Family communion: celebrant the Rev. Marion Barber.
First reading: Daniel 1 (complete)
Gospel: John 19.38-end

This fourth service in our 'young people' series explores the challenges, difficulties and rewards of standing up for one's beliefs, as well as the difficult issue of how far and when it is right to compromise with those whose beliefs differ from our own. Daniel, and his companions Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, were high-status prisoners of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon: he treated them well, and no doubt intended in due course to integrate them in his household and to make Israel a contented and settled part of his empire.

The Israelite youths, however, refused to eat the food or drink the wine provided by Nebuchadnezzar. It isn't immediately obvious why not: possibly the food violated Jewish dietary rules, or perhaps they felt that by accepting the king's hospitality in the form of food from his table they would be placing themselves under an obligation to him. In any case, they took a considerable risk: Nebuchadnezzar had behaved generously towards them, and he could have taken their refusal as an insult. In the event, both here and later in the Book of Daniel, they established the principle that a person can and should be able to serve the civil authority without compromising their religious beliefs.

In our New Testament reading, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus take a stand which is in many ways comparable to Daniel's. They are both clearly upper-class Pharisees, and we may suppose that they were not only important figures in Jewish circles but also well regarded by the occupying Romans. When they asked to be allowed to take charge of the body of a man just put to death by crucifixion, they risked their reputation for respectability with the Romans, their status in the Jewish community and, probably, lifelong friendships with other Pharisees.

The painting above, by Briton Riviere, shows a later event in Daniel's life where he again refuses to compromise religious principle and in consequence is thrown into a dungeon with hungry lions, who refuse to attack him.