What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Here’s to you, Bishop Robinson

    Gene small

    The Church of England is in full brouhaha mode today over gay bishops once again. Before saying anything about that, I think it is important to give a shout out to the Rt Rev Gene Robinson who is retiring today as Bishop of New Hampshire. It was obvious when he was elected and consecrated that the issues which excited people so much about him were going to be coming to churches all around the world. So it has proved.

    I caught up with Bishop Gene in September in San Francisco. He was the preacher in Grace Cathedral whilst I was there on my sabbatical trip. I could see him trying to work out who I was from across the sanctuary. When I reminded him that I was the person who invited him to celebrate the eucharist in Glasgow during the Lambeth conference, a time when he was said to be banned from every altar in England, his face lit up. Indeed, he described the visit to Glasgow as a “lifesaver” at a very low time.

    I’m grateful to him for his ministry here, one of the most electric Sunday mornings since I came here. I’m also grateful to him for keeping the faith, preaching the gospel and standing up to injustice. And yes, I’m proud of having known the first out gay man in a partnership (marriage now…) who became a bishop.  So, here’s to you, Bishop Robinson, Jesus loves you more than you can know. And I’m thankful for what you shared about that love whilst Bishop of New Hampshire.

    Bishop Gene seemed full of beans and pleased to be alive. He has good cause. When I stood next to him in 2008 in St Mary’s there were serious threats being made to his life and he couldn’t even distribute the communion elements because there was a fear that someone would stab him. Thank God things were more relaxed when I saw him recently. It was the Feast of St Francis in San Francisco itself and he and I got involved in blessing dogs, cats and a rather lively macaw.

    It is abundantly clear today that it is not all about Gene Robinson any more. The compromise that has been announced in England in the last 24 hours only turns the clock back by about 18 months and I’m genuinely surprised by all the excitement in the media about it. Nothing has changed since yesterday. The key facts remain the same:

    • The Church of England behaves badly to gay people in leadership
    • The public discourse of the Church of England at major festivals is dominated by a prurient interest in Jeffrey John’s private life.
    • The media don’t understand it but like the fuss and use any excuse to put nutters on the television

    I see only two ways in which this could end. Either one side or the other will win or alternatively there will be an agreement within the church that different views about human sexuality may be held with integrity. I rather favour the latter. It would need some common understandings about sexual ethics that focused on fidelity, passion and love rather than this uninspiring display of public disagreement but I think that could be achieved.

    I see no other options.

    Here in Scotland, I think that it is quite likely that a majority of people in the church would agree with me though it has not been tested. Meanwhile, our College of Bishops and our Faith and Order Board continue to behave as though a winner takes all approach to these issues (whereby we are all supposed to have our actions limited by the opinions of some) is the answer to what is wrong.

    The truth is, that attitude is not the answer, it is the problem. And somehow or another we need to move towards something more sensible, for our good and the good of all God’s holy church.

    Amen.

    , , , ,

8 responses to “More sermons”

  1. ryan Avatar
    ryan

    Listened to one of the sermons (the wife for Isaac one) and it struck me that the one thing all proper episcopal preachers that I’ve heard have in common is an attractive voice. Is this taught at theological college, or are prospective ordinands vetted, Simon Cowell on X Factor style?

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  2. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    You are too kind Ryan. And the idea that people at theological college should be taught anything to do with preaching is delightfully charming.

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  3. morag Avatar
    morag

    just read the kingfisher sermon,you really do have a beautiful way with words and imagery.I believe God is with us every day.I was walking with my dog in Kelvingrove park the other night and in the pond standing quite still and majestic was a large heron.He looked magnificent but nobody else seemed to notice they just walked on by.God is definitely in my local park,Victoria.There is a sort of semi wild section of large yellow Peace roses there and their scent is truly heaven “scent”I love to sit theredrinking it in and have quiet thoughts with God.This web page you have is truly unique and it is wonderful to come across someone in the church who so obviously has a living ,loving relationship with God

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  4. David |daveed| Avatar
    David |daveed|

    And the idea that people at theological college should be taught anything to do with preaching is delightfully charming.

    May I beg to differ, at least for this side of the pond.

    Both of the seminaries which I attended in the USA, had a department with professors dedicated to teaching homiletics & worship. At Perkins School of Theology, SMU, we took two required semesters, which included writing weekly sermons to be delivered in class for critique by both professors and classmates. Each semester we also had three sermons which were videotaped at staggered points in the class for us to be able to witness and have record of our own improvements.

    I was even asked to preach one of my three in my native Spanish and was critiqued by the hispanic community, staff & students at Perkins.

    Preaching and Worship are pretty standard fare at seminaries in the USA & Canada.

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  5. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    My apologies, David. I’d forgotten that we had gone global.

    I would say that I learned a lot about liturgy and worship during my training, much of it from other students. I don’t think there was much more than 15 minutes devoted to homiletics in all my training.

    I think that the theory was that this would be done whilst on placements in congregations. Although one can learn a lot in such placements, I think that preaching is something that everyone can always learn to do a bit better and that the church should not be shy of trying to teach.

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  6. ryan Avatar
    ryan

    I’m always curious as to whether preachers write out a full script of a sermon, actor giving a reading style, or if there is an element of improvisation. A 60 minute sermon,at average speaking speed, works out at 6,000 words which is surely a lot to write out in full each week.And what happens if there are pastoral crises that prevent completing the writing of a sermon? Do you guys have a folder of back-up material for such occasions? Are you allowed to plagiarise or is that a big a vice as it is in academia?

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  7. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    Thanks Ryan. Those are good questions.

    First of all, no-one in their right mind preaches for 60 minutes in the UK, do they? I think you will find on listening to mine that you get about 12 minutes. I think that if you are a regular preacher and you can’t say what you want to say in St Mary’s in 15 minutes you’ve probably started to preach next week’s sermon a week early. My recent one about dating strategies was just over 10, and there was a lot packed in!

    The readings that we use come round in a three year cycle so quite often one may have as a starting point what was said three years ago or six years ago. Using a common lectionary also means that a lot of people are preaching on the same thing at the same time and there are a lot of websites with emergency resources and other people’s ideas.

    I’d say that most preachers use other people’s ideas. Often it is nice to acknowledge them. Since putting all mine online, I’d say that I use other people’s material much less. I do sometimes use things that I’ve used before and in other contexts. If it was worth saying once, it might be worth saying again. Again, however, putting it online makes that kind of thing more risky now. They might have heard the jokes before.

    In a good week, I will have been thinking about the lectionary readings all through the week even through the pastoral events that come along. They feed into it somehow.

    Lots of my influences come from people I encountered when I was reading Divinity at St Andrew’s University. At the time I learned a lot from a prominent feminist theologian and have since learnt the importance of the Liberation Theologians that people were trying to get me to appreciate. At the time, it bored me silly. Now it is the stuff of life.

    They key is to develop a range of ways of reading the Bible. A repertoire of styles.

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  8. David |daveed| Avatar
    David |daveed|

    Ryan, there are many styles, and we all have to find which of them is a best fit for us personally. I know a few who preach from the barest of notes on a 3 x 5 card. Others who read verbatim from a type written manuscript. I think the majority of us type a manuscript and refer to it, however, certainly not slavishly, leaving room to expand or alter “as the Spirit moves.”

    The axiom I was taught by both John Holbert and Marjorie Procter-Smith was that if you preach more than 15 minutes, you do not know what you are talking about.

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