What is in Kelvin's Head?

How shall we pray for our elected representatives?

18/01/2019

Last Sunday morning there was a service from St Mary’s Cathedral on Radio 4. It was my job to write the script for the service.

To many people’s surprise, the service goes out live, meaning a very early start.

One of the features of doing a live broadcast like that is the necessity of listening to the news at 7 am and 8 am before the service starts at 8.10 am. Should something significant have happened, it is not unreasonable for that to be reflected in some way in the service.

We had a really tough one a few years ago when we were doing the same live broadcast on the weekend on which there was a terrorist attack on Glasgow Airport. This had taken place just before we had a rehearsal on the Saturday and it meant rewriting the service throughout the evening to reflect the unfolding news story. One of the clear things that I remember was that I wasn’t allowed to use language to describe what had happened until the newsroom had used it. Throughout a long evening, we went from “unexplained incident” right through to “terrorist attack”.

I also remember a time when the choir had rehearsed the South African national anthem before a broadcast as it seemed entirely possible that Nelson Mandela might die at that time and we had to be ready.

This week there were no sudden incidents. There were no unexpected deaths announced on the news and no particularly shocking incidents in the 24 hours before we went on air.

The script was unchanged – though a huge amount of thought had gone into how we were to pray at this time.

How are we to pray in any religious community at a time when the country is divided and our elected representatives are thrust so entirely into the spotlight?

How do we pray about Brexit at all?

It seems to me that one of the characteristic things that Christians do is to pray for those whom we have elected.

I suspect that this means very different things to different people. For me, I think I’m holding them before God and hoping that they will be blessed with wisdom, generosity and understanding. I know others who pray that God with cause elected politicians to implement particular policies but I don’t really see God doing that much so that’s not for me. It does seem reasonable to pray for the places that we are associated with and again that seems a very long tradition indeed. The book of Jeremiah seems to give a strong steer:

But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.
Jeremiah 29:7

I rather like that – seeking the welfare of the city seems practical and active alongside the injunction to offer prayers for the city too.

But we don’t always know or agree about where or who we are.

Last Sunday for the radio, I wrote a prayer which went:

Saviour of the world,
we remember all who have decisions to make which affect the lives of others.
We pray for elected representatives in our parliaments in
Strasbourg, Westminster and Holyrood
as decisions are made which will affect all our lives.

We pray too for this great city and pray that you will let Glasgow flourish.

God in your mercy

ALL: HEAR OUR PRAYER

Now, that’s a fairly uncontroversial prayer to pray here in St Mary’s Cathedral in Glasgow but it is entirely possible that a Brexiteer might have spat out their morning cup of Earl Gray with something of a splutter to hear our European politicians being prayed for.

I think it is significant that Europe has been rather absent from the intercessions of a great many churches. After all, I often hear people in churches praying for the Queen, Ministers of State, the Government, MSPs at Holyrood, the First Minister, the Prime Minister and so on but I don’t ever remember hearing anyone pray in a church in the UK for Donald Tusk.

If collectively, as a people, we had been more thankful for the EU, would we have prayed more for its welfare?

Praying for leaders can be controversial too. Within the history of Episcopalians in Glasgow there were those who very much didn’t like the Hanoverian monarchs to be prayed for. It was said that at one time people snorted snuff in order to provoke a sneezing fit at the weekly mention of one of the King Georges in the intercessions. In other places, people slammed shut their prayer books at that point.

I don’t really know the historical truth about this, but it was said in Perth when I lived there that St John’s Episcopal Church still regularly prayed for the Queen on a Sunday as they had essentially been a Qualified Chapel, whilst St Ninian’s Cathedral did not normally pray for the Queen on a Sunday as its congregation was formed from the Jacobites (and wannabe Jacobites) of the town who refused to Qualify.

[Please sprinkle a load of Scottish Episcopalian Rose Tinted History Petals upon the last couple of paragraphs as you read them]

Prayer is a complex way in which we define ourselves, even as we couch our prayers as supplications to God.

I remember being in the Middle East in a large congregation once and someone nudged me and pointed to a couple of well dressed men wearing sunglasses. “Look,” I was told, “the secret policemen – they are here every week to make sure we are still praying for the President”.

Prayer – or lack of prayer, can be dangerous.

I like to know my Member of Parliament and other elected representatives. I know what it is like to stand in elections after all. I’ve done it.

When I meet politicians, I sometimes say to them – “Don’t forget we pray for you”.

Generally speaking they seem grateful.

I suspect that thinking thoughtfully, carefully and kindly about our elected politicians right now might be a rather important thing to do.

God bless them.

praying for politicians

7 responses to “Twitter and the Church”

Justin

18/06/2009

First, congratulations Kelvin on your appointment as I&C Board convenor, and thanks to you and all who contributed to the SEC’s Synod Twitter coverage, which worked really well.

Some thoughts:

Next year, as was suggested by some of the Synod ‘Twitterarti’ we should have a proper Synod 2009 Twitter account, like that set up by the Church of Scotland for their Assembly. And it needs to be integrated into the Synod pages on the Provincial website from the outset.

It would also be good to integrate the #pisky Twitter stream into the Provincial site on a permanent basis, or to set up an SEC account for that purpose. I would also suggest making the site’s SEC blogroll more prominent. And the SEC Flickr streams.

I understand the concerns some have about the impossibility of monitoring what’s said on Twitter and the blogosphere, and its undeniable that sometimes people will say insensitive and daft things that will offend and hurt.

But that is part of the very nature of online communication. The days when organisations could manage their channels of communication through press releases and a limited number of printed publications are gone. The web has democratised communications media, offering a low cost platform for all members of an organisation: the concept of gatekeepers at the top approving and filtering information is redundant.

Like all organisations the SEC needs to embrace and engage with things like Twitter, blogs and other social networking tools, or people will simply bypass the ‘official’ channels and jump straight to where the real conversation is happening, like your blog.

It’s not just Twitter we need to embrace, but the existing web platforms we’ve already got in place. I’ve been honoured to be asked to develop a number of websites for the SEC over the past couple of years, including the Provincial site and a few diocesan sites.

Some good use has been made of these – Kennedy in particular has been doing some great stuff on the Glasgow site over the past few weeks. But my perception is that the web still plays a very muted second fiddle to print as a means of communication within our church.

At Provincial level I don’t see why all the good news material should be kept for inspires magazine. I think it should go straight onto the website as soon as it becomes available. If it’s kept in inspires nobody outside the church can see what’s going on. I don’t think subscription rates to the magazine would be affected at all if inspires material also appeared online: most commercial magazines have found that putting selected material online serves to promote rather than threaten their presence on the newstands. There are now more printed magazines than ever, and they all have websites.

I think we should allow the boards and committees to post their material direct to the SEC News section. That would, I think, encourage far more of them to contribute their material to the website.

The same applies at diocesan level: nearly all the good news is kept back for the diocesan magazines, and almost none of it makes its way to the website (again, I know Kennedy is doing his best for the Glasgow site).

News and events functionality, RSS feeds, photo galleries: they are all there on the diocesan websites waiting to be used. I have to be frank and say that communicating our diocesan news through rather poorly designed newsletters (where the Comic-Sans wars are still taking place) received only by insiders, makes us look very old-fashioned and insular.

I realise that sounds rather harsh, and that people are volunteering their time to put together the magazines. But I don’t see why we are spending so much time and money doing it that way when the web is there waiting to be used. I love the church and want it to grow, not continue to decline. The web is our friend, offering so many exciting possibilities, and its importance as a means of communication will not be grasped unless we keep banging on about it!

My tuppenceworth. Very interested to hear what others think. Congrats again and best wishes in the new post.

Reply
gaielle

19/06/2009

Congrats and Best Wishes indeed, Kelvin. A most demanding role and requirement.

Encouraged by Justin, I shall add a penny-ha’pennies-worth.

Communication in the world of today is a serious and complex undertaking, isn’t it, not least because there are so many across-generation and accessibilty issues involved, leaving the ‘non-tech’ community disenfranchised if the ‘old fashioned’ hard copy approach is neglected – or perceived to be neglected. Hard copy will continue to be an essential medium for a while yet – and rightly so.

But equally important, and especially for reaching, including and empowering the youngest generations in the SEC, is the recognition and inclusion of new and newest technologies. Perhaps the teenagers in our midst have some useful insights to offer us for Developing Mission Outreach. The Good News was given to us to share – with everyone.

Good – effective – communication is a great thing when you encounter it. Rare Creature tho it be. Fully – and clearly intended to BE – fully inclusive, and therefore encompassing and using ALL practical and available methods of communication.

Problems in achieving Good Communication so often seem to be due to omission, oversight and a lack of appreciation of The Need To Try.

So, for instance, I Receive Information From Other, I process this internally with every intention that my Final Response will then be shared comprehensively – but I first neglected to Assure The Other that I had Actually Understood What They Were Saying. In consequence the Information I have Taken On Board may be incomplete or flawed – hence I have (inadvertently no doubt) neglected that very important step of Ensuring My Understanding Of Information Matched what Was Being Said…….

“What Is Said”, what is “Intended To Be Heard”, “What Is Heard” and “What Is Understood” are frequently 4 different things. However, effective/”good” communication requires a thorough appreciation of such likely mis-match, and also requires enormous strategic endeavour (until the skill becomes second nature) to outwit the intervention of MisUnderstanding.

As with anything in life, a little digging, hoeing, watering, general nurture and attention will reap a fine result. It takes time, and it takes effort. Such, however, are well worth investment.

But you will know these things. There is no need for me to be teaching you to suck eggs. I was just mulling out loud.

All Very Best Wishes for balancing the new hat. (I assume the new post includes a hat ?)

Reply
gaielle

19/06/2009

PS. If there is currently no hat, maybe we could invent one…………..

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Kennedy

22/06/2009

Perhaps one of our issues is that in the absence of any centrally provided forums for discussion – eg. we don’t normally have a letters page in Inspires – then the blogs and other social media just step in and provide the forum for the sort of discussion that people obviously seek.

If staff at GSO aren’t involved then the discussion is the poorer for that.

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jaye richards

23/06/2009

Just a little point, and I’m curious as to your thoughts on this, but how would you feel about someone tweeting during , say, one of your sermons or during a particularly uplifting piece of music ? is there a time and a place for this kind of communication, and might this include a religious service

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Kelvin

23/06/2009

I’d be bothered if someone was disturbing others with their tweeting. However, I was chastened a couple of years ago when I became a little distracted by someone near the front apparently unable to sit still and seeming to send lots of text messages.

It turned out however that he had the whole bible on his mobile phone and was simply looking up the passages as they were being talked about.

So, I’m not bothered about discreet twittering, I don’t think, though someone might well choose not to twitter in order to be able to concentrate more on what was going on. Part of a spiritual life in most traditions is about learning not to be distracted sometimes, and choosing not to be distracted during worship would be an admirable path to try to follow.

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jaye richards

24/06/2009

I have to admit to being disturbed sometimes during conference presentations by those around me twittering, although I do it myself so perhaps I shouldn’t complain ! I do think there’s a time and a place though, and for me, anyway, a sacred service is not the place to tweet from.

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