What is in Kelvin's Head?

Sermon for Janey Godley

30/11/2024

She said, “I’ve been making lists”.

I said, “Oh, right. Is that lists of people that need to be invited to the funeral?”

She said, “Naw – not that”

Someone came into the hospice room for something and we were distracted.

I know that some of you might be a little surprised to find yourselves in church today.

The first time she came into this church, she had been chatting to me outside and wanted to look around.

But as we approached the door, she said, “I can’t come in”.

Why not, I asked.

Because it will fall down if I do.

“Oh no Janey, in fact that’s not what we believe in here”.

Janey had a complex relationship with religion.

She told me in the hospice that she had mocked religion through most of her career. But, she said, “The thing is, no-one much knew that I always had a church I went to. The church was always a place of safety to me”.

[And as she said that, I remembered a Sunday morning a few weeks before when I had smuggled her through the church to get her away from someone who was giving her grief in the street over her support for the trans community.]

But it was complicated. Janey’s religious experience was complicated.

Janey was baptised twice. She went into whatever church she could find without regard to what kind of church it was. She received the last rights three times. Somewhere or another there were Buddhists chanting for her when she died.

And one of her favourite phrases was, “That would be an ecumenical matter”.

The truth is, Janey was an ecumenical matter.

Brought up amidst the worst of Glasgow’s sectarianism, which she hated, she had good reason to mock much religion. And yet. And yet she did somehow hang on to belonging.

And some of her protestant forebears would have been surprised at her deep devotion to Mary, reflected in this service. The Hail Mary that we use in our prayers was a prayer that she held onto and prayed fervently and passionately. And many of those who heard her mocking the church would have been surprised to hear that she prayed every day.

Janey Godless certainly wasn’t the whole story. And we have brought her to a place this day, a place which shares in her inclusive values and a place that proclaims that Jesus is risen from the grave. And we believe that God’s love embraces all the world’s waifs and strays and wanderers as well as the holy and the pious.

She tried again. “I’ve been making lists”.

“What? lists of things you want to do whilst you are in the hospice?”

“Naw, don’t be stupid”

A nurse came in with something. I had to go out.

I met Janey in a couple of different ways.

I was aware of her years ago. But then during lockdown I found on YouTube that she was making these funny wee videos. Voicing for us all what she thought was actually going on in other people’s heads.

It was such a strange time. And it sometimes felt that Janey was producing these videos just to get me through the day.

Because I thought it was just me that had discovered these videos at first.

Little did I know that we all did.

“She got me through lockdown” is something I’ve heard again and again.

Janey was the voice of that time for me. And whilst the best government spin doctors in the world were trying to tell us what being 2 meters apart actually looked like, Janey cut through all the nonsense.

Everyone understood what it meant to be 2 Alsatians apart.

Big Isa, all the Sandras and me. We all understood it.

Her direct way of communicating got through to people when the official channels were struggling.

It is no exaggeration to say that it is likely that some people are alive today because wee funny videos from Janey kept them going through lockdown. And because we were able to make sense of the advice that was being given to us though those videos.

There still are people around the world who admire the plain speaking message that Scotland had at that time. Some of them are still surprised at the kind of language that our former first minister seemed to be using on YouTube and have still not really grasped that Janey and Ms Sturgeon were not one and the same.

Such is the internet.

She said, “I’ve been making lists”.

OK Janey. Lists of what.

The room was quiet at last. She got her chance to tell me what she had been making lists of.

“People,” she said. “People to forgive.”

Janey, knowing that she was dying was making lists of people to forgive.

And that’s what real religion and real humanity is made out of.

Janey had a great deal to forgive. Bad things had been done to her.

I asked her how she was going to forgive. She said that she was going to forgive everyone (including, she said, everyone who would be at the funeral) because her love was bigger than anything anyone had every done to her.

That’s a lot of love, by the way.

“So Janey”, I said. “Everyone? Can you forgive everyone?”

“Yes,” she said. “Everyone”

And what about American Politics, I asked, have you changed your mind about anyone. She smiled.

Friends, Janey Godley died having forgiven everyone.

But she still believed to her dying day, that Trump, is a country mile away from being someone who should ever have come anywhere near power.

So, what shall we say about Janey Godley this day?

It is our job to remember her today with kindness and with affection. With thanksgiving and love.

And I say this.

Janey Godly,

Daughter, wife, mother,

And beloved friend.

Defender of the vulnerable,

Champion of God’s belovèd trans community,

Fearless critic of tyrants, hypocrites and abusers,

Janey Godley,

Queen of comedy,

Daughter of Glasgow,

Doctor of the University.
May you rest in peace.
And Rise in Glory.

10 responses to “The Church of England and its Bishops”

Joan H Craig

20/11/2012

You put it well, and I agree with all that you say. In one sense it is a very sad day for priests who are women. In another, parity is crucial 🙁

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Patrick Smith

20/11/2012

I am not a regular C of E communicant now but have been so in my life and I unequivocally support the proper human rights entitlement of women to serve equally as Bishops.I think that the women priests appear to have been too inclined, cap in hand, to compromise that would still have deemed women bishops, as second class.This Vote, according to some of their spokespersons was as far as the talented women priests could get, amongst the conservative antis, in the C of E.

Surely,that in our enlightened world men do not hold a monopoly on either the aspiration to achieve good in their work or to eclipse human goodness in prayer,mission and faith in the ranks of the C of E? The Bishops and Clergy have seen that women are now do one third of active work in the C of E but do not have parity at the top table.

Why is it the case that women are ordained in the US and NZ and have served their communities equally, as men, over 20 years? Whereas, in the C of E at home, the vision of the Laity Synod threatens to derrogate the status of women, as if the clock had been turned back into Victorian times and before the Suffragettes had started their quest for universal suffrage and equality in work for women.

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Duncan MacLaren

20/11/2012

Nigel McCulloch said in the debate, “If you wait for the perfect piece of legislation, you’ll be waiting for ever.”
I can understand the principled position that you don’t want to pass flawed and discriminatory legislation: but I can’t help thinking this would be better than acquiescing for another 5 years in an even more discriminatory status quo.
Had women bishops been voted in, they would have had five years to demonstrate practically to their opponents that they were competent, valuable, indispensable, talented and undeniably called leaders in the church. Instead, we now have the task of creating legislation the opponents will like even less (because it won’t make space for their position), and then trying to get it voted through. And five years of practical experience – perhaps the best argument – wasted.
If there were six lay liberals (the margin of votes) who voted ‘no’ on principle this evening, I wonder how long before they will rue the day? Principle is all very well, but possession is nine-tenths of the law. Had women been granted this possession, we could have spent the next five years chasing down the discriminatory clauses: as it is, we are back to square one. Barren theological argument now prevails over the witness and example of flesh and blood women.

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1. kelvin
  
  20/11/2012
  
  I understand that view, Duncan. I’d agree with it if there was any evidence in the last 20 years of anyone either trying or succeeding to eliminate the flying bishops that were created last time around. It is much, much easier to create good legislation than to repeal, tinker and undo bad legislation.
  
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2. Augur Pearce
  
  21/11/2012
  
  As I see it part of the problem was the large number of Synod members who wanted to see women bishops but thought that unity was more important than principle, and were therefore prepared to compromise. The ideal scenario would not have been rejection of the Measure, but an amendment to get rid of the discriminatory clauses. That wasn’t possible because the ‘unity party’ (for want of a better name) would have allied with the fundamentalists to defeat it. I hope that those who made up this ‘unity party’ will now realise the time for compromise is past and support legislation which, as you say, the opponents will like even less because it wonâ€™t make space for their position. I believe such legislation would pass, but would lead the fundamentalists to dissent from the C of E and form their own conventicles (as many have done before them, for better reasons). There would then be some hope of the General Synod addressing other equality issues, such as marriage…
  
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Tim

20/11/2012

Could it be said that it spent too long cooking?

The impression I get is that the SEC was quite decisive in dealing with the Covenant earlier.
What I’ve seen with the CoE looks like internalized via-media meeting a half-open door – and no wonder some people use the word “irrelevant”. As such, I’m wondering if it shouldn’t have simply been “women bishops, yes or no?” a while ago and then there wouldn’t have been such clumsy inaccuracy of reporting, at least…

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Ritualist Robert

21/11/2012

I have to say, regretfully, that I am relieved it didn’t pass because, imho, it allowed for far too many ‘provisions’ for so-called traditionalists. Their arguments seem to be based on one of the most vile theological concepts ever invented – ‘taint’ – though, of course, nobody admits to it. I understand the Evangelicals’ objections (though I disagree with them), but I am flummoxed by things like the ‘traditionalist’ catholics’ demand for ‘flying bishops’ (a concept which fails any test for catholicity) and attacks the very basis of Anglican Church structure and order – that of a bishop acting as the Ordinary in his/her diocese. Choosing one’s bishop based on whether one likes their theological outlook is quite a novelty, but it’s one that the so-called traditionalists insist on being allowed. Moreover, to claim to be catholic surely means to support the Church. When the Church of England ordained women for the first time surely it was up to those catholics who disagreed to either (a) conform their minds to the mind of the Church – surely the duty of anyone who calls themselves catholic – or (b) to have enough integrity to part with the Church and find another spiritual home.

Instead we have so-called traditionalists promoting what are essentially congregationalist novelties whilst claiming – falsely, I believe – to be catholics, all the while arguing for a distinctly non-catholic version of the Church.

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Justin Reynolds

22/11/2012

If politics is ‘the art of the possible’ then surely all liberals should have backed the measure, whatever its flaws. The notion that one day we will all be marching hand in hand towards the sunlit progressive uplands is somewhat fantastic, I think.

Everyone who joins the C of E, or indeed the SEC, knows what kind of church it is: essentially progressive (as witnessed by the Synod vote) but with significant minorities opposed to change. And it isn’t like a political party where arguments are conducted in the field of political philosophy and politics with a realistic hope that the mind of the party might change decisively over time in one direction or other. In the case of the church disputes are necessarily more intransigent, concerned with the interpretation of revelation and long standing traditions. These disagreements take decades, indeed centuries, to resolve, in so far as they can be resolved at all.

Perhaps those who can’t live with compromise, be they conservative or liberal, should consider whether they are actually in the right denomination at all, rather than hoping that one day – sooner rather than later – everyone will agree with them. It’s often noted that conservatives can go Orthodox or Roman Catholic, as indeed some have. It’s less often suggested that liberals might consider Unitarianism or Quakerism. I say that as a liberal who has at various times wavered between those two – and others – and Episcopalianism. I’ve ended up as an Episcopalian, but I did so knowing full well the intractable nature of the disagreements besetting the denomination, and that I had to live with them or simply go elsewhere. It seems to me that Christians are far too sentimental and attached to particular denominations.

Also, with respect Rowan Williams’ tenure can hardly be seen as an ‘abject failure’. Everyone knew he believed in conciliation and compromise when he was selected. His liberalism on a number of issues only formed a component of his theology. And his intellectual contribution over the past decade to British national life has been significant, particularly in regard to political and economic issues. His archepiscopate has gone some way towards restoring Anglicanism’s intellectual credibility: witness the tributes from secular as well as religious quarters on news of his retirement.

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Seph

22/11/2012

Apparently Diana Johnson MP (Lab., Hull North) is planning to bring a ten-minute rule bill in the new year which will include a clause calling for women bishops. Parliament could succeed here where General Synod failed.

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Rosie Bates

02/12/2012

Check out Bristol Diocese action re Vote of No Confidence in Synod! How lovely on the mountains are the feet of Him who brings Good News! Hope the rest take note and follow a fine example. Hope in this Advent message. Bishop Mike was an Area Bishop in Oxford Diocese and likely to be very clued up to certain of their Synod Reps games which cannot be stopped before July without reform or, at the very least, tough love.

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