Against the puritans

Preached Remembrance Sunday (13th November) 2022, St Michael's Church, Stockwell

Malachi 4:1-2
Psalm 98
2 Thessalonians 3:6-13
Luke 21:5-19

Now the Vicar isn’t here, I can admit that I really don’t want to give this sermon. I like giving sermons in general, just not this one, the Remembrance day sermon.

And I have three main problems with it:

• Firstly, the cricket is on, so I’m missing England’s batting in the final – this may be a blessing in disguise.
• Secondly, the timing is highly stressful. Up and down the country preachers are having their sermons timed carefully to ensure that we hit 11am. There is no time for improvisations.
• Most importantly, the tone is very difficult to get right. This is a national, secular, day of solemn remembrance, which sometimes makes preachers give half-baked political opinions and neglect the theology.

You can judge me later on how I do.

That tone issue is particularly relevant when we look at the readings that we have. The Old Testament does not appear to have been chosen for solemn remembrance. Malachi is all about retribution, the Psalm is a celebration: we are invited to make a joyful noise to the Lord. And we are promised the whole earth will resound with joy and celebration – the seas roar, the hills sing.

We are a long way from the Cenotaph.

It made me think of the places where the war still sits heavily. 104 years after the end of the First World War, there remain places in France where the earth has never recovered. In the ‘zone rouge’ in north east France, contamination from the battlefield means that the water remains poisoned, almost all plants die, and locals are still at risk from unexploded shells. There may be noises in the hills, but not singing. They are uninhabitable.

I could not ask for a less subtle metaphor: the scars from wars are deep and long. And that is why today we remember the Great War, and subsequent ones of course. But the First World War was a global war, with soldiers from every continent, and battles across the globe. For the remembrance of what was meant to be the war to end all wars, it is poignant that we do so in a Europe that is once again at war. In Ukraine, nation has once again risen against nation.

We in Europe rightly are gripped by this new, rare, war, but war itself is not new, it is certainly not news. Many of you will have first hand knowledge of it.

In first century Palestine, it was very present. In the century before the crucifixion, Jerusalem itself had been the scene of several wars and rebellions and control of Judea had changed hands several times. When Luke records Christ talking about war and hardship: ‘kingdom against kingdom … great earthquakes, … famines and plagues’ he could be talking about their recent history. By the time the gospel was written, later in the first century, the Romans had crushed the Jewish revolt and destroyed the temple.

The first audience of the gospels didn’t need warning about the future where nation fought nation, their nation had fought, and it had lost. What they needed to be told was what happens next. And the gospel gives them – and us – the answer. And it gets worse before it gets better:

• This isn’t just a normal war: ‘there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven’
• Nor will you face it with your compatriots and allies: ‘they will persecute you… you will be hated by all.’

This, rhetorically at least, is not like the wars we remember today. It requires much greater bravery than that. You will be alone.

But, in the end: you will gain your souls.

And this is why our readings on Remembrance Sunday start with jubilation. Not because there is no danger. There is. Not because the it will not hurt. It will. Not because sacrifice is not needed. Not because some sacrifices were misguided. They were. But because in the end, you will gain your souls. And we will rejoice.

This has always been the promise, but there are two dangers embedded in this:

• Firstly, that knowing one is saved, it is easy to stop trying. The writer of our epistle (possible Paul) has little time for this: Anyone unwilling to work should not eat … do not be weary in doing what is right. This danger lurks in the Calvinist theology of predestination, but for another time.
• But there is also a second risk. Not addressed directly, and that is that by fixing upon the future rejoicing, the church becomes miserable, dour, and joyless - a puritan Christianity that drives out all enjoyment. Calvin’s Geneva banned art, music with instruments, dancing, and theatre. We must not be so fixed on the narrowness of the path that we forget to laugh along the way.

For Remembrance must be tempered with laughter, just as the sacrifices of the war years were also tempered with joy. The pubs did not shut in either World War. And I wrote the last parts of this sermon last night, after Martin Kenyon’s memorial service in this church yesterday. Like all good funerals, while of course it was sad as we said goodbye to Martin, it also had jokes. Sorrow must be mingled with laughter. Afterwards, we debated about what to do with the flowers and I promised Wendy that it would be fitting to keep them. Remembrance should be solemn, but it need not be joyless.

Today is, in some churches, the feast of St John Chrysostom. He was THE superstar preacher of the late fourth century, later poached by the Emperor to become bishop of Constantinople, the biggest job in the church. It went terribly badly: John preaches against the excesses of the court, falls out with everybody and dies on the way to exile.

John did die alone, persecuted, I assume, the promise of his soul sustained him.

But I raise John not because of what he did, but because of what he wrote. This is his paschal homily, given every Easter in the Orthodox church:

Let us all enter into the joy of the Lord! First and last alike receive your reward; rich and poor, rejoice together! Sober and slothful, celebrate the day! You that have kept the fast, and you that have not, rejoice today for the Table is richly laden! Feast royally on it, the calf is a fatted one. Let no one go away hungry; partake, all, of the cup of faith. Enjoy all the riches of His goodness! Let no one grieve at his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed.

Remembrance is solemn. The sacrifices made are real, and we should, must and will honour them, but let us do so with our eyes fixed on the light that is coming and they joy. They all – and we all – will gain our souls.

Amen.

Bibliography, October 2022

M. Renault, Fire from Heaven (1969)

H. Atlee, The land where lemons grow (2014)

J. Didion, Slouching towards Bethlehem (1968)

R. Hoggart, Uses of Literacy (1957)

D. Landy, Skulduggery Pleasant (2007)

M. Le Conte, Haven't You Heard?: Gossip, Politics and Power (2019)

D. Orr, Motherwell (2017)

D. Simmons, the fall of Hyperion (1990)

  

Amongst my ever growing list of regrets, most of which were pointed out at the time to make them additionally galling, I include a regret that I didn't do Classics. I'm not sure I could have done Classics. I, as the memorable phrase has it, never had the Latin. Part of the problem is that I never really wanted the Latin, but I did and do want the Greek. As you'd expect, I still believe the most perfect expression of that is the Eastern Roman Empire, but reading Renault reminded me that there's a lot more Greek history I would have done. It's famous, it's very well done on the past, both the familiarity and the alien nature of it, it's bold on homosexuality, and it's compelling in the specific portraits of the protagonists. It's slightly too long, but still excellent.