iGod

Easter is not just for the religious type

A local vicar and pastor stood by the side of the road holding up a sign that said, "The End is Near! Turn yourself around now before it's too late!"

"Leave us alone, you religious nuts!" yelled a driver as he sped by. Then from around the bend they heard a big splash.

"Do you think," said one clergy to the other, "we should just put up a sign that says, 'bridge down' instead?"

I have heard people say that they are not the religious type, insinuating that, perhaps, I am.  As if I came out of my mother’s womb clutching an open Bible with a full-robed choir singing the Hallelujah Chorus by the bedside. I mean who sets out in life to be religious?

For some strange reason though a few atheist writers recently, such as Alain De Botton and Richard Holloway, find “religion” attractive. In fact, the former writer has gone so far to try and set out a religious life for non-believers. Then there is AC Grayling who has even written a bible for the atheist.

Someone once wrote, “To be is to be connected. And to be connected is to be plugged in.” The Bible states that we are all “made in the image of God”. These are both big, big statements and this is a small, small brain here that reflects upon them. Yet, life is a big experience and so I think it deserves a little of our time to dwell on the big stuff once in a while, don’t you?  And it is also okay not to have a conclusive answer in two minutes. Some things are meant to be pondered over a lifetime. Maybe even over eternity.

I guess for many people though “religion” in the UK stands for a shrinking minority of church-goers who hate gay people, resent women and despise those who have abortions, but anyone with a bit of savvy will know that this not quite the case but, of course, it makes a convenient headline.

However, personally speaking, if my faith does come across as judgmental, intolerant and exclusive, it bothers me and the finger needs to be pointed firmly back at my face.

Mahatma Gandhi once said, “Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Sadly, I think at times he is right. I have met many non-Christians whose conduct is better people than Christians. Religion in itself does not make anyone a better person - Christian or atheist. But, of course, choosing to follow Jesus is not principally about ethics, it has to do with an awe-inspiring divine-human relationship.

Shortly our local churches will be celebrating Easter, a time we celebrate new life in Christ through his resurrection, but maybe we could see as the time when Jesus Christ, the son of God, came as the non-religious type for the non-religious type to draw all people to himself into a real, relevant and restored relationship with God the Father.

I truly believe the message of salvation is still as powerful and pertinent as it was 2,000 years ago, because you see Jesus’ death happened in a secular setting, not in a private religious community. It was not really a religious event at all. It happened in the city of one of the busiest and most important trading outposts of the Roman Empire.

On Good Friday we remember how Jesus, isolated and with a minority following, gave his life in a divine act of love for the majority, regardless of belief or faith. Now, I am not wanting to impose my position on anyone, but I do want to put it out there to our community.

We are all free to accept or reject, but let me leave you with this last thought: did Jesus really die just to make us religious? It just doesn’t stack up for me.

Maybe see you at Stour Valley Vineyard Church 10.30 am on Easter Sunday at the Delphi Centre.

Happy Easter!

ASD

A reflection for Good Friday - if you are religious or not

At noon, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. And at three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).

When some of those standing near heard this, they said, “Listen, he’s calling Elijah.”

Someone ran, filled a sponge with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to take him down,” he said.

With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last. The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. And when the centurion, who stood there in front of Jesus, saw how he died, he said, “Surely this man was the Son of God!” (Mark's gospel, the Bible)

My youngest daughter loves reading stories from her Children's Book of the Bible. I tend to let her chose one, which hopefully isn't too many pages. Amidst the other stories is the account of Jesus' death. The Church calls it Good Friday. To a child of seven or even a mature adult it is perhaps hard to see why this could in any possible way, shape or form be called a good day.

But here's the thing.

Even the most hardened of skeptics I meet admit that Jesus stood for life, love, justice and faith. Through history and society people have broadly cheered at his indignant approach to upsetting convention and exposing hypocrisy and abuse. But every hero apparently has his day and we get disprited when people don't live up to our hopes. Much like politicians and expensive footballers, I guess.

DId Jesus get too big for his boots or did the people big him up for their own needs? A large number really just wanted a king to lead a revolution and overthrow the Romans and live life again on their own terms again.

Last Sunday we rememembered Palm Sunday, the day when Jesus rode into Jersusalem at the time of the Feast of the Passover, not as a people's king or a vainglorious rebel leader, but as a pilgrim on a way to a festival on a donkey and colt.

On Maundy Thursday we remembered how he met with his closest disciples for the Passover meal, a meal that symbolised the salvation of the Jewish people, by the retelling of the story of their exodus from Egypt many hundreds of years previously. They had a last supper together in a upper room, taking the bread made without yeast and the cup of wine and passed them around to each other.

The night would end in betrayl by one disgruntled militant activist member whose trust in Jesus had worn thin by a lack of perceived action.

And so we come to Good Friday or bad Friday, depending on your viewpoint as a child or not. It may interest you to know that the cross was known as such a horrendous form of Roman torture and death that for the first part of the Church's development no reference to the cross as a symbol is to be found. it was only latterly in the Western church first that the cross started to be depicted as a main symbol of Christianity and that was through art as much as anything else.

Today, Jesus' death is overlooked by many in a secular society because he is seen as a narrow-minded, judgementalist, religious bigot out to conform everyone to one view, regardless of other views, cutlure etc.

However I have to say this is what others have made him, not himself. Much like in his day.

This 'king' did not live up to socio-political expectation at so many levels.

Firstly he never owned property, he always had something borrowed to him. His parents borrowed a stable (not born in a palace). He borrowed friends' houses to stay in (no possessions of his own). He borrowed a donkey and colt to ride in Jerusalem (not a steed). He borrowed a guest house room for the last supper. And at the end he even borrowed another man's tomb to be buried in.

Recently I heard atheist Rick Gervais say in an article in the New York Times that he thought he was a better Christian than Christians because he kept the 10 Commandments. He had come across those who profess to follow Jesus but had dubious actions, citing Ghandi who said. "I like your Christ, I don't like your Christians." Often the church has to be shamed by unexpected sources for it to come to its senses.

Sometimes It is hard to see beyond the moment and get perspective for Christians, agnostics and atheists alike. Easter gives our lives perspective whether we are religious or not.

So what makes Jesus' life, death and resurrection relevant for us today? Because his death historically happened in the hands of a secular institution, the Roman Empire, and so stopped it from becoming a small religious regional affair, making it unknowingly everybody's business. Hence, becoming a world faith across all cultures and backgrounds today.

The Easter story slows us down to remind us of our falibility and human weakeness. It reminds us that untimately we all want to be saved from something or ourselves.

Beyond being one of the earliest human rights activists, Jesus Christ demonstrated a purity that most of us, if we are honest with ourselves, yearn for. It came with great and awful sacrifice.

We want hope. We want to believe in better. We, therefore, need to be reminded of the pain to gain.

So when I wish you happy Easter, I mean 'happy Easter!'

May you find peace and love in the power of his life, death and resurrection.

ASD