Homily for Ascension Day

Go out to the whole world - proclaim the Good News!

(First Draft - to be updated)

As I think a lot of you know, I am a great fan of technology. It’s not just the gadgets I like, but its what they can do. I listen to podcasts and audiobooks while I walk the dog. I don’t buy a newspaper, but I read the news on my phone or my computer. !’m on facebook, my space, friendfeed, plurk, ping and meebo (or is it beebo?) I use email rather than postage stamps. I tap appointments onto the screen which I carry in my pocket. I’ve made podcasts. I put together websites. I write a blog. I use twitter. (In fact on twitter I have the second most followers of any clergyman of any form of Christianity in the whole of England!)

Does this make me a better person? Not really.
Does all my technology make me efficient and reliable? Oops, not necessarily.
So is it just a hobby and all a waste of time?

Well, of course not.

It’s not that everybody has to use email or surf the web, any more, I suppose, than everyone ought to drive a car or have a telephone. And its not that all these gadgets and gizmos will be here for years to come. Some may last, others will fade away like the quill, the comptometer, the abacus, the telegram and the K-tel Egg Slicer, and live only in the corridors of museums.

The point of course is not the gadgets, the technology, however interesting or annoying they may or may not be. What is important is what we do with them.

These are all ways of communication. (And today is a day of prayer for the Church's work in the social media). And just as the first Christians used the methods of their own day - standing at the street corners and in the market places, speaking before Kings and rulers, sending letters along the roads of the Roman Empire, travelling by horse by mule by foot - so in our own way we do the same today, by email, by website, by video and by audio, by blog and by twitter, because we are called to spread the word, to teach the faith, to proclaim the Gospel.

It is a divine command, and whatever the means, the methods or the technology we are sent to do it: proclaim the Good News!

Homily / Sermon for Easter Six

Love one another, as I have loved you

Love is a word widely used, and widely abused. It refers to a rush of emotion. A stirring of urges. A blinding of reason and a driving passion. Love is powerful, and it is dangerous. It can drive people to madness, or murder. It inspires jealousy. It too often leads to heartache and tears.

Well, so you would think from watching popular dramas, or reading literature. So you would think from reading inside the newspaper where the more interesting human stories are told.

But of course, this is not the love which Jesus speaks of.

Why not? Well it is not because Christian love is unrealistic or idealised. Quite the opposite: it is the idealised, one-sided kind of love which leads to pain and anguish.

The love of God is real, realistic, because it is not one-sided, or deluded, but because it is mutual, it is shared - love one another as I have loved you. It is not the obsession or infatuation of one person for another, but a sharing of lives, of commitment. It is giving and receiving. It is not about choosing, but about being chosen. This is the love that bears fruit - because this is the love that will last.

And in this month of May, we celebrate the one who loved Christ into the world, and in the world. The one who loved him before the world ever knew him. The one who fed him and nursed him and hugged him and gave him up, to embrace him again in his death and resurrection. We celebrate she who in loving him, loves us too, and cares for us, and prays for us as our Mother.

When we sing our praises of Mary, we sing the praises of the Love that chose her, to go out and bear fruit, the fruit of her womb, fruit that lasts for eternity.

Homily / Sermon for Easter Five

I am the vine, you are the branches.
Whoever remains in me, with me in him, bears fruit in plenty.

We used to have a vine. When we lived in Oxford - in very built up Cowley, not far from the University Press and the Car Factory - our house was bordered by an old stone wall, which clearly used to be part of a farm. And by the wall - probably long after the farm was ‘regenerated’ (as we now say) - some imaginative soul had planted a vine. And the vine had grown up the wall, and across the wall, and had wrapped itself over the wall, hugged the round top like fingers extending their grip. From a root which could hardly be seen it has hugged the wall and extended in all directions. And we got grapes. In a warm summer you could just about eat them, though usually they were a little bitter. More often, one of the parishioners collected them to make wine. I don’t know if she put them in a Vat and trod on them - and sadly I never got to taste the wine.

Then one stormy spring, in very strong winds, the wine was swept off the wall, thrown over back onto the edge of our driveway, and lay rather forlorn on the ground. Try as we might it was too big and too extensive just to lift back over the wall. It didn’t die, but that summer at least it was a sad reminder of its former glory, and bore no fruit.

And Jesus compares himself, and us, in his Church, to a vine.

Like a vine the Church draws life from a single root, and that is Christ. Separated from the vine, the branches die: drawing life from him, they thrive. We may think that we can go our own way, pick and choose what we believe and how we live, but separated from Christ we will certainly not thrive.

Like the vine the Church has spread in many different directions. Strong and vibrant in some places, thin and sparse in others. Some strong branches may bear little fruit, while newer and flimsier ones are more abundant. The vine sometimes veers off in unexpected directions. It is not always neat - but it is always connected to the root.

Like the vine the Church bears a fruit. Not always easily palatable at first taste, but with tending and understanding, it makes a very fine wine. And the wine, the fermented fruit, brings life from the tree. 

And like the vine the Church needs tending. Life comes from Christ, but fruitfulness comes from our co-operation with him. A vine which is not cared for will wither. It may survive, but it may not be fruitful. A vine that is tended, and nourished and cared for will produce good fruit and excellent wine. So too the Church needs our commitment, our love, our obedience and our service - and if we do not give it, while it may not die, we may find it hard to draw life from it when we really need it.

Homily / Sermon for Easter Five

I am the vine, you are the branches.
Whoever remains in me, with me in him, bears fruit in plenty.

We used to have a vine. When we lived in Oxford - in very built up Cowley, not far from the University Press and the Car Factory - our house was bordered by an old stone wall, which clearly used to be part of a farm. And by the wall - probably long after the farm was ‘regenerated’ (as we now say) - some imaginative soul had planted a vine. And the vine had grown up the wall, and across the wall, and had wrapped itself over the wall, hugged the round top like fingers extending their grip. From a root which could hardly be seen it has hugged the wall and extended in all directions. And we got grapes. In a warm summer you could just about eat them, though usually they were a little bitter. More often, one of the parishioners collected them to make wine. I don’t know if she put them in a Vat and trod on them - and sadly I never got to taste the wine.

Then one stormy spring, in very strong winds, the wine was swept off the wall, thrown over back onto the edge of our driveway, and lay rather forlorn on the ground. Try as we might it was too big and too extensive just to lift back over the wall. It didn’t die, but that summer at least it was a sad reminder of its former glory, and bore no fruit.

And Jesus compares himself, and us, in his Church, to a vine.

Like a vine the Church draws life from a single root, and that is Christ. Separated from the vine, the branches die: drawing life from him, they thrive. We may think that we can go our own way, pick and choose what we believe and how we live, but separated from Christ we will certainly not thrive.

Like the vine the Church has spread in many different directions. Strong and vibrant in some places, thin and sparse in others. Some strong branches may bear little fruit, while newer and flimsier ones are more abundant. The vine sometimes veers off in unexpected directions. It is not always neat - but it is always connected to the root.

Like the vine the Church bears a fruit. Not always easily palatable at first taste, but with tending and understanding, it makes a very fine wine. And the wine, the fermented fruit, brings life from the tree. 

And like the vine the Church needs tending. Life comes from Christ, but fruitfulness comes from our co-operation with him. A vine which is not cared for will wither. It may survive, but it may not be fruitful. A vine that is tended, and nourished and cared for will produce good fruit and excellent wine. So too the Church needs our commitment, our love, our obedience and our service - and if we do not give it, while it may not die, we may find it hard to draw life from it when we really need it.

Homily for Easter Four / Sermon for Good Shepherd Sunday (Vocations)

The Good Shepherd

If you pay peanuts, as they say, you get monkeys.

It is a cynical view, but one with a lot of truth in it. If you are employed by someone else, then you expect a proper reward. When the situation is not so good, then commitment falls considerably. When you work for someone else, you may take pride in your work, but fundamentally, at the end of the day you can walk away.

On the other hand, if it is your own business, your own idea, your own vision, you are highly motivated. You want it to succeed. You work long hours. You will even work for peanuts. Your commitment is entirely different.

In this parable, Jesus hits on this very point. You could say it is the parable of self-employment, or the small business. But it is also the parable of vocation.

Because there are times when in a job our commitment is not like that of the hired man. When we are doing something which gives us a sense of vision and purpose, When we are caring for others, When we are sharing our skills or our knowledge: in all these situations we may work outside hours, for little or no pay, because we are committed to what we do. It is no longer a job given by someone else, but a job owned by us. And it is owned by us because it is an answer to the call of God within in. It fulfils us not so much because we have chosen it, but because it has chosen us.

And this is what Vocation is all about.

A job may be given to us by another human being, but a vocation is given us by God. And the trouble is we follow our own desires and needs, rather than listening to God.

Today on what we call Good Shepherd Sunday, we pray for Vocations to the Priesthood and the Religious Life. We pray that our hearts may be open to the voice of God, and that men and women may respond to God’s call to service. Pray for vocations. Pray for priests. Pray that men and women may hear the voice of God, and respond to it.

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Bidding Prayers for this day can be found here.