Remembering the Palatines 300 years later

Saint Mary’s Church, Old Ross, Co Wexford

Patrick Comerford

Three months ago, on 9 September I was asked to preach at the service in Saint Mary’s Church, Old Ross, Co Wexford, marking the 300th anniversary of the arrival of the Palatines in Ireland from Germany in Ireland.

Last night [17 December 2009], RTÉ Nationwide included scenes from this service in their magazine programme, with a clip from their interview with me almost at the end of this item:

http://www.rte.ie/news/2009/1216/nationwide_av.html?2669816,null,228

For my sermon on that evening go to:

Remembering the Palatines of Co Wexford

A bishop should ‘not cling on to office’

Today’s edition of the Church of Ireland Gazette (11 December 2009) carries the following report on page 4:

A bishop should ‘not cling on to office’

Canon Patrick Comerford, Director of Spiritual Formation at the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, has said that “a bishop should not cling on to office on the basis of some opinion poll, some X-Factor vote, some popularity contest among clergy and their parishioners.”

He was speaking at a recent Sung Eucharist in the Institute shortly after the publication of the Murphy Report on child sex abuse in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin.

Canon Comerford affirmed that “a bishop must be a focus of unity.”

Whilst acknowledging that “sometimes bishops make mistakes … we all make mistakes,” he continued: “If a bishop does not expect high – not necessarily the highest, but certainly very high – moral standards from his priests, then he is not just negligent of his office, but he can no longer be the focus of unity that is at the heart of the primary ministry of a bishop.”

Asked by the Gazette if he had any particular bishop or set of circumstances in mind in making his remarks, Canon Comerford did not comment further, other than saying he had “said what is in the script and did not move beyond that.”

In his address, Canon Comerford commended Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, “because he is willing to provide moral leadership and to provide it even when he has to take tough decisions.”

He added: “The truth is that the overwhelming majority of priests in the Roman Catholic Church are good priests. In their lonely solitude at night, they must be drowning in seas of sorrows … as they realise how … they are bearing the blame that ought to be shouldered by a few, but who have been protected in the past and sometimes even in the present by some bishops and even by some in the Vatican.”

Canon Comerford expressed the hope that Roman Catholic priests “will find sympathetic hearts among their colleagues who are deacons, priests and bishops in the Church of Ireland.”

See: http://gazette.ireland.anglican.org/2009/111209/index111209.html

‘Come to me … for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light’

‘Come to me … for my … burden is light’ (Photograph: Greg Tonks)

Patrick Comerford

8.30 a.m., Wednesday 9 December 2009, Said Eucharist: Isaiah 40: 25-31; Psalm 103: 1-10; Matthew 11: 28-30.

May I speak to you in the name of + the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Our Gospel reading in the lectionary this morning is particularly short. So you will glad that this only a short reflection, a very short reflection, and not really a sermon.

But it’s a very appropriate reading as you try to balance your lives at the end of a very long term, between finishing assignments and essays, and getting ready for Christmas at home.

I’m sure some of you are feeling exhausted at this stage, and some of you may even feel that you are the end of your tethers.

But the offer and the promise in this morning’s Gospel reading hold out hope.

In the law of contract, there are two important elements … offer and acceptance.

This morning Christ invites all of us who are tired, frazzled and bothered, weary and heavy-laden, to come to him and if we do he offers us rest. There’s the offer.

What about acceptance?

He simply asks that we take his yoke and learn from him.

Ah, but I can hear you say: “What about the terms and conditions?”

As you know – as the banks and our mobile phone services constantly remind us – all contracts are subject to terms and conditions.

Well the terms and conditions are simple: for his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

I still remember how the former Dean of Lismore, Bill Beare, once challenged a clergy meeting in the Diocese of Cashel and Ossory in words like: Who said you couldn’t dump everything at the foot of the cross.

This evening, I hope we have a wonderful evening, all of us, at the Carol Service. Try to dump everything at the foot of the cross during the day so that you can relax and enjoy this evening.

And then try to do it every day. And enjoy the promise of Advent and the look forward to the hope that is born at Christmas.

And so, may all we think, say and do, be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This reflection was shared at the Morning Eucharist in the institute chapel on Wednesday, 9 December 2009.

Bishop should not ‘ cling on to office’

In this morning’s edition [Thursday, 3 December 2009], The Irish Times reports on my sermon last night:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1203/1224259997285.html?via=rel

Drowning in a sea of tears

An icon of the Advent or the Second Coming of Christ

Patrick Comerford

Wednesday 2 December 2009

5 p.m.: The Community Eucharist

Jeremiah 33: 14-16; Psalm 25: 1-9; I Thessalonians 3: 9-13; Luke 21: 25-36

May I speak to you in the name of God, + Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen.

We had a very comforting service in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, last Sunday afternoon, with the Advent Procession. The cathedral was slowly lit up with candles at different points as the Advent readings were read from different points in the cathedral.

It was a reminder of our need to – our call to – take the light of the Gospel into the darkness of the world. But so often this is more of a challenging than a comforting call.

I know some of you were in the cathedral on Sunday afternoon. But how many of you had the more challenging task of preaching on Sunday morning … on the readings we are using this evening, the readings for the First Sunday of Advent?

These are not very comforting words for people who are not regular churchgoers and who are drifting back to Church at the moment for the comforts and cosiness of Christmas, with carols, and the holly, and the Sunday school nativity plays, and the mulled wine, and the cribs, and the advent wrath.

It’s nice to think of the coming of Christ as some precious, cuddly gift from a God the Father who is more akin to a benign Santa Claus in the sky, given as the centrepiece for a shop-front crib.

It’s much more difficult, for many, to think during the Advent season about the coming of Christ in the way his advent is presented in our Gospel reading this evening – to think of it in those dramatic apocalyptic terms of signs in the sun, moon and stars, distress among the nations of the earth, with everyone confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves, and people fainting from fear and foreboding.

If you were listening to this Gospel reading last Sunday in Church in Ballinasloe or Ardrahan, or Cork, and your home had been flooded for a week or more, you would find it very difficult indeed to find any good news in the prospect of your world being confused by the roaring of the waters – not if the ground floor of your new home or your small shop was under three feet of water, and you are not covered by insurance.

As you try to keep your head above water, physically and financially, how can some people expect to find hope in circumstances such as these in this Advent? And how would you bring them hope?

But there are so many other seas and waters that people are drowning in at the moment, without any signs of hope.

I think of all the tears that must have been shed, tears enough to fill many lakes and to flood out many family homes as a response to the horrific child abuse that we have heard about in the Murphy Report in the past week.

There are the tears of the victims, whose stories are so horrific that I am not going to cite any one of them this evening.

These are tears wept not just in the past. The victims continue to drown in their woes and their sorrows to this day. Some have even been driven to despair to the point that even as adults they could not cope with the memories and have died by suicide.

How does someone cope with the loss of childhood and the loss of innocence?

How does a family cope with feelings of trust betrayed? Feelings of inadequacy and failure when it came to protecting those they should have been nurturing, cherishing and protecting.

One of the first baptisms I was involved in after ordination was with a child whose father wanted to know could I drop the questions in the rite that ask: “Do you reject the devil and all proud rebellion against God? Do you renounce the deceit and corruption of evil?”

He thought they were superstitious and old-fashioned questions.

But when children’s lives are destroyed, when you see the heart-break of those children, those former children, their parents, their families, their loved ones, you know there is nothing old-fashioned or superstitious in facing up to reality of the devil, proud rebellion, deceit, corruption and evil.

How do we cope with the loss of faith in thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people who had once been asked to and had readily placed unquestioning trust in their Church?

These were not simple people. These were good people. And their goodness has been trampled on, stolen from them, drowned in the seas of their tears and sorrows.

Church attendance is dropping rapidly. There is a crisis of confidence in authority – all sorts and shapes of authority – in Ireland today. People no longer have faith in our politicians, in our banking and financial system; the collapse in the property market means they also know that there no linger is such a thing as something that is “as safe as houses.”

And the crisis facing the Roman Catholic Church today is a crisis that faces not just one tradition in the Church but that will rock the confidence people once had in all the traditions of the Church.

As one caller to a phone-in show said: “A plague on all their houses!”

This is not an opportunity for the Church of Ireland. This is a time for us to weep in the Church of Ireland. People are going to have their ears closed to the Word of God, their mouths shut to the sacrament, their eyes closed to Christ … and they won’t care who ministers, who proclaims and preaches, who shepherds and pastors.

And how will you cope with the tears and sorrows of your colleagues in the ministry?

I hear many people saying things such as: “I know there are many good priests in the Roman Catholic Church.” But this is not fair. It is not far because it is an under-estimate. In other words, it is damning by feint praise.

The truth is that the overwhelming majority of priests in Roman Catholic Church are good priests. And in their lonely solitude at night they must be drowning in seas of sorrows and in their tears as they realise how day after day, each day, they are bearing the blame that ought to be shouldered by a few, but who have been protected, in the past and sometimes even in the present, by some bishops and even by some in the Vatican.

Who can they turn to bear their grief, to share their sorrow, to listen to their woes, to show their tears?

I hope they can turn to their colleagues in the other traditions in the Church, that they will find listening ears and sympathetic hearts among their colleagues who are deacons, priests and bishops in the Church of Ireland.

In some cases they are not being provided with the leadership they need and they deserve. A bishop should not cling onto office on the basis of some opinion poll, some X-Factor vote, some popularity contest among his clergy and their parishioners.

A bishop must be a focus of unity.

Sometimes bishops make mistakes. We all make mistakes. We all make administrative mistakes. Administrative mistakes should not be a cause of resignation for anyone. After all there is a popular saying, “It could happen to a bishop.”

But mistakes based on poor moral judgment, on low moral standards must be a cause of resignation. If a bishop does not expect high – not necessarily the highest, but certainly very high – moral standards from his priests, then he is not just negligent of his office, but he can no longer be the focus of unity that is at the heart of the primary ministry of a bishop.

I have the highest respect for Archbishop Diarmuid Martin. Not just because he preached here in this chapel; not just because he is the brother of a very good friend; not just because I know he has a wonderful working relationship with my own archbishop. But because he is willing to provide moral leadership, and to provide it even when he has to take tough decisions.

You will have to take tough decisions throughout all of your ministry. I hope they are not of the magnitude that many Church leaders are facing this Advent.

Immediately after your ordination as priests, your ordaining bishops will warn you in these words:

“Remember always with thanksgiving that the treasure now entrusted to you is Christ’s own flock, bought through the shedding of his blood on the cross.”

But beforehand, the bishops will also remind you: “… remember in your heart that if it should come about that the Church, or any of its members, is hurt or hindered by reason of your neglect, your fault will be great and God’s judgment will follow.”

In the old rites, the words are even sterner: “And if it shall happen the same Church, or any member thereof, to take any hurt or hindrance by reason of your negligence, ye know the greatness of the fault, and also the horrible punishment that will ensue.”

Those were the words used at my ordination … and they sent shivers down the spines of some of my friends present who didn’t know what to expect.

You will need to be supported in your commitment to your ordination vows. And when you know the joys and the necessity of that support, remember too, in love and charity, those who cannot find that support, your colleagues and neighbours who will not have that support either because of the past actions and misjudgements of their bishops, or because of enforced celibacy, or because others say things like: “A plague on all your houses!”

Hold before you the hope that the Son of Man is coming this Advent, as our Gospel reading reminds us, in power and glory. When you hear the sort of things we’ve heard and see the sorts of things we’ve seen, stand up, chin out, raise your heads, strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before God at his coming.

And help your colleagues to do the same.

And take courage, help them to take courage too, from the words we heard from the Apostle Paul this evening: “… may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all” (I Thessalonians 3: 12).

And now, may all our thoughts, words and deeds be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This sermon was preached at the Sung Eucharist in the chapel on Wednesday, 2 December 2009.

A blessing at baptism

Patrick Comerford

Welcome

Grace, mercy and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ
be with you all
and also with you.

Explanation of the Sacrament

What a wonderful gathering this is this evening!

I was disappointed this morning to learn that this is not the first Baptism in this chapel. But we can claim this evening that this is the first Baptism in the Chapel of the Church of Ireland Theological Institute.

Well, we are working our way through the services of the Book of Common Prayer since the beginning of term … Morning Prayer, Evening Prayer, the Litany, the Holy Communion, the Service for Ash Wednesday … Those services take us through from page 7 to page 338. And this evening, at last, we have arrived at page 346 and so on …

When the Book of Common Prayer was going through the final stages of editing and approval, some critics asked why we started off with so much, and did not start off immediately with the Eucharist or the Holy Communion.

But I think we should have started the prayer book with the Sacrament of Baptism – because baptism is the foundational sacrament of the Church; it is what makes the Church. And every other act of public worship of the Church depends on this first sacrament.

Two generations ago, in any theological college like this on these islands, we might have had debates on obtuse theological points about baptismal regeneration. A generation ago, that debate might have been about the merits of adult or believer’s Baptism because so many people were simply using Baptism as a way of naming a child. The word “christening” simply meant welcoming a child into the family, with a name.

“Christening” still equals “naming” in many parts of Ireland. One Muslim friend was very hurt recently when a receptionist insisted on asking him to fill out an admission form with his “Christian name.”

Today, most of us understand that there is more to baptism than those debates would have allowed us to think. And we can all agree, no matter what differences there are about baptism in the different traditions of the Church, that baptism is the foundational sacrament of the Church.

In Baptism, Christ incorporates us into his body, which, in its visible form on earth is found in the Baptised people and in the sacrament of the Holy Communion that the baptised people celebrate as one body.

Put plainly, without Baptism there is no Church. And it is not we who baptise, but Christ who incorporates us into the Church, into the Body of Christ.

Even today, many of us are worried about the number of people who use Baptism as a naming ceremony or ritual. There was a debate on the Ryan Tubridy Show this morning about the merits of having a baby baptised a week or two after birth, which was the traditional Irish way of “christening” or naming a baby, or waiting for a few months until the mother was fit and well and strong enough to party the whole evening out.

But we are not here this evening to name Evelyn Rose Heffelfinger … her parents and grandparents already know and love her as Evie. Nor are we here to “christen” her.

We are here today to rejoice that Evie is being incorporated into the Body of Christ. This the wish of her parents, this is the wish of all of us, this is the wish of the Church, this is Christ’s own wish for her, and as they bring her up and as they take responsibility for her spiritual nurture and growth, her parents and godparents will hopefully bring her to see this as her own wish for herself.

The Book of Common Prayer rightly talks about baptism as the beginning of a journey with God that continues for the rest of our lives as we journey as pilgrim people. This is the first step in the response to God’s love. Evie’s baptism this evening should be a reminder to each and every one of us that we are still called to step out, to walk out, to move forward in that pilgrim journey … like called or chosen children moving through the waters towards God’s goal for us.

There is no Church of Ireland Baptism, there is no Methodist Baptism, there is no Roman Catholic or Presbyterian Baptism. There is only Christian Baptism, which is a call to rejoice and to dance in our covenant with God.

And because there are so many covenants between Methodist Churches and Anglican Churches around the world, it is particularly pleasing that Katie and Jamie have chosen to have Evie baptised here … apart from this being a place where Katie works and where Katie and Jamie know their families are part of one bigger family, can I also ask whether the Methodist Churches have a better Anglican friend than Maurice?

And because there is only Christian Baptism, not separate denominational or connectional Baptisms, it is good that the faith communities that have welcomed Katie, Jamie and Evie to Ireland are represented here too.

Among them, of course, are the Revd Derek Sargent of the Church of Saint John the Baptist, the Church of Ireland parish church in Clontarf, Clontarf parishioners, the Revd Julian Hamilton of the Dublin Central Mission, and friends from Abbey Street Methodist Church.

But as we go through this Baptism service with Evie you will also notice that there are prayers, thoughts and influences from other religious traditions too … Anglican, Methodist – why, even Russian Methodist and American Methodist – Mennonite and even Jewish.

And that is appropriate too. Not just because Evie’s mother is an Old Testament scholar, but because there is a continuity in our covenantal relationship with God, who calls us out, through the waters of the covenant, to be free to worship God, and to be in an intimate relationship with God.

Yes, let us party. Yes, let us rejoice. Yes, let us delight in Evie’s new names. Yes, let us congratulate Katie and Jamie and their families. But, yes, let us all be reminded also that we being many are one body for we all share in the one waters of Baptism.

The Baptism of Christ ... El Greco

The Dismissal

God has delivered us from the dominion of darkness
and has given us a place with the saints in light.

You have received the light of Christ;
walk in this light all the days of your life.
Shine as a light in the world
to the glory of God the Father.

Go in peace to love and serve the Lord:
In the name of Christ. Amen.

Can we be stubborn and obstinate like Saint Andrew?

Saint Andrew ... a window in Saint Andrew’s Church of Ireland Parish Church in Malahide, Co Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Patrick Comerford

30 November 2009: Saint Andrew the Apostle

Isaiah 52: 7-10; Psalm 19: 1-6; Romans 10: 12-18; Matthew 4: 18-22.

May I speak to you in the name of + the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

At the moment I am re-reading Penelope Fitzgerald’s The Gate of Angels (1990), a novel set in Saint Angelicus, a fictional Cambridge college, near Christ’s Pieces at the back of Sidney Sussex College.

Penelope Fitzgerald came from a well-known family of Anglican and Roman Catholic theologians. So you can understand how early in the novel she throws in the delightful piece of historical information that Saint Angelicus in Cambridge, like St Andrews in Scotland, has no legal existence. They both received their founding charters from Pope Benedict XIII, one of the last antipopes in Avignon.

In reality, Benedict XIII (Pedro de Luna) was no Pope at all – even his own schismatic followers deposed him at Pisa in 1409 and the antipope party even threw him out of Avignon, forcing him into a delusory and arrogant exile in Aragon. He had no legal right to grant a charter to any college or university.

But Pedro de Luna – whether he was a lunatic or simply liked the idea of being a Pope – was caught up in the nets of his yesterdays and stubbornly continued to behave like a Pope. His stubborn behaviour gave rise to the Spanish saying seguir en sus trece (to stay in his/her 13), referring to people who refuse to change their minds, who stick to their stubborn and obstinate behaviour.

Eventually, no-one but the Scots recognised him as Pope. But he clung to the delusions of office, granting charters to universities, and in a series of bulls in 1413 and 1414 set up St Andrews four or five years after he was sacked.

Now, far be it from me, in front of Maurice or Lynne, to challenge the historical legitimacy of St Andrews, or its claims to antiquity. But in the past and in antiquity some interesting claims have been made too on behalf of Saint Andrew, the apostle we commemorate this morning.

Andrew was a fisherman, working on the Lake of Galilee with his brother Simon Peter. He was a disciple of John the Baptist when he heard the call of Christ to follow him. Andrew hesitated for a moment, not because he had any doubts about that call, but because he wanted to bring his brother with him. He went to Peter and, as Saint John’s Gospel tells us, he told him: “We have found the Messiah … [and] he brought Simon to Jesus” (John 1: 41, 42).

In answering our call to ministry and mission, we must not forget those who are closest to us, those in our families and those who have worked with us. But, at the same time, like Andrew, we must be happy about leaving behind the nets of yesterday and not getting caught up in them.

Tradition says Andrew was so obstinate and so stubborn at his martyrdom in Patras that he insisted on being splayed on an X-shaped cross as he said he was unworthy to be crucified on a cross the same shape as the one on which Christ was crucified.

Unlike the other disciples named in this morning’s Gospel reading – Peter, James and John – Andrew never gave his name to an Epistle, never gave his name to a Gospel. But Andrew, the first-called of the Apostles, truly took up his cross and followed Jesus. And he called others to do the same.

His stubborn and obstinate commitment to mission, to travelling for the Gospel, has made him the patron saint of mission work and the patron saint of Constantinople, Greece, Romania, Ukraine, Russia – and even Scotland.

That stubborn and obstinate commitment to Christ, to the point of a martyr’s death, makes Andrew an appropriate saint to start off the Church Year at the beginning of Advent. As yesterday’s Gospel reading (Luke 21: 25-36) reminded us, Christmas is meaningless without looking forward to the Cross, the Resurrection, and in Advent the coming of Christ again in glory.

This morning Saint Andrew, the first-called of the Apostles, reminds us of the meaning of our call to ministry and mission. When you leave here, casting aside the nets of study, assignments and exams, may you remain stubborn and obstinate – not like Benedict XIII but like Saint Andrew, the first-called of the Apostles, in your commitment to Christ, his Church and his mission.

And now, may all praise, honour and glory be to God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Collect:

Almighty God,
who gave such grace to your apostle Saint Andrew
that he readily obeyed the call of your Son Jesus Christ
and brought his brother with him:
Call us by your holy Word
and give us grace to follow without delay,
and to tell the good news of your kingdom;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Offertory Sentence:

How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? (I John 3: 17).

Preface:

In Andrew and all the saints
you have given us an example of godly living,
that, rejoicing in their fellowship,
we may run with perseverance the race that is set before us,
and with them receive the unfading crown of glory:

Post Communion Prayer:

Father,
may the gifts we have received at your table
keep us alert for your call
that we may always be ready to answer,
and, following the example of Saint Andrew,
always be ready to bear our witness
to our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Blessing:

God give you grace
to share the inheritance of Andrew and his apostles and his saints in glory:

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This sermon was preached in the chapel at the Eucharist on Monday 30 November 2009.

The Kingship of Christ and the majesty of grieving mothers

Christ the King ... a modern American tapestry

Patrick Comerford

Sunday 22 November 2009: The Kingship of Christ (The Sunday before Advent)

11 a.m.: The Cathedral Eucharist, Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin

Daniel 7: 9-10, 13-14; Psalm 93; Revelation 1: 4b-8; John 18: 33-37

May I speak to you in the name of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

This morning’s Gospel reading may seem to be a little out of sequence for some. We are preparing for Christmas, you may think, not for Easter.

Already many of us have started sending our Christmas cards, and drawing up our lists for presents. Although there may be a sense of foreboding in advance of Christmas this year, nevertheless many are determined to enjoy it and celebrate it.

Despite that foreboding, it seems Christmas comes earlier and earlier each year, and this year has been no exception. I wonder to myself whether this is simply a sign that I am getting older. Is being grumpy about seemingly earlier-and-earlier Christmas trees and decorations and snowmen in the shops just part of the ageing process … like claiming that policemen or gardai appear increasingly to be younger than I am?

And yet, without being grumpy, I know that this year too families will feel inadequate, under the wrong sort of pressures, and express this by saying there are too many Christmas trees around, too many Christmas offers, too much pressure to shop and spend, when they don’t have the money, or the security to spend the money they have.

Putting the Christmas trees up too early, hanging up the lights and frosting the windows may not be helping to encourage a Christmas spirit. And too much of everything at this time means we forget what Advent is supposed to be about.

This Sunday marks the end of the Christian year, the Church year. And we appropriately mark this by crowning Christ as King. This helps us to focus from Sunday next on Advent, which is supposed to be a time and a season of preparation for the coming of Christ.

And he comes not just as a cute cuddly babe wrapped up in the manger and under the floodlights of a front window in a large shop in Grafton Street or the window of a leading brand shop in Dundrum.

We are also preparing for the coming of Christ as King. And so on this Sunday, the last Sunday of the Christian calendar, the last Sunday of the Church year, we celebrate the Kingship of Christ.

But kingship is not a very good role model for those of us who live in a democratic society where we elect our governments and our heads of state. The models of kingship that we have in history or in contemporary society are not so good. Let me give three examples.

On our neighbouring island, we have a model of monarchy that paradoxically appears to be benign on one hand and on the other appears aloof and remote, at the very apex of a class system defined by birth, title and inherited privilege.

In other northern European countries, we have a model of monarchy that is represented in the media by figureheads portrayed as slightly daft do-gooders, riding around on bicycles in parks and by canals in ways that rob kingship of majesty, dignity and grace.

Or, look at two recently deposed emperors: in the case of Halie Selassie, there was a king who sat back in luxury as his people starved to death; in the Emperor Bokassa, we had a tyrant accused of eating his people and having them butchered at whim.

No wonder some American translations of the Psalms avoid the word king and talk about God as our governor.

But in this morning’s Gospel reading, Christ rejects all those dysfunctional models of majesty and kingship. He is not happy with Pilate trying to project onto him models of kingship that are taken from the haughty and the aloof, the daft and the barmy, or the despotic and the tyrannical.

As he is being tortured and crucified, his tormentors and detractors still try to project these models of kingship onto Christ as they whip him and beat him to humility, as they crown him with thorns and mock him, and finally as he is crucified for all the world to see.

What sort of a king did Pilate expect Christ to be? Indeed, what does majesty and graciousness mean for you today?

The sufferings and compassion of three mothers in recent months have illustrated for me how loving parents can be reflections of divine majesty and grace.

When her son Sebastian was murdered in Bray last August, Nuala Creane spoke movingly at his funeral as she told her story, telling all there that “my story, my God is the God of Small Things. I see God’s presence in the little details.”

“A well-sculpted eulogy, carved with all the beauty, precision, delicacy and impact of a Pieta being sculpted by a Michelangelo”

It was a beautiful and well-sculpted eulogy, carved with all the beauty, precision, delicacy and impact of a Pieta being sculpted by a Michelangelo. She spoke of how the God of Small Things had blessed her with a sunny child, “was saying, is saying, let the child inside each of us come to the surface and play.”

She understood generously and graciously, and with majesty, the grief of those who loved the young man who had killed her son and then killed himself, believing these young men “both played their parts in the unfolding of God’s divine plan.”

She spoke of the heartbreak and the choice that faces everyone confronted with the deepest personal tragedies, asking herself: “Do we continue to live in darkness, seeing only fear, anger, bitterness, resentment; blaming, bemoaning our loss, always looking backwards, blaming, blaming, blaming, or are we ready to transmute this negativity? We can rise to the challenge with unconditional love, knowing that we were born on to this earth to grow ... Our hearts are broken but maybe our hearts needed to be broken so that they could expand.”

Broken hearts, expanding hearts, rising to the challenge with unconditional love … this is how I hope I understand the majesty and the glory of Christ, at the best of times and at the worst of times.

Last month, when the Cork All-Star hurler Donal Óg Cusack published his biography, Come What May, his mother went on the Marian Finucane Show on RTÉ and spoke movingly about how “very difficult” it is for his father to accept that their son is gay.

Bonnie Cusack spoke honestly of how “very sorry” she feels for her husband who was finding the situation tough to deal with. But while her husband did not find their son’s decision to go public easy to accept, they both fully supported Donal Óg, and she proudly described her son’s courage as the “most important quality a man can have.”

Bonnie Cusack said she knew that her son was gay from the time he was aged about 16. But in the face of the discrimination and the taunts her son suffered at matches, despite the lost hopes for the future, of ever having a daughter-in-law, of ever having grandchildren, she is proud of her son and his courage. She loves him unconditionally.

And her dignity on the Marian Finucane Show was regal and majestic … a lesson for every mother on how to publicly show love for a son who has made a difficult yet public decision.

Then, at the end of last month, we had the tragic killing of an Irish backpacker in Australia, followed by the graceful, majestic, regal response of his compassionate and loving mother.

Gearóid Walsh (23) suffered severe head injuries and died in hospital in Sydney. He had been drinking in beachside bars and pubs before getting into an argument with someone else outside a kebab shop. Initially, he walked away, but then returned a moment later to continue the argument. He was punched once, stumbled, fell and hit his head on the ground.

His widowed mother, Tressa Walsh, flew out to Sydney immediately. Mrs Walsh was filled with emotion as she appealed for the man who hit her son to give himself up. And then she explained, with grace and majesty: “I’d really like to say that as a mother I really feel for this guy who got into a fight with Gearóid.”

She was holding back tears as she said: “I am heart-broken for him because we don’t blame him, we don’t want him to serve time in prison. I think he was just very, very unlucky. We don’t want him to torture himself over this. I don’t see this as a murder.”

She said her son was tall … “he had a long way to fall.”

In her love for her son, she had compassion and mercy for the man who subsequently handed himself into police in Sydney. And she could see how darkness can lead to light, bad things can be turned around to good, despair can lead to hope, for after she accepted that her son was being taken off life support, she also allowed his vital organs to help six Australians who might otherwise have died to live.

In our world today, refusing to seek revenge is seen as passive acceptance. We confuse seeking the best for ourselves and those we love with being insensitive to and trampling on the hurt and grief of others.

When Christ comes to us this Advent, as the poor suffer because of the recession, because of our failed economy, because of the cuts we are being prepared for in the looming budget … who will he identify with?

In his glory and his majesty, I expect he will understand those who suffer, those who grieve, those who forgive.

At his birth, he was born in a humble dwelling in Bethlehem, he showed how much he has in common with the poor who will suffer this Christmas.

At his death, he rejected the thrones and palaces of the Pilates and the Herods. As Michelangelo’s Pieta shows us, he had a more dignified throne.

And when he comes again at his Advent, his glory and his majesty is reflected in those who are filled with grief, with compassion, with love and with understanding.

And so, may all we think, say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2009)

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, and a canon of Christ Church Dublin. This sermon was preached at the Sung Eucharist in Christ Church Cathedral on Sunday 22 November 2009.

Being brothers (and sisters) of the Lord

Saint James the Brother of the Lord … icon written by Tobias Stanislas Haller, BSG, for Saint James Episcopal Church, Parkton, Maryland dedicated 26 October 2008

Patrick Comerford

23 October 2009: Isaiah 49: 1-6; Psalm 1; Acts 15: 12-22; Mark 3: 31-35.

Collect: Lord God of peace: Grant that after the example of your servant, James the brother of our Lord, your Church may give itself continually to prayer and to the reconciliation of all who are caught up in hatred or enmity; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

This morning we commemorate one of the key figures in the New Testament, Saint James the Brother of the Lord, who is described in the New Testament as a “brother of the Lord” and in the Liturgy of Saint James as “the brother of God” (Iάκωβος ο Αδελφόθεος, Jácobos Adelphótheos).

The relationship of James and Jesus is difficult to unravel for those who believe in the perpetual virginity of Mary. Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions say he was the half-brother or step-brother of Jesus and that Joseph already had children – that James was already a boy when Jesus was born (see Matthew 13: 55). The Gospels name the brothers of Jesus as James, Jude, Simon and Joses or Joseph (Matthew 13: 55; Mark 6: 3; see also Galatians 1: 19). Even Josephus in his Jewish Antiquities (20.9.1) describes James as “the brother of Jesus who is called Christ.”

Some would say that James could have been a nephew of Joseph, that cousins could have been called “brothers” and “sisters” in the Aramaic spoke by Jesus, and that the Greek words adelphos and adelphe were not restricted to their literal meaning of a full brother or sister.

Whichever opinion you accept, this James is the James who is called James the Less (Mark 15: 4) to distinguish him from James, the son of Zebedee, who we encountered with John in our Gospel reading for Sunday last (see ); or from James the Great, and who is also called James the Just because of his great holiness and righteousness.

We identify today’s James with the author of the Epistle of James. The Apostle Paul names him as one of the witnesses to the Risen Christ (I Corinthians 15: 3–8), and describes James, alongside Peter and John, as a pillar of the early Church (Galatians 2: 9).

The Letter of James can be compared with some of the wonderful Wisdom Literature in the Hebrew Scriptures, with for example, its words of wisdom on true worship (James 1: 19-20), on discrimination and respect for the poor (2: 1-13), on the false dichotomy of faith and works (2: 14-26), on truth and careful speech (3: 1-12), godliness and worldliness (4: 1 to 5:6), on putting love at the heart of all relationships in the Christian community … and so on.

They are words of wisdom that we can all take to heart in a community such as this. How we speak about one another, how we respect one another, how we hold up one another, how we love each other even in spite of our failings towards one another.

We are to value one another, but not because of wealth or status or intellect; we are to listen to one another, and to be slow to speak and equally slow to anger; we are to bridle our tongues and not to speak loosely about one another. We are not just called to be Christians, but we must do Christianity too.

When we have difficulties, are hurt or tugging against one another in any Christian community – whether it is here, in our families, in your future parishes or dioceses – then the words of James are a wise reminder of how we can how that our Christian faith is not just a matter of being but also doing.

The Acts of the Apostles is silent about James after the year 60. However, according to Josephus in his Jewish Antiquities (20: 9), “the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James” met his death in the year 62, when he was condemned “on the charge of breaking the law.” He was thrown from the wall of the Temple on the day of the Passover and was stoned. As he prayed for his slayers, his head was crushed by a wooden club wielded by a scribe.

How many of us would like to die like this? How many of us would aspire to being pillars of the Church? How many of us would like to be so close to Jesus that we could be called brothers or sisters of the Lord, still more “the brother of God” (Iάκωβος ο Αδελφόθεος, Jákobos Adelphótheos).

But to be a real brother of Christ, to be a real brother of God, is to be brothers and sisters to one another in Christ.

This morning we give thanks for James who was an early disciple and apostle, a witness to the Resurrection, a reconciler and a mediator in the early Church, a pillar of the Church, the author of a New Testament epistle, an early martyr, and a wise counsellor.

Post Communion Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, we thank you that after your Resurrection you appeared to James, and endowed him with gifts of leadership for your Church. May we, who have known you now in the breaking of the bread, be people of prayer and reconciliation. We ask it for your love’s sake. Amen.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This sermon was preached at the Eucharist in the Institute Chapel on 23 October 2009

Me, me, please pick me, I want the glory

The King of Kings and Great High Priest ... an icon from Mount Athos on the wall of my study

Patrick Comerford

Wednesday 21 October 2009, 5 p.m.: The Eucharist (Holy Communion 2)

Collect and Readings for the 19th Sunday after Trinity: Job 38: 1-7; Psalm 104: 1-10, 26, 37c; Hebrews 5: 1-10; Mark 10: 35-45.

May I speak to you in the name of + the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

I have five or six icons on the wall of my study above my desk. They have been hung in random fashion without any particular order. But they represent different phases and aspects of my ministry.

There is a treasured copy of Andrei Rublev’s Hospitality of Abraham, the Old Testament Trinity, which was given to me by one of my former lecturers … There the Trinity is prefigured or represented by the angels, with Christ seated at the table, with the Father and the Holy Spirit on each side of him.

There is an icon of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, patron saint of the institute in Cambridge where I have studied over the last two years … and of Saint Catherine’s Monastery on Mount Sinai, where I stayed while working on a project on Christian-Muslim dialogue.

And so on.

And then there is an icon from Mount Athos of Christ, the King of Kings and the Great High Priest, who I hope sets my pattern – who should set the pattern for each and every one of us – in our ordained ministry.

In this icon, Christ is wearing the robes, the crown or mitre, and the stole (ὠμοφόριον, omophorion) decorated with crosses of a bishop vested for the Divine Liturgy. Christ, the Great High Priest of his Church on earth, holds an open New Testament in his left hand and his right hand is raised in blessing.

We are told in the Epistle to the Hebrews, in the verses immediately before this evening’s reading: “Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathise with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4: 14-16).

Christ comes into the world as the King of Kings and as the Great High Priest.

But he comes not as the sort of king that we would expect a king to be, nor as a great high priest full of pomp and self-importance.

When you have been ordained as priests for a few years, when you have served your first curacy and come to move to your first or second parish as rector, you will be in danger of slipping into habits that you do not realise have been formed slowly and invisibly.

You will be the centre of attention. Nominators who want to attract you to their parish will tell you how wonderful and how talented you are; people will praise your sermons and how well you perform at Christmas and Easter, at baptisms, weddings and funerals.

You may delight in being at the centre of attention; your photographs will appear in the Church of Ireland Gazette beside bishops and in the local newspaper beside mayors and celebrities. You may be interviewed on television and write books that received critical acclaim.

And all in a very good cause, no doubt.

But once you are on a career path, you will be in danger of forgetting that priesthood is not a professional option, you will be in danger of forgetting the first reasons why you started to explore the idea of ordained ministry.

I hope at least one of you, if not more, will become a bishop in my lifetime … but a bishop who will serve the Church, and not a bishop for the reasons some mothers would like their son or daughter to be a bishop.

There is an apocryphal story in this diocese of a new curate in a parish who was asked by the rector’s wife to go around the table at a pensioners’ coffee morning and make sure that people had their cups topped up.

“But,” he protested, “I’m here to talk to people. I’m not here to wait on tables. What do you think I was ordained for?”

What indeed did he think he was ordained for, if not to wait on tables? The Greek word for deacon (διάκονος) means precisely that: someone who waits on tables, and not the head waiter or master of ceremonies either.

The foundation of all ordained ministry is our diaconate. We are called first and foremost to serve. And when we serve the people, when in obedience we meet them in their suffering, then we can hear their cries and their prayers and truly serve them in the services of the Church and in the Divine Liturgy (see Hebrews 5: 1-10).

It was in humbling himself as a servant that Christ truly became the role model for all deacons, priests and bishops.

Did James and John think opting to follow Jesus, becoming disciples, was a good career move?

Whenever I read this evening’s Gospel story (Mark 10: 35-45), I think back to my childhood days. I remember all those preparations for football matches, as we lined up to pick sides. And how we all wanted to be among the first to be picked for a team.

Everyone wanted to be picked first, everyone wanted to line up there beside one of the two captains, no-one wanted to be picked last, even when there were enough places for everyone to get a game.

I can still see them: 9- or 10-year-old boys, jumping up and down on the grass, waving our hands or pointing at our chests, and pleading: “Me, me, please pick me, I’m your friend.”

Me, me, please pick me. And then when we were picked how we wanted the glory. Slow at passing the ball, in case I might not score the goal. Better to lose that ball in a tackle than to pass it to someone else and risk someone else scoring the winning goal.

And that’s who James and John remind me of: wanting to be picked first, wanting to be the first to line up beside the team captain, being glory seekers rather than tram players.

No wonder the other ten were upset when they heard this. But they were upset, not because they wanted to take on the servant model of priesthood and ministry. They were upset not because James and John hadn’t yet grasped the point of it all. They were upset because they might have been counted out, because they might have missed out being on the first team, on the first XI.

And their upset actually turns to anger. Not the sort of candidates you’d like to meet at a selection conference.

And what did James and John want in reality? They wanted that one would sit on Christ’s right hand and the other on his left.

Now, even that might not have been too bad an ambition. The man who stood at the right hand of the Emperor in the Byzantine court was the Emperor’s voice. What he said was the emperor’s word. And so, in the creed, when we declare our belief that Christ sits at the right hand of the Father, we mean not that there is some heavenly couch on which all three are seated, comfy and cosy, as if waiting to watch their favourite television sit-com.

When we say that Christ “is seated at the right hand of the Father,” we mean that Christ is the Word of God. In some way, I suppose, this is what Andrei Rublev was trying to convey in his icon of the Visitation of Abraham, his icon of the Holy Trinity in the Old Testament.

In Andrei Rublev’s icon of the Holy Trinity, the Christ-figure is wearing a simple deacon’s stole, and is seated with the Father and the Holy Spirit to his left and to his right

In that icon, the Father and the Spirit are seated to the right and left of the Son. Indeed, in that icon, Christ is wearing not the elaborate high-priestly stole of a bishop, but the simple stole of a deacon at the table.

For James and John to want to be seated at the right and left of Christ in his glory – not when they were sitting down to a snack, or travelling on the bus, or even at the Last Supper, but in his glory (see verse 37) – they were was expressing an ambition to take the place of, to replace God.

But to be like God means to take on Christ’s humility, as we are reminded in our reading from the Letter to the Hebrews this evening.

We are made in the image and likeness of God, and then God asks us, invites us to return to that image and likeness when Christ comes in our image and likeness – not as a Byzantine emperor or Roman tyrant, but just as one of us.

Are we willing to be like him in our ministry?

Christ asks us that this evening. Are we willing to drink the cup that he drinks, or to be baptised with his baptism (see verses 38 and 40)?

Of course James and John were. See how this hot-headed pair, the sons of Zebedee, went on to serve the community of the baptised and the community that shared in the one bread and the one cup, the community that is the Church, the community that in baptism and in the shared meal is the Body of Christ.

James – not James the Brother of the Lord, whom we remember on Friday next – but James the Great was executed by the sword and became one of the first Christian martyrs (see Acts 12: 1-12).

John too lived a life of service to the Church: he was exiled on Patmos, and although he died in old age in Ephesus, there were numerous attempts to make him a martyr. And, of course, he gave his name to in the Johannine writings in the New Testament.

Martyrdom comes in many forms. In essence the word means witness. But the first step in martyrdom is dying to self, to self-ambition, to self-seeking, to self-serving. Your life must be a life that is testimony to your most cherished beliefs, testimony to Christ himself.

We love our titles in Anglicanism – canon, archdeacon, prebendary, dean – and stand firmly on our dignity, and even on our dignitaries if they get in our way. But you are not entering a career with good prospects. There is nothing wrong with any one of you wanting to be a bishop. There is something wrong if you are here seeing that as a career goal.

“For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10: 45).

And so, may all we think, say and do, be to the Glory of God, + Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This sermon was preached at the community Eucharist in the institute chapel on Wednesday, 21 October 2009.

Harvest Thanksgiving, Swords

Saint Columba’s Church, Swords, Co Dublin

Patrick Comerford

Sunday 4 October 2009: Saint Columba’s Church, Swords, Co Dublin.

11.30 a.m.: Harvest Thanksgiving Eucharist, Joel 2: 21-27; Psalm 126; I Timothy 2: 1-7; Matthew 6: 25-33.

May all we think, say and do be to the glory of God, +Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

It’s wonderful to be here in Swords this morning for your Harvest Thanksgiving, and I’d like to thank you and Canon Robert Deane for this kind invitation.

Before ordination, I was placed as reader in Saint Maelruain’s Parish in Tallaght. As you probably know, in the Celtic Church, Dublin was ringed with monasteries, but Tallaght and Swords were paired together and were known for their learning as the “Eyes of Ireland.”

And so, whether by accident or design, one of the first parishes I preached in outside Tallaght as a reader was this church, sometime in the mid-1990s. So thank you for inviting me back again.

Earlier this morning, I was preaching at the harvest in Saint Patrick’s in Donabate. And I was telling them there of my family connections with the Portrane and Donabate area. My grandparents, Stephen Comerford and Bridget Lynders, met while my grandfather was working in Portrane. Bridget was then living at the Quay House in Portrane, and they were married in Donabate on 7 February 1905.

It must have been very difficult after that wedding for my grandmother to move with my grandfather from what was then a beautiful rural part of Ireland to suburban life in Dublin, first in Ranelagh, then in Rathmines, and later in Terenure.

But they both loved that area so much that their children and step-children spent much of their time in Portrane. And when my grandparents died, they were both buried in the churchyard beside the ruins of Saint Catherine’s Church in Portrane.

It is peculiar how families in city parishes can cling onto the roots they have in rural parishes and to traditions like the Harvest Thanksgiving but forget why we celebrate it.

When families in cities like Dublin lose any sense of memory or belonging or identity with rural areas, or when places like Donabate change from being small villages to be being part of the suburbs, then it is important to remember the harvest.

In Swords too, as the suburbs have expanded, as you become absorbed more and more into the life of Dublin, it is easy to forget the significance of harvest.

We need to be reminded, not for romantic or sentimental reasons, but for a sense of realism, just how difficult it is for the farmers and gardeners, those who toil in the fields and on the sea, to produce the food on our tables.

There is a real danger in suburbs and cities today of forgetting the problems farmers face after summers like this year’s when it comes to harvest time.

And yet, the economic problems we have all been facing during the past year or two probably mean we are all suffering together.

The poor summer weather has reduced the harvest this year. And with the economic meltdown we have all suffered, farmers in particular have borne an even greater share of the problems.

I suppose that as things become more difficult at home, as the harvest at home leaves us with fewer and fewer pickings, one of the easiest ways to make savings is to cut back on our support for projects supported by agencies like the Bishops’ Appeal Fund or the mission and development agencies.

It’s not that people are so cruel and lacking in compassion and understanding to say things such as charity ought to begin at home. But it is easier to cut back on projects and spending that won’t be seen at home. And that’s what is happening to government funding too.

Who is going to notice a million here or a million there cut from the overseas aid budget? Few of us here, I’m sure. Politicians weighing up their options and looking only at the short-term consequences may say decisions like that are not going to lose them any votes. But it is going to lose lives.

I know only too well that farmers haven’t been getting their share of the harvest this year. When the Apostle Paul is writing to Timothy, in the Epistle reading we shared this morning, he talks about how we must share in suffering, and how the farmer who does the work ought to have the first share of the crops.

But for a few moments let me share some of the experiences of the harvest in Africa from the students and ordinands in the Church of Ireland Theological Institute where I teach and where my job entails being the chaplain.

The students arrived back in the theological institute over the last two weeks, and as you can imagine there has been a lively buzz about the place e has been abuzz, with everybody catching up on their summer holidays and their summer placements the length and breadth of this island.

But one student, the senior student, Paul Bogle, who was on placement in Swords and Donabate as a first year student two years ago, had a summer placement this year that was a very different from the usual summer placement in an Irish parish.

Instead, Paul decided to work his summer placement through USPG Ireland – the Irish section of the oldest Anglican mission agency – with an Anglican parish in Swaziland, with Andrew and Rosemary Symonds, who have been USPG mission companions in Swaziland since 2005.

Andrew is the training officer for the Diocese of Swaziland and is a parish priest or rector, while Rosemary facilitates key community projects.

Paul was inspired to go to Swaziland after the students – men and women – took part in a sponsored shave earlier this year on Shrove Tuesday – what they called Shave Tuesday – to support USPG’s work in Swaziland.

Children at Usuthu Mission Primary School in Swaziland (Photograph: Paul Bogle)

Now Swaziland is about as far away as one of our students could go on a parish placement. This small, land-locked country in southern Africa has a population of just one million people.

But Swaziland has possibly the highest level of HIV/AIDS in the world: 40 per cent of the people there are HIV+, many children are born HIV+, and 20,000 new HIV cases are reported or diagnosed each year.

But there are only 2,000 hospital beds in Swaziland. This means most of the people are left to die at home.

To compound these problems, 40 per cent of the people are unemployed, and 69 per cent of the people live below the poverty line. And Swaziland now has 80,000 to 90,000 orphans, mainly because of HIV/AIDS – it is impossible for us to imagine the scale of this problem; in Ireland, it would mean having half a million orphans.

A feeding station for orphans in Swaziland ... Swaziland has 80-90,000 orphans today (Photograph: Paul Bogle

But for many people the biggest problem is not HIV – it is the problem of what they are going to eat. For many mothers, the only way to feed themselves is to sell themselves.

And because of the high infection rate, the HIV virus is spreading more rapidly that in other countries.

Life expectancy is low, the mortality rate is high, and so 15 per cent of households are headed by a child. Now, how can you expect a child to feed children, to look after their education, health and clothing?

With the support of the Bishops’ Appeal, USPG Ireland is working with the Anglican Church in the Diocese of Swaziland to provide feeding programmes and to provide training in horticulture and market gardening so that the diet of people and the ability of families to be self-sufficient can be improved significantly – a true harvest thanksgiving project.

To help this work, it has been possible too to make use of previously under-used church lands.

All this is set in the context of the local church’s anti-HIV programme and the need to give people confidence that there can be a sustainable future for their communities, that Swaziland is not going to implode.

Hope is so important for people in Swaziland. But then, isn’t hope central to living out the Gospel?

Hope is at the heart of our Gospel reading this morning, which comes from the middle of the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. As a lecturer in theology I sometimes think of the Sermon on the Mount as an ideal model for a lecture or seminar on discipleship, and on practising piety:

In the chapter in which we find this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus has already spoken about giving alms in humility; about prayer, including praying simply and praying in the words of the Lord’s Prayer; about fasting without being dismal, but fasting joyfully; about refusing to hoard and keep things all for myself; about looking at things in the best possible light; and about putting God before our wealth.

In the section we shared this morning, verses 25 to 33, Christ hopes the disciples will realise that life is about more than our personal comforts. There’s more, in the following chapter, but there’s enough there for us and our harvest thought in the few verses we read this morning, I think.

It is very difficult if you are a 12 or 14-year-old girl looking after your younger sisters and brothers to continue to have hope if the younger ones are asking you last thing every night and first thing every morning “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?” (Matthew 6: 31).

And the only way we take away those worries, give them hope, is to support projects such as USPG’s work in Swaziland, by encouraging other students to follow in Paul’s footsteps, or directly supporting the work of mission agencies like USPG.

The harvest has been very poor in Ireland this year. And as the recession bites, those who have lost their jobs, those who have suffered pay cuts, farmers who are going to find this a very bleak autumn and winter indeed must be taken to heart.

But if we fret for ourselves and not for the children of Swaziland, can we say that we are striving first for the Kingdom of God and his righteousness? For as Jesus tells us this morning; “… your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6: 32-33).

And now may all we think, say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This sermon was preached at the Harvest Thanksgiving Eucharist in Saint Columba’s Church, Swords, Co Dublin, at 11.30 a.m. on Sunday 4 October 2009

Harvest Thanksgiving, Donabate

Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate (Photograph: Bubla)

Patrick Comerford

Sunday 4 October 2009: Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, Co Dublin; 10 a.m.: Harvest Thanksgiving Eucharist

Joel 2: 21-27; Psalm 126; I Timothy 2: 1-7; Matthew 6: 25-33.

May all we think, say and do be to the glory of God, +Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

It’s wonderful to be here in Donabate this morning for your Harvest Thanksgiving, and I’d like to thank you and Canon Robert Deane for this kind invitation. I’m often in this parish, but this is the first time I’ve ever been inside Saint Patrick’s Church. Yet I already feel I know you.

But, of course, I have many connections with this area. My grandparents, Stephen Comerford and Bridget Lynders, met while my grandfather was working in Portrane. Bridget was then living at the Quay House in Portrane, and they were married across the road, in the other Saint Patrick’s, on 7 February 1905.

It must have been very difficult after that wedding for my grandmother to move with my grandfather from a beautiful rural part of Ireland to suburban life in Dublin, first in Ranelagh, then in Rathmines, and later in Terenure.

But they both loved this area so much that their children and step-children spent much of their time in Portrane. And when my grandparents died, they were both brought back here to be buried, and are buried in the churchyard beside the ruins of Saint Catherine’s Church in Portrane.

It is peculiar how families in city parishes can cling onto the roots they have in rural parishes and to traditions like the Harvest Thanksgiving but forget why we celebrate it.

When families in cities like Dublin lose any sense of memory or belonging or identity with rural areas, or when places like Donabate change from being small villages to be being part of the suburbs, then it is important to remember the harvest. Not for romantic or sentimental reasons, but to be reminded how difficult it is for the farmers and gardeners, those who toil in the fields and on the sea, to produce the food on our tables.

There is a real danger in suburbs and cities of forgetting the problems farmers face after summers like this year’s when it comes to harvest time.

And yet, the economic problems we have all been facing during the past year or two probably mean we are all suffering together.

The poor summer weather has reduced the harvest this year. And with the economic meltdown we have all suffered, farmers in particular have borne an even greater share of the problems.

I suppose that as things become more difficult at home, as the harvest at home leaves us with fewer and fewer pickings, one of the easiest ways to make savings is to cut back on our support for projects supported by agencies like the Bishops’ Appeal Fund or the mission and development agencies.

It’s not that people are so cruel and lacking in compassion and understanding to say things such as charity ought to begin at home. But it is easier to cut back on projects and spending that won’t be seen at home.

And that’s what is happening to government funding too.

Who is going to notice a million here or a million there cut from the overseas aid budget? Few of us here, I’m sure. Politicians weighing up their options and looking only at the short-term consequences may say decisions like that are not going to lose them any votes. But it is going to lose lives.

I know only too well that farmers haven’t been getting their share of the harvest this year. When the Apostle Paul is writing to Timothy, in the Epistle reading we shared this morning, he talks about how we must share in suffering, and how the farmer who does the work ought to have the first share of the crops.

But for a few moments let me share some of the experiences of the harvest in Africa from the students and ordinands in the Church of Ireland Theological Institute where I teach and where my job entails being the chaplain.

The students arrived back in the theological institute over the last two weeks, and as you can imagine there has been a lively buzz about the place e has been abuzz, with everybody catching up on their summer holidays and their summer placements the length and breadth of this island.

But one student, the senior student, Paul Bogle, who was on placement in Donabate and Swords as a first year student two years ago, had a summer placement this year that was a very different from the usual summer placement in an Irish parish.

Instead, Paul decided to work his summer placement through USPG Ireland – the Irish section of the oldest Anglican mission agency – with an Anglican parish in Swaziland, with Andrew and Rosemary Symonds, who have been USPG mission companions in Swaziland since 2005.

Andrew is the training officer for the Diocese of Swaziland and is a parish priest or rector, while Rosemary facilitates key community projects.

Paul was inspired to go to Swaziland after the students – men and women – took part in a sponsored shave earlier this year on Shrove Tuesday – what they called Shave Tuesday – to support USPG’s work in Swaziland.

Children at Usuthu Mission Primary School in Swaziland (Photograph: Paul Bogle)

Now Swaziland is about as far away as one of our students could go on a parish placement. This small, land-locked country in southern Africa has a population of just one million people.

But Swaziland has possibly the highest level of HIV/AIDS in the world: 40 per cent of the people there are HIV+, many children are born HIV+, and 20,000 new HIV cases are reported or diagnosed each year.

But there are only 2,000 hospital beds in Swaziland. This means most of the people are left to die at home.

To compound these problems, 40 per cent of the people are unemployed, and 69 per cent of the people live below the poverty line. And Swaziland now has 80,000 to 90,000 orphans, mainly because of HIV/AIDS – it is impossible for us to imagine the scale of this problem; in Ireland, it would mean having half a million orphans.

But for many people the biggest problem is not HIV – it is the problem of what they are going to eat. For many mothers, the only way to feed themselves is to sell themselves.

And because of the high infection rate, the HIV virus is spreading more rapidly that in other countries.

Life expectancy is low, the mortality rate is high, and so 15 per cent of households are headed by a child. Now, how can you expect a child to feed children, to look after their education, health and clothing?

With the support of the Bishops’ Appeal, USPG Ireland is working with the Anglican Church in the Diocese of Swaziland to provide feeding programmes and to provide training in horticulture and market gardening so that the diet of people and the ability of families to be self-sufficient can be improved significantly – a true harvest thanksgiving project.

To help this work, it has been possible too to make use of previously under-used church lands.

All this is set in the context of the local church’s anti-HIV programme and the need to give people confidence that there can be a sustainable future for their communities, that Swaziland is not going to implode.

The market in Manzini, Swaziland (Photograph: Paul Bogle)

Hope is so important for people in Swaziland. But then, isn’t hope central to living out the Gospel?

Hope is at the heart of our Gospel reading this morning, which comes from the middle of the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel according to Saint Matthew. As a lecturer in theology I sometimes think of the Sermon on the Mount as an ideal model for a lecture or seminar on discipleship, and on practising piety:

In the chapter in which we find this morning’s Gospel reading, Jesus has already spoken about giving alms in humility; about prayer, including praying simply and praying in the words of the Lord’s Prayer; about fasting without being dismal, but fasting joyfully; about refusing to hoard and keep things all for myself; about looking at things in the best possible light; and about putting God before our wealth.

In the section we shared this morning, verses 25 to 33, Christ hopes the disciples will realise that life is about more than our personal comforts. There’s more, in the following chapter, but there’s enough there for us and our harvest thought in the few verses we read this morning, I think.

It is very difficult if you are a 12 or 14-year-old girl looking after your younger sisters and brothers to continue to have hope if the younger ones are asking you last thing every night and first thing every morning “What will we eat?” or “What will we drink?” or “What will we wear?” (Matthew 6: 31).

And the only way we take away those worries, give them hope, is to support projects such as USPG’s work in Swaziland, by encouraging other students to follow in Paul’s footsteps, or directly supporting the work of mission agencies like USPG.

The harvest has been very poor in Ireland this year. And as the recession bites, those who have lost their jobs, those who have suffered pay cuts, farmers who are going to find this a very bleak autumn and winter indeed must be taken to heart.

But if we fret for ourselves and not for the children of Swaziland, can we say that we are striving first for the Kingdom of God and his righteousness? For as Jesus tells us this morning; “… your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6: 32-33).

And now may all we think, say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute, Dublin. This sermon was preached at the Harvest Thanksgiving Eucharist at 10 a.m. in Saint Patrick’s Church, Donabate, Co Dublin, on Sunday 4 October 2009

Messengers of God and bringers of good news

The Archangel Michael ... a contemporary icon

Patrick Comerford

Tuesday 29 September 2009, Saint Michael and All Angels, 8.30 a.m., Holy Communion: Genesis 28: 10-17; Psalm 103: 19-22; Revelation 12: 7-12; John 1: 47-51.

Collect:

Everlasting God,
you have ordained and constituted the ministries
of angels and mortals in a wonderful order:
Grant that as your holy angels always serve you in heaven,
so, at your command,
they may help and defend us on earth;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

May I speak to you in the name of +the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

I have to confess I am a cathedral buff. On city breaks, I love visiting cathedrals, not just for their liturgy, worship and music, but for their architecture and art too.

For my generation, when it comes to art and architecture, Coventry Cathedral is one of the most influential cathedrals in the Church of England. I was overpowered when I first visited Saint Michael’s Cathedral in 1970.

Basil Spence’s cathedral symbolises new life and hope in the aftermath of World War II and the Holocaust. Its community, life and values, centred on the Cross of Nails, influenced many like me in the 1960s and 1970s.

And Coventry’s art and architecture have had a profound and lasting influence too: even my old school chapel was a mini-replica of Coventry. Many of us are familiar with images of Jacob Epstein’s sculptures; Graham Sutherland’s great tapestry; the Chapel of Christ in Gethsemane framed by his crown of thorns; the Chapel of Unity; the unusual aisle windows; or the Coventry Cross of Nails.

Sir Jacob Epstein’s bronze statues of Saint Michael and the Devil on the wall outside Coventry Cathedral

Even before you enter the cathedral, Saint Michael features prominently. As you approach the building, you are overlooked – overwhelmed – by Epstein’s bronze statues of Saint Michael and the Devil on the wall.

When Basil Spence commissioned Jacob Epstein, some members of the rebuilding committee objected. They claimed some of his earlier works were controversial. And, although Coventry was at the centre of post-war reconciliation, some even objected that he was a Jew – to which Spence retorted: “So was Jesus Christ.”

The Screen of Saints and Angels by John Hutton at the entrance to Coventry Cathedral

The new cathedral is entered through the “West Wall” or “Screen of Saints and Angels.” This glass screen, 70 ft high and 45 ft wide, with panels by John Hutton, was inspired by Basil Spence’s plans for the new cathedral, rising up from the ruins of the bombed cathedral, inspired in turn by his vision of a new church rising through a screen of angels and saints, linking the old and the new.

Gazing at this screen, especially on a sunny day, picking out the angels and archangels, patriarchs and prophets, apostles and saints, you also see a vivid reflection of the old ruins in the glass.

Graham Sutherland’s tapestry showing Christ in Glory ...on the right, between Saint John and Saint Mark, Saint Michael is hurling down the devil

Inside, Graham Sutherland’s great tapestry shows Christ in Glory surrounded by four figures from the Book of Revelation, the four evangelists. Beneath Christ’s feet is a chalice with a dragon, referring to our reading this morning from the Book of Revelation: “Then another portent appeared in heaven: a great red dragon … But they have conquered him by the blood of the lamb” (Revelation 12: 3, 11).

On the right, between Saint John and Saint Mark, you can pick out Saint Michael hurling down the devil. This refers to the verses: “And war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon … The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world – he was thrown down to the earth” (Revelation 12: 7-9).

What is your image of an angel? Is it fluffy little cherubs with white wings and pudgy cheeks, floating above the earth on white fluffy clouds?

Or is an angel for you someone like the angels in the screen that is the West Wall of Coventry, inviting you into the Communion of Saints, into a Church that is built on the past but looking anew to the future?

Is an angel some “new age” figure, easily dismissed because of the weird views of the authors of all those angel books on the popular “Mind and Spirit” shelves of our bookshops?

Or is an angel for you like the Archangel Michael depicted by Jacob Epstein and Graham Sutherland, inviting you into the triumph of good over evil, to join Christ in Glory?

Is Saint Michael the patron saint of shoppers at Marks and Spencer and all others who have made the shopping malls their earthly cathedrals? Or, like the Michael of Coventry Cathedral, does he challenge you to reflect on our values today? For the name Michael (Hebrew, מִיכָאֵל; Greek, Μιχαήλ) asks the question: “Who is like El (the Lord God)?”

In the Bible, Michael is mentioned by name only in the Book of Daniel, the Epistle of Jude and the Book of Revelation. But he represents reliance on the strength of God and the triumph of good over evil.

Facing the world ... the Gethsemane Chapel in Coventry Cathedral

In today’s world, where angels and archangels are often the stuff of fantasy, science fiction and new-age babble, it is worth reminding ourselves that angels are nothing more than – but nothing less than – the messengers of God, the bringers of good news.

Traditionally Michael’s virtues were standing up for God’s people and their rights, taking a clear stand against manifest evil, firmly opposing oppression, violence and corruption, while always seeking forbearance and mercy, clemency and justice – are virtues we should always keep before us in our ministry and mission as messengers of God.

In our first hymn this morning, Ye holy angels bright (Irish Church Hymnal 376), Richard Baxter invites each of us to join with the angels, the saints above and the saints on earth in praising God. We join in that praise in the Gloria, and it is an invitation that is repeated again in the Great Thanksgiving: “And so with all your people, with angels and archangels, and with all the company of heaven, we proclaim your great and glorious name, for ever praising you ...”

How shall I sing that majesty ... Coe Fen in Cambridge (Photograph: Patrick Comerford)

Our second hymn, How shall I sing that majesty (Irish Church Hymnal 468), contrasts God’s heavenly glory, splendour and majesty with our own inadequacies and frailties. It emphasises the truth that when we attempt to sing of God’s glory, all our human efforts appear feeble and pathetic.

As I sing that hymn to one of my favourite tunes, Kenneth Naylor’s Coe Fen, I am forced to ask: “Who am I?” – the question we all ask when we first hear God’s call to mission and ministry.

I may not feel as powerful and agile as Michael when it comes to battling for the world and confronting evil. But we do this in the company of the great heavenly host of archangels and angels, patriarchs and prophets, apostles and saints, strengthened by God alone. For we should always be prepared, like Michael and the angels, to ask and to answer the question: “Who is like the Lord God?”

And so may all we think say and do be to the praise, honour and glory of God, + Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Amen.

Post Communion Prayer:

Lord of heaven,
in this eucharist you have brought us near
to an innumerable company of angels
and to the spirits of the saints made perfect.
As in this food of our earthly pilgrimage
we have shared their fellowship,
so may we come to share their joy in heaven;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological Institute. This reflection was shared at the Michaelmas Eucharist in the institute chapel on Saint Michael’s Day, 29 September 2009.