The Bigger Questions
Social Justice
January 2005 saw the launch of the MakePovertyHistory Campaign, a coalition of UK charities, trade unions, faith groups, campaigning groups and celebrities who are united by a common belief that 2005 does offer an unprecedented opportunity for global change.
With the UK Government holding presidency of the European Union (EU) and acting as host of the annual G8 gathering of powerful world leaders, this country is in the position to be a particularly influential player on the world stage.
Make Poverty History looks to mobilise popular support across a unique string of events and actions, and to urge the UK government to compel rich countries to fulfil their obligations and promises to help eradicate poverty, and to rethink some long-held assumptions.
The campaign has focussed on three critical and inextricably linked areas: trade, debt and aid .
Trade justice. The UK must fight to ensure that governments, particularly in poor countries, can choose the best solutions to end poverty and protect the environment; end export dumping that damages the livelihoods of poor communities around the world; and make laws that stop big business profiting at the expense of people and the planet.
Debt: Despite promises from rich countries, little more than 10 per cent of the total debt owed by the world's poorest countries has been cancelled. Each year Africa faces demands for over $10 billion in debt repayments. In Malawi, more is spent on servicing the country's debt than on health, despite nearly one in five Malawians being HIV positive. The unpayable debts of the world's poorest countries should be cancelled in full, by fair and transparent means.
Aid: Currently 8 million lives are lost each year because minimal healthcare is unavailable in developing countries. Donors must now deliver at least $50 billion more in aid each year and set a binding timetable for spending 0.7% of national income on aid. Aid must also be made to work more effectively for poor people.
Each day 30,000 children die as victims of the scandal of global poverty. Making poverty history is not idealism or wishful thinking - it a realistic response to a tragic reality. It springs from a belief that we can make a difference and by mobilising popular support, we can take this opportunity to urge governments and international decision makers to rise to the challenge of 2005.
St. Martin's has been actively engaged in this campaign in a number of ways:
In January 2005 we hosted a gathering of nearly 600 female clergy and the comedienne Dawn French - TV's Vicar of Dibley - before they marched on Downing Street to deliver the Make Poverty History message to the Prime Minister.
In April 2005 we were part of the Wake Up to Trade Justice event which attracted 25,000 campaigners to Westminster and Whitehall for an all-night vigil, and a variety of awareness raising events. St. Martin's hosted "The Late, Late Trade Justice Show" and an ecumenical service at 2.30am(!) - while the Café-in-the-Crypt serviced the needs of the campaigners serving food and drink throughout the night.
In July, a group from St. Martin's travelled to Edinburgh for the rally prior to the G8 meeting, joining over 200,000 others who together became a human white band around the city of Edinburgh.
The campaign continues in the autumn, focussing on the United Nations Millennium Development Goals Review in September and the World Trade Organisation Meeting In December.
(More information at the website www.makepovertyhistory.org )
The Anglican Communion
With its unique position in the heart of London and its long-standing links and across the world, St. Martin's strives to play an active role within the wider church.
Through our relationships with churches and individuals in a number of different countries, we particularly seek to encourage dialogue and understanding within the Anglican communion.
Earlier this year, we hosted a lecture and discussion led by the Bishop of the Highveld, Bishop David Beetge. Bishop David was a member of the Lambeth Commission which produced the Windsor Report considering the future of the Anglican Communion. Click to download the text of the lecture » (50Kb, PDF)
What is Mission?
In thinking about our international mission, we have been exploring this question by means of a threefold theological model of mission based on an understanding of God's mission in the world.
We believe in a God who is truly present in the world. The Hebrew scriptures tell of God present with God's people, Israel, through their wanderings, in their joys and in the times when they turned away from and rejected God. For Christians this story of presence is made real in the incarnation - the presence of God among us in the birth, life and death of Jesus Christ. In the Resurrection , Jesus is revealed or disclosed as God. This disclosure transforms our understanding of what it means for God to be present - in the expected and unexpected. In the sending of the Spirit , the people of God are energised and enlivened to proclaim the incarnate and risen Lord.
The presence, disclosure and sending out of God continues in the life and mission of God's people in the world today. As God's people are sent out so they too become God's presence and a pointer to God's glory in the world. The model of presence, disclosure and sending out is therefore not a straight line but a spiral that has no fixed start point or end point.
How do we understand each part of this picture of mission?
• Presence
Presence is about being there and staying there. Presence means being involved. It is not enough to be a spectator. To be truly present means being real and to be real about who we are means being vulnerable. This vulnerability may show itself in a sense of being alongside or with others and in service to those amongst whom we are present. Being truly present means being vulnerable enough to belong - to identify completely with those among whom we are present.
The Church's model for presence is found in the Incarnation. In being born and living as a human being, God in Jesus Christ shows a vulnerability and a willingness to engage with humanity in all circumstances. During his earthly ministry, Jesus entered fully into the experience of others, being alongside and with them in their joys and sorrows. The ultimate faithfulness of being there and staying there is shown in the crucifixion - a willingness to endure to death itself and to engage fully with the human experience.
For the Church, being there and staying there brings a need for a sustaining spiritual discipline in practising this continuing faithfulness. The presence of the church may be expressed in people, buildings or structures; in individuals or communities; but always with an enduring trust in the presence of the incarnate God.
Biblical passages for reflection: Mark 6: 1-6; John 4:1-30; Mark 15:25-37; John 13:1-11
• Disclosure
Mission calls us to move beyond presence to disclosure. Disclosure transforms presence by pointing beyond. Disclosure involves the paradox of being visible and yet a mystery. It involves a growing understanding informed by a sense of wonder and awe and an "expectation of the unexpected". It is about both breaking in and setting free; of newness and eternity; of showing the face and grasping the challenge of the unknown.
The Church's model for disclosure is found in the Resurrection. The Resurrection transforms the enduring faithfulness of Jesus in human life and death, to a revelation of the incarnate presence of God. Through the Resurrection, God's glory is disclosed in the self-emptying, vulnerable love of the Cross. The disclosure of Resurrection liberates humanity from the need for self-vindication and self-justification - identity is found in pointing beyond ourselves to the image of God found within each of us.
For the Church, disclosure brings a liberation from making ourselves known to pointing beyond to the glory of God already present among us. It challenges our images of success and the emphasis on ourselves and our activities and instead invites us to be the creative place where God's transforming presence may erupt into those places where we are present. Disclosure brings a depth and a purpose to the meaning of being present. It challenges us to resist easy ways of being "accessible" and "explainable" which sell short the sense of mystery; for in cherishing a sense of mystery we enable a sense of the possible breaking into the visible in unexpected ways.
Biblical passages for reflection: Matthew 11:2-6; Luke 9:18-21, 28-37; John 20:1-14; Colossians 1:15-20
• Sending out
Mission calls us to move from discerning the word to being sent out to proclaim the word. Being sent demands confidence in the truth that has been disclosed and the truth that is embodied and made present. But being sent also demands humility which allows us to give attention to that which we discover in our going forth. Confidence demands that words be proclaimed; humility demands silence in the face of mystery and the limitations of language.
The Church's model for sending out is Pentecost - the sending of the Spirit. The gift of the Spirit to the first disciples enabled a sense of purpose and authority, and a confidence in the distinctive truth disclosed in their experience of the incarnate Christ. But the Spirit is also the life-giver, the creative Spirit which breaks down barriers and enables a common understanding and a shared experience. It is the Spirit of riskiness, initiative and engagement, prompting speech and energising action.
For the Church, sending out moves us from both presence and disclosure into new initiatives and purposeful engagement. It will not allow us to be satisfied with the easy comfort of tradition or the surface attraction of self-defined truths and careless relativism. Our sending out by the Spirit will not allow us the to stay in one place for too long but prompts us to new discovery and creative risk-taking. It urges to speak and act with confidence in the distinctive truth revealed in Jesus Christ, yet open our eyes to the discovery that God is there before us and refines our confidence with a humble openness to the truth which others have discerned. It demands that our engagement with the world to which we are sent balances words, action, silence and a passion for the truth, with the wisdom to recognise that truth in the words, action and silence of those whose experience differs from our own.
Biblical passages for reflection: John 15:12-17, 26-27; Matthew 28:1-11; Acts 2: 1-11; Acts 10: 30-48; Acts 17: 22-31
