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EDGES MAGAZINE Issue 17 |
April/May 1999 |
Bishop Brain is the Bishop of Salford
I've just celebrated the first anniversary of my father's death - the
week after T.H.O.M.A.S. commemorated Homelessness Sunday with the names
of those whom they knew that had died on the streets. I joined you in
commending them to God. Like many of you I said the Lords Prayer; Nearly
everyone knows the Lord's Prayer, don't they? "Our Father who art
in heaven...".. Sometimes when we want to say a prayer we might
cross ourselves: make a sign of the Cross. We might even know the words
to say when we cross ourselves: In the name of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Some might say "Crossing yourself
isn't a prayer; its superstition!" True, for some its only
superstition, but for others it is truly a prayer. (What makes the
difference?) Notice how we begin both these prayers by addressing God
with the name "Father"? What does it mean to say God the
Father? To answer that, begin to think what is a Father? then I think of my own father and I put my idea of what my father meant to me onto the idea of God as a father. So if my memories and experiences of my father are good, then my image of God as father is good. If my memories are not good, or are distressing, or even fearful, then that is how I'll imagine God as father as well. There must be some funny old images of God going around in peoples heads. It's not surprising we hear people saying "I don't believe in God!" If I had their image or their experience, I wouldn't believe in God either.
"I never knew my father - he wasn't a real father" " I was never close to my father - I never really knew him". When we hear things like this it tells us something about a father. To be a father needs another person - there has to be a child. I need to know my father and my father must know me. Then we can have a real relationship. The better we know each other the closer the relationship, the more we love each other. That's true if what we know of each other is good. But again some peoples' experience may say - "Hang about, I thought I knew them; I thought they loved me, but they were really just ripping me off! I don't trust anyone now!" So when love doesn't grow, we cant have that relationship we long for; There is no spirit of love between us. A Spirit of love - must be great to have that!
I wish someone would tell me they love me: give me that spirit: love me like a real Dad. Be a true father to me. The way I want God to be a father - loving, merciful, forgiving, letting me grow, letting me love Him. If I could see God that way.....
In the Bible - in the gospel of St Matthew - there is an account of some of Jesus's friends seeing him the way God sees him, and they heard God say He was his father and loved him. '"Jesus took with him Peter, James and John. In their presence he was transfigured: his face shone like the sun and his clothes became as dazzling as light...suddenly a bright cloud covered them with its shadow, and suddenly from the cloud there came a voice which said "This is my Son, the Beloved; he enjoys my favour. Listen to him." (Matt 17:1ff) The Father; with the Son, and the two one in the Spirit of Love. God, in the name of the Father, and of the son and of the Holy Spirit Can you hear God's voice here, and believe what you hear? Can you see God here and believe what you see ? Yes or No. That's the difference between crossing yourself as a prayer or as a superstition.
