Category: Social Justice

by the Very Revd Dr David Ison, Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral 

The last Sunday in November is dedicated to Christ the King. It’s a recent commemoration, started very deliberately by Pope Pius XI in 1925 to recall Christians to the truth that their allegiance is to their spiritual ruler in heaven, as opposed to the earthly supremacy which was being claimed by the new Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, who had begun calling himself Il Duce, the Leader. Pope Pius was putting down a marker that for Christians, no earthly man is their Leader, but only Jesus Christ our heavenly king.

The feast of Christ the King is thus a symbolic and subversive celebration; it puts all earthly authorities under question, whether individuals or electorates. It proclaims that the rule of God is for truth, justice, compassion and peace, and that rulers on earth are subject to the rule of God’s kingdom; and that God cares nothing for our status or importance, our wealth or privilege, and cares rather about justice and service to the poor, and love shown to the weak and needy.

Which political party will promise to care for the poor of the world, and carry out its promise? Which democratic government will confront its people’s prejudices to have compassion on destitute refugees, or have the courage to close down the life-destroying arms trade, or confront us with the necessary cost of caring for our environment? And which Church or religious authority has the grace to admit that it has failed to live out the truth it proclaims, and that before God it has done wrong?

A strength of having an established Church in England and Scotland is that it bears witness to what Christians believe, that all of us stand under the judgement of God’s truth, love and justice.  The fact that judges and local councils still come to church for legal and civic worship, and that Parliament when it meets begins with prayer, acknowledges that their values come from beyond themselves and the people they serve, and that they are liable to a higher power – which is in my view the main justification for an established church. And yet churches, denominations, sects, scholars of different faiths, can fall into the same trap as some politicians in believing that they or their human organisation or nation have absolute rather than relative power, and that they need to defend their position rather than humbly seek the truth, in politics or gender or race or sexuality.

Jesus was crucified for subversion of absolute political and religious power. In John’s Gospel account of Jesus’ crucifixion, the chief priests were more direct than Pilate: ‘Everyone who claims to be a king sets himself against the emperor’, they said. They recognised that Jesus as King makes claims on the loyalty and actions of all: that in the light of Christ, the claims and orders of politicians, kings and emperors, priests and imams and prophets, are not absolute but are subject to scrutiny and question. A true love for our country and for our Church includes the need to ask questions of all authorities, to recognise human fallibility, and to refuse to sacrifice others on the altar of injustice, even if that requires the sacrifice of ourselves in the process.

For followers of Jesus the King, there can be no unqualified and absolute obedience to political or religious rulers. That’s why humility, dialogue, and the willingness to truly entertain the possibility that we might be wrong, are essential in tackling difficult issues. Because we live in divisive and dangerous times, we need more than ever a commitment to the even-handed, compassionate and truthful justice of God in the face of intolerant and violent language and actions. Those who claim absolute authority, whether elected politicians or dictators or caliphs, or those who troll on the internet or daub hateful slogans on churches or mosques or synagogues, or oppress people by claiming to know the mind of God, will be subject to the just and gentle rule of Jesus Christ our Judge.

by the Revd Hayley Matthews, Rector and member of the National Executive for UNITE representing the Faithworkers’ Branch

The Rt Rev. the Lord Bishop of Gloucester, Rachel Treweek has delighted many of us recently with her campaign to speak out about body image issues, and in particular for teenage girls.

Yet I would suggest the damage sets in so much earlier than that.

Just last week my four-year-old daughter was promised that the next time she visited a particular venue she would have her nails polished ‘if your Mummy doesn’t mind’.  Well, yes, as a matter of fact, I do mind but you have now put the idea into her head.  She’s only four and she has dirt under her fingernails from digging in the garden and exploring bugs and ‘creatures’ and asking questions about where and how they live and what they like to eat.  Sometimes it’s paint or bread dough under her tiny little nails, and for now, that’s how I’d like it to be. Thankfully, she barely registered the comment as I’m not a big fan of nail polish – never having mastered the art of not ruining it within an hour of application, which I like to think is proof-positive of my active lifestyle.

I’ve therefore worked hard to avoid her prematurely mimicking an adult, make-up and all.  For ‘beautiful’ as she is (and even a stranger would concede me that point), her innocence and lack of self-consciousness is such a delight to see.

Bishop Rachel confirmed what us women – yes, even us dog-collared types – know only too well, that the first comment most people make about us will be a comment on our hair, clothing or general appearance.  This is happening already my Reception aged daughter.  Whilst her brother is asked how is he doing, what subjects he likes at school and what his hobbies are, she is told that she has beautiful eyes, gorgeous hair and ‘is cute’.  Some have even gone on to remark about her weight, even though she is a perfectly healthy and well within her average height/weight range – implying that she may not be ‘thin enough’ to pass the bar when she’s older.

Conversely, I don’t mind admitting that I have sometimes been labelled ‘a strapping lass’.  But this summer has been a real eye-opener for me.  Unfortunately, I have been really quite ill, and have lost a significant amount of weight.  Yet when I meet with people who know what I’ve been going through (let alone those who don’t) the exclamation is the same, ‘Wow, you look AMAZING!’ which loosely translates as ‘you are barely a size 10!’  It has stopped people feeling empathy for my suffering or recognising that I am so weak and frail. But that doesn’t matter for it seems that finally I meet the ‘magic mark’ of feminine perfection:  the hallowed ground of ‘being thin enough’.

One fellow professional confided in me that one of her colleagues wasn’t being taken as seriously because she was considered to be ‘fat’ and therefore ‘less intelligent’ and that perhaps now I might be taken more seriously, too.  The whole premise is so ludicrous –  do women really have to think like this, let alone be judged professionally by their weight and dress size?

So, where is God and Godliness in all of this?

Of course, women are beautiful in all of their varied shapes and sizes and ought to be celebrated as such, but where have these norms arisen that suggest a conformity to a singular ‘perfection’ that not even our supermodels can meet?

Ironically, the Old Testament warns of women’s beauty as a means of leading good and godly men astray.  Similarly, in the New Testament epistles St Paul suggests we ought not to be vain, braiding our hair and adorning ourselves with pearls and fancy fabrics.  The Bible has a strong emphasis on the beauty of a woman being her character, her personality, her values and the way she cares for her own family, her own enterprising nature and her willingness to care for others.  Of course, the perfect woman pictured in Proverbs 31 is a little too good to be true, but include being a good business woman, an owner and developer of land and of an optimistic disposition, facing whatever tomorrow may bring with a smile.  Yes, it mentions that she dresses well, but it does not focus on outward but inner beauty, wisdom and an entrepreneurial spirit as her delights are listed for praise.

The constant focus on diet, clothing and make-up that consumes many a teenager’s mind (female or male) must surely be to the detriment of developing the sorts of qualities that trudging around in the mud on a Duke of Edinburgh’s Expedition plants as diamonds deep in a teen’s preparation for adulthood and all of the new responsibilities, challenges and decisions they will soon face.  To think that beautiful (inside and out), vibrant, quirky, characterful children and young people might be straightjacketed into a physical conformity that is neither life-giving nor natural for them, saddens me immensely.

We are three dimensional beings, body, soul and spirit and for each person to be fully free, fully themselves, each aspect of their being must be free to be itself, too.  And that includes owning, befriending and caring for the body we have, not some imaginary ‘body beautiful’.

by the Revd Dr Hayley Matthews, Rector and member of the National Executive for UNITE representing the Faithworkers’ Branch.

Lord Rowan Williams opened Inspire at Magdalen College, Cambridge this Saturday by inviting delegates to consider the two most toxic ways of knowing oneself and being human; first: ‘I know who I am and it’s not you’, second: ‘I know who I am and I don’t need any help from you [to be me]’.

Whichever position we take, whether it be that of a tribal group closure that looks for the differences to be avoided, or an intense independence that is beyond an openness to new perspectives (‘I did it my way’), the movement is that of pushing others away from ourselves, unless they reflect back to us precisely the image we hope to be cultivating for ourselves.

In my visit to the Diocese of Bloemfontein in South Africa some years ago I learned the term ubuntu which translates as ‘I am because you are’.  In other words, I do not exist on my own, I exist only in relation to the other people around me.  Archbishop Desmond Tutu explains the concept as “mean[ing] my humanity is caught up, is inextricably bound up, in theirs. We belong in a bundle of life. We say, “a person is a person through other people.” It is not “I think therefore I am.” It says rather: “I am human because I belong.” I participate, I share.”

To be human is essentially to encounter ourselves in relation to others.  Ancient creation mythologies do not refer to the making of humankind singularly with the Christian tradition specifically resting upon the words, ‘And the Lord God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him”’ (Genesis 2:18, NKJV).  Isolating ourselves as individuals, and, I would suggest, isolating ourselves as people groups, is ‘not good’.

Sadly, in our desire to attain power we often focus on finding ways of subordinating ‘the other’ to ourselves as our ‘helpers’.  We must lead, they must follow.  ‘We’ are the dominant cultural norm, ‘they’ must jettison their cultural norms and take on ours.  ‘I am working hard at ensuring I live well, live aright, therefore if you think or live differently to me, you must be wrong’.  However, the Holy Spirit is the Trinitarian equivalent of just such a ‘helper’ to Jesus, and what does the Holy Spirit do if not to empower Jesus to fulfil His ministry as the Christ? What does the Holy Spirit do but shower God’s people with spiritual gifts in order to build up a diverse group of people into a new kingdom that does not rely on geo-political states to define boundaries and borders, but which shatters previously held religious and cultural ghettos in which ‘there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus’ (Galatians 3:28, NKJV).

To be a ‘helper’ is not to be subservient in any way; to be a ‘helper’ is to enable the other to see themselves in a new light; to become all that they might be; to release their own gifts whether mined in the darkness or the light.  To be a ‘helper’ is to reflect back to the other all that they are and all that they might be.  Of course, one of the problems with this, is just how painful it can be to recognise how we are seen by others.  This is possibly why it is so much easier to return to ‘the tribe’ whether it be an affirming partner, or a political or nationalistic tribe in order to find the image in which we have cast ourselves reflected back positively without ever being challenged, extended, critiqued or indeed explored for consonance and depth.

Consequently, the imageo dei with which we are all endowed becomes shrouded in a hall of mirrors as we pick and choose through which one we wish to be viewed. At times we seriously risk losing an authentic sense of self as we build a self-image that is two-dimensional and cannot risk authentic, intimate, honest connection with the other; the not-like-me; the challenge-to-my-thinking; the stranger; the danger-to-my-status-quo.  In trying to become human on our own terms, we lose our genuine humanity.

In these days where mass migration across the globe affects every locality and continent, encountering the stranger, encountering the ‘not-like-me’ gives us myriad new opportunities to harbinger the kingdom in where we are not divided geographically, politically or along any other tribes of race, religion or cultural norms.  It gives us fresh insight into who we are and who we have been, both as individuals and as people-groups or nation-states.  Our preconceptions – and misconceptions – must be challenged afresh as our minds, our hearts and, dare I say, our spirits are enlarged with all that we did not know until we allowed ‘you’ to help us see ourselves for what we are, as we began to truly know you for who you are.  What a gift that is; a pearl beyond price.

Yet there is a stranger much closer to home, a stranger who we ‘other’ for ourselves and who is perhaps all the more dangerous for that.  The one who has (or seems to have) the power, the great job, the perfect partner, the health, the wealth, the happiness.  The person we ‘other’ from envy, bitterness, hatred; the person we judge as undeserving of that which we ourselves desire.  Why were ‘they’ chosen and not me?  It is this ‘other’ that we deliberately construct as an enemy that destroys the imageo dei within us most profoundly, preventing us from radiating that which connects with others as we refuse to ‘rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep’ (Romans 12:15).

Genuine human connection exists only between those willing to risk encountering people who will show us our shadow side, dredging up our depths that we might have the opportunity to bring all that sullies our humanity (that which we Christians call ‘sin’) to the surface. Not that we might despise ourselves or lose all hope, but precisely so that we might have hope in bringing all that darkens us to the expansive light of Christ’s love for His all-forgiving, transformative, healing touch; a touch that might well come through those we find most uncomfortable to encounter.

Being human has been packaged into any number of self-help, self-starting, self-reliant ‘life-hacks’ but it will never be the ‘self’ that truly transforms.  We were born out of relationship; we grow and develop in relationships, and as adults continue to become all that we are through relating riskily, readily, intimately and authentically with others.  Then as individuals and as people-groups, we grow ever more confident that whoever we are, and with whomever we are, we share in the profound bond of a common humanity.  It is only from that place that real understanding and a genuine sharing of safe-haven and resources can occur.  Until then, the vast global inequalities and Western protective paranoia with which we live will continue to divide and dehumanise those with whom we are, in fact, inextricably bound.

Picture of Archbishop Desmond Tutu at a gathering of the Desmond Tutu Peace Foundation

by the Very Revd Dr David Ison, Dean of St Paul’s

It was a scandal. How dare he overturn nearly two millennia of tradition and upset people’s faith unnecessarily? And he’s kept doing it. It’s absolutely against the rules….  So some Catholics say about the 2013 papal innovation by Pope Francis’ of washing the feet, not just of devout Catholic men, but of people including women and those of other or no faith, on Maundy Thursday in remembrance of the Last Supper.

In 2015 Pope Francis changed the rubric, the rules of the service, to allow others to do what he’d already been doing – not that those who disagreed with him would have wanted him to make it legal anyway. Interesting that Jesus had a habit of doing that: challenging the rules made up by those around him, and doing it in order to share wholeheartedly the love of God and the challenge of God with those who need it.

I was preaching last Sunday on a gospel passage which has spoken powerfully to me across the years about this: Luke 7.36 onwards. And in the context of conversations and disagreements, I was struck anew by the question which Jesus asks his host, a question which on the face of it seems absurd.

‘Do you see this woman?’, Jesus asks Simon the Pharisee as they recline at table, probably in the open courtyard of Simon’s house, perhaps surrounded by curious onlookers. How could he not have been transfixed by the woman in question? She had been sobbing behind Jesus during the dinnertime conversation, had been caressing and kissing and anointing his feet, letting down her hair in the process, and acting in a way which shocked those who looked on. Even in Britain today, such behaviour would be regarded as outrageously inappropriate for a dinner party. Luke tells us what Simon was thinking, and it wasn’t good news for Jesus or the woman. How does Jesus rescue the situation in a way which doesn’t demean anyone but which challenges all with the truth of the love of God?

You can read it: the parabolic story with its transforming question, the comparison between the lack of hospitality given by Simon and the devotion of the woman, and the declaration of forgiveness and healing which further challenges those around the dinner table.

And what does this have to do with us?

As the reactions to Pope Francis show, touch is embarrassing, crosses boundaries, invades our space – but if we don’t touch God and God doesn’t touch us, we’re lost.  And that touch of God is about love and forgiveness, the love which God offers us no matter who or how we are; the love which challenges the judgements we make about others.

‘Do you see this woman?’ The point of Jesus’ question is that we think we do, but we don’t. We need to really stop and see, to look at people as they are, and not cast them as a caricature or stereotype in our categorisation of the world. Think of how we look at people around us, in the street or on the TV, especially those who make us feel uncomfortable. Beggar? Posh person? Rough diamond? Office worker? Celebrity? Slapper? Hoodie? Gay? These categories determine how we react to people as stereotypes, but we don’t see them – and often we’re surprised by the way in which people don’t behave as our script says they should.  Which is because, all around us, there are no stereotypes. Only real people in all their beauty and sin and brokenness and need for transformation. People like us.

That’s what faith should grow in us – the ability to see better, to stop and perceive the person who is there, instead of the image in our own minds. Road safety for small children starts with the phrase: Stop, Look, Listen. That’s a good slogan for safety in our relationships and encounters with others, in person as well as on the road. It even works well for our worship and prayer too, in our relation to God: because at the heart of Christian prayer is contemplation – simply looking to God, paying attention to God, in order to touch and be touched by God and so be changed.

Simon Butler’s blog last week pointed out how we get stuck in talking at one another in the Church instead of talking – and listening – to each other. And that’s why we need to stop, look, and listen to God; and then stop and take time to really look and listen at the person in front of us, and see them as Jesus sees them, and allow God to challenge us through each other.

Do you see this woman, this person? Do you see what forgiveness & acceptance can do? Are you ready to be generous with your love?

Do you see this woman?

Reflections on the race for London’s Mayor by Canon Dr Angus Ritchie

Would you like to have more power?

The word “power” usually produces a pretty negative reaction, especially among religious people. Our immediate reaction is often to focus on the ways it can be misused, not its potential for good. But, at its most simple, power is the ability to act. How can anyone look at the world around them – its injustice, its brokenness, and yet its extraordinary potential for beauty and goodness – without wanting to act?

Each year, I teach a number of classes of ordinands and interns about organising for social justice. I used to begin by asking “what is your reaction to the word ‘power’?” The answers were usually negative. Now, I often begin with a different question: “How is the word ‘power’ regarded in the New Testament?” The answer to that question is almost uniformly positive. It is power that the risen Christ promises his apostles at Pentecost (Acts 1.8). The message is underlined again and again in the Epistles – perhaps most strikingly in 2 Timothy, where we are told God has given us a Spirit “not of timidity” but of “power and love and self-control”.

At the heart of the Christian faith is a redefinition, not a rejection, of power. In John Stott’s words, we are called to be ambitious for the Kingdom:

Ambitions for God, if they are to be worthy, can never be modest. There is something inherently inappropriate about cherishing small ambitions for God. How can we ever be content that he should acquire just a little more honour in the world?

Christians should be eager to develop their gifts, widen their opportunities, extend their influence and be given promotion in their work — not now to boost their own ego or build their own empire, but rather through everything they do to bring glory to God.

When I look at the changes happening to my East London parish – families uprooted from their neighbourhood because of the housing crisis; the growth of new forms of gambling which prey on the poorest and most desperate; the effect of poverty on life expectancy – I believe Christians need to rediscover a godly sense of power and of ambition.

If this is true of my local context, it is equally true of the wider political scene. The rise of politicians who feed on people’s sense of impotence (perhaps seen most disturbingly in the candidacy of Donald Trump) reminds us that powerlessness can also be poisonous. When people case to hope, when they cease to believe in the positive potential of common action, they all to often look for scapegoats.

Of all people, Christians have reason to be a people of hope. We follow the One who died to end all scapegoating. In the daily prayer of the Church, we celebrate the fact that, in Christ, God has “shown strength with his arm, and has scattered the proud in their conceit, casting down the mighty from their thrones and lifting up the lowly.” As the Magnificat reminds us, the poorest and most marginalised are the agents as well as the beneficiaries of God’s power.

In my last column, I wrote of the Via Media approach being taken by Pope Francis and Archbishop Justin. These two leaders have spoken passionately about the need for a church which is truly of as well as for the poor; of the role of the most marginalised people in the evangelisation of our wider culture. Here, for example, is Pope Francis addressing a congress of popular movements in Bolivia:

What can I do as a craftsman, a street vendor, a trucker, a downtrodden worker, if I don’t even enjoy workers’ rights? What can I do, a farmwife, a native woman, a fisher who can hardly fight the domination of the big corporations?… A lot!… You, the lowly, the exploited, the poor and underprivileged, can do, and are doing, a lot. I would even say that the future of humanity is in great measure in your own hands, through your ability to organize and carry out creative alternatives, through your daily efforts to ensure the three “L’s” (labour, lodging, land) and through your proactive participation in the great processes of change on the national, regional and global levels. Don’t lose heart!

It is not only in Latin America that communities are organising for justice. Here in East London, 6000 people will gather at the end of this month to hold the candidates for Mayor to account on these same three “L’s” – calling for affordable housing and a genuinely Living Wage. It’s no coincidence that the Bishop of London will open the assembly, or that many of the delegations there will be from inner-city churches. As this recent report shows, the methods and the platform of this organising alliance have deep roots in Christian social teaching. It’s an inspiring example of what it means to have our understanding of power and of ambition reshaped by the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

by the Very Revd Dr David Ison, Dean of St Paul’s

On 18^th March Iain Duncan-Smith resigned from his UK government Cabinet post as Work and Pensions Secretary. His resignation letter said, ‘The latest changes to benefits to the disabled and the context in which they’ve been made are a compromise too far. While they are defensible in narrow terms, given the continuing deficit, they are not defensible in the way they were placed within a Budget that benefits higher earning taxpayers… I hope as the government goes forward you can look again… at the balance of the cuts you have insisted upon and wonder if enough has been done to ensure “we are all in this together.”’

That final phrase is a quote from the 2010 general election campaign, much used before then and since by Conservative (and other) politicians. David Cameron’s first Conservative Party Conference speech as Prime Minister used the word ‘together’ twenty times as a rallying call for a united country where ‘fairness includes asking those on higher incomes to shoulder more of the burden than those on lower incomes…. It’s fair that those with broader shoulders should bear a greater load. And I think it’s time for a new conversation about what fairness really means… fairness means giving money to help the poorest in society. People who are sick, who are vulnerable, the elderly – I want you to know we will always look after you.’ And whether or not that’s still true is what Mr Duncan-Smith’s letter is wondering about.

The subsequent few days have produced a torrent of comment and analysis, briefing, counter-briefing and spin. But there are two questions which Mr Duncan-Smith has highlighted and which are in danger of getting forgotten – indeed, which some might want to see well buried. Is the principle that ‘we are all in this together’ – which the Conservative Party freely adopted as its rallying call – being put into practice? And who is ‘we’?

The politics of power in human institutions, whether a government, a country, a church, a hospital or a family, often revolve around questions of justice and belonging. Politics as a profession is about the exercise of government; but all of us are involved in politics, just as everyone is involved in religion even though only some are ministers of religion or theologians. And, as with Mr Duncan-Smith, we do need to wonder about how just and fair our institutions are; and whether, when we say ‘we’re all in this together’, we really do mean all, or whether we actually mean ‘we who have power and those who we think are on our side’. Who gets left out of the ‘we all’ that includes ‘hard working people’ and hopefully ‘the sick, vulnerable and elderly’? What of asylum seekers, disabled people, LGBTI people, ‘foreigners’, black people, young people, Muslims, unemployed people, ‘shirkers’, prisoners… the list can be a long one.

Giving voice to wondering about justice was the job of the prophets in ancient Israel, as in God’s name they called rulers and powerful people to account for their partiality. Who are the prophets now? Pundits, bloggers, committees and commissions, pressure groups and tweeters all do some of it, and yet all have their own axe to grind as well. As Jesus pointed out in the Sermon on the Mount, we’re very good at pointing our finger at the shortcomings of others and very good too at ignoring where we ourselves fall short.

If we’re to avoid the fruitless conflict of mutual accusations of self-interest and unfairness, then we need two things. The first is an absolute commitment to the equal importance of every human being: the commitment to define ‘we’ as everyone with no exclusions. Otherwise, justice becomes partial. The Bible that inspires the preferential option for the poor, the weak and downtrodden by calling on the powerful to act with justice also contains the injunction not to be partial to the poor either (see Exodus 23), because justice is equal for all. Underlying this impartiality is God’s love for each of us, and God’s judgement for each of us: we are all equal before God in love and in falling short of the glory of God… It’s not comfortable, but then God’s love seen in Jesus isn’t comfortable: it requires us to love the stranger and the enemy. For politicians it means caring for those who might vote for someone else; for religious people it means that God loves those who we think have got it wrong – or at least, wronger than we have.

And the second thing we need is the commitment to love our neighbour at least as much as ourselves, to put the interests of others alongside or over our own. Modern prophets may challenge the government about how it allocates resources fairly; but they might also call on each one of us who gains from income tax cuts to increase our giving to charities for the disabled by at least the amount we get from the Budget (and Gift Aid it) – and while we’re at it, hand over to charity also the money we might have paid in extra duty on beer, spirits and cider. One thing that Jesus and the Hebrew prophets teach us is the need to be the message we proclaim: that holding those with power to account is only a just activity if we ourselves speak and act with justice and compassion in our own lives.

From a Christian perspective, the furore about benefit cuts highlights the challenge to the Church to be the justice and compassion it proclaims. Of course we accept the principle of loving our neighbour as ourselves, and that in the Church ‘we’re all in this together’: and yet we may then define certain groups as being outside the bounds of the Body of Christ, so that our togetherness is partial and our love is compromised. Whether it’s the scandal of ecumenical division (which we hardly notice because it’s been going on so long), institutional racism and sexism, failure to care for victims of abuse, the silencing of LGBTI people; whether it’s in our local church or denomination or international structures of belonging – we need the voices of prophetic lives to re-call us to God’s love and justice for those we overlook, in church as well as society, and to learn to become those prophets ourselves.

‘I wonder if enough has been done to ensure “we are all in this together.”’

by Canon Dr Angus Ritchie, Executive Director, The Centre for Theology & Community.

Pope Francis and Archbishop Justin have a striking amount in common. Both reject the idea that religion is a matter of ‘other-worldly’ piety. Both are outspoken in demanding justice as well as compassion for the poorest in society. And both challenge the stereotype of a church divided between ‘liberals’ (interested in social action and inter-faith engagement) and ‘conservatives’ (doctrinally orthodox and committed to evangelism).

These two Church leaders are ‘both-and’ Christians: committed to social justice and doctrinally orthodox; serious about inter-faith engagement and committed to evangelism and church growth; deeply rooted in prayer and active in the wider world. Their approach – confident in the truth of Christianity, serious about spreading the faith, and yet keen to work with those outside the Church – reflects developments within grassroots church life which defy the usual stereotypes. Social action is no longer seen as a distraction from, or a pretext for, evangelism.

‘Both-and’ Christianity is serious about social justice as an end in itself. It is unapologetic in its desire to spread the faith and make disciples. There is a strong and simple theological basis for this ‘both-and’ approach. It is summed up in one word: love.

Love is the word with which Jesus sums up ‘the whole law and the commandments,’ and it makes sense of both social transformation and personal conversion as complementary aspects of the church’s mission. The church does not feed the poorest, fight for a living wage and support Credit Unions in order to make converts. It is commanded to show practical love and fight for justice as expressions of unconditional love to believer and non-believer alike. As Pope Benedict wrote it his encyclical on social justice (Deus Caritas Est)

“Love is free; it is not practised as a way of achieving other ends…. a pure and generous love is the best witness to the God in whom we believe and by whom we are driven to love. A Christian knows when it is time to speak of God and when it is better to say nothing and to let love alone speak. He knows that God is love (1 John 4.8) and that God’s presence is felt at the very time when the only thing we do is to love.”

By the same token, part of what it is to love someone is to share that which you hold most precious. As Mark Russell puts it, “If a church doesn’t do evangelism, it is effectively saying Jesus changes lives, but this is only for us.”

We don’t work for social justice in order to convert, and we don’t evangelise in order to do more social action – both are expressions of love to the neighbour. But there is an increasing amount of evidence that social justice and evangelism are mutually reinforcing. A report on church growth which is about to be published by the Centre for Theology and Community (CTC) argues that the practical embodiment of Christian love is vital to the credibility of its proclamation of the Gospel, and also makes the obvious point that churches which grow numerically have a greater capacity for social action (what Bishop Paul Bayes calls “a bigger church to make a bigger difference”).

In a context like east London, where alongside so many people of other faiths and of none, this ‘both-and’ approach makes obvious sense. Local churches work with people of other faiths and none to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless – and to organise for a Living Wage, affordable housing and ethical lending.

As these public relationships develop, it is inevitable that more personal conversations occur. In such discussions, neighbours of other faiths and of none have sought to persuade me of the truth of their convictions. Far from finding this offensive, I welcome it as an act of friendship and indeed of love. To take me seriously as a fellow human being involves sharing what you believe to be of ultimate significance. Likewise, for me to love my neighbour involves sharing what Pope Francis calls “the most precious thing given to me: Jesus Christ.” I don’t care for my neighbours in order to make them Christians. Sharing my faith is one of many expressions of that care.

The approach of Pope Francis and Archbishop Justin – humble and confident, frank and engaging – is indicative of a church finding its place, and its voice, in increasingly plural societies. ‘Both-and’ Christianity is well suited to these new and challenging contexts. It has the even greater advantage of being faithful to the breadth of Jesus’ message, which has always challenged the neat categories of those who seek an ‘either/or’ approach.