A meeting planned in secret. A message deemed subversive. The authorities both antagonised and confused. The gatherings of the early Church in the time of the Roman Empire? Or Tommy Robinson’s proposed carol concert at an as yet undisclosed London location, proclaimed as the event to put ‘Christ back into Christmas’?
To draw even the most strained comparison between the two would seem to offend most mainstream sensibilities. Established churches across the country have reacted with horror and disdain at the former football hooligan and recent prison inmate claiming to be Christianity’s champion this Christmas.
Recall the example of Jesus, whose love was not rationed and whose message was for all mankind
And it is not just incumbent priests and ministers who are concerned at Robinson (more properly Stephen Yaxley-Lennon) appropriating the Christian message. Commentators such as Polly Toynbee, not hitherto one valiant for Christ, have urged resistance to the co-option of the Church’s message by the ‘far-right’ and ‘nationalists’.
It is no endorsement of Mr Yaxley-Lennon’s politics or lifestyle to recall that Jesus himself proclaimed his good news was for everyone. He embraced the politically anathematised tax collector Zacchaeus and the morally compromised Mary Magdalene. The apostle Matthew was the effective agent of a foreign power colluding in the oppression of the Jewish people before he followed Christ. As Jesus himself proclaimed: ‘I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.’
Mr Yaxley-Lennon came to the Christian faith in prison. Others who have come here as refugees – particularly from majority Muslim nations – have converted to Christianity. In both cases there has been scepticism that these conversions are matters of conviction and not just convenience. Those most inclined to doubt the one are perhaps those most inclined to trust the other. The hearts warmed by asylum seekers finding their way into the Christian Church may be less aflame with joy at Mr Yaxley-Lennon joining their ranks. But we cannot glimpse into the souls of individuals and weigh the precise merits of their professions of faith. What we should do is recall the example of Jesus, whose love was not rationed and whose message was for all mankind.
What should give the Church’s leaders pause for thought this Christmas is the likely appeal of Mr Yaxley-Lennon’s meeting. Whatever his motivation, and whatever their suspicions, his gathering will speak to a yearning among many for a faith if not militant then confident.
As a new Archbishop of Canterbury takes her place in St Augustine’s Chair, and as a new Pope prepares to address the city and the world from Rome this Christmas Day, perhaps they should consider how to make their message not more relevant to this world but more radical in transcending it. Instead of worrying about ‘Christian nationalism’ they should seek to win the nation for Christ.
Christian leaders across the United Kingdom cannot be faulted over the past few decades in attending to the political issues of our time. On questions of asylum and immigration, climate change and the environment, poverty and mental health, they have borne witness to a social gospel actuated by con-cern for the vulnerable, a vision of stewardship and compassion for the broken. That voice is valuable. But the Church’s special call on our attention comes not from the skill with which its leaders outmatch Amnesty, Greenpeace or Oxfam in the arts of NGO advocacy. The Church commands we listen because it tells the good news of the Gospels, it bears witness to the birth of Jesus, his transforming, miraculous mission and the saving sacrifice and resurrection of Christ crucified.
The Christmas story has been told for 2,000 years not because it is a simple morality tale about refugees or a warning about un-accountable power, although it can tell us much about those things. It resonates across centuries because the miracle of God become man is unique, wonderful and redemptory.
God sent his son into this world not to become a wielder of secular power, not a strongman who bent thrones to his will, but a man of sorrow, who wept at the suffering of others and whose senses were overwhelmed by pain. The child born in a manger is given gifts by the Magi at his birth appropriate to a king, but his gift to us is infinitely more precious, the saving love that forgives all and calls us to see the greatest glory in service and sacrifice.
Christ’s message advances not at the point of a sword or by subtle argument, not by veneration of ancestors or the profoundest meditation. Christianity is radically different from other faiths in that it asks only that we love – without condition and limit – every other human being, because they are all, like us, made in God’s image and are each worthy of our consideration, respect and wonder.
The message of Christianity is radical both in its simplicity and glory – simple like the love of a mother for her child, glorious in that it can illumine every thought and action of all our lives. Whenever two or three are gathered in His name, there is He also. May the gift of love be yours this Christmas.
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