Faith, Community, church

We all come to church for different reasons.    It is not always for religion.  I remember one of the ladies in my chapel honestly saying to me that she didn't really listen to what I said on a Sunday morning.  She thought about the refreshments afterwards and how many cups and biscuits to put out.    

She was the third or fourth generation of her family to attend that church and she loved it because she belonged to it and always had done.  She was the one I relied on for planning,  maintenance and decoration.   It was the belonging that was important to her.   The truth is she was a bit wary of anyone new turning up.

Others come to church because they are on a religious quest.  They have a faith which is deep rooted but have not always found their way properly into it.     They might have gone to a church but what they heard or told how they have to live seemed to conflict with what they instinctively felt.  

Consequently they either leave their church or simply compromise, paying lip service but not truly engaged.     Quite often these spiritual seekers come to us, the Unitarians, that is if they can find us.   Sometimes they stay and sometimes they move on.

Having a faith is personal.    Talk about it or try to share it with someone and you will find it is the best way to scare them off.    I think there is a form of denial of the religious instinct.    If someone asks me what I do for a living and I say that I am a minister, it usually gets a reaction, usually negative.

They suddenly think they are in the presence of a different being - as if they should behave differently, not speak openly anymore.   Often they start to answer a question which hasn't been asked, as if I have said, Why don't you go to church?   

They usually say something like they don't need church, they find their religion in the great outdoors or they say, religion has ruined the world, which is true of course, or they don't like to discuss religion or politics.   Then of course that is exactly what they do like to do.   They want to talk about religion, because it is a deep question that people do want to talk about.    

As the old Moody and Sanky hymns said, religion is an anchor in your life.    And how without a spiritual anchor, your life really can drift.

Many years ago I went to a happy clappy service.   It was quite exhilarating.  The music was good, most people there really were happy and were on a high.   It was a strange mix.  They said they had found Jesus.   Jesus answered all the questions in their life, they said and sang.  They only had to follow.    

What put me off was the disdain they had for the rest of the world.  Yes they had a zeal to convert everyone they met, but unless you were converted there was no pity for you.   It seemed a high energy high end exclusive club.  I thought they were blinded by it.  It wasn't for me.

It made me think of Walter Raussenbauch one of the leaders in the social Christian movement.  He went to New York in the depression of the 1930s and set up soup kitchens in the streets.  His faith was in service to humanity. He noted those other missionaries going around with Bibles in hand, and, as he put it, pathetically trying to save souls.  I liked Walter Raussenbauch when I read about him.

Church is about community, about that feeling of belonging.  In my early days I had a couple of goes at joining churches.  The fact was I was lonely.  Living alone in London I found very difficult.  There was not the natural northern hospitality and easy chat I was used to.   Talk to someone in a pub who looked just as lonely as I felt and you were rebuffed.   Strange the world of loneliness.

I suppose that was also part of the culture of the churches I tried.   They either took no notice of you so you felt you had intruded on a private club or they came gushing over you and frightened you off.  Maybe I should have stayed and played myself in but the worship itself didn't speak to me.  

When I had my ministry I used to say to people who came along out of the blue.  Give us a go for three weeks and then decide.   

I suppose I had been guilty of not doing that.  And I suppose I was looking for community more than anything else.

In the end I joined the TA and found what I was looking for, a real community of friendship, adventure, physical activity and good pay.   

Funnily enough it was in the TA that I began to find the answer to my religious quest.  I had joined a TA regiment that had an added take on soldiering.  Yes they were a military organisation but they had a sort of golden rule.   They said to us, The only discipline here is self discipline.  If you break the rules you do get thrown out but you have let yourself down.     

So I felt religion is like that, you have a set of values and you try to live by them.   You might see yourself as a soldier of God as the Jesuits did, but you keep to those values by your own self discipline.  

I am a fan of Ignatius Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits.   He had been a soldier but was seriously wounded in a battle.   As he recovered he had a lot of time to think.   He said religion should be out in the world, not in the monastery.   

First You find your way to knowing God through the spiritual exercises.     The spiritual exercises are an intense course of self discovery by prayer, meditation and discussion, usually over a three week period.    Those who completed the spiritual exercises  could become a Jesuit  and thereafter they were loyal to the Society of Jesus and worked for good in the world.   

They did and still do much good work especially in education but they caused controversy.  They swore allegiance to the Pope but wouldn't be part of the church structure, refusing to acknowledge the authority of the bishops.  They were a sort of paraspiritual religious organisation.

    But I had a problem with all  Roman Catholicism, actually I have it with most of the Christian teaching.   I was asked to conduct the funeral of a man who had been christened a Unitarian.  When I saw the family, they said, actually they were all catholic so could I make the funeral as catholic as possible.   So I read it up.   There was an awful lot about being released from sin and hoping to be forgiven at last.  I cut those bits.

    I realised that by definition I am not a Christian.   Not in the Christian sense.   That was a great release, I could sort myself out and not bend the knee to teachings which didn't feel right.

     The first followers of Jesus were called people of the way, and I thought that was what I was.

    You might abandon the Christian church with all its doctrines but you should not abandon those teachings from the sermon on the mount, nor seek for the meaning in those parables and miracles.   

    Because they teach a way of life, which to me is as it should be.     And it is always positive, it is about letting your light shine in the world, be who you are.   And it is about personal prayer.  And it is about community.  Twelve quite different people going around together.

       I suppose it is a paradox.   You find your own understanding of faith. And it is personal, but you are better in a group, a community, a congregation.   

     It is why when I found the Unitarians I never left.   I like the community.   I meet like minded people in every congregation I visit and on the national scene.    

What I personally believe is my business, it doesn't matter to anyone else if I say I am a pagan gnostic, I can explore that in my worship and thinking and as well as have it challenged without being forced to give it up.

I know we Unitarians sometimes get it wrong.  We can be testy and unfeeling sometimes and prejudiced,  but the underlying trend is good.   It is easy to default, hard to stick to your principles.  

One of my friends stood up in the pub one day and announced he was going to Australia on the £10 scheme.   We all went to Waterloo station to see him off.  One of the guys insisted on reading a poem to him it at the barrier.  It was by Robert Service and the last line of every verse was, it is dead easy to die, it is going on living that's hard.  I don't know if he ever remembered that line, but I did.

    Where I go on my preaching travels I feel that connection to a community that cares for one another, looks out for one another when bad times come, and cares too about the suffering outside its gates, and it is based on a spiritual something that doesn't have to be declared.  

We spend a lot of time trying to define who we are and what we stand for.  To me it is easy.  We are a community of free spirits seeking the meaning of God.  

Those who stay with us find their own place on the way of life.   It reminds me of my old regiment that the spiritual values are those of self discipline, and of the Jesuits who say religion is best practiced out in the world not just in the cloister,  and my lovely friend in Bolton to whom the chapel itself was everything.

   

   

     

Prayers for August 15

We open our hearts to prayer.
Let us open our hearts to the mystery that moves in our lives, the
unseen touch on the soul that comforts those who that weep, the gentle
hand easing the courageous forward. A presence in the heart to console
the sad. A presence in the heart of joyful songs, a presence that is a
source of warmth, source of light. Mystery that understands weakness,
mystery guiding footsteps. The ancient light in modern darkness leading
lost spirits back to reverence and wholeness.
The paths of life lead towards unknown places, through strange
landscapes. The path is both an adventure and a trial. The expected is
not found. The unexpected can stand like a highwayman, yet we must
walk on, sometimes forced to turn aside, sometimes made to face our
fears. Sometimes walking in the light.
When times have been good let us be grateful and follow the sun. , when
times are sad let us walk on. Know that the presence of that greater
love walks with us, stands beside us when we pause. Becomes part of
daily life.
The mystery within can forgive wrongs and understand weakness. The
mystery within strengthens our own spirits and hearts and our own
hands to reach out and help the souls who travel with us.
In our prayer let us be the pilgrim band that joyfully makes the journey, at
ease with life, in love with the world and filled with a deep knowledge of
that holy mystery of God. Be welcoming to our fellow travellers, aid and
support them, for each one carries the same mystery in their hearts as
we do.

Thoughts on faith and altruism

What does it mean to be a person of faith?   

Some will say that faith is about trust.  Trust in the teachings of the church - teaching how to live your life as a spiritually inspired person, trust in the promises of redemption and salvation, trust in the way to make a better world.  Trust in the power of prayer.  Trust in the power of God

Christian faith communities will say that faith is found through study of the scriptures and belief in God.  Muslims will say the Qu’ran and Allah, Hindus the Gita and Shiva.  All require a submission to their own teachings.

Such faith communities often claim that the only way to make a better world is for them to be the sole rulers of it, albeit the spiritual rulers.   

If we could make everyone a Christian, said the church, there would be harmony everywhere and god's purpose would be fulfilled.   Onward Christian soldiers and fight the good fight.

But what is faith for?  Is it to conquer the world?    There are also those who have no desire to conquer anyone or change anything.  Their faith is that personal connection to God.  Faith is coming to church to worship, faith is private devotion, faith is enriching the spirit.   Faith does not have to involve changing the world, only living life as close to the image of God as you can.

This is about religious faith, trust in a guiding God, but there is another type of faith.  Not a religious faith but often connected to it or connected with it.

It is the faith that is a trust in humanity - altruism.  Trust in the worth of all human beings as individuals and as people.  For many it is a deeply held faith.  

Once upon a time it was the guiding faith of politics, making the country or the world better for everyone.   Governing the country for the benefit of everyone.  It was the guiding faith of philosophy.

The faith of altruism is about loving your neighbour as yourself, caring as much for their welfare as your own.

The Ten Commandments of socialism are all about altruism. there is no call to faith in these.

1. Love your schoolfellows, they will become your fellow workers and companions in life.
2. Love learning, which is the food of the mind; be as grateful to your teacher as to your parents.
3. Make every day holy by good and useful deeds and kindly actions.
4. Honour good people, be courteous and respect all, bow down to none.
5. Do not hate or offend anyone. Do not seek revenge, but stand up for your rights and resist tyranny.
6. Be not cowardly, protect the feeble and love justice.
7. Remember that all good things of the earth are the result of labour. Whoever enjoys them without working for them is stealing the bread of the worker.
8. Observe and think in order to discover the truth. Do not believe what is contrary to reason and never deceive yourself or others.
9. Do not think that he who loves his own country must hate and despise other nations, or wish for war, which is a remnant of barbarism.
10. Help to bring about the day when all nations shall live fraternally together in peace and prosperity.

To my mind these are two different faiths, religious faith and the faith of altruism, caring about your neighbour.   They are not one or the other but often both together like a double helix.

I was set thinking about this especially in this election week, as I look for signs of altruism.  

Those of us who look on Facebook will have seen pictures from several of our Unitarian congregations standing outside their churches last Sunday with placards that said, 'Migrants are people'. It was a Unitarian response to the drowning of so many people in the Mediterranean trying to reach Europe.

Is it practicing the faith of altruism?  Or simply practicing religious faith?

These Unitarian congregations have decided to stand as communities and be counted against what they call the trend of dehumanising people and against  describing them in terms of categories.   They say migrants are people not categories.  

Sometimes it is asked ‘What do Unitarians believe in?’    One simple answer could be  that they believe in Altruism.   That goes with their religious faith.

In this country, as in so many others we have so easily slipped into this usage to describe people in dehumanised terms - we read about 'immigrants' as if they are aliens come to invade us.   

We talk about Asylum Seekers not as people, not as individuals;  People on benefits are collectively labelled as the dehumanised lowest common denominator - scroungers, work shy.

It is easy to do, you take the worst minority in any group and then push everyone else down into it, then you can punish them all.  Of course there are a minority of people who do watch TV all day behind closed curtains and there always will be, but there are many more who are seeking a way out of this poverty trap, but it is hard when you are fighting against that ‘label’.  

There are people in work struggling to make ends meet, it is called part time poverty, or part time unemployment.  But they are all lumped together - they are all ‘on benefits’.    Maybe we senior citizens should begin to worry.    The pension we have earned by contribution is being referred to as a benefit these days.

I sometimes wonder how I would feel if our little terraced house in Bolton was blown up by a bomb, all our treasures gone, nothing left, or if we had to run the gauntlet of rifle fire just to get to Morrisons and find that they had been blown up too and looted.  There was nothing to eat for anyone in the district of Harwood and Bradshaw.   And then coming home there was a road block - Unitarians stand over there.

The bravest of us, those with a little cash would try to get out of it, go somewhere where there was no fighting and no bombing, make a fresh start.  How sad to achieve all that and then be treated as a scrounger, an alien, then locked up in a detention centre with your children to be sent back to where you came from.

Or maybe we would just give up and head for a refugee camp.  It would be a one way ticket and many years living in a tent donated by Oxfam.

Every single person stepping into a boat from Africa is a human being, a person who has taken extraordinary risks to get to that boat.

But for us it is a dilemma.  When we take a reality check, we feel a conflict between altruism and the selfish gene.   

Yes we feel anguish for the suffering of people trying to escape violence, some just seeking a better life.  Yes we feel anger against those who exploit the vulnerable, taking extortionate sums of money off them and then pushing them out to sea in unworthy boats.

But we also feel fear.  Fear that we will be swamped by hordes coming from Africa and the Middle East.  Fear that our way of life will be changed for the worse.  We even fear that the refugees, will be given resources and homes which our children can't afford to buy.

It is these fears which are emphasised over and over again by a popular press.  We become conditioned.  People dehumanise the suffering just as the press does.  They do not see the suffering in any other way - So people say, ‘Let them stay in their refugee camps, over there !’, That is the general un altruistic way.

Dehumanising is a means to kill altruism.

Faith, is a means to restore it.   It comes from religious faith and it comes from altruistic faith.   

Unitarians are criticised for not being religious enough.  That we do not stick to one particular faith, such as Christianity but embrace people from all religious faiths, and none.

Unitarians are criticised for having no ten commandments of their own.

The difference is that  we accept we are not an organised religion with a mission to convert the world, we are an assembly of individuals, we are connected by our personal faiths.   The glue that holds it all together is acceptance of one another and support for one another, practically and emotionally.   

It is here with us that religious faith and the faith of altruism meet and coexist.   And what we do is learn from each other, and in many cases a person is a mixture of both these faiths.

Sometimes we do feel challenged.   We can become complacent about ourselves. Especially when see other congregations standing with banners outside their churches, supporting this or that cause.    Do we have to do that too?

The answer is yes, if we feel stirred to agree, or no, if we don’t.    The challenge is to consider the situation both from a personal religious faith view and from an altruistic view.

If we are asked to hold a placard for someone or some people, it might come  as a challenge to a long held personal belief. Then we  might have to reassess why we hold the views we do.   

Sometimes we feel we have to take actions  further and engage as a community, or engage as part of the community, there is nothing wrong with that.

I would like to think we can develop faith in our religious beliefs and faith in altruism together, both individually and as a church community.

Sometimes we should discuss our two faiths, religious and altruist  

Should they be separate, or are they really one?    

That is the question.   

Prayer for stillness

Let us open our hearts to prayer.

In prayer we offer pleas from the depth of our hearts.  We reach for the comfort of peace.   Peace that is in the stillness of the soul.  Such peace is hard to find.  We know the peace that is but the lull between storms, the anxious peace unsure of what is coming next, the peace that is the relief after worry.  The peace that is no action.

Let us seek the peace that is deeper.  That is the deep stillness of the soul.   The peace beyond all worries, the peace of gentle breath and no thoughts, a peace that brings close the presence of holiness, where angels seem to be, seeming to wait and comfort and enfold us in a love that is only of this peaceful place.

From this we see the world anew.  Those we love, we love more.  Forgiveness is an act of understanding and love, a gift for which no reward is sought.   There is a calm strength to accept the uncertainty of change.  

Wherever we go we take with us the calm strength of our inner selves.  We are who we are.   We take with us the strength of our holiness.

So let our prayers begin with the search for that deep stillness within, to seek that connection to the holiness of God.  Let us walk in the light of that inner stillness.  This is our prayer.

The way not followed

What would have happened if that early Christian church had decided that the life and teaching of Jesus was the beginning of a new religion, with God in a different nature.   Christianity might have been quite different and become more mystical.   It would have been a religion of peace, equality and tolerance.   

Jesus was a religious revolutionary who said that God is gentle and within you, you don't need to obey the rules of sabbath, food and gender to be at one with God.

Christianity took all that away and restored the Old Testament with headquarters set up in Rome because the gospels also claimed Jesus as the Jewish messiah and used quotations from the Hebrew bible as proof.     

This was a second and quite different nature of God but it was the one that the early church adopted, along with a priestly class.  Christianity became the very type of religious organisation that Jesus had challenged.

I think that Christianity lost its way when it chose the Old Testament God.  This was the God who was more like a distant emperor than a loving father;  a God who ruled the world and would punish wrongdoing severely; whose wrath should be feared; whose subjects should be humble before him.  

When we have our debates about Unitarian Christianity, perhaps we should bear this in mind.  It is the spark of the spiritual revolutionary we should retain,one that points towards a God of love and a community of all people -  not the king in the sky.

tony mcneile

Empowering the present age for Unitarians.

I am a member of the Bolton Socialist Club.   It is one of the oldest in the country and is still active, supporting and campaigning on issues for the 'common man' - but it is not a church.  Unitarians most often also support and campaign on issues for the 'common man', they are a church.  What is the difference?

Many years ago one of my colleagues suggested our Unitarian churches were more like social clubs, that they were meeting places for middle class like minded people who met up on a Sunday morning for an unchallenged hour of singing and listening.   It was also suggested we were the irrelevant last hurrah of a great reforming religious movement when the name itself identified a person as an influential game changer.

It is indeed a great legacy but visit many of our congregations where there is only a handful of members and it does seem to be a legacy which is almost spent. It makes me ask what we Unitarians can offer in today's world that others do not.  Do we still have a unique selling point.

I learnt a lesson many years ago when the congregation decided to have a flower festival in the Chapel.  Someone suggested that as well as the main theme we invited displays to represent the interests of our members.  To my surprise these filled a very large section.   The Bolton Equality Council, the Women's Refuge, Save the Children, United Nations Association, all founded by present day Unitarians and there were about fifteen other organisations in the display that people supported.

But no one said, 'I do this work because I am a Unitarian'.  They simply did it from the goodness of their hearts and they also happened to be Unitarians but never said so.   After that I gave everyone a chalice lapel badge to wear.
It made me realise that we are still more than the legacy of our past.

 It is just that help is given in an unsung modest Unitarian way.   It is not our unique selling point either, charity shop workers and interfaith supporters don't just come from the Unitarians.  They come from all walks of life, all faiths and no faiths.

I am not sure whether the worship we offer, even the rights of passage we offer can be claimed as a unique selling point either.   I have been to other churches just as happy as ours.  I have been to non religious funerals just as sensitive as ours, and weddings too.

There are two things we need to do to continue our existence as a church that matters in the world
 First we need to transform ourselves into a living tradition and secondly we need focus on meeting the spiritual needs of the modern individual.

The Living Tradition is about modifying our worship, using our space and extending our ministry.
Worship should be a joyful happy experience open to participation and with a message that can be discussed openly.  We don't need to be tied to the wheel that is the hymn sandwich.

Our space should be an open space where other than worship groups can meet - meditation, yoga, fringe faith groups, support groups and discussion groups.   We shouldn't be afraid of collaborating with other faith groups for the mutual advantage of the wider communities we seek to serve.

Our ministry should be about leadership, not just spiritual leadership, but groups leadership, community leadership.  We should not expect to find all these leadership skills invested in one person but be prepared to facilitate training of our own members and to work collaboratively with other churches and organisations.

In the communities around our churches there are many many individuals who feel lost and isolated.   Loneliness is an issue, meeting and socialising with other people is an issue, age is an issue, mind, body and spirit are issues.   We have to ask ourselves as a church if we provide space and comfort for people to address those simple questions of, 'Who am I?', 'How can I feel better about myself as an individual and a participator in life?'

I often hear people say, 'But that is about counselling!'   I say this is different.  It is about spiritual development, finding the confidence and the place to explore those questions of identity and relate them to an overarching reason to belong in the world.   Add to that a sense of being in a community where you feel you belong and yet you are still an individual.

How are we to achieve all this?   It requires a change of direction, moving away from being just a worshipping community based on a Unitarian tradition.
It requires developing a web of interdependence between individual Unitarians, congregations, districts and Essex Hall.  We need to share experiences of what works and what doesn't.  We need to financially support the training of leaders and the delivery of courses and resources.

We need to share templates for worship and personal spiritual development.  
We need to promote ourselves - wear the badge and the fly the flag that says who we are and what we stand for.

Above all we need to share a new vision for the future that meets the spiritual and emotional needs of the searching individual.   We need to support, enable and empower our own generation to do great deeds because they have found a faith that speaks the truth of life to them?  This is how I believe we can best serve the present age as Unitarians.

Tony McNeile

 A sermon :

What does it take to be a leader? What is it that makes a leader?

Some are leaders by consent, called to lead. Some have become leaders through intimidation ­ the dictators who have seized power and who have littered our history over the centuries.

Cometh the hour, cometh the leader sometimes, Winston Churchill is the best example for us. Lincoln and Roosevelt for the United States.

Good leaders are inspirational, they become role models, people follow them and like to imitate them. They are loved by those they lead.

Dictators lead by force and fear.
I suppose for Greece it has been the arrival of Alexis Tsipras to represent the mood of the people under the economy of austerity. The popular will has rejected the established leaders.

It doesn't happen in religious societies. The king of Saudi Arabia owes his power to the religious state. The religious leadership of the country endorse his rule so each one supports the power of the other, and they both survive.

In the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, it is said that many of the psalms were more than just songs of worship and praise. They were ceremonial anthems sung at annual festivals when the relationship between king and people and God was reaffirmed.

The king was supported by the priests, the priests were supported by the king, the people were reassured of their religious contract.

The people had their history and their prophets to remind them what happened when this three way contract was broken. The prophets continually reminded them that God had saved them from the Egyptians.
God had given them this land they had settled in.Reminded them of their obligation to worship and obey. Whatever was going wrong or had gone wrong in the past was always said to be the result of God’s response to their actions ­ Blessing or punishing what they had done.

If the king had erred, they said it was God who punished by bringing disaster. The fortunes and misfortunes of the people were also attributed to acts of God. God either saved them from their enemies or handed them over to be conquered. The Philistines, the Hittites and the Amorites were all said to be acting out God’s plan.
But if you read the stories of the Patriarchs and the Kings, their personal relationship with their God seems different, not quite so devout or obedient.

Abraham is given the promised land but doesn't go there. He goes to Egypt instead.
The philosopher Soren Kierkegaard wrote a long essay about the story of Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac. What was happening when Abraham raised the knife over his son? Was Abraham challenging God, calling his bluff ? Did his God expect him to plead for his son's life. Did Abraham know the knife would not fall?
There are other reasons, that it was a story of human sacrifice, and human sacrifice was common in some of those societies.

I like those stories of the Patriarchs. Jacob is my favourite of course. Jacob always does exactly what he wants to do. God rarely comes into his story and when he does, it doesn't seem to change Jacob at all.
How does the stairway from Heaven change Jacob ? How often does he pray to his God? How often does he acknowledge his God? Not often!

He treats all his family in an ungodly and unfair way, his brother, his wives, his children.
The same theme is repeated time and time again. God is the creator and Lord but in the distance. The main characters to do what they like. Their stories and adventures are stories without their God, the shadow of their God is written in the background,hidden behind a cloud.

God was still seen by the people as a God who punished and rewarded. Like a distant king or Emperor he ruled from afar, and all should live in awe and dread of his intervention in their lives.

That aspect of God was carried over into the Christian religion. That God controls everything. If you don't eat your greens, God will ....., if you don't go to church, God will send you to hell on judgement day. Powerful stuff, until you realise that if you don't eat your greens nothing happens.

The prophets of the Old Testament retold the past more than foretold the future. You fell off your bike because you didn't eat your greens.

The Old Testament people though obeyed all the rules ­ as laid down in the book of Leviticus. When they didn't then the prophets railed against them. Obeying the law kept the religion alive. The priests punished the breakers of the law.

There were stories of devout men, Joseph and Daniel. Their faith gave them leadership and high office in the land ­ though it was not in their own land. They worked for their conquerors.
At the time of the New Testament Israel was ruled by a foreign power, the Romans, there were religious sects like the Essenes and the strange community at Qumran, and there were sects of Mystics who

found secret interpretations of the scriptures, the priesthood was divided into conservative Sadducees and liberal Pharisees.

Judaism had become a fashion religion with rich young foreigners converting and becoming part of a temple aristocracy.

The rules of the religion were strictly enforced on the ordinary people.
Into this scenario comes the figure of Jesus. Immediately displaying those qualities of leadership that created a following. Follow me he said, and they did.

His mission, not to restore the king, and not to restore the religion. He deliberately breaks the religious rules ­ those rules about the sabbath and not eating unclean food.

He ignored the hierarchy of the given social order and shared the table with all and anyone and helped all and anyone who asked for help. Render to Caesar what is Caesars. So he was not a revolution wanting the Romans out.
His mission was to restore God, nothing more, nothing less. But not the distant ruler whose wrath was threatened and whose vengeance was promised, who dealt only in reward and punishment.

Jesus presented himself as the son of God differently. A God of compassion, a God of personal relationship, and more than that, the light of this new God shone within you ­ not at you from afar.

What sort of leader was he? Was he gentle Jesus meek and mild, or a character who had a presence, a quiet authority. One whose strength was in that presence and in the way he spoke. He was a leader. He was a spiritual leader.

He taught a personal religion and he said you could take it or leave it. But if you took it, then you would see and then you would understand

what he preached. You would be like the blind man whose sight was restored or like the lame man who was cured and able to walk. The world would be different.

It was a leadership that inspired action, the spiritually enlightened saw the world differently and lived in it differently. You became the spiritual leader of your own life. You were part of God, you acted for God.
He spoke with authority but did not demand obedience.

It was only afterwards that his followers turned him into a different type of leader. They and the church they built fused him back into the Old Testament.

They brought back the Old Testament God who punished and rewarded. You had to fear the wrath of God again and they made Jesus into his agent, watching your life closely and reporting back to the God of wrath.
Christians were then in the same position as the people of the Old Testament. The Kings and priests and rules were there again too, but as popes and priests, and Kings claiming the divine right to act as they pleased.
Christianity was an Old Testament religion. The Kings and priests bowed before teachings of Jesus but did not practice them. They still went to war, they still made slaves, they never turned the other cheek.

Gentle Jesus was set into the historical New Testament and all have to wait for his second coming with Angels bearing judgement swords and pots of fire to destroy all life.
It was a leadership of fear.

But it seems there was no historical Jesus. No physical evidence of his existence, only rumour about what happened to him and his followers.

The Gnostic Gospels suggest that Jesus came as a manifestation from the cosmic God. He was a spiritual being and his teaching is universal, found in all the great religious literature of the world.

His gift was to empower every person who listened to him. To give them leadership of themselves as human beings; to give them an inner spiritual strength and a sense of union with God.
His leadership was to change the social order, no longer to be a hierarchy but a place where everyone supported and helped one another in this pilgrimage of life.
It is the simplest of truths and yet the most difficult to follow.

Today we wrestle with those very same problems. Many people feel no connection with religion; many seek meaning and purpose in their lives and it can be a spiritual hunger.
If our church does not follow that simplest of truths, How can it lead? How can those who seek find leadership and authority in their own lives?

The challenges of today seem no different to the challenges of so long ago.