Building bridges into the future.

Vincent Strudwick, theologian, member of the Society of the Sacred Mission and author of The Naked God, writes on the theme of this year's Bloxham Faith and Literature Festival …

Building Bridges – Shoes and Life Jackets

In the early part of the new century, in response to a request from ‘Smithsonian Associates’ to lead a seminar at Chatauqua in New York State, I devised ‘The shoe-shop game’. Adult learning games involving role play make some of us impatient, like giving theological students ‘tasters’ of a life outside their experience, but both can contrive to link emotion to reason and open the mind. It is, after all, only a participative form of story-telling, a kind of colloquium, and there are different ways of doing it. At Chatauqua in 2004, we arrived during the time when there was a passionate debate about what should be done at the site of 9/11. Some people present had personal involvement with the tragic event and its aftermath, and feelings were very strong. Working in threes (two people with opposing views and a monitor), a view was expressed and listened to by the ‘other’; who then was invited to express the same view with equal accuracy and passion – in other words, to wear the other person’s shoes. Choice of words, facial expression, body language and outward evidence of emotion, all played a part as roles were swapped, insights shared and evaluations were made. It was the kind of role-play that could only be done in a residential setting, with careful attention to social bonding and the ‘return to home base’. The feedback was unanimously positive. Views were not necessarily changed, but listening and understanding was enhanced.

A powerful example was offered by St James Church, Piccadilly, in the heart of London in December 2015. A capsized rubber dinghy made for about 15 people, used by a group of 62 refugees from Syria to reach the Greek island of Lesbos, was suspended above the nave for the Christmas season, in a display created by artist Arabella Dorman. Three life jackets – two adult and one child – suspended over the side towards the congregation, reminded those beneath that the Christmas story includes the flight of Joseph, Mary and the child Jesus to Egypt as refugees, and that wearing the life jacket is more vital to understanding that story than saying ‘Aah’ over a crib.

It is now possible (and for many of the young generations a much more natural thing) to engage in participative virtual story telling over the internet. At the time of writing, PokeStops is the new game and ‘Pokemon Go’ is the Church of England’s digital media office’s follow up, with a blog to share with churches on ways of using it. Developing this modern form of story-telling is going to be increasingly vital; but a counter-cultural difference may be our need to imagine how to create for the gamesters a return from virtual to real, if we believe that we need boots on the ground, and not in space, to effect the common good.

Other People’s Bridges: Being Aware

A danger with bridge building is that we are so focused on our own constructs that we do not see when someone the other side of the river is throwing a Bailey bridge from that other side. The terrorist activities of Daesh, and the increase in UK people’s fear of being overwhelmed by refugees and other migrants, has widened the gap between long term natives and English and other European Muslims, largely because the media and others insist on identifying them by religion rather than nationality: ‘So called Islamic State’ insists the BBC, instead of Daesh or Arabs or Africans. The radicalisation of young Muslims is complex and often personal; but part of it is their perceived exclusion from the mainstream culture of the generation to which they belong, by attitudes they meet at school, in the street or supermarket. For example, an employee in a supermarket in Merseyside may speak with the right accent, support ‘the Reds’, but may find it difficult to arrange shifts that enable him or her to go to the Mosque on a Friday, or come to an arrangement where s/he doesn’t have to sell alcohol. The law is too heavy handed to deal with such issues, but in spite of the bridges being crossed by scholars, Imams and many ordinary Muslims, not least shopkeepers, the cultural barriers imposed by the ‘Britain Isn’t What it Was Yesterday’ brigade (the laager mentality – laager meaning ‘withdrawing into a cultural defensive huddle’) seem to be getting stronger, and in turn alienation or radicalisation is bound to increase. This is not to say that religion has not been, and is not today, responsible for much hatred, violence and war. But care must be taken in distinguishing where it is, from where it is not.

In South Africa and the USA in the 1960s, I was able to experience a ‘taster’ of Apartheid in the one, and the idealism of the young, and the post-Selma march hostilities among others at first hand. In both I experienced the laager mentality.

Because Society of the Sacred Mission (SSM) members had worked in South Africa from the very early days, with both pastoral and educational responsibilities, we had students from South Africa (black and white) coming to Kelham as ordinands, so at second hand I was familiar with the situation through them and through contemporary colleagues who were working there. However, as the apartheid regime extended its grip on the country, limiting the education that blacks were allowed, the Society withdrew from the system, rather than compromising with the regime. This was at the same time as changes were taking place in the way the college at Kelham was run, and also coincided with Basutoland preparing for independence under Chief Leabua Jonathan – who many thought would ‘nationalise’ the schools in that country, when the moment came. A great number of those schools were resourced through SSM from the priory at Teyateyaneng.

I was sent, first to South Africa and then to Basutoland, in the winter of 1964/5 on a diplomatic mission for my community, to explain what was happening to the College at Kelham to the South African brethren; and then to carry back to England what they were worried about there. By chance, I travelled into South Africa with Father Simeon Nqwame, a black priest returning home from the College at Mirfield. He briefed me on the need to separate when we left the plane – total separation of black from white in all public places of course – and that if we met in the street (amid laughter) he would have to lower his eyes and adopt a servile attitude. It was no joke, and of course I knew about it. But that is not the same as experiencing it.

While in Johannesburg, attending a three-day conference of the Christian Institute of South Africa, I found myself in the midst of a remarkable group of white clergy of all denominations; wrestlers who were making a theological critique of the regime and attempting to draw up a programme of positive action to undermine both the philosophy and the practice of the regime. A significant figure in this, who had founded the Christian Institute in that fateful year 1963, and lead speaker at the conference, was Dr Beyers Naude, a Dutch Reformed pastor and former Moderator (Head) of the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa. By this time he had rejected apartheid, been thrown out of the Reformed Church, and shunned by his local congregation. We met in the gents loo, and I began to open up a conversation with him. He put his finger to his lips and beckoned, and we walked in the garden. ‘We are being bugged by CID’ he said, ‘And I don’t want you to get detained.’ At this moment I sensed the laager. Literally making wagons into a square fence or barrier, keeping the perceived enemy outside; I felt ‘the enemy.’ Having had this taster experience, I was appalled, but did not immediately ask myself ‘Can I wear Boer boots and learn what makes them act like this?’ I wish I had, but later I tried to put on Naude’s boots and feel something of the pain he had undergone in the reality of his pilgrimage as he built a bridge to break out of the Afrikaner laager into a new future for his country and his people.

Building Bridges into the Future

Preparatory work has to be done, and we have hard work ahead. Laagers have to be identified and shoes tried on.

The same goes for those of, say, Islamic faith coming to our shores who may have to redefine themselves with a new collective identity and an ability for self-affirmation in the European context. They will need understanding and help by historic long-term Brits and we will not be able to do it if we have not tried on their shoes.

Our values today are not fixed, and with new actors on the scene, new groups and new customs, we are together in a process of transformation, and we shall make new alliances some of which embrace parts of secular culture while others will be counter-cultural to the secular values of the market economy. The Christian understanding of embodying the divine in showing mercy and compassion is complemented in the Qu’ran, where every chapter but one is prefaced with the words: ‘In the name of God, the Lord of Compassion, the giver of Compassion’. In her book Hospitality in Islam: Welcoming in God’s Name Mona Siddiqui argues that Christian and Muslim understandings of hospitality have the special quality that both believe that God is a generous God, and that ‘we must give and be generous because that is how God is, and God’s giving knows no limits.’ She goes on ‘I would contend that offering hospitality, especially to the stranger, as a way of imitating the divine, as well as being obedient to God, is embedded in the rich vocabulary of charity, generosity, mercy and compassion which permeates the entire Qu’ran.

This deeply embedded value is shared in Judaism through the tzedakah, which demands faithful giving to the needy as a priority, and to the depth that ensures those receiving never have to ask again. Together the Abrahamic faiths bring this enrichment to those compassionate people without faith, who in their lives prioritise and exhibit selfless compassion to the stranger, the vulnerable, the refugee and all who are needy.

There will be areas where Christian values and the values of those of other faiths are opposed, for example in the case of same-sex marriage. Mona Siddiqui and many other scholars, together with Imams responsible for pastoral care, reject a blanket reading of sharia law, and recognise that change can, and should, happen. Pointing to the way in which the Muslim world has contextualised Islam in different cultures, adapting it to widely different social, political and economic situations, Michael Nazir Ali instances the history of radical reconstruction in sharia law, and also the principle of maslaha, where change may be guided by taking into account the common good. Nevertheless, there will be times when we all, Jew, Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist or whatever, find ourselves appalled by what is being said and done by those who bear our religious identity. In a pluralist State, we may need to practise Hooker’s ‘Harmonious Dissimilitude’, which can only become harmonious if we build on the local face-to-face sharing that was outlined in the previous chapter, seeking understanding together when we hear or face the violence that is part of human nature, both within religious institutions as well as outside them.

There are many radical bridge builders into the future growth in the Church of England, as there are in all the religions here. The Reverend Andrew Cain gained press notoriety because he was the first licensed clergyman to marry a same-sex partner instead of crossing the legal toll bridge of a non-sexual civil partnership. What the press did not feature in such bold type was his transformation of the church of St James, West Hampstead, from a beautiful (but largely empty) church into one that has become a hub in the life of the local community, with a Post Office at the west end, a café, a physical play area for families and children, a shop – and a host of activities providing employment, a welcome for all, of any faith and none, as well as a refuge for the vulnerable. The beauty of holiness, and of worship, is preserved at the (open) East end where both traditional Anglo-Catholic and other kinds of worship are offered. St James is one church in a huge project, which is the Diocese of London’s ‘Capital Vision 2020’. In the Diocese of Oxford a full time pioneering appointment has been made to explore a new strategy and alternative forms of mission for the rural church. The Revd Val Plumb is currently serving four rural deaneries to research their situation in context, reflect, and consult with the Area episcopal team to enable action in that place. It is expected this will serve as a model for other parts of the diocese, to combat resistance to change, and ‘envision’ a church better able to serve the local community.

My experience has been that visionary theology and practice have not become embedded enough to be sustained. Passionate charismatic leaders move on, or die, and the legacy remains fragmented or dissolves. Can Andrew Cain, for example, with his grass roots team, win over a coherent majority of informed wrestlers, to join in ensuring the longevity and continuing development of their project at St James, West Hampstead? Are there other churches in similar city environments, or in suburban or rural contexts, willing to free their institutions from the tyranny of non-essentials, and look to the future with determination and imagination?

All institutions in the UK have lost the people’s trust in recent years, including the Banks, the Stock Exchange, the Police, Trades Unions, Parliament and the Church. They no longer have authority. Can the Church of England, for example, stand out among these institutions and regain the idealism and enthusiasm of its lost generations in this atmosphere? I fear not, in a world drowning in the airwaves of Twitter, Facebook and the cynicism of journalists. It needs something new to do this. But ‘I am doing a new thing’ says the Lord. One of those Hebrew wrestlers called Isaiah picks up a recurring theme in the Jewish/Christian story: look around in the light of your story and respond to what is happening. Pope Francis has done this – responded – by opposing the ‘free market’ theory that assumes economic growth will ‘trickle down’ and benefit all.

This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralised workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile the excluded are still waiting. To sustain a lifestyle which excludes others, or to sustain enthusiasm for that selfish ideal, a globalisation of indifference has developed. Almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, or weeping for other people’s pain.

This is an edited extract from The Naked God:Wrestling for a grace-ful humanity by Vincent Strudwick and Jane Shaw. The book is available now in paperback, priced £12.99.