Valediction
Farewell from Andrew Deuchar
John 3:16
God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might be saved.
From “The Road Not Taken” - Robert Frost (1874-1963)
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
The heart of the question is - how can we be more fully the community that, in Christ, we are called to be? At every turn, at every parting of the ways, that must be the question that continues to confront and to challenge us. For no matter what happens, whatever decisions we make, day by day and year by year, God calls, Christ walks with us and the Holy Spirit enlightens the eyes of our hearts that we may see Truth.
That could be put in a different way, in the words of a question that I have often asked from the pulpit, and a question which has lain at the heart of the life of the church at the centre of this city for a lot longer than the seven and a half years that we have journeyed together:
What on earth is the Church for?
And to begin to uncover an answer to that question, there is a more fundamental question to which we all know the answer deep down, but which we too easily forget or ignore:
Who is God?
“God is love” (1 John 4:16)
“God is light and in him is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5)
“God is our hope and strength” (Psalm 46:1)
God is creator, sustainer and redeemer, the beginning and the end. God created, continues to create, and will go on creating until all is transfigured and fulfilled. From the void came substance, from the darkness came light, from death came life. These are the eternal truths of our Creator God, and what was true then continues to be true now. God is concerned to create new life, new possibilities, always, out of the darkness, the brokenness, the chaos of our present, until all of us – individuals, communities, the whole earth are as God desires us to be. And so determined is God in his love that he gave of his own essence, of his own most intimate life that we might see and know through the eyes of our enlightened hearts, once and for all, the transfiguration, the salvation that is ours in God.
How our lives should be filled with longing for that life. How our hearts should expand to embrace the vision of that salvation. How our prayer should reach out towards, as the Irish Priest/Poet, Patrick Murray put it:
A ground within you no-one has ever seen, a world beyond the limits of your dream’s horizon.
A world, an existence in which all is reconciled, at peace and in love.
That we are deeply compromised in that longing, all of us, every single one of us, goes without saying. The whole story of humanity, the whole biblical narrative is laced with the fact of our weakness, the shallowness of our vision, the brokenness of our lives. A couple of years ago, I preached a sermon at a joint evensong, to which I gave a title almost as long as the text: ‘King David: A Cautionary Tale for Compromised Kings (and Princes, Presidents, Prime Ministers, Primates and People generally) and a Celebration.’ In grappling with the hugely compromised figure of King David, I suggested that the story “is as racy and plot-filled as any Edwina Currie novel, and it is a remarkable piece of religious writing, precisely because of the ‘warts and all’ portrayal of this national hero”. Throughout the shared history of our faith community (and of all other faith communities), we learn of the way that God has taken the fragility of the humanity that he created, and transformed it into something of beauty and significance in the history of salvation. It doesn’t excuse us, it doesn’t remove from us the responsibility of rising to the challenge our faith sets before us; but it could mould us into a people of deep gratitude and a people of deep humility – an engaging mixture – because we see and know, with our enlightened hearts, that every person, every being, every part of creation is of absolute value!
Sometimes church life does not look much like that, but sometimes, too, a flicker of a flame shoots up through the dark of the coal and ashes. A Christian community that is willing to take a risk, even when it is hesitant – perhaps especially when it is hesitant – about the outcome, is flickering towards transformation. That is what is happening in the city centre of Nottingham. It has been a huge privilege to be a part of the struggle to take that step of faith. Believe me, I know the cost for some people. I know there are those who remain unhappy that stability and security have been disturbed, but I am absolutely sure that God will bless the onward journey, and that all the constituent parts of the nascent ‘Minster Community’ will discover new and enriching paths to follow and explore, even if some would love to go back and choose another path instead.
I hope and pray that the ecumenical journey will continue. It has been one of the most exciting and potentially fulfilling elements of our development. There is no reason for us to think ‘apart’ or not to involve one another in everything that we plan. That there will always be diversity in our worship and in the ways in which we express our belief is part of the richness of the world in which we live. We may at times feel uncomfortable with that diversity because how others worship, or the priorities that they set, can be very different from our own. That is all part of the challenge to us, and it is when we will need to draw on the resources of our gratitude and humility.
And what is true of relations between different parts of the Christian community is true too of our relations with members of other faiths. There is only one God, and we are all children of that God, and everyone is called to play their part in creating the community of love and hope that heralds God’s domain. The service held to celebrate the Bicentenary of the Abolition of the Slave Trade will always remain in my memory as a great united celebration of the compassion and justice that can and does flow when God is allowed to work, and we had countless messages of gratitude from all over the county for the inclusive nature of the liturgy, and the sheer joy of being at one in our prayer, penitence and praise. On the other hand, the partly negative reactions to inclusion of a ‘Call to Prayer’ from a Muslim cantor at the High Sheriff’s service in January was disappointing (though not totally surprising). We have wonderful space to offer the city. It is space dedicated to and hallowed by the worship of God. We should rejoice that such a variety of people recognize it as such and wish to express their faith in God within the walls. The new window at St Peter’s, sponsored by UNISON and other trades unions, as a memorial to those who have died in the course of their work, is another shining example of how our sacred space can be used, and the needs of ordinary people of diverse backgounds expressed.
I am not going to say more about the life of the parish through 2007. Others will have done so in their reports, and mine is late anyway! And this report is different. It marks the end of our time here, and my ministry among you. The way of departure is not how I or anyone else would have chosen it. I deeply regret the way it has happened. I pray for forgiveness for the things that I have got wrong. I hope that the parish will still, however, hold on to the vision that together we have been forming. It is a vision of inclusivity, because God is inclusive. It is a vision of hope because God is our hope and strength. It is a vision of love, because God is love. We have been immensely touched by the messages of love, appreciation and support that we have received in the past weeks. A community can only be as loving, as compassionate and inclusive as the individuals who make it up, and the individuals will reflect those Godly values only as a result of a depth of prayer that goes way beyond the stuff we do in church. And I know that we leave with a sense of calm even in the midst of a depth of suffering, because those of you who have contacted us have made us feel that we belong. As the very popular Irish Christian philosopher, John O’Donoghue (whose book ‘Eternal Echoes: Exploring our Hunger to Belong’ I have been reading during Holy Week and Easter) writes:
The shelter of belonging empowers you; it confirms in you a stillness and sureness of heart. You are able to endure external pressure and confusion; you are sure of the ground on which you stand.
You have enabled us to know that we still belong within the community of love, that we still belong in the heart of God. And that friendship, that steadfastness, that generosity of spirit is the place where God’s seed comes to birth and brings to life the hope of transfiguration. Paths have been taken and not taken. I will look back with sadness and penitence at some of those, but know too that forward is the only way.
This comes with my love, my gratitude and my prayer for God’s blessing on all who have shared this journey of the past eight years. You will remain a part of our journey, and I hope, with the sure knowledge that God brings new life and hope at every turn, that we will remain a part of yours.
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