Between: refugees

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Wednesday, 13 August 2025

Charlecote Park and Fry Art Gallery

This week I've visited Charlecote Park in Warwickshire and the Fry Art Gallery at Saffron Walden.

Charlecote Park, a family home for more than 900 years, was transformed in the 1800s into one of the finest examples of Elizabethan Revival style by its owners Mary Elizabeth and George Hammond Lucy.

Overlooking the river Avon on the edge of Shakespeare’s Stratford, it is a place of surprising treasures, which reflect the tastes and memories of the Lucy family.

The exceptionally well preserved working spaces, the laundry, brewhouse and kitchen, give a taste of past activity, while the stables still hold the family carriage collection.

In the parkland, Jacob sheep and fallow deer roam across the landscape designed by 'Capability' Brown, while the formal parterre and shady woodland garden that Mary Elizabeth loved so dearly are a haven for pollinators.

'The Library of Memories' is a brand-new display situated in the upstairs room of the House and open to the public from March 2025. It showcases the writing of Mary Elizabeth Lucy, who lived at Charlecote Park in the Victorian era, and draws on themes of making and sharing memories. We seek to inspire visitors to share their memories with us, and with each other, and find new ways to relate to Charlecote’s past residents. The display focuses on a book from the library written by Mary Elizabeth Lucy, Grandmamma's Chapter of Accidents, that has not previously been displayed.

The Fry Public Art Gallery was opened in 1987 and houses an impressive number of paintings, prints, illustrations, wallpapers and decorative designs by artists of the 20th century and the present day who have local connections and have made a significant contribution to their field. There is an emphasis on those who for a variety of reasons settled in Great Bardfield between the early thirties of the last century and the death in 1983 of John Aldridge RA who had lived in the village for fifty years.

The Great Bardfield artists were a community of artists who lived and worked in and around the village of Great Bardfield in Essex from the 1930s to the 1970s. The community included artists like Edward Bawden, Eric Ravilious, Charlotte Bawden, and Tirzah Garwood, among others. Their work often depicted the local countryside and village life, and the Fry Art Gallery was established to showcase their artistic contributions.

The Gallery is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year and is delighted to have as guest curator of the exhibition in the main gallery Ella Ravilious, with a celebration of art and design depicting or made for the domestic space ‘Finding a Home at the Fry’. In the Gibson Room they are presenting an opportunity to view and buy a selection of works by Richard Bawden from the later period of his life in Hadleigh, Suffolk. ‘Richard Bawden: the Hadleigh Years’: runs from Saturday 26th July to Sunday 26th October 2025.

A statue of the Great Bardfield artists by Ian Wolter has recently been placed outside the Fry Art Gallery in Saffron Walden, Essex. The statue serves as a welcoming feature for visitors to the gallery, which houses a collection of art by these artists.

Other sculptures to be found nearby include:

The 'Children of Calais' by Ian Wolter, which is a life-sized sculpture of six children in poses echoing 'The Burghers of Calais' by Auguste Rodin but dressed in contemporary clothing. One of the figures holds a life jacket in place of the city key held in Rodin’s original. The piece is designed to provoke debate about the inhumanity of our response to the children caught up in the current refugee crisis.
'Mary' by Tessa Hawkes. This sculpture at St Mary's Saffron Walden portrays Mary as a young and vulnerable woman, receiving the news from the angel Gabriel that she is to be the mother of Jesus, God's Son. The artist originally intended to portray Mary at a very early stage in the annunciation of a young girl completely bewildered but the eventual sculpture is of a later stage in the annunciation, one of acceptance whilst still a little bewildered.

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The Fire Theft - Heaven.

Sunday, 1 June 2025

The book of Ruth: Migration, eldercare and patriarchy

Together with other clergy from the Diocese of Chelmsford, I had the pleasure of attending and contributing to activities for the Jewish festival of Shavuot as celebrated at Oaks Lane Reform Synagogue.

My contribution was as the Christian representative to a Scriptural Reasoning style session on the book of Ruth, together with Rabbi David Hulbert. Doing so was a particular pleasure because, while Vicar of St John's Seven Kings, I had got to know David through the East London Three Faiths Forum including travelling to the Holy Land with that group, and had also been involved in setting up and running a Scriptural Reasoning Group which included groups from the local Islamic Study Centre, Oaks Lane Reform Synagogue, and Sr John's Seven Kings.

Here is the introduction to the book of Ruth that I shared in the session this evening:

In the Revised Common Lectionary, which is used by many Church of England parishes for the scripture readings in their services, the book of Ruth is included in Sunday readings once in year A and twice in year B. The Revised Common Lectionary works on a three-year cycle. The daily lectionary also provides 17 additional readings from the book of Ruth.

A principle identified by the compilers of the Revised Common Lectionary was allowing for multiple perspectives on a specific text, depending on where the text is assigned in relation to other scripture texts and in relation to the liturgical year. For example, the fidelity of Ruth to Naomi and the Moabite people and God’s fidelity to Ruth and her posterity are related to God’s fidelity to Israel in the Isaiah reading for Advent 3 of year A. The connection is thematic.

In a similar way, for thematic reasons, Ruth is read again in the season after Pentecost in the complementary series of year A. In this instance, where the first reading for Sunday (I Kings 17:8-16) tells of God feeding Elijah and the widow of Zarephath, Ruth’s story is told on Monday through Wednesday to show the compassion of God and of Naomi’s kin for two widows, both Naomi and Ruth.

The book of Ruth is a story of ordinary people. History is commonly but, perhaps misguidedly, spoken about as being written by the victors; the rulers or monarchs with their armies. There is, of course, much in the Hebrew scriptures that is about those who rule and their actions but there are also writings like the book of Ruth which take a very different focus.

One Biblical scholar in the Christian tradition to have written about these twin strands in scripture is Walter Brueggemann. Brueggemann writes about this in terms of the core testimony and the counter testimony. The core testimony is structure legitimating; that is to say it is about order and control – everything in its rightful place and a rightful place for everything. The counter testimony is pain embracing; that is to say it is about hearing and responding to the pain and suffering which is found in existence. The core testimony is “above the fray” while the counter testimony is “in the fray”. The core testimony is about the victors and the counter testimony about the victims.

When the two are brought together Brueggemann thinks the Bible sees the kind of justice we see being worked out in the book of Ruth as key to any form of public leadership: “The claim made is that power – political, economic, military – cannot survive or give prosperity or security, unless public power is administered according to the requirement of justice, justice being understood as attention to the well-being of all members of the community.”

Brueggemann notes that the kind of kingship that we see David and initially Solomon exercise: “had the establishment and maintenance of justice as its primary obligation to Yahweh and to Israelite society. This justice, moreover, is distributive justice, congruent with Israel’s covenantal vision, intending the sharing of goods, power, and access with every member of the community, including the poor, powerless, and marginated.”

As a result, as Gerd Theissen has written that, in the Hebrew scriptures, when compared with other writings from the same time period: “religion takes an unprecedented turn, and becomes instead an agency of healing for the wounded. In the religion of the prophets … we see the distillation of faith in a God who is on the side of the downtrodden rather than their oppressors, and who seeks to bring a new, supernatural order of justice and peace out of the natural laws of selection and mutation which spell death for the weak and powerless.”

With that thought in mind, I would like to share brief reflections on the book in terms of three current issues: migration, elder care, and patriarchal views.

The book of Ruth is one of those places in the Old Testament where women are central to the story and where the story is told from the perspective of the female characters. The book ends however with a genealogy in which the women's world of the story was completely ignored by the male voices of those who compiled a traditional patrilineal genealogy. So, this is a story of women surviving and thriving in a patriarchal world, a struggle that, as we know, continues to this day.

Ruth and Naomi became refugees driven by economic necessity from Ruth’s mother country in Moab to Naomi’s mother country in the land of Judah. They survive and thrive in these challenging circumstances through their commitment to and support of each other. Ruth could have left Naomi, as Orpah did, but there was a bond of friendship between the two women that held them together, as Ruth said to Naomi, ‘Where you go, I will go; where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die.’ The world of women and female solidarity are therefore at the centre of this story.

Ruth and Naomi show great courage in leaving one culture to enter another, as do all those who become refugees today. In addition, they are proactive and resourceful in seeking ways forward to find security and a significant place in the history of Naomi’s people.

When Ruth and Naomi return to Israel, they are very poor and a local farmer, Boaz, takes pity on Ruth and allows Ruth to do what is described in Leviticus 23 v 22; Boaz leaves the grain at the edges of the fields so that poor people like Ruth can harvest it and make food to survive. Boaz could harvest the whole of his fields and keep all the grain for himself but doesn’t. Instead, he deliberately reduces what he harvests for himself in order to ensure that there is something left over for those less well off than himself. In doing so, he is following a specific instruction from God, which, while not directly applicable to us today because we are not farmers harvesting fields, can still apply if we reduce what we have for ourselves in order that we share something of what we have with others less well off than ourselves.

The story of Ruth, then, is a wonderful story of the benefits and joy of caring for others, even in the midst of tragedy. Difficult circumstances and tragedy can be the prompt or spur for real acts of care, as we saw happen to a significant extent during the Covid pandemic.

As a result, I once used this story in a funeral address. Fred and Ivy knew tragedy in their lives, particularly through the untimely deaths of their two children. Such heartbreak can cause people to look inward and shut themselves off from others and from God, but that was not the response of Fred and Ivy who continued to love and support each other, to care for Ivy’s parents in their old age and, then, Fred cared faithfully for Ivy as she approached death.

Ruth and Naomi returned to Naomi’s home where Ruth’s care for her mother-in-law was recognised and rewarded by Boaz, a landowner, who firstly found ways to support the two women and later married Ruth bringing an end to the poverty in which they had lived since the tragedy of their husband’s deaths. Similarly, the need that Fred and Ivy had in their lives to receive support and care, as well as to give it, was also recognised. Cousins and long-time friends stayed in regular contact. Closer to their home in Ilford, Fred received care and support from Janet and Gill, who met him through church and a lunch club.

People may ask where was God in the tragedies that occur in these stories; the untimely deaths of Ruth and Naomi’s husbands and also of Fred and Ivy’s children. Where was God? In talking with Janet about Fred, she said, “The Bible says that people should not live alone. We can’t always be close to those who need care. Others can be a substitute. Just keeping an eye on another is not to be sneezed at.” So, I concluded in this funeral address that, as we offer practical care to those nearby and the support of remaining in regular contact with those further away, we are the hands and feet, the eyes and ears of God in this world. That kind of care is also what I think we see modelled for us in the book of Ruth.

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Victoria Williams - What Kind Of Friend.

Monday, 31 March 2025

Ben Uri: Essay of the Week

In 2023 I curated an online exhibition for the Ben Uri Gallery which is entitled Exodus & Exile: Migration Themes in Biblical Images. The exhibition includes a range of Biblical images from the Ben Uri Collection in order to explore migration themes through consideration of the images, the Bible passages which inspired them and the relationship between the two. This is because themes of identity and migration feature significantly in both the Hebrew and Christian Bibles and images from these Bibles are a substantive element of the Ben Uri Collection.

The combination of images and texts enables a range of different reflections, relationships and disjunctions to be explored. The result is that significant synergies can be found between the ancient texts and current issues. In this way, stories and images which may, at first, appear to be describing or defining specific religious doctrines can be seen to take on a shared applicability by exploring or revealing the challenges and changes bound up in the age-old experience of migration.

The Gallery said: "We are delighted to present a new exhibition interpreting works from our collection titled Exodus and Exile. The survey has been curated by Revd Jonathan Evens who has a long-established parallel interest in art and faith and how they are mutually engaging. We are privileged to benefit from his scholarship and innate sensitivity and am sure you too will be inspired by his selection and commentary."

Alongside the exhibition is an essay Debt Owed to Jewish Refugee Art, an updated version of an article I originally wrote for Church Times looking at influential works by émigré Jewish artists that were under threat. The article mentions Ervin Bossanyi, Naomi Blake, Ernst Müller-Blensdorf, Hans Feibusch, and George Mayer-Marton, telling stories of the impact of migration on the work and reputations of these artists.

Following the launch of the exhibition, I wrote an article 'How the incomer’s eye sees identity' for Seen and Unseen explaining how curating an exhibition for the Ben Uri Gallery & Museum gave me the chance to highlight synergies between ancient texts and current issues. This week, this article is Essay of the Week for Ben Uri. Click here to read the article:

'The combination of images and texts I selected from the Ben Uri Collection enabled a range of different reflections, relationships and disjunctions to be explored. These include the aesthetic, anthropological, devotional, historical, sociological and theological. The result is that significant synergies can be found between the ancient texts and current issues. In this way, stories and images which may, at first, appear to be describing or defining specific religious doctrines can be seen to take on a shared applicability by exploring or revealing the challenges and changes bound up in the age-old experience of migration. This was important in writing for an audience including people of all faiths and none, and in writing for an organisation which seeks to surpass ethnic, cultural and religious obstacles to engagement within the arts sector.'

To see 'Exodus & Exile: Migration Themes in Biblical Images' click here, to read my related essay 'Debt Owed to Jewish Refugee Art' click here, for my post about the exhibition and essay click here, and for more on the Ben Uri Gallery click here.

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Dry The River - History Book.

Monday, 2 December 2024

Artlyst: The Art Diary December 2024

My December Art Diary for Artlyst takes us to Washington DC, New York, London and Bangkok:

'An exhibition of prints by Bruce Onobrakpeya also spotlights Nigerian artists exploring faith and spirituality through the lens of African heritage and mythology. A rare opportunity to see Romare Bearden’s ‘Paris Blues/Jazz’ series of collages also takes us to Paris, New Orleans, and Harlem. ‘Es Devlin – Face to Face: 50 Encounters with Strangers’ creates awareness of the conflicts from which refugees seek sanctuary, while the fourth Bangkok Art Biennale draws inspiration from Mother Earth as a nurturer and giver of life across cultures. Finally, Alexander De Cadenet’s ‘World Domination Burgers’ satirises the excesses of conspicuous consumption while ‘Carved & Cast’ presents a compelling survey of sculpture through the ages.'

For more on Alexander de Cadenet, see my Artlyst interview here, plus my ArtWay Visual Meditation here and exhibition/conference posts here, here, and here.

Interviews -

Monthly diary articles -

Articles/Reviews -

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Neil Young - Hold Back The Tears.

Saturday, 16 March 2024

Hannah Rose Thomas: Tears of Gold

Last night I was at Exhibition Launch for 'Tears of Gold' at Garden Court Chambers. This exhibition by the artist, author, and human rights activist Hannah Rose Thomas features portraits of Yazidi women who escaped ISIS captivity, Rohingya women who fled violence in Myanmar, and Nigerian women who survived Boko Haram and Fulani oppression. Hannah’s most recent portraits depict survivors of the re-education camps in Xinjiang, China, and of conflicts in Afghanistan, Ukraine and the Gaza Strip.

With these artworks, along with the associated publication Tears of Gold, Thomas bears witness—painting by painting, relationship by relationship—to the singular stories shared by each individual, and by extension the trauma and recovery experienced by their communities.

This body of work not only serves as a reminder to remain concerned about the ongoing persecution of people around the world based on their backgrounds and beliefs, but also reflects on the complexities and limits of empathy as we look to pursue justice more compassionately.

Hannah Rose Thomas demonstrates the potential of caring and creative practices that take time to listen, learn, and focus a prayer-like attention on the suffering of others and in the process reveal a sense of interrelatedness, common vulnerability, and shared humanity that allows for healing and hope.

Hannah Rose Thomas is a British artist and an UNESCO PhD Scholar at the University of Glasgow. She has previously organized art projects for Syrian refugees in Jordan; Yazidi women who escaped ISIS captivity in Iraqi Kurdistan; Rohingya refugees in Bangladeshi camps and Nigerian women survivors of Boko Haram. Her paintings of displaced women are a testament to their strength and dignity. These have been exhibited at prestigious places including the UK Houses of Parliament, European Parliament, Scottish Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Lambeth Palace, Westminster Abbey, the International Peace Institute in New York and The Saatchi Gallery.

Her exhibition Tears of Gold was featured in the virtual exhibition for the UN’s Official 75th Anniversary, “The Future is Unwritten: Artists for Tomorrow.” Hannah was selected for the Forbes 30 Under 30 2019 Art & Culture; shortlisted for the Women of the Future Award 2020 and selected for British Vogue Future Visionaries 2022. Hannah’s debut art book Tears of Gold: Portraits of Yazidi, Rohingya and Nigerian Women was published in 2024, with a foreword by HM King Charles III.

The book also presents Thomas' stunning portrait paintings of Yazidi women who escaped ISIS captivity, Rohingya women who fled violence in Myanmar, and Nigerian women who survived Boko Haram violence, alongside their own words, stories, and self-portraits. A final chapter features portraits and stories of Afghan, Ukrainian, Uyghur, and Palestinian women.

These portraits, depicting women from three continents and three religions, are a visual testimony not only of war and injustice but also of humanity and resilience. Many of the women have suffered sexual violence; all have been persecuted and forcibly displaced on account of their faith or ethnicity.

Hannah Rose Thomas met these women in Iraqi Kurdistan, Bangladeshi refugee camps, and Northern Nigeria while organizing art projects to teach women how to paint their self-portraits as a way to reclaim their personhood and self-worth. She gives women their own voice both by creating a safe space for them to share their stories and by using her impressive connections to make sure their stories are heard in places of influence in the Global North.

Thomas uses techniques of traditional sacred art – early Renaissance tempera and oil painting and gold leaf – to convey the sacred value of each of these women in spite of all that they have suffered. This symbolic restoration of dignity is especially important considering the stigma surrounding sexual violence. Hannah’s work attests to the power of the arts as a vehicle for healing, remembering, inclusion, and dialogue.

Long after the news cameras have moved on to the next conflict, this book shines a spotlight on the ongoing work of healing and restoration in some of the most vulnerable and marginalized communities around the world.

Hannah's essay from the book can be read here. My interview with Hannah for Artlyst can be read here. My Church Times review of her UN75 exhibition is here. Hannah exhibited at St Stephen Walbrook in 2017 and posts about that exhibition are here and here. Hannah also participated in a HeartEdge workshop on 'Art and Social Change' which can be viewed here.

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Tim Hughes - We Won't Stay Silent.

Sunday, 8 October 2023

God gives back what we rejected to become the cornerstone of our lives

Here's the sermon I shared at St Nicholas Laindon this morning:

The Parable of the Wicked Tenants (Matthew 21:33-46) is in essence the story of Jesus’ ministry, arrest and death. He is the son that is killed by the tenants to whom the landowner entrusted his property and he is the cornerstone that, although rejected, becomes the stone which holds all the others up; the keystone, the crucial link, the vital connection.

However, while this is the story of Jesus, it is also the story of the Israel of his day; a chosen people who were not fulfilling their purpose despite multiple messengers, most recently John the Baptist, having come to warn them of their need for change.

When Abraham was called by God he was told that he would become a great and mighty nation and that all the nations of the earth would be blessed in him. The nation founded through his obedience to God’s call was to be a blessing to all nations. The people of Israel were reminded periodically of this call, as in Isaiah 49:6 where we read:

“It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the survivors of Israel;
I will give you as a light to the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

The prophecies collected together in Isaiah also show the kind of place that Jerusalem was intended to become; a place to which all nations could come to hear from God:

“Many nations will come streaming to it, and their people will say,
‘Let us go to up the hill of the Lord, to the Temple of Israel’s God.
He will teach us what he wants us to do;
we will walk in the paths he has chosen.
For the Lord’s teaching comes from Jerusalem;
from Zion he speaks to his people.” (Isaiah 2. 2b & 3a)

Instead of that vision coming to pass, by the time of Jesus, the Temple had become a symbol of Jewish identity with all sorts of people excluded from worship unless they conformed to the detailed requirements of the Mosaic Law. The Temple and the worship in it prevented the free access to God that God wished to see for people of all nations.

In Jesus’ ministry, crucifixion and post-resurrection commission to his disciples, we see him tearing down barriers that prevented sight of God and raising up those whose position in society excluded them from worship. In his ministry Jesus expressly went to those who were excluded from Temple worship, including them both by accepting them (and teaching that they will enter the kingdom of God ahead of the religious leaders) and by healing them so they could actively return to the Temple worship. When he died the curtain separating people from the most holy place in the Temple was torn in two, showing that access to God was now open to all. Jesus also prophesied that the Temple itself would be destroyed and that when this happened his disciples should take his message of love to all nations.

As an Iona Community liturgy puts it, Jesus was ‘Lover of the unlovable, toucher of the untouchable, forgiver of the unforgivable, bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh, writing heaven’s pardon over earth’s mistakes. The Word became flesh. He lived among us, He was one of us.’ As Christ’s followers today, we inherit the task of putting into practice what Jesus has achieved through his life, death and resurrection. We are the people today who are called to work towards that Isaianic vision of nations streaming to learn what Israel’s God wants them to do, settling disputes among the great nations, hammering swords into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks, and never again preparing to go to war.

Sam Wells, Vicar of St Martin-in-the-Fields, notes that: “The stone that the builders rejected didn’t find a place in the wall somewhere by being thoughtfully included like a last-minute addition to a family photo. The rejected stone became the cornerstone, the keystone – the stone that held up all the others, the crucial link, the vital connection. The rejected stone was Jesus, as our Gospel reading makes clear. In his crucifixion he was rejected by the builders – yet in his resurrection he became the cornerstone of forgiveness and eternal life.

That’s what ministry and mission are all about – not condescendingly making welcome alienated strangers, but seeking out the rejected precisely because they are the energy and the life-force that will transform us all. Every minister, every missionary, every evangelist, every disciple should have these words over their desk, their windscreen, on their screensaver, in the photo section of their wallet, wherever they see it all the time – the stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.”

He says this is important because, if we’re “looking for where the future church is coming from, we need to look at who or what the church and society has so blithely rejected. The life of the church is about constantly recognising the sin of how much we have rejected, and celebrating the grace that God gives us back what we once rejected to become the cornerstone of our lives. That’s what prophetic ministry means.”

With these words, Sam Wells turns the story on ourselves, just as Jesus did with the chief priests and the Pharisees of his own day, who heard his parables and realized that he was speaking about them. In the eternal relevance of Jesus’ parables, Jesus tells this story to us in order that we realise he is speaking about us. As church and society, there are many people that we reject and exclude, so, as Sam says, we need to look at who or what the church and society has so blithely rejected, to constantly recognise the sin of how much we have rejected, and celebrate the grace that God gives us back what we once rejected to become the cornerstone of our lives.

I saw this happen in practice one year at St Martin-in-the-Fields when Jesus and the disciples in our Palm Sunday Passion Drama were members of the weekly 45-strong asylum-seekers group that meets at St Martin’s every Sunday afternoon, many of them experiencing homelessness and destitution in London – including a Kurdish Iranian, a Ugandan, a Dominican Republican, a Bangladeshi, a Kenyan, a Zimbabwean and a South African. One, a Ghanaian, spent two years travelling to the UK, crossing the Mediterranean from North Africa in a boat and waiting for many weeks in the Calais Jungle. In our Passion Play, at the last supper they gathered around Jesus – played by Sam, a young Afghani refugee - waiting on his every word, knowing from their own lives what it means to hope and pray for salvation.

Sam Wells described what happened to those of us watching this Passion Drama:

“The British public sees asylum-seekers as a threat or at best an administrative burden. The churches tend to see them as objects of pity and mercy. On Palm Sunday they were none of these things. They were prophets, preachers, provocative witnesses to the gospel, challenging us at St Martin’s, used to thinking of ourselves as edgy and politically engaged, with the question of where we each stood in the passion story. This was the first time our International Group has led us into worship. In the past, members of the group have joined our fellowship by acting as wicket-keeper or demon opening bowler in our cricket team, or as waiter for our hospitality events. But on Palm Sunday they were swept up into the passion narrative itself. And they changed the whole way we thought about the story we thought we knew.

Sam from Afghanistan sums up St Martin’s because he is the asylum-seeker who played Jesus in the drama and was water boarded for our salvation. He sums up St Martin’s because we aren’t about condescendingly making welcome alienated strangers, but instead about seeking out the rejected precisely because they are the energy and the life-force that will transform us all. Sam sums up our community not because he gratefully received our pity but because he boldly showed us the heart of God.”

The choice that Jesus puts to us in this parable is either one of standing with those who persistently reject the cornerstone or becoming those who seek out the rejected precisely because they are the energy and the life-force that will transform us all and, thereby, becoming a light to the nations. Which do we want to be and which will we choose to be?

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Ed Kowalczyk - Cornerstone.

Sunday, 23 July 2023

Weeds, Wheat, Fruitfulness and Messy Spirituality

Here's the sermon that I shared this morning at St Mary's Runwell:

This story (Matthew 13. 24-30, 36-43) divides people into weeds and wheat. So, who are the weeds and who are the wheat? Our natural tendency as human beings is to want to know and to assume that we are in the wheat camp rather than the weeds camp.

More worryingly, our natural tendency as human beings is probably to try to identify those who are different from us and attempt to weed them out of our community. That is what we call scapegoating and, interestingly, it is a human tendency that the French cultural critic, Rene Girard, suggests is gradually unmasked and exposed by the Bible. Firstly, because the people of Israel sacrifice animals as scapegoats instead of other human beings (as happened in the nations around them at that time) and then as God himself, in Jesus, becomes the ultimate scapegoat bringing an end to the need for any further scapegoating. “Jesus’ ‘strategy’ as the ambassador from a loving, non-violent Father is to expose and render ineffective the scapegoat process so that the true face of God may be known … in the scapegoat, or Lamb of God, not the face of a persecuting deity.”

It’s not difficult to think of times and places in our society where scapegoating occurs. Whether it’s the scapegoating of refugees that characterises the Government’s Illegal Migration Law or the way we view travellers as different from us or, in the Church, the ways in which the LGBTQIA+ have historically been excluded from leadership and some sacraments. Whichever side of those issues we stand on, we need to beware of arguments often made by those at the extremes which would seek to rid us of those who don’t agree with their position because Jesus, in this story, says that it is not our job to pull up the weeds from the field.

It is not our job partly because, if we were to try, we would pull up the wheat with the weeds. In other words, we do not know, as we look around our church, the Anglican Communion, or our society, who are the wheat and who are the weeds. It is God who “searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts” we are told in 1 Chronicles 28. 9 can see what goes on in our hearts, he knows “the secrets of our hearts,” says Psalm 44 and this is because it is God who created our inmost beings and formed us in our mothers’ wombs, as Psalm 139 tell us.

Therefore, it is for God, not us, to make that judgement in his way and in his time. Jesus warns us that it we judge others, we ourselves will be judged by the same measure we use on others (Matthew 7. 1&2). Again, he is saying that it is God’s place to judge, not ours, and, even, that we are likely to be surprised by the judgements that God makes at the end of time. Sometimes, Jesus says, as in Matthew 7. 21-23, that those who appear to be the most religious are actually those who are among the weeds.

So, it is not our job to judge, but God’s, and he will do so in his way and his time. What we need to do is to trust that that is so and we do this by allowing the weeds to grow together with the wheat. In other words, Jesus is commending here the aspect of Anglicanism that, it seems to me, has always been its great strength and glory; its holding together from its inception of ‘catholics’ (with a small ‘c’) and protestants and in more recent centuries its holding together of the diverse streams that have developed within those traditions – anglo-catholicism, evangelicalism, liberalism, the charismatic movement and so on. To hold these things together is, it seems to me, to show absolute trust in God’s ultimate judgement because we are allowing the wheat and the weeds to grow together.

Rowan Williams, in the opening session of the 2008 Lambeth Conference, encouraged the bishops and archbishops present to “find the trust in God and one another that will give us the energy to change in the way God wants us to change.” That is, he said, “the most important thing we can pray for, the energy to change as God wants us to change individually and as a Communion.” But it is trust in God and one another, he says, that will give us this energy.

Why is that? Well, if all our energy is going into pulling up what we think are weeds then our energies are not going into what makes for fruitfulness. Our responsibility is not to be monitors and judges of others but to allow our energies to flow into developing the fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. This won’t happen if we are forever distracted by try to spot and root out weeds but if we trust God to sort out the weeds in his way and time then we can focus on the things that contribute to fruitfulness.

This means that we need to accept what the author Mike Yaconelli called Messy Spirituality. This is the reality “that all of us are in some condition of not-togetherness, even those of us who are trying to be godly.” We’re all a mess, he says, “not only sinful messy, but inconsistent messy, up-and-down messy, in-and-out messy, now-I-believe-now-I-don’t messy, I-get-it-now-I-don’t-get-it messy, I-understand-uh-now-I-don’t understand messy.” Can you identify with that? I know I can.

Yaconelli goes on to claim that Christianity is a messy spirituality for people like us who lead messy lives: “What landed Jesus on the cross, was the preposterous idea that common, ordinary, broken, screwed-up people could be godly! What drove Jesus’ enemies’ crazy was his criticism of the ‘perfect’ religious people and his acceptance of the imperfect, non-religious people. The shocking implication of Jesus’ ministry is that anyone can be spiritual.” To prove his point, he suggests we look at the Bible where we will see that its “pages overflow with messy people” because “the biblical writers didn’t edit out the flaws of its heroes.”

Just look at today’s Old Testament reading (Genesis 28.10-22), where Jacob dreams of angels ascending and descending a ladder from earth to heaven. From the time of his birth, Jacob was associated with trickery and deception. His most notorious acts of trickery were committed against his twin brother Esau. Jacob offered his “famished” brother a bowl of soup in exchange for his birthright as the firstborn son, which was a double portion of his father Isaac’s inheritance. Moreover, Jacob robbed Esau of their father’s blessing, which had been Esau’s right to receive. Nevertheless, Jacob ends up receiving a vision of angels and heaven. That’s nothing if not very messy.

Those who follow God in the pages of scripture are not perfect, far from it, and yet they strive for the perfection of God the Father. We need to be the same, humbly recognising our own fallibilities and therefore bearing with the failings of others yet seeking to change ourselves and supporting others in the changes that they are also able to make.

So, let us do what Rowan Williams has suggested and pray for the energy to change as God wants us to change, individually and as a church, even as the Anglican Communion:

Pour down upon us, O God, the gifts of your Holy Spirit, that we may be filled with wisdom and understanding. May we know at work within us that creative energy and vision which belong to our humanity, made in your image and redeemed by your love, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

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M Ward - Epistemology.