A prayer for the many millions dealing with deep disappointment this Christmas:——May the love of God the Father bring unexpected comfort to your home today, connecting hearts that are apart, and reconfiguring family this Christmas. May the hope of God the Son, born into dark disruption and deep uncertainty, ignite a little light in your home today, surprising you with joy this Christmas. May the peace of God the Holy Spirit console your soul today, filling your heart and your home with the serenity of his presence this Christmas. And so let us return to that first Christmas to find a fearful mother as she brings her baby into such a dark place and time in history. It is not what she wanted. See the uncertainty etched in the man’s features, worried and unable to properly provide, feeling clumsy, unsure of his own role and involvement. It is not what he wanted. Consider their sense of isolation at a time of such vulnerability, far away from loved-ones and home. It is not what they wanted. Imagine the frustration they feel, forced to be here now, against their will, at this most intimate moment by the relentless demands of a distant government. It is not what they wanted. This year of all years, perhaps we may celebrate with new understanding the Christmas no one wanted. The fragility of life in the shadow of death, the hope of healing in a dangerous environment, the love ephemeral yet eternal, born to a tiny, vulnerable, isolated, disorientated, disappointed, fearful, fragile family, which is Immanuel, God with us (when others can’t be with us), a Light that shines in the darkness, a defiant hope in spite of everything, Jesus Christ the Lord.
“The news of fresh restrictions in many areas will be a bitter blow," they said.“For many people, it will mean spending Christmas Day alone. None of us has experienced a situation quite like it in our lifetimes.“We note the rise in infections and hospitalisations with real concern. But we also know that there is real hope. We are nearer the end of this than the beginning, with a vaccine already being made available and treatments improving.“We recognise the increased risk we face from the coronavirus - which has already taken so many lives and has now developed a new, more easily transmissible, strain - and we recognise our duty to look out for our neighbours and protect the vulnerable.“So, as many of us enter these new restrictions, we must commit ourselves more than ever to looking out for those who are alone, to caring for those in need and to praying for our nation and world.“We know that public worship – both in person and through remote means – has brought comfort, hope and inspiration to so many.“So we are grateful that, even in tier four, church buildings can be open this Christmas. But we urge everyone to take precautions and, especially for those in tier four, to be exceptionally careful.“Even though attending public worship is permitted, many people may feel it is currently better they do not do so. Clergy and others who are shielding should certainly feel no compulsion.“At this time of year - even this year - we celebrate the birth of Jesus with joy and hope. Jesus came to bring light that shines in the darkness.“We need that light now and always.”
Friends, as we approach a Christmas like no other, a line from a familiar Christmas carol has come to mind: not ‘In the bleak midwinter’, though it may have sometimes felt like that in our gloomier moments. Not ‘O tidings of comfort and joy’, though that’s been the inspired choice of the archbishops this year. But the phrase, ‘Brighter visions beam afar’. From the beginning of the millennium, you see, this year - 2020 - has been associated with visions. Taking its cue from the world of the opticians, and deploying a rather obvious pun, every self-respecting business, school, hospital and church has had its 2020 Vision Statement, planning and preparing for this very moment, as 2020 draws to a close. And such planning and preparations are important, of course, if our lives are to be fruitful and purposeful; and 2020 Vision Statements have their place. But what the <em>real</em> 2020 has reminded us is that even if our human vision might be proclaimed as faultless – 20/20 – when we next pay a visit to the opticians; there’s something we need that goes way beyond that: the ability, in the words of the apostle Paul, to walk by faith, not by sight: <em>‘Sages, leave your contemplations,</em><em>‘Brighter visions beam afar’. </em> The first Christmas, after all – like the first Good Friday – like the first Easter Day – was entirely unforeseen. No manmade vision statements could have come up with the idea that the world’s salvation would hang on the life of a tiny baby lying in a cattle shed, or an alleged blasphemer nailed to a cross, or an empty tomb and reports of a man risen from the dead. Only the divine vision of the prophets got anywhere near the true story, and they ended up being ridiculed or thrown down wells for put in the stocks or their pains. As the first Christians went around proclaiming this message, they too were seen as fools, ‘fools for Christ’, as Paul again put it. But then he added, ‘God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength’. And as I reflect back on this past year, and as I look forward to Christmas, my original 2020 vision statement – which, speaking personally, involved a sabbatical, and writing a book on Discipleship, and fostering the first tentative signs of church growth across the diocese in the 2019 statistics, may lie in tatters; but perhaps that’s a lesson in true discipleship itself. For following Jesus involves brighter visions than these, as together we choose to leave our human contemplations and ‘Come and worship Christ, the newborn king’. May God bless you and yours this Christmastime! <em>Bishop Andrew, December 2020</em>
