What is in Kelvin's Head?

Farewell to Oliver Brewer-Lennon – a sermon preached on 18 August 2024

19/08/2024

Jesus said, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the uttermost ends of the earth. When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight.”

Oh Oliver. If only your manner of going was the same as that of our Lord. Jesus is simply surrounded by a cloud and then he is gone.

If only I could shake the thurible at you and surround you with a cloud of incense only for you to appear from a similar puff of heaven over in St Michael and All Saints freshly minted as their new Rector.

Jesus does not seem to have had to go through much admin in his departure.

He didn’t need to think about handing over his keys – he’d already given them to Peter some time ago.

He didn’t need to book the removers to remove all his stuff in a wagon – foxes have holes and the birds have their nests but the Son of Man never seemed to have a need for a place in which to put all his mid-century modern furniture and his other half’s Hornsea pottery mugs and strange Apple computers that I will never understand, so there was nothing to take with him in the cloud when he moved on.

He didn’t need to clear out his office. He didn’t need to clear out his desk. He didn’t need to give up his email address. He didn’t need to hand over his University Chaplain’s keycard. And he didn’t need to change any of his login details for anything.

He was just … gone.

Oliver – it turns out that you and Jesus are not in fact the same.

And you are having to do something this evening which Jesus, when he moved on never seemed to do.

You are saying goodbye. Our Lord, rather surprisingly, never did. It is one of the most significant things about the Great Commission that he gave his disciples. He told them what to do but he never said goodbye. Somehow he knew something that they didn’t yet know- that he would be with them always.

This is the day that you have been working towards for some time now. And although I know that you are looking forward to your new role in Edinburgh with great anticipation – for it is the thing that you want to be doing and need to be doing, I also know that you’ve been anxious about today for it does mean saying goodbye.

Goodbyes are tough and I know that there is much that you have come to love in Glasgow and much that you and Joe have loved here.

I don’t know what you knew about the city before coming here. Maybe you looked it up.

The city has several slogans that have been attached to it. The first that we know of us the motto.

The motto of the city is “Let Glasgow flourish”. The full thing is “Let Glasgow flourish by the the preaching of thy word and the praising of thy name”.

Well, you’ve lived up to that. You have helped this cathedral in this city flourish.

Your job when you came here was to help me and to help this congregation to build itself up. It has not been the rebuilding that we expected to do. For just months after you arrived the world fell apart and we were no longer building the congregation up from a strong and stable base but building it pretty much from scratch all over again.

And I’ll never forget you saying to me with absolute confidence on the day that the first lockdown was announced, “Don’t worry, I know exactly what we need to do…”

It has taken considerable effort to rebuild this congregation and to build the new ministry that we have shared at the University of Glasgow. You were not in fact the Son of Man, the ruler of the Universe, the King of Kings or the risen and ascended Lord, but you were the perfect person to help us to do so much. You and I have had an unusual working relationship and along with others who are here this night and people who can’t be here, I’ve much to thank you for in helping us flourish, much of it by your confident preaching of God’s word and your passion for praising God’s name in worship.

Another of the slogans that Glasgow used for many years was “Glasgow’s Miles Better”.

That slogan never said exactly where Glasgow was miles better than. (But I’m pretty sure we all know the answer to that).

Oliver, I rejoice in your positive outlook. I rejoice that you can look at the church and think that it can always be better. And that you want to offer to God the very best that human beings can offer. You are not frightened of trying to do things well and of offering gold quality worship.

As you have done that here others have come to join you in doing the same. As you do that in Edinburgh, others will join you in doing it there. It is who you are.

I thank God for your commitment to doing things well as a mission strategy and hope that is a prayer-borne infection that others will catch from you.

Oliver, you can’t just zoom off in a cloud like Jesus. You have goodbyes to say tonight, you have things to do in order to get yourself to your new responsibilities. But before you go, know this. You have done what you came here to do. You have built this congregation up. You have loved us and we have loved you for coming here to share this strange and bewildering five years with us.

You have shared the love of God with us. And that love will remain here amongst us and help us flourish in the future. God doesn’t say goodbye,

But the time has come for you to go and share the same love of God with others.

Oliver, God is calling you to a congregation that I have much love and affection for. My sadness at you leaving here is tempered by my joy and delight that you will be the priest at St Michael and All Saints’ Tollcross.

They need you. And you need them too.

Oliver. Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.
In the name of Christ. Amen.

farewell, Glasgow, Great Commission, Oliver Brewer-Lennon, Scottish Episcopal Church, St Mary’s Cathedral, St Michael and All Saints

10 responses to “Response from the College of Bishops”

Father Ron Smith

12/01/2015

Thank you, Fr, Kelvin, for making the contents of the SEC Bishops’ Response to the Letter from 50 people concerned about their attitude towards the openness of the Church to the prospect of its eirenic treatment of clergy and Church members – desirous of solemnising Same-Sex monogamous relationships in the context of Marriage.

It seems to me – an outsider, but a member of the New Zealand Anglican Church – that the Letter has challenged your Bishops to positive action on behalf of Christians – and others – who consider faithful Gay relationships to be equally acceptable to God as those of heterosexuals. The Church, surely, must act to affirm faithful monogamous relationships on both sides of the spectrum.

Let’s hope your General Synod will move ahead to affirm such relationships, so that the Church may get on with other aspects of its mission; knowing that human justice for ALL people is paramount in the propagation of the Gospel. If SEC is pro-active in this important matter, it can only encourage churches like my own – in ACANZP – to follow suit.

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  12/01/2015
  
  The General Synod is, to some degree, inhibited from sorting this out until the bishops themselves decide to back a proposal which would allow all to flourish in the church.
  
  The synod contains the bishops and they have an effective veto on canonical legislation.
  
  I’m baffled at the moment as to why they have not rallied around a position which allows all of us, both those in favour and those against, to act according to our consciences in this area. I think that this is a position which would re-unite the church again. I know those who disagree with me on the substantive question about lesbian and gay relationships who are as mystified and as frustrated as I am that we are taking so long to deal with this and who, like me, want to get on with the business of letting Scotland’s people know that God loves them.
  
  Everyone I know says they want to come to a resolution which does not de-church other Episcopalians. The position that the bishops have taken comes very close to de-churching some of us and I remain greatly concerned for the Province as a whole.
  
  Reply
2. Christine McIntosh
  
  13/01/2015
  
  Amen.
  
  Reply
Pam

12/01/2015

From my reading, it’s a carefully worded document that attempts not to pre-empt what may happen at Synod. Talking to each other face-to-face is always better than written communication, in my opinion. This issue does need a resolution and I’m sure that people on both sides of the debate, in good faith, would want to honour each other. Bishops have a tough job but so do the people who don’t get the opportunity to attend Synod, for whatever reason.

Reply
Chris Hansen

12/01/2015

I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of being talked about by people who would rather not talk to me. This “listening process” that the C of E is going through is bull. They’ve been doing variations on that for years. Nothing comes out of it except more conversations. No progress is made thereby.

The trick is to push the bishops to take a stand and do some prophetic leading.

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  12/01/2015
  
  The current process in the Church of England is related to the Cascade Process that we’ve had in Scotland.
  
  Some people have benefitted from the process here. There’s no getting away from that. It has been a good thing for some but by no means all.
  
  Some have felt very disappointed and upset that the bishops themselves now appear not to have been working in accord with the principles of the process itself.
  
  And some, like me who have been working for change in this area for years, were excluded from the design of the process and from its major set piece provincial event.
  
  Reply
FakePete

13/01/2015

I feel very angry reading that.

Reply
Steven

13/01/2015

Dear Kelvin

Interesting developments. Not much in that letter really.

What would you do if you were Primus?

The reality is the SEC has always (at least in my mind) been open to a more progressive stance on this kind of issue and yet does contain those for whom this would be (very?) difficult.

Would you seek to maintain unity by some kind of compromise (CoE and women Bishops) or would you forge on ahead with prophetic change leaving those who didn’t like it to make their own choices (like the Episcopal Church)…?

The New Testament Christians didn’t seem to care much for unity at the expense of integrity and justice.

For my own part I think it is better for churches not to try and fudge this issue (look at the terrible mess in the Church of Scotland) but to agree a position and then firmly pursue same, come what may. People would not tolerate an institution that allowed a minority of people to adopt racist positions and so it should not really be any different for those who want to maintain positions that discriminate against same-sex couples.

All this is – of course – easy for me to say.

Steven

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  13/01/2015
  
  What would I do if I were the Primus? Well that’s a good question.
  
  The first thing I’d remember is that the Primus is simply the spokesperson for the College of Bishops and doesn’t have the authority that, for example, an archbishop might think he possesses.
  
  I would however as a bishop argue in a favour of a solution which allowed people to act according to their conscience in this area. I don’t agree that people should be forced to “firmly pursue” a particular stance over this issue. It isn’t who we are. In fact I think the problem at the moment is that people are being forced to pursue a position that they don’t agree with and that situation is unsustainable.
  
  The reasons for not forcing people to marry gay couples are these:
  
  1 – No gay couple wants to be married by someone who has been forced to do so but who would really prefer not to.
  
  2 – It would be illegal anyway and our canon law determines that we will abide by Scots Law.
  
  3 – We already have a precedent with divorce – no-one is forced to marry anyone who is divorced, they can chose whether or not to do so. I think that is a reasonable compromise and it has served the church well.
  
  4 – I don’t think anyone should be compelled to marry anyone and that is the situation that we currently have.
  
  However there are some positive things that a Scottish bishop could do at the moment. Although I agree that same-sex marriages cannot take place in churches or be done by SEC priests until there is a decision made by General Synod I don’t agree that it is the case that someone cannot affirm allegiance to the canons of the church because they happen to be in a same-sex marriage.
  
  I think de-coupling those two issues is urgent.
  
  I would argue in favour of an equal opportunities policy for the church.
  
  I would try to seek a way of bringing forward a synodical resolution which would allow same-sex marriage, allow those who don’t want to be party to it not to have to be and I’d argue in favour of that as a godly compromise that would allow us to get on with our gospel business of sharing the good news.
  
  If I were the Primus I would probably be encouraging the College of Bishops to allow me to say publicly that we regretted that some people had been excluded from the Cascade Process and I’d seek to commit the College to a more consultative leadership style. In particular I’d want to say that there should never be a process about people that did not include them in the design of the structures of the conversation. I’d want to say that we would never construct a conversation about the ministry of women without women being involved, we would never construct a conversation about ethnic minorities in the church without appropriate consultation with people who belong to ethnic minorities and I’d commit the church never to make the mistake that has been repeatedly made of constructing a conversation about LGBT people without their involvement.
  
  If I were wise, I’d be learning a lot more about the experience of trans people because I’d realise that trans issues are inevitably coming our way.
  
  Does that answer the question?
  
  Reply
  1. Steven
    
    13/01/2015
    
    Yes, it does rather. Thanks.
    
    For the avoidance of doubt I would not advocate forcing anyone to marry anyone. When I said it is better to adopt a position and then pursue that I meant in terms of whether or not to permit equal marriage in the SEC (which is not the same as saying that all priests would therefore be compelled to marry gay folk).
    
    We have just filed an equal marriage petition in Belfast, so thoughts and prayers all welcome!
    
    Steven
    
    Reply