Sabbatical blog 10: Sacred space as lamenting time

The images coming out of Ukraine are getting more upsetting if we watch them properly. Widows crucified in agony at the loss of their husbands; bodies on the side of the road; atrocities like people with their hands tied behind their backs and then shot and children with their name and date of birth written on their back by their mother in case mother gets killed in the melee of madness out there. 

Last Sunday, was Passion Sunday. Giles Fraser, who is always honest in his writing tweeted this early on Sunday morning:

“I had a sermon worked out. But just seen the images of bodies piled up outside Kiev, hands tied behind their backs. I don’t know what words will do. Just brought the cross in to the church. Perhaps that’s all I can do today.”

On several Sundays recently the worship has included a statement that there are no words, and  we just stand in solidarity and prayer. I’m sorting books at the moment at home. I rediscovered this week “The Crucified God” by Jurgen Moltmann. How about this theology to try and cope with Ukrainian heartbreak?

Moltmann uses a quotation from Elie Wiesel's Night to explain his theology of the cross. Whenever we experience the most horrific suffering, we may think of Jesus Christ crucified on the cross (especially on Good Friday), and know that whatever horror we have experience, Jesus the son of God has also experienced it in his crucifixion; and whenever we experience suffering, we may remember that Jesus is there with us, asking the same question "Where is God?" in our suffering. 

“ A shattering expression of the theologia crucis (Theology of the Cross) which is suggested in the rabbinic theology of God’s humiliation of himself is to be found in Night, a book written by E. Wiesel, a survivor of Auschwitz: The SS hanged two Jewish men and a youth in front of the whole camp. The men died quickly, but the death throes of the youth lasted for half an hour. ‘Where is God? Where is he?’ someone asked behind me. As the youth still hung in torment in the noose after a long time, I heard the man call again, ‘Where is God now?’ And I heard a voice in myself answer: ‘Where is he? He is here. He is hanging there on the gallows . . .’

Any other answer would be blasphemy. There cannot be any other Christian answer to the question of this torment. To speak here of a God who could not suffer would make God a demon. To speak here of an absolute God would make God an annihilating nothingness. To speak here of an indifferent God would condemn men to indifference.”

I didn’t go to church for various reasons last Sunday. It’s a rare gift to be allowed not to go! We were in Whitby on Sunday morning on a glorious day weather wise. I had some time quietly wandering round the Abbey. Hilda who founded the monastery here was clearly some woman! Bede writes that on her deathbed at the age of sixty six, she urged her community “to preserve the gospel peace among themselves and towards all others.” Perhaps that’s happening a bit at the moment as we rise up together to state what’s happening cannot have the last word. Hilda even managed a fairly united Synod in Whitby! I imagined as I walked round the Abbey the thousands of prayers for peace and unity which have been offered from it.

We went on to Tynemouth Priory after Whitby. I enjoyed it a lot. It was very peaceful. I love this article though I found about when it was under the control of St Albans Abbey. You didn’t want to be posted there as a monk!

“It has been suggested that some were sent to Tynemouth by the abbot as punishment. A letter has survived written in Latin by one monk, presumably in the mid 1200s when work on expanding the priory church had "been lately completed." The unknown monk talks of the church as "of wondrous beauty... Within it lies the body of the blessed martyr Oswine, in a silver shrine, magnificently decorated with gold and jewels."

The monk is less flattering about other aspects of the life at Tynemouth Priory. He says that: "Our house is confined to the top of a high rock and is surrounded by sea on every side but one. Here is the approach to the monastery through a gate cut out of the rock so narrow that a cart can hardly pass through. Day and night the waves break and roar and undermine the cliff. Thick sea frets roll in wrapping everything in gloom. Dim eyes, hoarse voices, sore throats are the consequence."

He continues: "Shipwrecks are frequent. It is a great pity to see the numbed crew, whom no power on earth can save, whose vessel, mast swaying and timbers parted, rushes upon the rock or reef. No ringdove or nightingale is here, only grey birds which nest in rocks and greedily prey upon the drowned, whose screaming cry is a token of a coming storm." But then, our unknown monk definitely had a "glass half empty" outlook on life. He goes on to say: We are well off for food, thanks to an abundant supply of fish, of which we tire."

Our visit was slightly more positive! We especially enjoyed having the gatehouse opened for us to park the car!

In the week, we wanted to return to Mount Grace Priory, but it was raining so we had lunch in their car park in the car. The cafe let me carry out lunch on a tray! I remembered in his little book on Northern saints and holy places, Stuart Burgess had mentioned the shrine of Mary of Mount Grace, a Roman Catholic place of pilgrimage near Osmotherley. It was a half a mile climb to try and find it walking up a muddy track.

It was worth the climb. The little church holds a mass run by the Diocese of Middlesbrough on a Saturday at three in the afternoon. I wonder who comes to that! 

Two older folk were in there when I arrived and they glared at me like I was intruding. I quietly sat in the back row while they lit candles by the rather horrible statue of Mary. This was my first dip into Roman Catholic sacred space on this journey. I’ve never understood why Catholic folk pray to Mary. I get that she is the mother of God, the God bearer and the supreme example of obedience to the call of God to be what he needs for his purposes to happen, but isn’t the cross all about the dividing wall and distance between us and God going because of Jesus’ sacrifice for us? 

I found this on a Roman Catholic website:

“ Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death, Amen

While it is true that we can go directly to Jesus during prayer, intercessory prayer through Mary (as well as other saints) still makes sense as in the same way that we ask Christian friends and family on earth to pray for us we can ask our Christian family in heaven (Mary and the saints) to pray for us.”

While it was really good to make a pilgrimage and have some space I still don’t understand!  

The sabbatical journey so far has concentrated on North Yorkshire, County Durham, Lancashire and Northumberland, with one little excursion to the Fens, and every visit to sacred spaces done from home in Ripon. We ended this week with a couple of days in the South West en route to a family wedding on Monday. It was good to visit John Wesley’s New Room in Bristol on Saturday morning. 

 

In 1739, John Wesley was asked by the members of two religious societies in Bristol to create ‘a new room’ where they could meet.  The resulting building served many purposes because John encouraged the religious society members to offer food and clothing to the poor, run a school for children, arrange visits to the nearby prison, and help the sick by running a free medical dispensary. Many of the features of early Methodism first appeared at the New Room.

The New Room was too small and not well enough built, so, in 1748, it was rebuilt and doubled in size. This included creating a suite of rooms above the main room for use by John Wesley and other preachers. These now house a rather fab museum. I encountered a very enthusiastic elderly lady there as a guide who wouldn’t let me be! I didn’t need her tour!! There was also a rather lovely cafe space which a lady in the queue to order told me is the nicest place in Bristol to come for a coffee. Wesley created a space for all and it felt like it was still that 283 years later.

Then came the highlight of my week and perhaps my favourite sacred space found so far - the wonderful Hereford Cathedral. I’d never been to Hereford before. The city and the cathedral had a nice feel to them. 

It was good to visit the Mappa Mundi. Scholars believe it was made around the year 1300 and shows the history, geography and destiny of humanity as it was understood in Christian Europe in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. The inhabited part of the world as it was known then, roughly equivalent to Europe, Asia and North Africa, is mapped within a Christian framework. Jerusalem is in the centre, and east is at the top. East, where the sun rises, was where medieval Christians looked for the second coming of Christ. The British Isles is at the bottom on the left.  Fascinating. 

It was good to wander round the cathedral and then to join in evening prayer in the crypt. There was in the lectionary a miserable bit of Jeremiah! Afterwards it was really good to chat to the new Dean of the Cathedral, Sarah Brown. We met Sarah a few times when she was canon missioner at Peterborough Cathedral. I didn’t expect her to remember us including our names. She will be great in her new role in what is a place I need to return to. 

I end this week’s blog on the 9 April. On 9 April we remember Dietrich Bonhoeffer as he was martyred on 9 April 1945. I love this prayer. It was prayed in the prayers I shared in in Hereford Cathedral. The chancellor who prayed it looked rather gobsmacked when I thanked him for using it. As I’ve thought about lament and longing in sacred space, maybe Bonhoeffer, facing death, helps us enter Holy Week 2022 with all our uncertainty. 

“In me there is darkness,

But with You there is light;

I am lonely, but You do not leave me;

I am feeble in heart, but with You there is help;

I am restless, but with You there is peace.

In me there is bitterness, but with You there is patience;

I do not understand Your ways,

But You know the way for me.”

“Lord Jesus Christ,

You were poor

And in distress, a captive and forsaken as I am.

You know all man’s troubles;

You abide with me

When all men fail me;

You remember and seek me;

It is Your will that I should know You

And turn to You.

Lord, I hear Your call and follow;

Help me.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison