Entrance Antiphon
I am the Saviour of all people, says the Lord.
Whatever their troubles, I will answer their cry, and I will always be their Lord.

The Collect
O Lord,
we beseech you mercifully to hear the prayers of your people who call upon you;
and grant that they may both perceive and know what things they ought to do,
and also may have grace and power faithfully to fulfil them;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

The Readings
Missal (St Mark’s)        
Isaiah 55:6-9
Psalm 145:2-3, 8-9, 17-18
Philippians 1:20-24, 27
Matthew 20:1-16

RCL (St Gabriel’s)          
Jonah 3:10-4:11
Psalm 145:1-8
Philippians 1:21-30
Matthew 20:1-16

On Thursday of last week, September 14^th, the Church celebrated Holy Cross Day. That’s a day in the Church’s calendar that’s also known as the Exaltation of the Holy Cross and, as that title suggests, it’s a day when we remember and celebrate the Cross of Christ, its meaning for us, and its importance to us. And the Cross is of vital importance to us. The Cross is the instrument of our salvation because it was on the Cross that Jesus bore our sins and died to take those sins away so that we might be raised with him to eternal life. But, whilst it’s right and proper that we do exalt the Cross in this way, it’s also of vital importance that we remember too that, as important as the Cross is to us and for us, we still have work to do, in spite of the Cross.

I think it’s very easy for Christians to think that, because Christ bore and paid the penalty for our sins on the Cross, we’re home free; we’re in a nice, comfortable position because we’re assured of eternal life, whatever happens. But that is not what we read in Scripture and it’s not what Jesus himself said during his earthly ministry. The Gospels tell us that, at the very beginning of his ministry,

Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

During his ministry he told people on numerous occasions about the need for repentance, and indeed his teaching and parables are full of warnings about the terrible fate that lay in store for the unrepentant. And those warnings weren’t nullified by the Cross because even after his Resurrection, Jesus said,

“Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” 

And, in fact, this is just what St Peter preached to people on the Day of Pentecost;

“Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins…”

So I don’t think that we can be, nor should we be, under any illusions about our need to acknowledge our sins and to be repentant, to make a real, determined effort to stamp out sin in our lives, if we want to receive the benefits Christ won for us on the Cross. We can’t take the Cross for granted. We can’t simply live our lives as we please and take it for granted that we’ll be forgiven our sins and raised to eternal life.

I’m assuming that no one who takes their faith seriously can be in any doubt whatsoever that they are sinners who need to repent, and who are in need of forgiveness. But to what extent do we believe those things? I think the answer to that can often be gauged by our attitude towards forgiveness, both the extent to which we think we need to be forgiven and our willingness to be forgiving ourselves.

Our Gospel reading this morning leaves us in no doubt that, unless we ourselves are ready and able to forgive others when they’ve wronged us, we can’t expect God to forgive us for the wrongs we’ve done either. In reply to Peter’s question, Jesus says that we must forgive others not,

“seven times, but seventy times seven.”

and in the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant, he warns us that unless we do forgive others, God will not forgive us either. And this is something that should remind us of another of Jesus’ teachings; that the measure we use to judge others, will be the measure used by God to judge us.

But this is something we shouldn’t need to be reminded of because it’s something we probably acknowledge every day. It’s certainly something we acknowledge every time we come to a church service because it’s in the Lord’s Prayer. When we pray that ‘Our Father’ will

“…forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”,

we’re not only acknowledging that God will forgive us only to the extent that we forgive others, but we’re actually asking God to do this. So how willing are we to forgive others?

I think one of the great problems we have with forgiveness is honesty. By that I mean, how honest are we when we call to mind something that’s happened that we think requires forgiveness? How honest are we willing to be with ourselves, and with others about what really happened?

It’s true isn’t it, that when something has happened that shouldn’t have, when some wrong has been done, we like to play the innocent? We like to downplay our part in what’s gone on and portray ourselves as the wounded party rather than acknowledging any part we might have played in what’s happened. So we highlight the faults of others and ignore whatever we might have done to cause a problem or make a situation worse. A problem that might really have been a case of ‘six of one and half a dozen of another’ becomes, in our telling of it, all the fault of the other, a completely unprovoked and unjustified sin committed against us. And, if we’re forced to admit some part of the blame, usually because other people know the truth and we can’t play the innocent entirely, we try to claim that we were provoked into doing what we did. We say that it wouldn’t have happened if the other person, or people, hadn’t done what they did first (and it always is the other who acted first in our telling of these situations isn’t it?). This isn’t always true, but it’s invariably what people do and I’m sure we’ve all been on the receiving end of it and been the one who’s done it to others too. In fact, some people do this so often that, in the end, they really do start to believe their own distorted version of events and can become very angry with anyone who tries to correct them with the truth. I’m sure we’ve all dealt with people who’ve done that too.

But as Christians, doing this kind of thing is something we should try to avoid like the plague. As Christians, we’re called to be repentant, and we can’t be repentant if we don’t acknowledge our own sins. So we can’t blame other people for the wrong that we’ve done  As Christians we want God to forgive us our trespasses, so we have to forgive those who trespass against us. But that doesn’t mean blaming other people for what we’ve done so that we can get on our moral high horse in order to forgive them for wrongs that we’ve committed. We can’t show ourselves as forgiving by trying to deny our own need of forgiveness. 

As Christians we can’t be in any doubt that the standards we use for other people will be the standards God uses to judge us, so we can’t be in any way dishonest or duplicitous in our accusations of other people, nor in our thoughts and claims about ourselves. If we do these things, if we are dishonest and duplicitous in these ways, the Gospel, and Jesus himself tells us that we’re going to find ourselves in serious difficulties with God, regardless of the salvation Christ offered us on and through the Cross. It won’t be a case of double whammy when we stand before the Lord on the Day of Judgement, more like quadruple whammy, at least!

If we try to play the innocent and deny our own sins – wham! We’re  unrepentant sinners and, as St John reminds us, liars in whom there is no truth. If we try to downplay our sins by highlighting the sins of others and criticising them for what we’ve done wrong – wham! We’re hypocrites looking for specks in other people’s eyes but ignoring the planks in our own. And the only mercy and forgiveness we can expect from God is the same lack of mercy and forgiveness we’ve shown to others. If we try to shift the blame for what we’ve done wrong onto others by accusing them of sins that we’ve committed – wham! We’re blackening the name and character of another person and we have Jesus’ assurance that we’ll leave ourselves,

“…liable to the hell of fire.”

And if we try to take the moral high ground, sententiously forgiving others rather than humbly accepting that we ourselves are at least equally in need of forgiveness – wham! We’re just like the Pharisees, people full of spiritual pride and self-righteousness, and how then will we ever be able to claim a place in the kingdom of heaven?

The Cross of Christ is the instrument of our salvation. Christ bore our sins on the Cross and through the Cross we have the assurance that our sins can be forgiven and that we can be raised with Christ to eternal life. But that doesn’t mean that we’re there already. We can’t take things for granted. We still have to live as Christ taught and commanded and, in part, that means that we have to see ourselves as sinners who are still in need of repentance and forgiveness. It means loving our neighbour as we love ourselves, treating them in the way we would like to be treated by them. It means applying the same standards to ourselves that we apply to others and vice versa. If we’re lenient with ourselves, we must be equally lenient with others is we want God to be lenient, and merciful and forgiving to us. If we’re harsh with our neighbour, then we’d best make sure that we’re equally harsh with ourselves because if we’re not, God will be.

Amen.

---

Propers for the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Trinity 15) 17th September 2023

Entrance Antiphon
Give peace, Lord, to those who wait for you and your prophets will proclaim you as you deserve.
Hear the prayers of your servant and of your people Israel.

The Collect
God, who in generous mercy sent the Holy Spirit
upon your Church in the burning fire of your love:
grant that your people may be fervent in the fellowship of the gospel
that, always abiding in you,
they may be found steadfast in faith and active in service;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

The Readings
Missal (St Mark’s)        
Ecclesiasticus 27:30 – 28:7
Psalm 103:1-4, 9-12
Romans 14:7-9
Matthew 18:21-35

RCL (St Gabriel’s)          
Genesis 50:15-21
Psalm 103:1-13
Romans 14:1-12
Matthew 18:21-35

I don’t know about you, but one of the things that I find very annoying at times is the way Christians are usually portrayed, although I think caricatured might be a better word for it, on TV. By that, I don’t mean the way they’re shown in reality shows, those which show the real lives of clergy, for example, I mean the way Christians are portrayed in other kinds of programmes. In an article in the Church Times in December 2020, an ex-bishop of Lincoln expressed the opinion that clergy and Christians in general were portrayed on TV in ways that range from risible to downright offensive. And I think he was quite right in his opinion.

Before I go any further, I must say that I don’t think there’s anything wrong with comedy  programmes like Father Ted and The Vicar of Dibley. They show clergy, and Christians, in a risible way for comedic effect in that they exaggerate reality in order to make it funny. And I think it’s very important that we do have that ability to laugh at ourselves. We should take what we do as Christians very seriously, but we shouldn’t take ourselves too seriously because if we do, nobody else will and then we’ll become risible in another, less attractive sense; we’ll become objects of derision, of contempt, ridicule and mockery because we’ll become real life exaggerated caricatures of what we should be. And then we won’t be in the least bit funny.

I think TV programmes can be, and often are offensive in their portrayal of clergy and Christians, because they do show us as these humourless caricatures of what we really are, and so they make us, and our faith too actually, risible in that derisory sense. Just think of how Christians are often portrayed in soap operas for example. How many clergy in soaps are shown as people of deplorable morals? As people who can’t wait to jump into bed with the first attractive person they meet, and whether that person is married or not makes no difference whatsoever? As people who are drug addicts? As users and abusers of the vulnerable? And isn’t it true that Christians in general are invariable portrayed as people who sit somewhere along a scale that ranges from silly, annoying and trouble causing, interfering busy bodies to mentally unstable, sometimes violent, religious fanatics?

Sadly, we know that some clergy, and some Christians are like this and do these things. But only a very few. TV, however, gives the impression that, if not all, then at least the majority of clergy and Christians are like this and do these things. And this is downright, and deeply, offensive if we care about our faith. Some people, I’m sure, might think, So what, what difference does it make? It’s only soap land, it’s not real. We exaggerate things to make them funny in comedy programmes, what’s wrong with exaggerating them in soaps to make interesting story lines? But to think like that is to fail to see the damage this does to the Christian faith and the problems it causes us in trying to live out our faith and proclaim the Gospel.

One problem is that this incessant false and offensive portrayal of Christians and their faith on TV gives people a very negative impression of Christians and their faith. It reinforces the idea in an already sceptical population that Christians are all either hypocrites or religious lunatics who can’t be trusted. It gives the impression that the Christian faith is something that can’t be taken seriously because those who profess it and proclaim it don’t take it seriously. It gives people the impression that Christians and their faith are, at best, a pain in the neck because they, and it, wants to interfere in their lives, or at worst, something that’s dangerous because it leads people into extremism and potentially violent behaviour.

Another problem this negative portrayal of Christians and their faith on TV causes is that it makes it much harder for us to do what we’re called to do as Christians. As we know, we’re called to love our neighbour as we love ourselves. Part of doing that means getting involved in other people’s troubles and problems so that we can help them. Of course we can do that in an impersonal way through supporting things like Food Banks and charities, but if we’re going to help people in a more personal way, we have to get personally  involved, to some extent at least, with the people we’re trying to help. But if people think that Christians are interfering busy bodies, if they think that we’re religious nut cases, they might not want or accept our help. I have actually heard people say that they don’t mind help or a visit from Church people as long as they don’t start ‘Bible-bashing’ or trying to convert them or trying to interfere in their lives. I’ve heard people say that they don’t want help from the Church because all they’re interested in is how much they can get out of you in return. In other words, those people believe that the Church is happy to help, but it wants a pledge of money in return for its help. 

Those things do happen from time to time, but not as often as people think they do. As Christians we’re called to love people without asking or even expecting anything in return. Our reward for what we do comes from the Lord, and we get that reward simply for loving our neighbour. But, when we’re faced with objections like this, we’re not always able to show that love; our neighbour doesn’t want our love because they think there will be a price to pay for it. But also, when we have to face this kind of opposition to simply trying to help someone, when our offers of help are rejected, it’s quite possible that we’ll become more reluctant to offer help in the first place. For one thing, rejection can hurt, but also it’s because we don’t want to be seen as interfering busy bodies, let alone Bible-bashing nut cases.

But if we can be reluctant to help people because we don’t want to be seen as interfering in other people’s lives, how much more reluctant are we to do something that is quite clearly interfering in other people’s affairs and yet we are equally clearly called to do, and that is to point out wrongdoing?

Our readings today quite clearly tell us that, if someone is doing something wrong, we should speak up about it and urge them to change their ways. And this too, is part of loving our neighbour. As Jesus says, if we can convince someone that they’re doing, or have done, something wrong, and we can get them to change their ways, we’ve ‘won’ them back. In other words, we’ve helped them by saving them from any punishment due to them on account of their sins. But there’s more to it than simply that. If we can convince someone to change their ways and desist from whatever it was they were doing wrong, we’ve also helped the victims of their wrongdoing. So in speaking up and trying to stop wrong, we’re loving both the perpetrators and the victims of whatever wrong was going on. But we’re not only loving and helping the perpetrators and victims of wrongdoing when we speak up and try to stop it, it’s for our own benefit too that we do this.

In this morning’s reading from the prophet Ezekiel, we read;

“If I say to a wicked man: Wicked wretch, you are to die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked man to renounce his ways, then he shall die for his sin, but I will hold you responsible for his death. If, however, you do warn a wicked man to renounce his ways and repent, and he does not repent, then he shall die for his sin, but you yourself will have saved your life.”

Here, it’s God speaking to the prophet, but in this morning’s Gospel, doesn’t Jesus extend this responsibility to try and correct the wicked to us? And the meaning of this is quite clear; if we see wrongdoing and do and say nothing about it, we’re just as guilty in God’s eyes as those who have committed the act. If, on the other hand, we speak up against wrongdoing, whether the perpetrators listen to us or not, we’re absolved of responsibility and guilt.

It’s said isn’t it, that the trouble in the world isn’t the evil that people do, but the good they don’t do and that for evil people to succeed requires only that good people do nothing to stop them. As Christians, we’re called to do good, and we’re called to try and stop evil whenever and wherever we see it. The problem is that we can be prevented from doing these things, one by the very people we’re trying to do good to and for, and because people can, and sometimes do, see us as the evil ones. In part that’s due to the few Christians who aren’t good and who have done evil, but it’s also due to the negative view so many people today have of Christians and their faith. And, again in part, that’s due to the risible and downright offensive way Christians and their faith are so often caricatured in popular TV programmes.

This negative view people have of us can make it hard for us to love our neighbour as ourselves, as we’re called to. Our help can be rejected because of it. We might be reluctant to help because we don’t want to be seen as interfering busy bodies. If we speak up against wrongdoing, we’re probably going to be accused of hypocrisy. And that can be very hurtful if we’re simply being tarred with the same brush as those few Christians who have themselves committed evil. And that might make us reluctant to speak out as we’re called to do. There’s also perhaps more than a touch of self-preservation in not speaking up against wrongdoing. More than once, for example, I’ve seen people try to break up a fight only to be the first one laid out by a punch on the jaw for interfering. Or was if for simply trying to do their Christian duty and stop something wrong from happening?

For all these reasons, it can be hard for us to love our neighbour as ourselves in practical ways, but we still have to try. When we find ourselves in situations like those I’ve described, we should ask ourselves whether it’s better to run the risk of being thought of as an interfering busy body, or of being thought of as uncaring? Are we prepared to proclaim the Gospel, even at the risk of being thought of as a ‘Bible-basher’? Are we prepared to let wrongdoing and evil go unchallenged because we’d rather risk our immortal souls than risk getting involved in something unsavoury by interfering in human affairs? If we take what we do as Christians as seriously as we should, if we’re not simply caricatures of what we should be as Christians, we can only answer those questions in one way and then do what our faith and our Lord calls us to do.

Amen. 

---

Propers for the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time (Trinity 14) 10th September 2023

Entrance Antiphon
Lord, you are just, and the judgements you make are right.
Show mercy when you judge me, your servant.

The Collect
Almighty God,
whose only Son has opened for us a new and living way into your presence:
give us pure hearts and steadfast wills to worship you in spirit and in truth;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

The Readings
Missal (St Mark’s)        
Ezekiel 33:7-9
Psalm 95:1-2, 6-9
Romans 13:8-10
Matthew 18:15-20

RCL (St Gabriel’s)          
Ezekiel 33:7-11
Psalm 119:33-40
Romans 13:8-14
Matthew 18:15-20