As I write this I have been a Deacon in the Church of England for 355 and I am 2 days away from being made a Priest - God willing!!
The past 355 days have been amazing. They’ve not all been easy, but I know I am where God has called me to be, doing what God has called me to do. Not to say I haven’t had, or continue to have, doubts. That is after all human nature - or perhaps societal that we constantly compare ourselves to others, and wonder whether we are good enough. The answer is mostly certainly no - but as our Retreat Co-ordinator reminded us in the second of our addresses this morning, God calls us in our brokenness.
The Gospel chosen for this retreat is the same as I have chosen for my First Mass on Sunday - a happy coincidence.
I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing … You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that shall last [John 5:5, 16]
We have spent the first two retreats reflecting on abiding in Jesus, what this means for us, and how do we measure it. How do we measure our success as Priests? One of my struggles within the Church of England is the focus on numbers and statistics to measure mission. I strongly believe that does not effectively demonstrate mission. That is not to say that an increase in Baptisms and Confirmations isn’t a good thing - it is - but it doesn’t accurately reflect the effectiveness of mission.
During one of the breaks today, another Deacon and I went for a walk. We ended up wandering through the middle of a wheat field (don’t panic any avid walkers - that is where the footpath told us to go). The field perfectly summed up the British Weather and the problems faced by farmers. But as I sat in the Eucharist afterwards I realised it also perfectly summed up mission in the Church.
When the farmer planted the seed they would have been hoping for a good return, blue sky thinking would be a good grain with 100% yield that could be used in premium milling products - most farmers would be more cautious then this and would have predicted less than 100%, but still for high end milling. As we first entered the field, it looked fantastic. Luscious green ears stood proud in the sunshine, once ripe they surely looked like they would fetch a good price - but looks can be deceiving and the reality is the farmer won’t know until harvest time. As we walked further in to the field, the ears got shorter and sparse - almost non-existent, simply looking like grass. We had tipped over a slight peak of a hill and in the field you could see patches of yellow, from crop that had died early on. My Grandad was the arable expert, and I was 11 when he retired - I remember bits of what he taught me, but it has certainly a while ago. I would, however, imagine that this field is not going to achieve the yield the farmer hoped for - and quality at this stage is probably anyone’s guess.
And that’s the point really - when we plant seeds we don’t know how many will germinate, we then don’t know how many will then die later down the line, how many will make it to harvest, and then if they do get harvested - what profit they will yield for the farmer, if they indeed do make one at all.
This is what it means to be missional in today’s society, you plant seeds and hope for a good yield. These seeds grow slower than wheat, so you may never get to see whether they germinate and flourish - but you were the one that planted them. We are all branches of Jesus’ vine, we all are all fed and watered by Jesus. That is why - for me - mission statistics are only a small part of the picture. People move around more than they used to, a seed you planted could quite easily germinate and grow somewhere else in the country, or indeed the world. But that doesn’t matter, as long as we always abide in Jesus that we ‘bear fruit, fruit that shall last’.
Sometimes as Priests things won’t go the way we hoped or expected - the seed might become something else, it might not survive, but we shouldn’t get discouraged. We should always remember that Jesus loves us - unconditionally.
I have been Reading Presiding Like a Woman Edited by Nicola Slee and Stephen Burns. Today over lunch I was struck by this poem of the same name, written by Nicola, and leave this with you now.
Presiding Like a Woman
Nicola Slee
This is how we do it:
In boardrooms, working skilfully so that all the voices can be heard.
In kitchens, standing over steaming saucepans, following recipes passed down by our grandmothers.
At the table, gathering the day's news from children, guests; lighting candles, feeding titbits to the cats.
In operating theatres, administering with precision the deadly wounds that will heal.
In parliamentary committees and city councils, trying to find another way of doing business, wielding power that enables and includes.
In concert halls, at the rostrum, bringing all that unruly creativity into one living, breathing music.
In classrooms, warming to our subject, encouraging the slow and quick-witted learners, drawing out incipient wisdom.
In gardens, clearing weeds, making space for things to grow, planning colours in their right times and seasons.
In bedrooms and at waterpools, leaning over the women about to give birth, holding their sweating hands, looking into their eyes, saying 'Yes! Now! Push!'
In our own voices - elegant, educated; rough, untamed; stuttering or eloquent;
in all the languages that God gives.
Or sometimes without voice, silently, through gestures:
the nod of the head, lifting of an arm, sway of our bodies,
the way we move around a space.
Sometimes with permission, mostly without.
Recognized for the priests that we are or, mostly, not.
Never alone: always in the company of sisters,
brothers, children, animals who call our gifts into being
And offer their own for the making of something
that includes everyone and yet is beyond all.
Seated, standing, lying propped up in beds or couches,
from wheelchairs and walking frames,
proud of our bodies, bent with the burdens we've carried all these years
or youthful, resilient, reaching after what's yet to come.
In shanty towns, under rickety roofs made out of tarpaulin,
and high-rise council flats in the centre of sprawling cities.
In remote rural monasteries and out of the way retreat centres;
in hospitals, prisons and shopping centres,
factories, office blocks and parliamentary corridors;
in women's refuges and hostels for the homeless,
old people's homes and kids' nurseries,
on death row and in the birthing wards:
every place where human lives jostle, mingle, struggle, despair, survive.
In the desert cave and the hermit's hidden cleft,
where land and sky and the company of saints are the congregation.
This is how we do it:
not really thinking how we do it but doing it;
not naming it for what it is but sometimes, in flashes,
recognizing the nature of what it is we do:
the calling, the gathering, the creating of community,
the naming, the celebrating and lamenting of a people's sorrows and joys,
the taking of what human hands have made, offering it with thanksgiving and blessing,
the breaking, the fracturing of so many hopes and expectations,
to discover something unlooked for, new, beyond the brokenness;
the sharing of what has been given by others;
the discovering that, even out of little, hungers are fed,
hurts healed, wounds not taken away but transfigured -
the bearing, the manifesting of the body of God,
the carrying in our bodies of the marks of the risen One;
seeing the light reflected in each others' eyes,
seeing Her beauty mirrored in each one's softened face.
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