I dont usually put sermons on here. And dont want to inflict this on all my forbearing friends. But Ive been asked for it by a number of people - and this way is the easiest to fulfil those requests. Its also a way to honour David Russell, one of the great prophetic figures of the South African context, and one of Anglicanism and Christianitys finest. Sermon for 31 August 2014 John Keble Church My wife Mary has a saying that shes inherited from her family. Its better to remain silent and appear ignorant than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. Its a good saying. Shes a very wise woman. Given all the meetings I have to attend beyond the parish I was thinking of having a badge made on which that phrase was inscribed or one of those stand up notices you used to see on office desks that told you the name of the person sitting there. Only, of course, Id have to have the notice pointing not outwards but to myself. Because the temptation - often when you dont quite know whats going on or what the issues are: which is quite a lot of the time in the meetings I attend - is of course to speak from your insecurity. Its not always bad to find what you think by talking. The current Archbishop of Canterbury swears by this method. He thinks aloud and this sort of thinking should definitely be allowed. But ... such an approach can be maddening for others particularly if those doing it are looking at the agenda and papers for the first time in a meeting and, well, talking from a position of ignorance! The balance between silence and speaking is hard to judge in many situations - sermons among them! And some of the people I admire the most are the ones who get it right. I wish I could be like them. At the other end of the spectrum I recall a very different phrase. It was uttered by one of the quietest bishops that Ive ever met. He died a fortnight ago and on the cover of his funeral service was the phrase in question. Its better to be silenced than to be silent. Its better to be silenced than to be silent. Bishop David Russell uttered those words. And he knew more than most about being silenced. He was for sixteen years the bishop of Grahamstown in South Africa, the place where the original white British settlers arrived in 1820, an extraordinary little town with just one Main Street, at one end of which is a university and the other a Cathedral. But as important as bishops are thats not the ministry for which hes remembered and for which the South African state awarded him one of its highest civil honours. David Russell was not a man of many words. He was, as Ive said, a quiet, gentle, retiring man. At least that was on the surface. But inside was a human dynamo the like of which I dont think Ive seen in anyone else. He was brought up in a privileged position in South Africa. His father was a member of parliament, albeit a member of the opposition party to the racist nationalists who created apartheid. He was Oxford educated. He had a doctorate from the University of Cape Town. He was fiercely intelligent. Heavy black rimmed glasses marked out what todays generation would identify instantly as rather geeky. He was bookish and wiry. But he loathed apartheid. He hated injustice. And he wouldnt be silenced even though he used few words. Preach the Gospel at all times, said St Francis of Assisi, use words only when they are absolutely necessary. David Russell could have been a curate in any parish hed wanted. But he chose to learn Xhosa - one of the many Indigenous languages spoken in South Africa. And he did so he in the most rural of villages in the eastern Cape because he wanted to know what conditions were like for the very poorest. He wasnt in fact good at languages but within three years he was preaching fluently in Xhosa. And as he learnt it from his parishioners he was noticing the worst effects of apartheid on them. Widows forced to live on five rand a month, in todays terms thats much less than the dollar a day beneath which the worlds poorest live. He didnt give speeches. He wasnt an orator. Instead, he wrote letters. He wrote articles. He wrote pamphlets. To individuals who might help, to ministers, to newspapers. And when they wouldnt listen he travelled the length of South Africa to Cape Town and stood on the steps of the Anglican cathedral there - which is right next to parliament - holding a placard drawing attention to the plight of the eastern cape widows in his parish and the five rand a month on which they were required to live. Eventually, even the idiocy of apartheid had to give way to such urbane and reasonable pressure. They increased the grant but at the same time - such was their spitefulness - they decreased the additional money that was sometimes available for extreme hardship cases. It was effectively a net loss to the widows, so back David Russell trekked to Cape Town, only this time, like his hero Gandhi, he vowed to fast until the situation was rectified. The stone hearts of those nationalists cracked just enough for something more positive to flow. Hed gained a hard-won, albeit a small victory, though later the apartheid government were to take revenge on him by banning him - he could only talk to one other person at one time - by restricting his movements, and eventually putting him in prison. Why am I telling you this story on a late summer morning in a suburban English parish so very different? One reason is pride. A proper pride that our Anglicanism, the faith that you and I share with 80 million people across the globe, and with many more millions of Christians worldwide, can produce such a disciple of Jesus Christ. We need to celebrate more often the best of our Christian traditions, and David Russell was quite simply among the best. But Im also telling it because you and I live in perilous times. We live in times where our Anglican neighbours, our Christian neighbours in Iraq, in Syria and in the Holy Land are being silenced. They are being silenced. Are we being silent? Are we, like David Russell writing to our Prime Minister, for instance, asking him - as the archbishop of York did this week - what exactly he proposes to do about the Christians fleeing for their lives in Iraq? France and Germany have opened their arms to embrace them. As a Christian country are we going to shut our gates or do what our faith demands? First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me. Those are the famous words of Pastor Niemuller, imprisoned in a concentration camp during the Second World War. They hang over our nation, over our Church of England, over the whole world right now. Another friend, Michael Lapsley, also, like David Russell, an Anglican priest made huge sacrifices because he would rather be silenced than silent. He gave his hands quite literally for the freedom of South Africa. They were blown off when he received a letter bomb from the apartheid government. He lay in a pool of blood on the floor. And he called out to a friend who wasnt an Anglican but an atheist. He called out to her, Say the Lords Prayer, please say the Lords Prayer with me. As she held him, she stumbled. It had been years. And deliver us from evil, she said, and then she got stuck. I cant remember it, she shouted in frustration but also because Michaels ear drums had been shattered. You cant stop at evil, Michael shouted back. For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever and ever, he continued - even amidst terrifying pain. You cant stop at evil. We cant stop at evil. We cant rest when our fellow Christians are being tortured, massacred, isolated and persecuted all over the world. We have hands. Surely if we dont want to raise our voices - it may not be our thing - we can use them to write those letters, demanding that the innate dignity owed to each and every human being be shown to our neighbours that some are trying so wickedly to deny them. We can do that. Each of us can pick up a pen and write to the Prime Minister this week. I did not begin with a text but allow me to end with one from the epistle. Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Amen.
Posted on: Sun, 31 Aug 2014 12:09:58 +0000