Sermon Archive
Look in a fresh way
Sermon preached by Freda Alexander at Holy Communion on 9 July 2006
Can you remember using a rule to draw a picture? The simplest is probably "Join up the numbers". When this is done a ladybird, whale or kangaroo may emerge.
Look at the picture on the pew leaflet. What do you think of it? It was drawn by a rule: points are black if they satisfy a simple algebraic rule; otherwise they are white. The black points form the Mandelbrot set named after the mathematician who discovered it in 1986. I find it really beautiful; it gets better because within each of the crevices there is another whole world, similar but different to what we first have.
Roger Penrose describes it in his books "The Emporer's New Mind" and "Shadows of the Mind". In these he demonstrates using elegant mathematics that human consciousness cannot be produced by any computer - which is a relief. He is coming to this year's Book Festival.
He also describes what I call the "Aha" reaction in mathematics. The best known example is Archimedes; he had been grappling with the problem in his rational consciousness but had reached an impasse. Then he went to have a bath - relaxed and something came to him from outside himself, which he knew was correct. Then, of course, shouting Eureka he ran down the street. Similar examples have been well documented in mathematics, music, painting and elsewhere.
What I want to suggest is that this isn't SO different from the experience described by St Paul. Truth, accompanied by certainty, came from outside ordinary rational thinking. But St Paul has more in common with experiences we see in mystics - Christians and those of other faiths. Like them he recognises his total dependence on God and his communion with all that is.
St Jerome, who fixed the Latin bible in the 4th C had one earlier problem: he preferred Roman literature to the Hebrew scriptures and had built up an excellent library. He used to fast so that he could allow himself a good read of Cicero. THEN, he developed a fever and appeared to be dieing. "Suddenly", he says, "I was caught up in the spirit...the light was so bright and those who stood around so radiant, that I cast myself on the ground" Jerome told God he was a Christian and the response was "Thou liest, thou art a follower of Cicero and not of Christ". Subsequently, after what we would now call his near-death-experience, Jerome kept away from Roman scholars.
He had learned to travel light - which brings me to our Gospel - its second part. Jesus tells his disciples to travel light. This story, but from Matthew's gospel, was read out to St Francis in 1209 at a critical time in his formation; Francis' biographer, Celano, describes what happened: "he trembled with joy and cried out ‘This is what I wish, this is what I am seeking, this I long with all my inmost heart to do'. He threw away his staff, his shoes, his cloak and replaced the leather girdle with a cord. He began preaching …with extempore words that were like a burning fire and he seemed to his hearers like one transformed". Followers began to join him and soon there were 5000.
BUT, BUT you may be thinking: this is alright for geniuses - mathematical, musical, artistic, scientific, spiritual - it has got nothing to do with ordinary people?
Remember the 1st part of the Gospel and its advice against the reaction "its only the lad next door". All of this has plenty to do with each of us.
Many ordinary mathematicians experience the "aha" reaction; mine came one night after I had spent months trying, unsuccessfully, to prove that two structures were the same. Then in the middle of the night I suddenly knew how they were different. I was certain but sought written proof the next morning. Since it was Saturday; my efforts at writing had to compete with my baby - and my proof (which was correct) was covered in milk and orange juice.
The Religious Experience Research Unit in Oxford has reported that over 60% of the general population report having had a religious experience. Penrose writes "a unity with the workings of Nature is potentially present within all of us".
The person next to us can be a prophet and one in whom we meet Christ. When we exchange the peace its good to make eye contact BUT +Martin Shaw suggested recently that its even better to look at another's face and see the face of Christ!
And what about the person who is even closer to us? The one of whose failures and frailties we are keenly aware, leading us to deny that anything prophetic can emerge - ourselves. After all, we know how weak and inadequate we are.
BUT we shall soon hear the words "In Christ your Son our life and yours are brought together in a wonderful exchange. He made his home among us that we might forever dwell in you." Do we REALLY believe this? Paul did and experienced the life of Christ in his own person -though he never denied his weakness. He gloried in it since it led him to recognise his total dependence on God; THEN he says "it is when I am weak that I am strong".
I perceive people in our times, as being called to look in a fresh way at the next person and at ourselves. We desperately need people who can travel light - free of attachment to power, prestige, status, theories, being right live as brothers and sisters to all others in communion with creation Being able to do this only comes as a gift - a repeated gift, which we may or may not recognise as an aha reaction or a religious experience. If each of us makes small ripple and the ripples come together to form a river, this will have power. It can heal the situation that created 7th July 2005; it can bring justice between Israel and Palestine; it can save our planet.
St Francis sent his companions out to preach the gospel then said "You may sometimes have to use words". It's lives that are most important.
Finally though, some words of St Cedd, a Celtic monk from Lindisfarne:
You are writing a gospel, a chapter a day
By the deeds that you do and the words that you say.
Others read what you write, whether faulty or true:
Well, what is the Gospel according to you?
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