What is in Kelvin's Head?

Easter Sermon 2022

18/04/2022

https://youtu.be/738ChTRb61I?t=2104

Years ago I remember going on holiday. It was my kind of travel – ferries and trains and buses and then a sailing trip with friends who used to take me despite and not because of my sailing abilities.

And there was this one morning that I remember. Will always remember. I’d managed to get myself off the boat without much incident. And rowed ashore and went for a walk in the first light of the day.

And on the walk I heard something. A tiny bird singing. And not just singing but singing its heart out. Trilling its way up and down in a way that even the best singers could only dream of.

I caught sight of it. And I recognised it. I knew what it was immediately. It was a tiny little wren singing in the morning air.

And it was one of those special, perfect holiday moments. The kind of thing you never forget.

And I felt particularly blessed. It was so rare to see a wren and hear it sing. And it sang just for me.

What a journey it had been to get to hear it. Travelling right across the country. Sailing and paddling my way across the sea. I had come a long way. And it was all worth it for the rare sound of the wren in the morning air.

It felt like a very special moment.

Fast forward a few years.

And lockdown came along.

And with the first lockdown the instruction to go out and walk every day for half an hour. And I did.

The world was still. The roads silent. The traffic gone.

And I got three hundred yards from my front door. Nearer to where I live than we are now.

And I heard a sound. Familiar.

Imagine that. I’d heard it once on holiday. So many miles away.

Well what do you know, I said. Three hundred yards from my front door.

And I listened and then went on. Another couple of hundred yards. And another tiny bird was singing.

And then another and then from across the canal, another.

The lockdowns were long. The pandemic has been long and it isn’t over yet. I think we’ve seen enormous generosity sometimes. And enormous selfishness at others.

All of human life was changed, but all of human life was there, the best of life and the worst.

For the last two Easters we have been telling one another the stories of Easter in ways that we never expected to have to do.

And it was good to do so. But I longed, oh how I longed to be able to bring people together do tell them again in this place.

For Holy Week matters to me.

For the stories of Holy Week are our stories of today. Always. All human life is here.

In Holy Week we encounter the worst of human behaviour.

A week in which we hear of bitter betrayal by Jesus.

Violence whipped up by unscrupulous leaders.

Pilate literally washing his hands to try to pin the blame for the crucifixion on others.

And a broken man buried with no ceremony, and no proper funeral whilst others celebrated a feast.

We do not need to look far to see the passion played out in our midst.

The violence being experienced by Ukraine at the hands of Putin is a real-life crucifixion story.

The agony of those of us who experienced heart numbingly difficult funerals whilst others partied in Downing Street is a bitter passion tale.

The suggestion that we should send those seeking refuge in this country on a one-way ticket to Rwanda is a bitter betrayal. A betrayal of this country’s international commitments. A betrayal of those in desperate need. Not one passion story but thousands of stories of people betrayed by those who should offer friendship, fairness and common decency.

The government’s proposal to export the neediest and the most desperate to a land far away for “processing” is immoral, shameless and obscene.

I say to the government today – You can’t outsource compassion. We are better than this.

Seldom was resurrection hope, the message of Easter Day more needed than today.

But Christians do not simply wring their hands on Easter Day.

On Easter Day, we proclaim that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead.

And it isn’t just that if that is possible for Jesus then it could happen to us. The Christian believe is that if that happened to Jesus then it will happen for us.

It isn’t just our believe that if Jesus gets new life then the world might get new life. It is our conviction that it will! And that it does.

We believe that death and betrayal, corruption and selfishness, bitterness and anger, violence and destruction… these things will never have the last word.

These are not things to live by.

Jesus Christ is risen from the dead and with his rising comes the news that the world is changed.

We have known love so many times by the pain it has caused us during the pandemic. The pain of separation. The pain of death. The pain of not being able to comfort one another.

Love is deep within us. And sometimes it hurts.

But love is the root of God’s mission to the world. Love that will not let us go.

It was love that brought Jesus into the world. And it is love that reaches into the very depths of hell to haul him out and us with him.

And it is love that causes us to encounter the world through the resurrection of Christ. Love that tells us to proclaim that new life has come; that death is not the end.

It is love, love buried deep, deep, deep within us that tells us to hope for, work for and believe in a world where pain and suffering will be gone. Where the tears will be wiped away from every eye.

Where we will encounter love and hope and joy in every human life so that everyone who lives and breathes on earth may be able to hear that every bird is singing.

Something happens at Easter which breaks the pattern of sin and death for good.

And I tell you that it has happened this day.

For if Christ were not risen from the dead, we would not be gathered here.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Media reports

Priti Patel’s Rwanda plan ‘immoral, shameless and obscene’, says Glasgow cathedral provost – Scotsman

Sending asylum seekers to Rwanda a bitter betrayal, says senior church leader – The Times

Boris Johnson attacked by Glasgow priest over Rwanda scheme and partygate – The National

Radio Scotland interview with Lucy Whyte – Good Morning Scotland 18 April 2022

7 responses to “Gender Segregation in Universities and Elsewhere”

Nick Brindley

13/12/2013

The issue that Universities UK was advising on wasn’t single sex meetings but segregated seating, which is significantly different. They were talking neither about organisations nor meetings that were closed to members of either sex but of segregation by sex within a single meeting open, on that basis, to all.

This isn’t to say that it isn’t important to think about the issues you raise, just that they are substantially and importantly different from the issues raised by the UUK advice, which in turn are different (as UUK say in this response http://blog.universitiesuk.ac.uk/2013/11/25/external-speakers-guidance-segregation/) from those raised in the subsequent debate)

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  13/12/2013
  
  I also remember about 15 years ago welcoming a straight couple into an Anglican congregation who told me that they had never sat together in church before, it being the custom where they came from in rural Wales for men and women to sit on opposite sides of the aisle in church.
  
  They also told me that it was the custom to put up on a board what everone had given the previous week.
  
  Reply
Kelvin

13/12/2013

Thanks Nick – I wasn’t aware that this was what had caused it. I don’t think my comments are irrelevant to that situation and some of the discussion I heard on Today was broader than simply over seating.

I am reminded of the performances of (I think) Oleana by David Mamet in which the audience was seated in gender segregated seating. It was an interesting experiment and one that made many uncomfortable.

I struggle to think of any situation where I would support gender segregated seating on the basis of the preference of the speaker.

Reply
RevRuth

13/12/2013

In Homerton Hospital 10 years ago they had invested big bucks in a stunning multi-faith chaplaincy centre. Women Muslim patients still said their prayers in the stairwell.

I say No to segregation.

Reply
Nick Brindley

14/12/2013

I certainly wouldn’t want to (try to) introduce segregated seating into my churches but that’s a slightly different question from telling others they’re not allowed to segregate, which is what’s in question in this case. The advice from UUK was that Universities should tolerate meetings being held in their premises where seating was segregated. The advice was not aimed at anyone who wanted to segregate but at the owners of buildings such people might want to use. From the point of view of the Church we’re more likely, I would think, to be in the position of the University than that of the meeting organisers, since segregated seating is more or less unknown in contemporary British Christian settings (as far as I know).

Reply
1. Kelvin
  
  14/12/2013
  
  I’ve only encountered segregated seating in Coptic churches and in Synagogues.
  
  As I said above, I have met people who have lived their lives in the UK in a church which did practise segregated seating.
  
  Reply
Duncan

14/12/2013

Good points, well made.

The thing that does disturb me a little in this debate (refreshingly absent from your piece) is the shrillness of the liberal voices I have heard (particularly on Radio 4) about that fact that, on occasion, consenting adults might want to sit in separate groups.

Listening to them, it was as if one of the 10 commandments had been broken. (“Thou shalt not sit in a group comprised only of members of the same sex where there exists a group of the opposite sex in close proximity.”)

IF there is no coercion, overt or implicit, then surely people are free to sit ‘where the heck they like’ (to quote the University spokesperson speaking on this issue.)

What it did raise for me, however, is the fact that coercion is rarely absent from group gatherings of any sort – where the pressure to conform can be strong. And churches are as ‘bad’ at this as any other group. Group norms – whether voiced by the shrill cry of left-leaning liberals, or conservative Imams, or vicars on Sunday – are stubborn and powerful little blighters. I’m not sure that legislating them in – or out – really works.

Reply