A Big Disappointment

"My faith is very important to me" when ever I hear this sort of thing I tend to think that the speaker has it all wrong, faith shouldn't be important to you, it should be central to who you are.   My Church is something I do, a group I am a member of and activities I undertake, my Church is very important to me.   A bit like when Bill Shankley was asked how important Football was he replied that" some people think it is matter of life or death, they're wrong, it's more important than that".    So my faith is central too who and what I am, it dictates my attitudes and my behaviour, my Church is very important because it is part of the where and how I express my faith.

I say all this by way of preamble to explain why I was so disappointed yesterday to hear a talk from the pulpit of my Church that I just could not agree with.   While it was meant to be on the subject of wisdom taking James 3 as the text, it ended up as being a poorly put together attack on rationality.   I am used to hearing members of the Church voice homophobic views and embracing creationism, however to hear it from front apparently as the sanctioned view of the Church was more than disappointing.    I like to think of myself as a tolerant person but this has pushed me over the edge, I have done something I hoped I would never feel the need to do, I have written to the Rector complaining.   I have tried not sound like Mr Angry from Tunbridge, rather I am encouraging him to be more cautious about who is allowed to speak and to monitor what is said.

I know this is not really quite the sort of thing many of you may come here to read, but this is about the whole of me, all of me, I am not just a tuba payer, I am a Husband, a Father, a Son, a Musician, a Gardener, a Friend, and a Christian.

Bysantium

The other day I went to the excellent Byzantium exhibition at the Royal Academy. http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/ There was some truly beautiful stuff on display, and the whole thing was very interesting. Certainly as well as enjoying some lovely works of arts I learnt much about the Eastern Empire, and the development of art, especially Christian art.

In particular the whole thing with icons made me think, about how we represent historical religious figures, how we use images in our worship, how figurative art is uniquely Christian within the Abrahamic religions. While on a purely visual level I enjoyed the pictures I did find it disturbing to find that the images themselves were acknowledged as having religious significance, indeed many were accredited with having miraculous powers. This seems to me to be an obvious case of setting up Idols, directly against the second commandment.

4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand {generations} of those who love me and keep my commandments." (Exodus 20:4-6 NIV)

Because God has no physical form, any Idol intended to resemble Him would be a sinful misrepresentation of Him. Since other gods are not to be worshiped (the first commandment!) making Idols of them would be equally sinful. Clearly then the veneration of images is just a big no no, but how about some of the wonderful Christian art that has been used to illustrate the Bible, Michelangelo's David, any number of "Madonna and Child" paintings and statues, pictures of Jesus, these are representations of God when He was in physical form, so can they in themselves be sinful - I think I am coming to the conclusion that it is the attitude of the viewer as much as that of the artist that is important in this. Therefore we should ensure that we only worship God, in all His glory, not any images, not crosses, not alters, not stained glass windows, not TV or bloggers. All these things and others can remind us of God's glory, like books they can help us, but they should not in themselves be worshiped.
Don't get me wrong I love art in all (well most) of it's many forms, and I would deplore the idea of anything like the destruction of religious art that followed the reformation in England, I just found the the whole Iconoclast / Iconaclist thing rather challenging.
All bit heavy for a rainy Monday morning, but if you have been - thank you for reading and please do comment.
Paul

Love

We can now safely put Valentine's Day behind us for another year, the price of flowers can go back to normal and tables will be available at restaurants again. But it has made me think about love, what is it? how do I express it? who do I show or give it to?

In his first letter to the Corinthians Paul says quite a lot about love,

"Love is patient and kind; it is not jealous or conceited or proud; love is not ill mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs; love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth. Love never gives up; and it's faith, hope and patience never fail."

That gives us quite a lot to live up to when we tell someone we love them. If I was to put me name in the place of of the word love it would read "Paul is patient and kind; he is not jealous or conceited or proud; Paul is not ill mannered or selfish or irritable etc. etc." well I can only pray that one day this may be true, but for now I think I, and most of us, fall well short. Can this be because I don't really love? Well last night I certainly told my wife that I do love her so what does that mean?

One thing I am sure of is that love is not a feeling, no that slushy warm feeling that we sometimes confuse with love is sentiment. Love is about decisions, and actions. Love is a choice we make to put the considerations of another before our own. If we rely on sentiment alone to build our relationships, they cannot last maybe this is one of the reasons why so many relationships end early, certainly any marriage that ends before the death of one of the partners ends early. I mean sometimes we have to chose to love whether we feel like it or not, and maybe those are the times when we truly show the greatest love.

Sorry if all this is a little confused and not fully thought through, but then that could a description of it's author - if you have been, thank you for reading