One of the interesting conversations that has come out of us being locked down is how will our experience of it change us, as a nation and as a people?
Will it be seen as something that took so many lives, caused huge heartache as well as the ruin of businesses but that we, in our British tradition, put it behind us and carry on as we were before (“Keep Calm and Carry On”)?
Or will it perhaps be viewed as a defining point in our country’s history and that it forms part of a revival of the Christian faith as people turn (or return) to Christ?
Despite the awful onset of the COVID-19 virus and the damage it has wrecked on communities, we have also seen the better part of peoples’ natures. There has been a return of genuine community spirit and people wanting to help other people- whether that is in our case the amazing ‘Risborough Basket’ scheme, or nationally the ‘Good Sam’ NHS Volunteer Responders initiative where over 750,000 people put themselves forward to help in any way they can. People have helped whether it is checking on a neighbour or getting in touch with someone they haven’t spoken to in a while to see how they are doing. We have been re-learning how important it is to love our neighbours -“Love your neighbour as yourself…” (Mark 12:30-31)
That was certainly something that the Queen reflected in her stirring speech when she reminded us recently that “we should take comfort that while we may have more still to endure, better days will return: we will be with our friends again; we will be with our families again; we will meet again”.
But when that happy and joyous time finally comes, will we be a changed people?
There was a similar situation at the very end of the first millennium (999AD) when the Christian world especially in Europe believed that the end of the millennium would be the end of the world, heralded by a great blast from a trumpet -“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed” . (1 Corinthians 15:52), that the dead would rise from their graves to share a last judgement with all those who had not yet died. Christ would return to earth and lead true believers to Paradise.
It was reported that in the months, weeks and days leading up to 999 AD, something extraordinary happened. People forgave each other their debts, husbands and wives confessed to each other suspected and unsuspected infidelities to each other and stayed together. Thieves returned the things they had stolen to their rightful owners. People stopped spending money on attaining things because they realised that they could not store up wealth if they hoped to avoid the final judgement. Those with money and food feed beggars in the street, prisoners convicted of crimes were released from prison, those with wealth gave it away to those more deserving. People flocked in their thousands to churches and cathedrals wanting confession and absolution.
It was described by historians of an astonishing period in our history. People flocked to Jerusalem that year, people forgot any class differences that they had, people sang hymns and psalms when they walked through the street constantly keeping their eyes on the sky. The Christmas that year was thought of as the Last Christmas for humanity- families loved each other like never before, slaves and animals were let go in anticipation of the final judgement.
In the end of course (it is a spoiler!), the world did not come to an end on the stroke of midnight 31 December 999AD. When people found themselves in January 1000 and saw that they were still alive, there was great celebration and relief but ultimately people went back to their previous behaviours. However, writers of that early period talked about the love and forgiveness that people had for each other if only for a relatively short period of time.
Like now, we somehow need to bottle that loving and Christ like spirit that we have been witnessing and ensure that people do not give in to the temptation of returning to how they may have been prior to the outbreak, in not actively loving and looking out for their fellow human beings and not honouring the Lord’s Prayer.
How St Mary’s has been doing church differently does show a way forward. The numbers of people viewing our (and the other 800 UK churches digitally providing services) services online shows the huge and varied desire for peace and love in our world.
Our challenge will be to help them turn to Christ and change our world for the better!
Going through the current trouble times, we can be reminded from those that came before us, how their example through their Christian lives, shows us the way forward.
There can be few better examples of this than one of the most contemplative of Christians, a woman, a Christian mystic known as ‘Julian of Norwich’. We may never know her real name (she is named by her association with St Julian’s church in Norwich), but we know that she was in her 30’s and she lived in the 14th century.
Julian lived through the most fatal pandemic in human history – the ‘Black Death’- which like COVID-19 originated in China, but which it is believed killed up to 200 million people from 1347-1351 and around a third of the population of Europe died from it.
Like us, Julian self-isolated but she had become an ‘anchoress’, that is someone who withdraws from society and leads an intensely prayer-oriented life – a religious hermit if you will. In fact, it is believed that she lived much of her adult life in a room next to her church which would not have been much more than 10-foot square. She had a window in which people would seek spiritual guidance from her, but apart from that she lived in what was little more than a cell, so she could be alone with God.
Why though is Julian so important to us some 600+ years later?
Well, during her life she became seriously ill, so much so that the last rites were administered to her as she waited to die. However she held a crucifix in front of her and as she gazed at it, she saw the figure of Jesus beginning to bleed, and over a number of hours she had a series of visions that affected her gently but profoundly, and she recovered.
Julian, after great prayer, contemplation and understanding, wrote these experiences down in what is regarded as the first ever book written by a woman in the English language, entitled Revelations of Divine Love, and what she saw are as relevant today as they were then.
She spoke about seeing in her visions not an angry masculine God, but revelations revealed to her “very tenderly, indicating no kind of blame for me or for anyone who will be saved”. Her most famous passage in the book is when she says “And it seems to me, this suffering is something that exists for a while, because it purges us and makes us know ourselves and ask for mercy. For the Passion of our Lord is a comfort to us against all this and that it is His blessed will for all who shall be saved. He comforts us readily and sweetly by His words and says, “But all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well”.
These are familiar, well known and comforting words indeed. We all want the current situation to come to an end, for us to see our loved ones again and to smell ‘freedom’ once more- although that is likely to still take more time in self isolation.
What Julian continues to show to us today, is that God loves us, that He delights in us and He “will make all things well”. Yes, there will be times like now (and in the future) when we will be “perturbed, troubled and distressed by things”, but God’s promise to us is “You shall not be overcome”.
Through her revelations, Julian was shown a fundamental and profound Truth. That God made us, that God loves us, and that God cares for us. He will not let us down and right now we need to stick with Him. He will get us through this difficult time.
I am sure like so many others Thursday night at 8pm is when we all give a round of applause and thanks for health and care workers for their tireless work during this difficult time we are going through. It is also a huge testament to the NHS and their Army colleagues that in a matter of just a few days they were able to create from scratch their first pop up critical care facility, naming it the ‘NHS Nightingale Hospital’ in London.
It is very fitting that the hospital was named after one of the greatest female Christians, the founder of modern nursing and one of my personal heroines.
From a very early age Florence, born in Italy and growing up in Derbyshire, visited the local poor, read her Bible and loved collecting things and statistics. Being brought up in the 19th century though, as a young woman Florence was expected to find herself a husband and be a good wife and mother.
However, Florence, for whom her Christian faith was her driving force (“I promise to go to Church, to read, write and do the Bible”), felt from a young age that God had a specific Calling for her. Just before her 17th birthday she heard God telling her that she should be a nurse – something that middle-class women frankly did not do then.
She had several proposals of marriage from eligible men but she felt sure that God meant for her to be single but her family were dead set against that and Florence was forced to study nursing in secret and eventually she ‘trained’ in a religious community in Germany. There whilst learning about medicines, dressing wounds, amputations and how to care for the sick and dying she said that she never felt happier “Now I know what it is to love life”. This is what happens when you follow on the true path that God has for us.
Florence’s calling though became even clearer when the Crimean war (against the Tsar’ Russian army) took place and horrific reports came back that solders were dying in agony. Florence knew she had to go and help, so she bought together a team of 38 brave female nurses who sailed to the Crimea, and then like now, there were complaints of in efficiencies and lack of supplies, but undeterred Florence and her nurses acts of compassion, care and love made a huge difference to soldiers’ lives and the British public were in awe of what she had done.
Newspapers called her a “ministering angel” and reported that “as her slender form glides quietly along each corridor, every poor fellow’s face softens with gratitude at the sight of her”. For good reason was Florence Nightingale known as the “Lady with the Lamp”.
What she discovered at the army hospital at Scutari was that 90% of soldiers died not from their war wounds but from poor sanitation and hygiene at the hospital. She implemented handwashing and other clean practices that are still such a Godsend today in the current outbreak. Her actions it is believed reduced the death rate at Scutari from 42% to just 2%.
But even after the end of the war, Florence was not finished. She realised that hospitals needed to be healthy places to minister to the sick. She introduced what is known as “pavilion style” hospital wings and full-length windows on wards to allow better light and ventilation. With huge public support, she opened the Nightingale School of Nursing at St Thomas’ Hospital in London (it is still there) which led to the creation of nursing as a formal profession.
Florence died at the age of 90 in 1910- within 50 years the NHS was born. Florence’s contribution to the NHS that we now have cannot be understated. Her Christian calling about looking after a person’s mental as well as physical wellbeing, and to be sensitive to their needs is part of its cornerstones. She helped make nursing a respectable profession for women and to ensure healthcare for all -rich or poor.
Florence listened carefully and soulfully to God’s word and what He was calling her to do, and despite the difficulties of parental disapproval, and going against what society expected of her at that time, she persisted, and all of our lives have been affected by her Christian faith as a result.
We all make a difference. What is God calling you to do?
Now it is Easter. As a Christian you go through different rites of passage at this time of the year. From the lows of ‘Good’ Friday where Jesus was crucified and all hope of his mission seemed to have come to a dreadful End. But Easter of course has the happiest of endings. Three days later as Jesus predicted he was raised to life so you rejoice and say Hallelujah-it is the happiest of times.
But at this time of the year in an increasingly secular world that we live in, people may ask “but why do you think Easter is true, what is the proof that Jesus is the Son of God, where is the evidence that Jesus was who he said he was?”
Let me give you just one reason why I am a Christian and see if that helps:
Probably my favourite character in Christendom is a little known 3rd century martyr said only to be in her early 20’s by the name of Perpetua. She lived in what is now Tunis and was due to be baptised as a Christian when the Roman emperor at that time tried to quash Christianity and took her and others like her. Imprisoned prior to being butchered, her father visited her to plead for her to renounce Jesus so she could live. Her response was simple: “Father, do you see this vase here? Could it be called by any other name than what it is? Well, neither can I be called anything other than what I am, a Christian”.
She and her Christian sisters became admired by their prison guards and allowed them to baptise each other. When they entered the arena to be killed they robustly refused to wear the sashes and clothes of the pagan gods and awaited the wild animals who were to gore them, but they refused to approach them and instead attacked her captors. A Gladiator then struck the first blow into Perpetua but he was so shaken by what he was doing that he could not finish the act so Perpetua took his sword and finished the job herself.
Prior to her martyrdom, she wrote a diary of what had happened to encourage others to faith and 18 centuries on, it continues to do that.
When I first heard of Perpetua, I was greatly moved and I can still recall watching a theologian trying to tell the story but eventually she just broke down, so moved was she by the sacrifice made. My argument is why would a young woman in the peak of her life, who had a young daughter, give all that up when all she had to do was to deny who Jesus was? She and her sisters believed and they could not deny who they were and who Jesus is.
I still get moved by the example set by Perpetua and her friends, and there are numerous others who have given their lives or made huge sacrafices rather than deny Jesus. That is just one of the reasons why I remain a Christian. Happy Easter!
