Third Sunday of Easter St Peter's 25 April 2004

Fr Mark Bonney

Christianity is a dangerous thing- you don't know where it will lead or end up. Sometimes surprising and wonderful - sometimes it's scary and terrifying. I imagine, and I don't know this at all, that during the past year Jeffrey John must have wondered why on earth he had ever been ordained and what kind of animal the Church is if it treats people the way it treated him - but the courage of the Bishop of St Albans in supporting his nomination as our new dean goes someway to restoring my faith at least in the Church of England.
 
But the diocese of St Albans is but a small thing in Christianity worldwide - and there are some anxious making attitudes around that we are sometimes unaware of. I was particularly struck by an article in the Guardian this week, some of which I wish to share with you - I'm not sure that a vast number of this congregation are Guardian readers. The article related to the USA and its behaviour towards the Middle East and suggested that if you want to understand what's happening in the Middle East you must understand first of all what's happening in Texas. A look, for example, at decisions of the Republican party in Harris County at their convention are illuminating about issues of importance. The delegates nodded through certain matters e.g. that homosexuality is contrary to the ordained truths of God; that "any mechanism to process, license, record, register or monitor the ownership of guns" should be repealed; that any form of capital gains and corporation tax should be abolished; and that immigrants should be deterred by electric fences. This was mild stuff it would seem - the temperature really rose when the Palestine/Israel situation was discussed. An apparently watered down motion was adopted which states that Israel has an undivided claim to Jerusalem and the West Bank, that Arab states should be "pressured" to absorb refugees from Palestine, and that Israel should do whatever it wishes to eliminate terrorism. As the author of the article said it was "good to see that the extremists didn't prevail"!

Now this part of Texas is the heartland of a particularly extreme form of fundamentalism: they believe that Jesus will return to the earth when certain preconditions are met - the first of these is the establishment of the state of Israel, the next involves Israel's occupation of the rest of its so-called Biblical lands and the rebuilding of the Third Temple on the site now occupied by the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa mosques. The legions of the antichrist will then be deployed against Israel and their war will lead to the final showdown in the valley of Armageddon. The Jews will either burn or convert to Christianity, and the Messiah will return to earth.

The true Christian believers will have been whisked away before the big battle starts in what is called the Rapture. What some of these true believers are doing is seeking to bring these things about - staging confrontations at the old temple site (in 2000 three US Christians were deported for trying to blow up mosques there), sponsoring Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, demanding ever more support for Israel. By clicking on to www.raptureready.com you can find how close this all is.

Now you might want dissolve into hysterical laughter at this but the really scary thing is that American pollsters believe that 15-18% of US voters belong to churches that subscribe to such teachings; the best-selling books in the US are a kind of fictionalised account of the Rapture… and to top it apparently the attorney general of the US is such a believer, along with several prominent senators including the House majority leader Tom DeLay. The argument of the article was that since when they enter the polling booths 85% of Americans are more interested in domestic policies than foreign polices - the President will lose fewer votes by encouraging Israeli aggression that by restraining it- and that is what he appears to be doing.

Christianity is a dangerous thing.

The St Albans Diocese and the Parish of Gt Berkhamsted are small fish in this pond - and you and I are even smaller: but that mustn't frighten us because what one person does can make a huge difference. Just consider what the difference of the one man Saul, of our first reading made, just think what a difference that frightened bunch of disciples made after they realised that Christ was raised.

The gospel passage finished with the simple call "Follow me". On Friday seven members of our congregation answered that call in a very special way by being confirmed - and today we welcome them particularly as they receive Holy Communion with us for the first time. I don't know if they thought what they did on Friday was a dangerous thing - it will certainly be exciting if the call is followed, encountering God in Christ is an exciting thing. It can even happen when you're fishing - as we heard in this morning's gospel - perhaps for fishing we should substitute, being about your daily work - because that's what the disciples were up to.

The things that scars me most about the kind of Christianity in the Southern States of the US and to which it would appear that the President subscribes to a considerable degree is that God is understood as being out there somewhere waiting to whisk people away, or zap them, or enter the world with a bang. There's little expectation that God is going to be encountered in a Palestinian or a Muslim or a refugee. But the picture I get from the New Testament is ever so slightly different - God calls us to follow - to follow where Christ has been and where God is - to have our eyes opened to see God in and around us and to work with him to bring about the reconciliation that is so desperately needed in our world. A reconciliation that will never come at the end of a gun barrel or with a bomb.

The world is a dangerous place - Christianity is a dangerous thing in the wrong hands - let's pray that we may be open to encountering God, that we follow with joy and excitement and live lives that display the reconciling love of the one and only living God who is Fr Son and Holy Spirit.

Amen.