a cup of tea.

Why did they want to see her and why the threats to cut off her money if she did not attend? She had already been too scared to go for the first appointment. Now she sat and thought how stupid that had been. They would probably be a lot harder on her because of that. She knew what they were like. Sod's! Trying to force her into work she didn't want or need. Trying to take away her money. All she wanted was to be left to bring up her daughter how she saw fit.
Kelly! She'd have to find a babysitter for Kelly. That would be extra expense, that and the bus fare. All for some poxy interview. Now, when was she commanded to attend? She ran for the letter in the hall. They'd spelt her name wrong again. It was Sally Thornton with an 'o' not an 'e'.

*****

It was up three flights of stairs to a pokey, dark hole of an office that five interviewers had been squeezed into. As well as the desks for the interviewers they had miraculously found space for two more desks for the office workers and five chairs for the waiting area. There were ten people waiting when Sally arrived, and three being interviewed.

As she watched another interviewer emerged from a door behind some screens and moved to her desk. A moment or so later one of the three interviews finished and a relieved interviewer vanished behind the screens and out of the door. The female interviewer who had just arrived came to the reception desk, called out a name and scurried back to her desk as though the waiting area was contagious. Sally looked around her. The walls were plastered with gaudy posters proclaiming the glad tidings of how you would be helped to start a business if you already possessed £1,000. Was that what they wanted her for? Would they only give her money if she started a business for them? Why couldn't they start their own damn businesses, if that's what they wanted? What did they want her for?

Someone was asking for her name, someone was asking for her name. Startled, she came out of her reverie. No! she felt like saying. What do you want my name for? What will you do with it if I let you? But then she thought, they get you anyway, and gave in. They took her name and placed it where she thought it had always belonged.

She had felt just so right from her school days, when she had always had less than the other kids and had consistently been in the lower grades. "You thick or something?" was a question she had been asked on more occasions than she cared to remember. Until she had met her boyfriend she had felt it was her role to be thick. He had valued her as a person like no one before or since.
She sat in silent intensity among the other useless nobodies sitting or standing in a tight semi-circle. She longed for them to return her name to her. As others around her ended their wait, she watched her name inch its way towards the top of the pile and back to her.

She was glad she had left her baby with a babysitter. There was another woman who had brought her two kids. They were running around the office, in and out of desks screwing up leaflets as they went. The interviewers were glaring. You could hear them tutting to their neighbours about that woman's lack of control. The woman had ceased to be a mother, the environment had disabled her. Her initial attempts to control the children had not been a success and she was now embarrassed to try further. It was clear to her, as it was not to the others, that with nothing to do and such a long time to wait there was nothing left for children but misbehaviour.

You could clearly hear the conversations from the interviewer's desks. She was sitting not six feet from one of them so it was hardly surprising. These interviewers removed people's defences as easily as a prostitute removes her clothing. Snatches of intimate moments from increasingly desperate lives were wafting from each desk to be retained or lost as each listening person cared. She felt like taking her clothing off and dancing on their desks to show them what they were doing. She knew though that they would strip her more completely than if she were to bare herself. At least if she were to do it she would be in control, but she was not in control was she?

They could strip her because they knew that she and her fragile family relied on the money that they handed out and that she would humiliate herself, prostitute herself to keep that money. In that moment she felt that she could have been led by the hand and made to commit terrible acts that would revolt her but still she would do them. It was her fate.

It was then that her name struggled its way to the front and was called from the desk. "Miss Thornton". As she received her name, a thought formed in her mind. A memory from school. She often remembered bits of information that she had been taught. It was not that she couldn't retain information more that she'd never been encouraged. It was a history thought that she had remembered. She could picture her teacher talking about concentration camps in the war, and disgusting photos of the people that died. Someone who had been in a camp had said that the people who survived were the people with a purpose in life. That had impressed her, a purpose.
She hadn't known what a purpose was, she certainly didn't have one then. She had imagined herself in the shoes of the prisoner awaiting interrogation. It was odd that she could feel the same nausea in her throat that she had imagined that prisoner feeling.

For a fatalistic moment she felt that she was a purposeless person who caved in under pressure and could not defend what was valuable in their lives, maybe didn't have anything valuable. She thought of Kelly and Stan, her boyfriend who loved her for herself, and she knew what she had to defend. She purposefully pulled up the chair at the desk and looked her interrogator full in his stare.

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The Jam - To Be Someone.