New Blog on the Block, and a couple of other thoughts for the week

Mark Murphy, commenter here, has developed his own blog, Tumbling Ages.

Welcome, Mark!

His "About" page is here and his initial, vision-casting page is here.

I like what Mark says at the last link:

"I’m calling this blog Tumbling ages because it seems appropriate for the polarities, disorientation, intersections, and complexity we are living through. My particular focus will be Christianity, the religious tradition I was born into and have practised all my life, and which I’ve been rediscovering with special urgency as a middle adult. I hope this blog might be read by others on their own tumbling journeys of curiosity, disintegration, and wonder."

In the "disintegration" of the world around us this week, I note (in no particular order of merit or demerit):

- a news report this morning that Trump is "very angry" with Putin. As best I can see, his anger is that Putin is just the person many of us in the West had already marked him down as. In the language of a former time, he was, is and always will be "a cad and a bounder."

- lovely, joyful to be in Dunedin on Saturday for the ordination of the Reverend Dr Anne van Gend as bishop and installation as new Bishop of Dunedin. (No news report yet on Anglican Taonga.)

- Archbishop Justin Welby has given a first interview since concluding his term as Archbishop of Canterbury: sorrowful, regretful, explanatory. I feel for him. There is much that is "overwhelming" for bishops.

- it was good to participate in an Evensong last night to celebrate the life and achievements of one of Christchurch's most renowned architects, Benjamin Mountfort (1825-1898). This month of March being the 200th anniversary of his birth. His imprint is on our city (albeit with some removals from the scene due to the earthquakes in 2010-2011), and on our nation.

I have tried telling you so

Something I am often saying is that we (Western Christians in respect of living Christianly in the Western world) are in a very difficult place because there is a tide of secularization sweeping our world and it makes our gospel work of witnessing to the Good News of Jesus Christ very difficult.

Secularization is the notion that one doesn't need God to live a blessed life, that society can operate more or less effectively without organised religion, and it has an ever increasing grip on the way we Westerners live. 

So we see these days: few people want to hear our message; many people who have heard the message no longer identify as Christians, or if they do still identify as Christians are no longer active in the church; even if there is not outright hostility to the gospel, there is steadfast indifference to it; and generally, in a wonderful world of material plenty, longlife through good health and effective health systems, there seems, for many, no need of God in any sense, let alone the God of Jesus Christ. (Please remember that no matter how long the waiting lists for operations, or how many people need food from foodbanks, across the whole of Western societies we are way better off than our forbears ever were.)

Incidentally, secularization doesn't have much trouble coping with "spirituality" compared to "organised religion"; and it seems, in NZ, to be coping with karakia in public events (whether or not those karakia are thoroughly Trinitarianly Christian or not). What secularization doesn't cope with is that there might be another authority - indeed, the Authority of authorities - than "the state", "public opinion", "me."

Let's be honest: the secularization sweep across societies and cultures has absolutely enjoyed a boost from the many, now well reported failings of churches, especially in respect of sexual and spiritual abuse. failure to lift women into leadership and slowness to keep up with scientific discoveries.

Back to my key point which is this, we underestimate the tide of secularization at our ecclesial peril. We are in a situation where we must pray, be faithful to Jesus, bear testimony to Jesus, and hope hugely that God's power through the pervasive Holy Spirit in our world will find a way out of this current "dark age" into a new age of (true, gospel) enlightenment. Yes, let's do all we can with our courses and programmes, with improving our welcomes at the church door and what happens inside the church worship and teaching spaces: through such things people come to faith, people remain in the faith, and God is honoured. Yes, let's celebrate every church which is growing in numbers, especially because people are becoming Christians.

But let's do all we can with eyes wide open to the scale of what we face as census declarations of Christian identity wane, as church attendance (across all churches) declines (either in sheer numbers or in proportion to a growing population or both), and as we face closures of churches, parish mergers and so forth.

What prompts me to write thus and so this week?

A recent post by John Sandeman at The Other Cheek alerts us to this:

"... Nexus, a conference attended by evangelical ministers mostly of the Sydney Anglican variety. ...

From all accounts, they were examining responses to the attendance drop in Sydney Anglicanism, frankly facing up to their problems. For a overview of the stats a good place to start is the passionate speech by Dominic Steele complete with graphs that slope down, down that he gave at the Sydney Synod (church parliament) – he happens to host the Nexus conference at the Annadale Village church he leads."

(As an aside, the post linked to above is actually about some interesting observations made by a Presbyterian at the conference.)

What did Dominic Steele have to say?

"Steele began with this graph, which shows a steady attendance until 2017, then a decline which is projected through the Covid years of 2020 and 2021 and a bounce back in 2023. Steele noted: “Sydney Anglican adult attendance declined 6.7% between 2013 and 2023, or 14 percent against population.”"

Now, in the Anglican world of the West, Sydney is "the" diocese which stands staunch on certain fundamentals of the "orthodox" Anglican faith, stands true as "conservative" on the spectrum of theological positions held by Anglicans, and stands out in its contribution to leadership of and within GAFCON. When the jibe is made (often by certain pundits of my acquaintance) that the only growing churches in the Anglican Communion are the conservative, orthodox ones, I can only presume that such generalisation includes the Diocese of Sydney ... even as it is meant to exclude, oh, I don't know, my own diocese [smile].

But the evidence is not supportive of this generalisation that the staunchly orthodox grow. Church growth through conversions is hard in our secular world. If any diocese in the Western world should grow on the basis that one particular approach to gospel ministry is destined to succeed, then it should be Sydney. But like all of us, it too is finding it difficult to counter the tide of secularization.

To be very clear: this post is not having a go at Sydney re its particular character. That might or might not be a post for another day. It could be that the statistics of church attendance are such that Sydney is doing, so to speak, "least worst" of all dioceses in the Western world, that is, it is the best of all of us.

The question remains, I suggest, that there are no easy answers to the matter of "what then should we do?" as gospel Anglicans eager to see people come to faith, for the church to grow in numbers as well as in depth.

There are, however, some straightforward things we should do simply because we love the Lord Jesus Christ: pray, bear witness to the love of God in Jesus Christ, through word and deed, give praise to God, and break bread together. The Holy Spirit is in charge!

New Sights to See in John's Gospel

This past weekend I have been at a retreat for bishops and spouses - something we managed two years ago and then again this year. Hopefully we can do this again next year. What follows are some insights I gained, catalysed by things said during the weekend, but for these thoughts, especially if deemed heretical, I am solely responsible!

So: something said about Jesus being fascinated with us; about how we respond to the word "heart" (e.g. Jesus looking into our hearts and being fascinated by us) got me thinking ...

- When God or Jesus looks into human hearts, with the notable exception of the young David's heart, it is (interestingly enough) often less than good things that are found there.

- My thinking, for instance, was drawn to John 2:23-25 where Jesus does not trust himself to people "because he himself knew what was in their hearts."

- Yet, thinking about where in the gospels Jesus might be "fascinated" with someone, my mind went to John 1:43-51, the story of the call of Philip and Nathanael. When Nathanael and Jesus meet, Jesus says something about Nathanael - that he is an Israelite without guile - and Nathanael asks Jesus how he knows him.

"Jesus answered, 'I saw you when you were under the fig tree before Philip called you'."

Jesus "sees" Nathanael. Although there is no mention of Nathanael's heart, it is pretty clear that Nathanael's heart is looked into by Jesus, and he likes what he sees.

- But, further, that got me looking again at this chapter and the verb "see". Jesus invites two disciples to "Come and see" where he lives (39). So, "they went with him and saw where he lived" (39). Andrew introduces Simon to Jesus. Jesus "looked at him" and tells him his name will now be Cephas/Peter (42). Jesus then finds Philip and Philip finds Nathanael. When Nathanael questions whether anything good can come from Nazareth, Philip says - of course!! - "Come and see" (46). Then, per above, Jesus says he "saw" Nathanael (48).

Are we done yet on the verb "see" in John 1?

Not at all!

"Then Jesus said, 'Do you believe just because I told you I saw you when you were under the fig tree? You will see much greater things than this!' And he said to them, 'I am telling you the truth: you will see heaven open and God's angels going up and coming down on the Son of Man'." (50-51)

I realised, pondering these occurrences, that I had never really seen (!!) this verb "see" so often in this chapter.

What is going on?

With some background learning about John as a gospel of revelation, of disclosure of inner secrets of the divine life (e.g. John 3), I make the not particularly original suggestion that John is not merely reporting an interesting dialogue to us which points to his gospel being a gospel of revelation - enabling us to see things about God's purposes in Jesus Christ - but is, in fact, issuing an invitation to us as readers ... to see. 

To see for ourselves what the disciples here in John 1 have been invited to see: who Jesus is, what his relationship to God the Father is, what the significance of his life, death and resurrection is, what life in the Spirit of God holds in store for those who not only "see" but also "believe."

And there is more: just as the disciples-and-also-us-who-read-the-gospel are invited to come and see for ourselves about Jesus; we are also being invited to understand that Jesus sees us: he knows who we are, he knows what we are like, nothing is hidden from his sight, and yet, wonderfully, marvellously, he loves us and he invites us to "Follow me".

A final insight - though I think this one came to me a little while ago rather than at this retreat - but I thought some more about it while on retreat: it concerns why the great theme of the Prologue (1:1-18), that Jesus is the Logos/Word is hardly touched on again in the remainder of John's Gospel.

In John 1:14, we read - the very familiar words - "the Word became flesh" - the Word took on the full form and substance of a human being, Jesus of Nazareth. Is the remainder of the Gospel concerned with the history of "the flesh" the Word has become, and that is why we see little further reference to Jesus being "the Word" (and such reference as there is, is somewhat oblique rather than explicit)? The Word becomes a human being and John is now focused on the meaning of the human being (with particular and recurring reference to this fleshly Jesus being the Son of the Father).

In particular, in John 1, we see "the Word" being, in the fleshly man, Jesus, addressed with all the familiar christological titles from the other gospels: Son, Son of God, Rabbi, Messiah/Christ, King of Israel,  Son of Man, plus the novel-to-John title, Lamb of God. Through the remainder of the Gospel, John will stick to familiar titles, but all, it could be argued, as stretching out and focusing within the meaning of Logos/Word; and all such titles being used of the historical Jesus of Nazareth, whose history is retold because when Jesus is, according to the awesome, profound insight of John, "the Word became flesh" there is more to see than has been brought into the light by Matthew, Mark and Luke.

The critical importance of theology in the world today (according to Jesus himself)

Yesterday's gospel reading, Luke 4:1-14, The Temptation of Jesus, is pertinent for the world today in which Christians in some places are taking positions (supporting Trump, supporting Putin, calling for women to be removed from public life because Supreme Courth Justice Barrett voted with other, 5-4, to ... wait for it ... insist that the Trump government pay for work the US government had said it would pay for, writing about "the sin of empathy" and for forth) which come with a Scriptural backing but which seem very, very, very at odds with the main run of Christian thinking through 2000 years, or, more simply, are theologically unsound. 

Famously, in this narrative, the devil attempts in the third temptation to draw Jesus away from God's will, by quoting Scripture at him and Jesus responds by quoting Scripture back to the devil. Dare we use the word? Jesus trumps the devil's knowledge of Scripture! In this case, Psalm 91:11-12 v Deuteronomy 6:16.

But the obvious question to then ask, not only of this narrative, but any such exchange between people quoting Scripture to (or, at) each other, is, on what basis is one Scripture "better" than another Scripture? It turns out that Why is Jesus right and the devil wrong?, has the same answer as Why am I right and the Jehovah's Witness knocking at my door wrong?

That is because what Jesus is doing in Luke 4:1-13 is not a kind of "Scripture chess" (To your Knight to D6, I counter with my Queen to B8) but an exercise in theology - in the right understanding of God's will for the world. That is, what God wants and what the devil wants are at odds with each other, and the resolution of the dispute does not come from mere knowledge of Scripture (noting Jesus quotes Scripture to the devil in the first two temptations (4:2-3 [Deuteronomy 8:3] and 4:5-8 [Deuteronomy 6:13]). Resolution comes through Jesus' knowledge of the will of God - the mainline, if you like, of theology: in this theology, Jesus is to be God's agent (God's Son, God's Servant, God's Anointed) in the redemption of the world; not the agent of the devil. Moreover, Jesus will be the suffering servant of God (see the passage following, when Jesus is rejected at Nazareth, 4:14-30) rather than the triumphant, magically powered, populist servant of Satan. Jesus knows and understands this, not only because he has read Scripture and studied it well, but also because of his experience of God at work within him and around him (so, Luke 1-3): his theological understanding is informed by Scripture but it does not solely consist of a treasury of memorised verses. Jesus' theological understanding flows out of a reckoning with the main message of Scripture: that God is God, God has created the world, and even when the world has rebelled against God, God's love for the world sets out to redeem the world back to God. Jesus is committed to that plan and not to the devil's alternative.

So, Jesus himself affirms, through this passage, the importance of theology: of rightly understanding God and God's will for the world.

In our crazy, upside-down world - and, also, in this weekend's horrible, terrifying news, that Christians and others are being massacred in Syria - we need theology as much as ever in the history of the Christian faith. We need a right understanding of God and God's will for the world.

Otherwise the charlatans calling for women to be removed from public office, finding no fault in the supine surrender to Putin or, conversely, willing to remove Russian Orthodox priests from office for proposing a [Russian] end to the war will win. And the massacres will spread unabated.

Two of my favourite prayers (with NZPB postscript)

Two of my favourite prayers were prayed in yesterday morning's 8.30 am Holy Communion service at St. John's, Highfield, where I presided and preached. I would like to share them with you as oases of spiritual calm in a week of terrifying developments which our children and grandchildren may look back on as turning points in a world of (relative) peace heading towards World War III (Chinese navy firing exercises in the Tasman Sea; the White House vicious Trump-Vance ambush of Zelensky).

The Prayer of Humble Access [pp. 425-26]

We do not presume
to come to your holy table,
merciful Lord,
trusting in our own righteousness,
but in your great mercy.

We are not worthy
even to gather the crumbs from under your table.
But you are the same Lord
whose nature is always to have mercy.
Grant us therefore, gracious Lord,
so to eat the body of your dear Son, Jesus Christ,
and to drink his blood,
that we may evermore dwell in him
and he in us.
Amen.

The Gate of Glory [pp.428-29]

Father of all,
we give you thanks and praise,
that when we were still far off
you met us in your Son and brought us home.
Dying and living,
he declared your love,
gave us grace
and opened the gate of glory.
May we who share Christ’s body
live his risen life;
we who drink his cup
bring life to others;
we whom the Spirit lights
give light to the world.

Keep us firm in the hope you have set before us,
so we and all your children shall be free,
and the whole earth live to praise your name.

POSTSCRIPT

In comments to last week's post, questions were raised about "stories behind" and "authorship" of specific prayers in A New Zealand Prayer Book [NZPB].

OTOH: some stories are known, circulated and authors identified. So Bosco Peters' contributed these notes:

"There's quite a bit of history & several stories about NZPB in my thesis - free online: liturgy.co.nz/you-can-read-my-thesis and there's also quite a few stories buried on my site (18 years worth!) - with an excellent search box."

"... One other point: the litany mentioned in the comments, "Let us be at peace within ourselves..." is The Rev. Jim Cotter's adaptation of the Buddhist monk Thích Nhất Hạnh’s Litany for peace: https://liturgy.co.nz/interbeing"

and Liz notes:

""Lord, it is night", I found the story of that (quite by chance) after a quick search to remind myself of the words - up came a link to Bosco's site so I went there - and also got the back story! Funny how things happen: https://liturgy.co.nz/lord-it-is-night"

The last is a brilliant story about the late Canon John WIlliamson, a priest of our Diocese of Christchurch.

To the links above we could add Brian Carrell's [my father's] memoir of his work on the then NZ Prayer Book Commission, Creating A New Zealand Prayer Book, which is available for sale as a hard copy from Theology House, or as a Kindle copy via Amazon.

OTOH: we could note that with the exception of some specific acknowledgments of external contributors to NZPB, the Commission sought to anonymise its internal contributors so that the book as a whole would be seen, received and used as a resource of the whole church, agreed to by the whole church, via General Synod, with no favoured prayers because individual authors were identified.