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Homily preached
at Bradford Cathedral
Lent 4 2nd March 2008 - 10:15 Holy Communion
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What have the following got in common: Our 2 readings today, motherhood, Cyprian (an early church Father), Jesus on Mount of Olives, a village in East Africa, David Attenborough, you and me? Not immediately obvious is it?! Let me start with motherhood, and let me say straightaway that every one of us here this morning have a choice whether or not to be mothers; yes, even us men and even children can chose to be mothers to others, in the most important sense of mothering. But let's start with what we know. We think of a mother as a woman who raises children; she may or may not have given birth to her child. A mother who adopts or fosters is just as much a mother as one who gives birth. What matters, is the care, the nurture she gives to her child. And, because of the work involved, it is often at great cost to her own needs and desires. Many have attempted a job description for mothers: nurse, carer, counselor, psychologist, cook, cleaner, homemaker, teacher, homework assistant, banker, taxi-driver, etc. There are few (if any) more important jobs in the world. And few jobs that demand such a degree of unselfish giving. It's a pity it still doesn't get the recognition it deserves. We all owe something of a debt to our mothers, even if we think they might have done a better job. It's true that some fathers make better mothers than some women. If we define motherhood as nurturing another, caring for another, then many of us here will have being doing that this week. If I have offered a listening ear to a friend, I have nurtured them; if I have helped a sister with her homework, or given time to someone who is upset or put myself out in any way for another this week, I have been a 'mother.' Paul understood this. He was like a midwife and mother to the church communities he founded. Look at the tender way he writes to the Christians in Corinth: vs 6… "If we are being afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation; if we are being consoled, it is for your consolation, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we are also suffering." Paul did not give birth to the churches and leave someone else to raise them; as far as he could, he mothered them. And because he cared, he suffered - he was afflicted. Like most mothers Paul experienced personally the pain of caring. When he suffers, the churches are comforted, when he is comforted they too are comforted. To belong to Christ (for Paul) is to be joined to other believers. The idea that we sometimes have of an individual believer privately living out their faith in isolation would be foreign to Paul. For him, because the gospel is about love, it means risking the cost of caring. So that if one hurts in the body, all hurt. It is much like being in a human family where, if one member suffers, all feel it. 200 years later another early church leader, Cyprian, wrote this: "He can no longer have God for his Father who has not the Church for his mother;" ( x2) To claim allegiance to Christ whilst keeping oneself separate from His Body, the church, is the same as a child denying its parenthood. Of course, if we keep others at arms length there is less pain, less conflict, less discomfort. All human mothers experience pain at some time or other. Even if it is not at the beginning when their child is born into the world, there will be pain in their upbringing and in their departure from the home. And there is pain in Mother church. There is squabbling, disunity, rejection, departure and much more. But that is family life. To be joined to others is to suffer. To care for another is to suffer with them. Remember Jesus standing on the Mount of Olives looking over the city of Jerusalem? Like a mother rejected by her own children, he is in deep anguish: "'Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!" We hear his pain. It is the pain of One who cares deeply and for that reason, suffers deeply. Why must the Son of God experience suffering? Not because he deserves it of course. But because he has chosen to get involved with the world as it is. And suffering is part of the world we live in. Not only is it here because of the weakness and self-centredness of human beings. Suffering is v much part of Mother nature too. Life in cold blood. David Attenborough has been looking at reptiles. There was one extraordinary scene when a snake, a python captured an antelope and then, painfully for both of them I think, swallowed it whole. Life in cold blood. Mother Nature in the raw. We know that the bond of motherhood can be strong and the instinct of a mother to protect its young can be fierce. That is true of the animal world as it is of the human world. That makes it all the more tragic then when a mother stops caring for her young. Something pretty desperate must have happened for a Mum to walk away from her child, particularly if she has carried it for 9 months and gone through the pain of childbirth. In Africa poverty and disease drive mothers to abandon their babies and children. It is hard for us to imagine what circumstances lead to that and therefore a sin for us to stand in judgment. In Kisoro, in SW Uganda, there are 4 main causes: war, disease, poverty and ignorance through lack of education. Our own CMS mission partner Jenny Green is heading up a project to help the many destitute children who have been left with no fathers or mothers. Some of the children have been literally left at the side of the road by a desperate parent who in the hope that someone else will provide the care that they can't. Jenny has already adopted 2 herself and is a mother to Hannah and Joseph. But she is being a mother to many more through the Potter's Village project. My wife Jennie was impressed with the emerging project when she visited Jenny last May. The village will be made up of 12 different buildings: * A Babies' Home for up to 12 abandoned babies * A Maternity Unit for young pregnant girls *Three residential homes each for six children and their carers *Homes for the house parents, babies' carers (Mamas) and other employees *Three classrooms *Kitchen and wash houses * Offices Jenny and those working with her have made the choice to care and it carries a cost with it. There are emotional costs as well as physical and material ones. And you and I are being invited to share those with her. As St Paul would put it, we are being invited to offer consolation. If we chose to, we can be involved. Through this Lent especially, but beyond as well, we can read about the work, we can pray, we can write to her and we can give - if we chose to, in a way which costs us something rather than from our excess. Alongside this project we can also continue to give support for struggling African farmers (and from elsewhere) - by buying Fairtrade products we ensure a better wage for them than they would otherwise get and therefore a better life for their families. In Fairtrade fortnight, why not dig a little deeper and find out more about how this works. I said earlier that you and I had a choice. We can be mothers in the sense that we can care for others as mothers care for their children. I believe that there are moments when God faces us with a choice - to care and to bear the cost, or to protect ourselves and walk away. Thankfully for us, Mary made the right choice, she said Yes to bearing the Son of God, and to bearing the cost. Simeon was right, a sword did pierce the soul of this mother. There is no real caring without cost. And of course her Son paid the ultimate cost because His caring was ultimate - He loved to the end. May we know His care for us, so that we can care for others whatever the cost. Amen. As we think about that and as we move to our prayers, we are going to distribute flowers to everyone. So can the choristers come and as swiftly as possible give out the bunches to all the mothers here - that is, ALL of us! The flowers symbolize Mother Nature, and represent the care gone into tending living things. And they are a token too of our appreciation of one another. We wanted to have the flowers at this point so that we can hold them during the intercessions. They can remind us of the challenge not to protect ourselves but to risk caring and not to count the cost. Thank you.
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