Unapologetic

Around a year ago, having read a review in one of the weekend newspapers, I bought a copy of Francis Spufford’s Unapologetic:  Why, despite everything, Christianity can still make surprising emotional sense, (London: Faber & Faber, 2012).  There are two surprising things about this.  Firstly, it’s surprising in this age of new atheism to find a ‘religious’ book warmly received in the press. And even more surprising for me to buy a new book (in hardback!) on spec.  I’ve just re-read it and I am very glad that I did.

For any readers who, like me, love books and reading but dont carry a roll of twenties with them at all times, here’s a neat trick. Walk around a bookshop  – as I did today at Foyle’s in Westfield Stratford – and find something that you think you’d like to read. Pause. Check no sales assistant is looking in your direction. Then take a discreet pic of the front cover with your smartphone. When you get home, reserve the book online from the library. In Essex reservations are free.  I guess it also helps if you have a family member who works in the library, so that when you drive her to or from work you can also collect and return your books.  Buy a book from the bookshop occasionally to keep the pot boiling – don’t want them closing, do we?

Anyways, back to Spufford.  He is an acclaimed author of fiction who found he could no longer stomach the thin anti-Christian arguments of Richard Dawkins or the blunderbuss polemic of Christopher Hitchens. As he said in a recent interview: 

“They treat Christianity either as a bunch of mock-scientific propositions about the universe which you can disprove, or as a social phenomenon which you can treat as entirely malign if you squint at it and wave your arms a lot. In both cases they operate a million naïve miles away from the actual experience of belief.  However they did also piss me off (as we like to say in the Church of England). I certainly wanted to write something back that had equal polemical snap, crackle and pop, just in case anyone felt like buying the lazy assumption that the atheist side of the quarrel was the clever one.”

In this quote you find why Spufford’s book is so enjoyable and challenging to read. It is not a well-reasoned academic argument about the existence of God. It is a passionate, emotional tirade.  The opening chapter leaves one breathless: an outpouring of anger; a contemptuous rant at the way in which people who hold a religious faith are commonly assumed to be intellectually deficient or worse.  He offers us “a defence of Christian emotions – their intelligibility and grown-up dignity”.

He moves on to describe one of the key recurring themes of the book, the so-called Human Propensity To F*** Things Up (or HPtFtU as he shortens it throughout).  Maiden aunts attending evensong may reach for their smelling salts at his occasional use of the F word but, as a working definition of sin, I find this one rather appealing. It is thoroughly Biblical in concept. It is my personal experience.  

Spufford isn't someone who finds faith easy.  He struggles with belief, recording that God often appears to be absent.  He notes, rightly, that the contentions of Dawkins and Hitchens all depend as much upon faith as any believer – presumably why the Dawkins-inspired bus campaign “There probably is no God, so stop worrying and enjoy yourself” includes the ‘probably’ – Dawkins & Co have intellectual integrity enough to acknowledge that they simply don’t know if God exists or not.  Spufford is incensed by the idea that, if only the god-nonsense stopped then we could all stop worrying and enjoy ourselves, since the human condition is far broader than ‘enjoyment’. Would a convincing demolition of the concept of God bring enjoyment to countless millions who live in misery? No.

To his credit, Spufford does not duck the problem of pain: God is good and all-loving; God is all powerful; yet there is untold suffering in the world – discuss.  Remember, this is not an academic debate but an emotional diatribe. So he berates God for his absences but finds he cannot escape the Other that hints at His existence through emotions and situations.  He touches on the arguments about freewill but simply settles on the Person of Jesus as God’s response to suffering. I find his emotional response powerful and persuasive, accepting that he doesn't pretend to offer ‘The Answer’.  Along the way he tilts playfully at some flimsy arguments of atheists. His utter contempt for the risible John Lennon song, Imagine, is a delicious piece of prose…

Who might benefit from reading this book?

• Non-believers who have been suckered into thinking that science is the only lens we have to examine truth
• Believers who are fed up with their faith being attacked
• Believers whose faith rests solely on a set of propositions about God or Sunday-by-Sunday ‘experiences’ and who lack the integrity, toolkit or balls (maiden aunt has now fallen off her pew) to confront some of the harder questions of faith and the not-knowing, preferring instead to stick their fingers in their ears and loudly sing worship songs (so anointed…) to block out the inconvenient issues of pain, suffering or an apparently indifferent or impotent God.

So, well done Mr Spufford.  And I see from Amazon that the sole remaining hardback copy is priced at £1,007, so as well as feeding my soul I might also make a tidy profit by selling my copy. Good stuff !

Never mind the poor - it's rich people we need in this church!

Smile, Gordon, God loves you too...

One of the most pleasurable aspects of my role is when I visit churches that contribute to the Baptist Home Mission Fund, to thank them for supporting churches like mine through their giving. 

Without the financial support of our big Baptist family, Church from Scratch would not have been able to afford its current budget.  We celebrated our 11^th birthday as a church this weekend and the fact that we have grown and developed as we have owes much to our annual Home Mission grant. 

I would also want to acknowledge that we receive a double grant – one of very few churches to do so – for which I am deeply grateful.

These annual grants are made towards up to 50% of the costs of a minister’s basic stipend. However, they do not contribute to:

•             housing costs (pioneering churches are unlikely to have manses)
•             employer’s National Insurance
• employer’s pension contributions (the Baptist Union strongly encourages its ministers to belong to the Baptist Ministers’ Pension scheme or to make alternative arrangements)
•              the costs of ministry (e.g. travel: my church ‘parish’ covers an area of around 48 square miles)

The amount of our grant for 2014 has just been announced.  It is reducing to 40% of the basic stipend.  In real terms this amounts to just 24% of the full ministry costs to be carried by the church.

The taper (a reduction year on year) is presumably intended to encourage churches to grow and to take greater responsibility for their own financial needs, so that the HMF can be redeployed to assist other, perhaps new, churches.

  

I suspect, however, that the underlying assumption is that churches like this one should bring in enough higher earners to balance the bias we have towards sharing the gospel with people on lower-incomes or who live on benefits.

So I face a personal dilemma (I speak for myself only, not for CFS on this topic).

Should we focus on building relationships with accountants, architects, GPs, lawyers and stockbrokers – all of whom God loves and all of whom are welcome here – at the cost of time spent with people who have fewer opportunities and choices?

And if we abandon them to search for richer members, who will take up our work?

Or do we continue to reach out to those who will never be able to give enough money from their hand-to-mouth incomes to make this church financially self-supporting?

And has anyone really thought through the Gospel implications of this policy?

[Note: as well as the comments below, there is quite a debate on the issues raised here on my Facebook page here. Scroll down to the item headed "New Baptist strategy for evangelism"]

Rich ginger cake

The Lemon Posset recipe posted back in April seems to have been  well received, so here’s another sweet favourite. Is it calorie rich? Does it cost a bit to make?  Yes and yes but this is the best ginger cake I’ve tasted.  Stays moist for ages but you will have eaten it all well before then...

450g (1lb) self-raising flour

5ml (1 level teaspoon) salt

2.5cms (1 inch) length of rough grated root ginger (add more to make it fiery if you like)

15ml (1 level tablespoon) powdered ginger

15ml (1 level tablespoon) baking powder

5ml (1 level teaspoon) bicarbonate of soda

225g (8oz) Demerara sugar

175g (6oz) cooking margarine

175g (6oz) black treacle

175g (6oz) golden syrup

300ml (1/2 pint) milk

1 egg

Sift together the flour, salt, powdered ginger, baking powder and bicarb. Warm the margarine, sugar, treacle and golden syrup in a saucepan but do not allow to get hot. Combine the melted, warm ingredients with the powdered ones in a bowl, adding the grated root ginger at the end.  Warm the milk and beat in the egg then add to the batter, mixing very thoroughly until it is smooth.  Pour into a greased, lined 20cm (8 inch) tin and bake in the oven at 180°C (350°F) for about 45 minutes then use a metal skewer to check in the centre if the cake is cooked through (if the skewer emerges clean, then it is).  If not then continue cooking and checking every 15 minutes.  If the top starts to brown, cover with foil. When cooked, allow to cool in the tin before turning out.

Enjoy.  If you need a second opinion about your efforts, call me for a taste.

On friendship

In the last few days, my thoughts have been drawn again and again to friendship.

Yesterday was the funeral of Correne, a friend from my church. Despite being at the crematorium, which can be impersonal and cold, it was a moving service and a privilege to be there and to have a part to play.  Correne spoke the truth as she saw it, with a no-nonsense boldness.  When I’d been part of the church just a little while, over lunch at a group one day people got round to talking about vicars, priests and ministers. Not everything people said was very complimentary!  As several voices listed the faults of church leaders and clergy I thought I should remind people that I was one of them. “Oh not you’re not,” said Correne, in a voice that wasn’t accepting any disagreement, “You’re one of us.”  Nothing said to me by any church, before or since, has had quite such an impact on me.

The day before the funeral, a friend phoned from halfway across the world to ask me to listen for a few minutes as he talked about his marriage, work and life.  Though separated by many miles and by different cultures, faith and circumstances, our friendship was strong, real and there when we needed it.

Three weeks ago N and I met friends from student days who we hadn’t seen in many years.  We shared some of the old jokes and memories. Realising then how stupid it is to let good friendships wither, we are determined now not to leave it so long before we spend time together again.

Oh and I watched The Big Chill again (the film, not the festival).  Someone - actually it’s Kevin Costner though you never see his face! - has died and his friends gather for his funeral…  It’s of its time but still a good film about friendship. And the music is superb.

There are too few good friends in this life for us to let friendship die of neglect.

What does a minister do?

  

A short while ago graphics like this one were all the rage in social networking sites.

Of course we all know that ministers wear their collars back to front and lead church services.  Except that my church doesn’t have any services. We don’t have any mid-week Bible studies or half-nights of prayer. We no longer have a youth club. We don’t have a Mother’s Union.  We don’t have a building. And I’ve never worn a clerical collar in public (that’s got you thinking, hasn’t it?)

So, it’s not easy to see the pegs on which Joe or Joanne Public would hang their ideas about the regular content of my diary.

The fact is that most people do not know what ministers/pastors/priests do with their time.  My friend Les tells everyone that I’m on holiday every week (thanks, Les).  

A while back, in a rash moment, I promised to offer my church a kind of “Week in the life of….” glimpse into my diary.  Every time I have attempted to do this, I have ended up asking questions about what is a typical week - and when was the last time I had a typical week?
  

So here’s what I did in a recent week.  Is it a typical week?  No. This is just a week. Next one will be different.  I:

• accepted one and turned down two preaching invitations for the autumn.
• blogged
• checked Facebook (wouldn’t know what was happening in church without)
• countersigned a passport application
• dealt with (who knows how many?) emails, telephone calls, text messages, post – three-quarters of it unimportant
• drove twice to the edge of London for work-related meetings
• gave apologies that I couldn’t be with either of our Monday night groups for a while owing to other appointments
• held the hand of my dying friend
• home-cured some bacon for colleagues coming to breakfast next month
• listened to my son’s advice and enjoyed his company before he went back North.
• made ‘to do’ lists and tried to make progress in ticking off completed tasks
• organised, encouraged, schmoozed and ranted to get some people to do things 
• parted the waters of the Thames Estuary*
• played Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (it’s a good vs. evil thing)
• prayed
• read a couple of books
• read from the Bible
• reminded a few people in the church why we do what we do
• reviewed a theology book for an online magazine
• shared Communion
• spent time sharing life with the cell community that meets in my home
• spent time with colleagues in other local churches: listening, talking, planning and problem-solving
• spent time with our Life & Faith group, sharing lunch, talking and praying
• spent time with people who were grieving.  Didn’t say too much; just shared their company and their pain
• started to write some small-group teaching resources for the autumn
• started, with others, to dream some dreams about what next for our church – nothing ruled in or out.
• tackled bits of administration that arise from managing a charity
• took a family member to hospital for her oncology and audiology appointments
• took a friend to a half-day cardiology appointment
• took part in a team meeting
• tried to do some thinking
• visited hospital several times, to be with others who were caring for our dying friend.
• telephoned my friend H in her long-term hospital
• visited some people from church – nothing heavy, just tea and catching up with life
• walked five Rhodesian Ridgeback dogs
• went to the pub for an hour
• worked with my close colleague on managing current pressures in the church
• worked with people from 3 other churches, exploring what God might be saying about their next steps together
• wrote two detailed papers aiming to release a substantial amount of money for mission among a group of churches in Essex

Now you might be thinking – not all of that is work is it?  Some of that isn’t 'sacred', it’s everyday. Which is why ministers are paid a stipend as ‘holders of an office’, not a salary – an allowance to enable us live a way of life which isn’t 9-6.  Most weeks it’s a 50+ hour week, some of which will look like work and other parts not. One reason is that people don’t have their spiritual encounters or crises by appointment or during office hours alone.

I wrote this list because people asked me what I do, not to make myself look good or to seek approbation.  I chose this way of life. There are times when it's the best way of life in the world and others when it doesn't feel like that...

*This only happened in my head