The Vicar's January Message

A God-shaped Hole in Each of Us

Historians tell us that, religiously speaking, there have never been “ordinary” times. Even though there may be the God-shaped place within each of us seeking wholeness and peace, there’s always a disruptive sense of restlessness around human living and faith.

The Bible is littered with examples of one generation prophetically moving beyond the last one – Samuel goes beyond Eli (1 Sam 2 and 3), Amos denounces the complacency of his day (Amos 8), John the Baptiser draws crowds of those who are seeking a new holiness (Mark 1) and Jesus denies the best efforts of the Pharisees as working only from the “outside”, not from that deeper place, “the centre” (Luke 7).

Through more than 2,000 years of experiment in how to be a community that follows the risen Christ, battles have raged, loyalties have been tested and the best of friends divided. However, such tensions only serve to remind us how urgent, deeply ingrained and vital within humanity is the search for our inmost source that tells us really who we are.

One way in which dissent has often shown itself is in the turning away from what no longer satisfies – sometimes to the East. In the 1960s, many people, tired of the banality of Western Christianity, travelled to Asia to find new spiritual paths, some of them like the American Trappist monk Thomas Merton to weave together the Western inheritance with the silent contemplative paths of the East.

This is no recent phenomenon, though. Turning to the East also happened in a major way in the fourth century when thousands of academics and others, dissatisfied with a materialistic life, abandoned universities and employment in favour of finding their centre in the deserts of Syria, Palestine, Mesopotamia and Egypt. Their turning away from all that was familiar – the security of being eastern astronomers (Matthew 2) or running a village fishing industry in Galilee (Matthew 4) - are further examples of the human response to God’s invitation to turn to the centre, away from living just on the surface of things.

On January 6^th every year we keep “Epiphany”. This word refers to an “aha” or eureka! moment, when the penny drops – and we have a new disclosure, or showing of the truth. It reminds us that amazingly, in the human life, preaching, healing, dying and Rising of Jesus, the God who throws stars into space, comes near and  “shows” us Godself,  without remainder.

This showing - that God is absolutely and endlessly for us and foreveryone - invites from us a constantly developing and loving response. The camel and kings and gold, frankincense and myrrh offer us a moving narrative, rich in Old Testament symbolism. This story invites us, in humility, like those “wise ones” from the East, also to be drawn towards “Bethlehem”. The name Bethlehem in translation means literally “House of Bread” and, like those who are without basic food, we are invited to have our hunger satisfied by also coming to the Bread House (or “Centre”).

Sharing bread and wine as companions on a journey lies at the heart of all that we do. If we think of St Mary’s as our local Bread shop – providing nourishment beyond anything we could give ourselves – we would want to be there as often as we could, to have food for our tough life journeys.

In this coming year there’ll be lots of ways of learning, travelling and sharing happiness – all early signs of the Kingdom which Jesus brings near. Our Lent learning, for which we shall soon be preparing leaders, will be calledBeing God’s People. My own greatest hope for this centenary year would be that we should be recognized as a community of the Resurrection, energized and shaped by the habit of being formed on a weekly basis in gathering for praise, scripture, reflection, prayer, peace sharing, offering and sharing bread and wine, and being joyfully dismissed to change the world with and for the Risen Christ.

May I, on behalf of all our leaders at St Mary’s, wish you God’s peace and wisdom in the year ahead.

Your parish priest

 Robin