Sermon Archive
Worship and the World Cup
Sermon preached by John Armes at Holy Communion on 2 June 2002
Gen 6 9-22, 7 24, 8 14-19; Rom 1 16-17, 3 22-28; Matt 7 21-29
Is it right to change the time of church services so that people can watch the World Cup on TV? The England/Sweden match kicks off at 10.30 this morning and the Archbishop of Canterbury has said, 'Worship comes first, of course, but [the World Cup] comes round only every four years, and we can afford to be flexible.'
St Luke's, Eccleshill in Bradford has eagerly grasped this opportunity. It has not only shifted the usual 10.30am service to 3.00pm, but worshippers are invited to come wearing England football shirts (or red, white and blue in honour of the Queen's jubilee). The Vicar has written a hymn to the Match of the Day theme tune (good tune for a wedding hymn come to think of it) and his sermon is entitled, 'Make Jesus the centre-forward of your life.' It reminds me of some graffiti I saw years ago: 'Jesus saves!' to which someone had added, 'And Keegan scores on the rebound.'
Does this sound suspiciously like another of the church's rather pathetic attempts to be trendy and 'in touch'? Or is it merely pragmatism? Change service times or have empty churches. I must admit that a lazy breakfast in front of the telly on a Sunday morning seems kind of tempting. And I suspect that churchgoers in England this morning will be well outnumbered by the millions in pubs, clubs and sitting rooms cheering on the lads. And churchgoers in Scotland too will be outnumbered by the several million others supporting Sweden.
One of the things that people of other faiths find hard to understand about the Christian West is our tendency to collude with the with those who have no respect for spiritual values. The tide of faith has gone out and we seem content to paddle in its shallows. On the other hand, in 'secular' Britain one of the hardest questions believers face is to know where to make a stand. So easily we come across as moralistic and killjoy. It's not just about TV and Sunday shopping. For years church-going parents have battled with the dilemma of whether to insist on their children coming to church or allowing them to attend the growing number of sports clubs that only seem to be able to function on a Sunday morning.
'No, we can't have the school fete on a Saturday,' I remember a Deputy Head saying a few years ago, 'lots of people like going to football matches on a Saturday. It'll have to be on a Sunday.' The fact that a lot more people went to church on a Sunday than went to football on a Saturday was apparently irrelevant to him - that's just religion whereas football, presumably, was more than a religion.
There are other compelling reasons why we in the church should not suspend our critical faculties entirely and sell out to football mania. The world is on the verge of its first full nuclear war, for heaven's sake! India and Pakistan are squaring up to each other over Kashmir. This is not a local dispute its consequences could be cataclysmic. We read about Noah and his animals surviving the waters of the flood. This conflict raises the spectre of new arks setting off into space to escape the world we have destroyed. In the face of this the World Cup becomes a dangerous distraction. It is bread and circuses, keeping the masses happy whilst the world goes into self-destruct.
It is interesting, and curiously apt, that the World Cup starts on the very weekend that we celebrate the Queen's golden jubilee. We applaud her 50 years of commitment, of dutiful service and faithfulness. But the impact of the World Cup this time around helps us to see just how much the world has changed, how far Britain has moved on during these years. The kind of people we are now, the way we see ourselves, is different even from the silver jubilee year of 1977.
Of course change, in itself, is neither good nor bad. 50 years ago it would not have entered our heads to change Sunday service times to accommodate football. But perhaps we now live in a more understanding age. After all, churches are not cancelling worship only moving it. And there may well be more noble motivations at work than simply the Vicar's desire not to miss the match. A church is not just a worship box, it is a community of people themselves committed to being at the heart of a wider community. This is why one village has set up a large TV screen in the church because there is no pub. Surely there is something potentially creative here in which the church, so often a glowering bystander, is seen to enjoy other's enjoyment and to liberate people from an unnecessary choice.
Today's readings tell us nothing about the World Cup but they do tell us something about the priorities of God.
The story of Noah presents a picture of a God who is concerned about human behaviour and its impact on society, a God who intervenes in a decisive and pretty drastic way. But, if you remember the end of the story, God relents from his anger and promises never to repeat the destruction - sending the rainbow as his guarantee.
Paul's view of God takes this much further. This is not simply a God restraining his hand from anger but One who reaches out to us in love. Paul's world is founded on and illuminated by the grace of God. There is no need to persuade God to love or to earn this love, it already is.
Jesus tells the story of building on good foundations. True religion is not a matter of show - not about shouting loudly, 'Lord, Lord' - not about form and ritual - it is about depth and heart. It is the values that underlie the building, the rock or the sand, these determine whether what we build lasts.
There is something curiously affirming about this. God will support us as we try to make the best of things in a world where we are given a choice of foundations but no prescriptions for tomorrow. How could there be? If the world has changed so much since the Queen came to the throne, how much more over 40 times 50 years!
So, God's priority is to affirm not to condemn. And certainly that is something the Christian church must learn and relearn - to celebrate pure human spontaneity and joy. But is that all? We are asking here a very old and fundamental question. How does our faith engage with our culture? For culture is a human achievement - it describes and encapsulates the best of what we have made of ourselves. The rituals, the values, the aspirations towards the highest and greatest potential of human society. Is our faith here simply to blend in with culture? Is religion to pat the world benignly on the head? Or is it sometimes supposed to administer a swift kick to the backside?
In other words, there is no easy answer to the question I posed at the start: Is it right to change the time of church services to accommodate the World Cup? I find I am pulled two ways - which presumably makes me a person of two halves and sick as a parrot.
On the one hand, changing service times may be seen as a positive action in a multi-cultural world. In light of the events of the last year we have realised that we must transcend small tribalisms and find things that unite us in a common humanity beyond the confines of narrow religion. This demands a certain relativism; a willingness to give way on matters dear to us, in order to aspire to a greater good.
On the other hand, changing the service times may be seen as a retreat. We say we believe that worship of God is the highest calling known to humanity. We say that the Lord's Day, above all others, is the time when week by week Christians witness to this high calling. If so, what does it imply about our priorities when we so easily put worship second to football?
I suppose we can console ourselves with the thought that since Scotland so rarely seems to get into the final stages of football tournaments nowadays we have plenty of time to make our choice! And if any English or Swedish supporters have brought their radios with them this morning, please try not to cheer too loudly if your team gets a goal? and if after the service you could quietly tell me what the score is I'd be very grateful.
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