Here, on the Second Sunday of Christmas, are excerpts from three Christmas sermons.
1. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams:
Christmas is about the unshakeable solidarity of God’s love with us, not only in our suffering but in our rebellion and betrayal as well. One mediaeval Greek theologian, deliberately out to shock, described as God’s ‘manic passion’, God’s ‘obsession’; manike eros. And so it is a time to do some stocktaking about our own solidarity and fidelity, our own promise-keeping.
There are at least three things we might ponder in that respect, seeking to understand ourselves better in the light of the Christmas story. The first is our solidarity with one another, in our society and our world, our solidarity with and loyalty to our fellow-citizens and fellow-human beings. Faced with the hardship that quite clearly lies ahead for so many in the wake of financial crisis and public spending cuts, how far are we able to sustain a living sense of loyalty to each other, a real willingness to bear the load together? How eager are we to find some spot where we feel safe from the pressures that are crippling and terrifying others? As has more than once been said, we can and will as a society bear hardship if we are confident that it is being fairly shared; and we shall have that confidence only if there are signs that everyone is committed to their neighbour, that no-one is just forgotten, that no interest group or pressure group is able to opt out. That confidence isn’t in huge supply at the moment, given the massive crises of trust that have shaken us all in the last couple of years and the lasting sense that the most prosperous have yet to shoulder their load. If we are ready, if we are all ready, to meet the challenge represented by the language of the ‘big society’, we may yet restore some mutual trust. It’s no use being cynical about this; whatever we call the enterprise, the challenge is the same – creating confidence by sharing the burden of constructive work together.
The second is something quite different, but no less challenging. Next year, we shall be joining in the celebration of what we hope will be a profoundly joyful event in the royal wedding. It is certainly cause for celebration that any couple, let alone this particular couple, should want to embark on the adventure of Christian marriage, because any and every Christian marriage is a sign of hope, since it is a sign and sacrament of God’s own committed love. And it would be good to think that I this coming year, we, as a society, might want to think through, carefully and imaginatively, why lifelong faithfulness and the mutual surrender of selfishness are such great gifts. If we approach this in the light of what we have just been reflecting on in terms of the Christmas story of a promise-keeping God, we shall have no illusions about how easy it is to sustain such long-term fidelity and solidarity. There will be times when we may feel stupid or helpless; when we don’t feel we have the energy or resource to forgive and rebuild after a crisis or a quarrel; when we don’t want our freedom limited by the commitments we’ve made to someone else. Yet many of us will know marriages where something extraordinary has happened because of the persistence of one of the parties, or where faithfulness has survived the tests of severe illness or disability or trauma. I admit, find myself deeply moved at times when I speak with the families of servicemen and women, where this sense of solidarity is often so deeply marked, so generous and costly. As the prince and his fiancée get ready for their new step into solidarity together, they will have plenty of inspiration around, more than you might sometimes guess from the chatter of our culture. And we can all share the recognition that, without the inspiration of this kind of commitment in marriage, our humanity would be a lot duller and more shallow – and, for the believer, a lot less transparent to the nature of the God who keeps his covenant.
…. the key point is about keeping faith, sharing risks, recognising that our lives belong together. And all this is rooted for us in that event in which all God’s purposes, all God’s actions, what we might call all God’s ‘habits of behaviour’ with us come into the clearest focus. ‘This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken’; this was the ‘Yes’ to all the promises. And what God showed himself to be in Hebrew Scripture, what he showed himself to be in the life and death of the Lord Jesus, this is what he ahs promised to be today and tomorrow and for ever. He cannot betray his own nature, and so he cannot betray us. And by the gift of the Spirit, we are given strength, in all these contexts we have considered and many more, to let his faithful love flow through us, for the fulfillment of more and more human lives according to his eternal purpose and unshakeable love.
Williams’ sermon has engendered both support from an unusual source and criticism from a usual source. It’s also something of a reprint for us, but interesting that when we first ran mention of it on Christmas, it spurred one of our commenters, Gary Paul Gilbert, to opine,
It is disappointing though not surprising that Rowan mentions marriage as a model for human solidarity but says nothing about the issue of marriage equality. His notion of solidarity does not include same-sex couples presumably because the deity does not change.
Apparently, not everything has been revealed but is yet waiting to be revealed in that he cannot see or will not consider same-sex couples.
2. Archbishop of Wales Barry Morgan:
A recent Oxfam survey has shown that happiness at Christmas comes down to quite simple things such as enjoying time off work to spend with friends and family.
This is a common theme in literature old and new. Take the story of “Silas Marner” by George Elliot for example. It tells the story of a man whose life has become embittered and soured after a false accusation in his youth. He moves away from his home village, refuses to mix with anybody in his new village of Raveloe and is regarded by everyone who knows him as a miser because the only thing he loves is money. He hoards gold – he can see it, he can count it and it glistens. One night, the gold is stolen and he is totally devastated. Then shortly after Christmas a child, who has been abandoned by her mother, creeps into his cottage because she is cold and his first glimpse is of something gold gleaming in the light of the fire. Marner thinks “gold – his own gold – brought back to him as mysteriously as it had been taken away. The heap of gold seemed to glow and get larger beneath his agitated gaze. He leaned forward and stretched out his hand; but instead of the hard coin, with a familiar resisting outline, his fingers encountered soft, warm curls. In utter amazement, Silas fell on his knees and bent his head low to examine the marvel. It was a sleeping child, a round fair thing with soft yellow rings all over its head”.
And the novel goes on to show how the little child Eppie transforms his life and relationships. He comes to love her and she him. Marner, who has spent his life looking for happiness finds it when his treasure has disappeared and he stumbles across, by pure chance, a new treasure which brings him back into the circle of humanity and enables him to relate to his fellow human beings again.
Jesus is God’s treasure to His world – for He does for us what Eppie did for Marner. He makes us realise that true happiness lies in serving others; that we belong to one another and to God; that the gifts we want may not be the gifts we need. Christmas gives us a chance to ponder all this anew and like Marner “to fall on our knees, bend our heads low and examine the marvel”.
3. Archbishop of Dublin John Neil:
Much of the mess that we are in as a nation in the sphere of economics is about the grasping for wealth, even beyond clinging to what we have, grasping for more and more. In the world of politics it is about clinging to power at all costs and pursuing narrow self-interest. As a nation, we have still much of the trappings of religion, but little of the self-emptying that is at the heart of Christian faith, that is at the heart of the message of Christmas.
The wonder of the Christian hope is that it is not dependent on everything changing in the world around – it is not dependent on economic “Green shoots” or a General Election – it is dependent on a change of attitude, a conversion, among individuals, and families, and local communities, yes and churches too, to God’s was of changing things – self-emptying and self-giving love.
To return for a brief moment to those lines from St.John of the Cross that I quoted a few minutes ago:
This living fount which is to me so dear
Within the bread of life I see it clear
Though it be night.
We will be invited at the altar to receive that same Bread of life – which can only be received because of the costly self-giving love that is given in that Bread – he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death- even death on a cross. If the Bread is not broken, it is not shared. But because it is broken, love in all its beauty is revealed, the love of God made visible – the power of that love released into the world though it be night.