In following Christ there is no room for prejudice or discrimination against any who are ‘different’ in any way.
As the Sunday School song reminds us ‘All are precious in his sight’ and so everyone must be precious to us as well
Life would be much easier if we could pick and choose who we are called to care for, to forgive, and to cherish. Following in Christ’s footsteps demands that we even forgive and save those whom we don’t like and who dislike us.
If we are honest we cannot ‘make’ anybody into a disciple of Christ, that is the work of the Holy Spirit. All we can do is to live lives that are so transformed by the Gospel of Christ that people want something of what we have.
Telling other people our beliefs is not easy, and when we do we need to do so with love and care but it is a task that must be done or how else will people know who we are?
It is a common is conception to think that Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience are the calling of those who live a vowed life in a Religious Community. All of us, in our Baptism Promises, make similar vows and each of us needs to discern what their call on our life demands
We cannot become ourselves by ourself. We all need community to be a mirror for However, if we make it difficult for that community to be open to all sorts of people it become as an echo chamber which stunts our growth.
In popular culture to surrender involves giving up and failure. In the Christian journey to surrender is to place ourselves in the hands of our Beloved and find their purpose and meaning
In churches there are many differently shaped and decorated crosses. Some would make much of their ‘own’ as the ‘true’ cross and be tempted to belittle the devotion of others. We need to remember that it is the Cross of Christ and we cherish it not because of its shape but because our Beloved wore it
As Covid19 continues and it seems as if Easter has not yet arrived I re-visit reflections from 2012 to help readers through Lent v2.0 in 2020
Suffolk Vicar 