Uncomfortable
love for the homeless
Christ Church and
St Mary’s, 28th January 2001
The vicar was midway through his sermon when he
spotted a drunk coming into the back of church, shuffling and snuffling and
generally causing a disturbance. (It wasn’t
the curate!) Irritated that everyone
had stopped listening to him, he immediately changed tack: "If I had all
the beer in the world, I'd take it and throw it into the river." he said.
Suddenly all eyes were back on him.
"Amen!" the congregation cried.
"And if I had all the wine in the world, I'd take it and throw it in the
river."
"Amen!" the congregation cried.
"And if I had all the whiskey and demon rum in the world, I'd take it all
and throw it in the river."
And the congregation cried, "Hallelujah!"
The vicar sat down.
The curate stood up very tentatively and announced, "For our closing song,
let us sing hymn #365, 'Shall we gather at the river."
We feel so awkward with
homelessness don't we? If I can be
honest with you, whenever I see someone begging on the street down by my cash
machine in Regent Circus I always have a struggle. It’s even worse when I wear my dog collar! It’s big scarf time! I always have an argument in my mind that
runs something like this: "This person could be Jesus coming to me and
asking for my hospitality, my love."
"Ah yes, but they could also be on drugs and any money I give could
just go towards feeding their habit."
"Yes, but I could give them some food (and I sometimes do-the
bakery is fortunately just next the cash machine)." "Well, I could give them food this
time but I don't want to create a dependency culture. And besides, wouldn't it be more responsible
to try and address some of the structural problems in society that have created
homelessness. Poverty, unemployment,
reduced low-cost housing, education." "Yes, but I should be doing
more than giving them bits of change anyway.
Shouldn't I be inviting this person into my home and giving them
somewhere to sleep? Doesn't the Bible
say “Whatever you did for one of these you did for me?" "Ah yes, but
God calls me to be a father and a husband first, and I have responsibilities to
my wife and children. I could invite
this person in and unknowingly be letting a psychopath into my house. And besides, it isn't small time charity
that this person needs but a whole life change. Perhaps if no one gave them anything then they would get up on
their feet and make something of their life."
I'm a little ashamed of
that last sentence. But the truth is
that we expect those who receive help from us to show a little bit of
initiative, a little gratitude. In the hymn it's the “humble poor” who believe
after all. They should do what they can
to at least be a bit deserving of our help, to make it easy for us to help them. I remember being really annoyed when I did a
little bit of work at a drop in centre in Bristol and I helped someone who was
homeless. He didn't show any sign of
gratitude or recognition at what I had done at all. This just wouldn't stop bugging me, and when I spoke to someone
about it I was greatly helped when he made me realise that often people’s
actions are shaped by the system they have become victims of. That person had been sufficiently battered
by poverty and homelessness that any gratitude I could have expected had been
squeezed out of him. Anyway, however
compassionate we are, we still wrestle with the issues that a homeless person
on the street creates in us.
And we don't cope very
well as a church, either. Particularly
in our services we just aren't set up for awkward people. It’s partly to do with our own insecurities
about how to handle homeless people; it’s partly about the dynamic of a group
of people in a public setting; it's partly to do with not knowing who is responsible
for dealing with such situations; and it's partly because after the service
has begun there is little flexibility in the way our worship is organised. Of course, God is the focus of our worship
and it is important that we have a chance as a community of people to offer him
worship which is trying to be worthy of his greatness. But what happens if it is God who walks in
in the middle of the Eucharistic Prayer and starts to mumble at the back?
There is no greater gift
to someone who is at rock bottom than the gift of a home and a community who
will accept them. I remember being
close to a break down at the age of 18.
I worked for a year in a church in Huddersfield as a volunteer, spiritual
guns blazing straight out of school.
I’d attempted too much, was far from home, had bad health, and soon
reached depths which I haven't experienced since. For various reasons I couldn't go home. I will never forget being able to pick up the phone and ring my
close friend and just say, "Can I come tomorrow?" "That would be great," he
said. I spent the next week simply
staying with him and his family. They
didn't press me to talk, but just by their acceptance and hospitality they
helped me to find my feet again. They
gave me a home I could be at peace in.
I do dream of a church in
which those at the bottom of the pile can find out the we have a gospel which
puts them at the top, which offers them a home, not just in metaphorical terms,
but in the life of a living community.
I do believe that the call to be a Christian is most accurately
described in Isaiah when God says, "Is not this the fast that I choose: to
loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the
oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and to bring the homeless
poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them…?" I do dream with a lot of people here of a
church which would really welcome the outcast, which would be known and recognised
above all other things for its love of the poor, which would offer both a roof
and the community to those who have fallen through the bottom of society. I do dream of worship where we are at ease
with of all kinds of people and their needs, where there is reverence but also
flexibility to minister to each other.
But I know it ain't that simple.
It isn't that simple
because while it is true that every homeless person demands a personal response
from us, radical answers will address structural problems in society. 2000 people sleep rough on the streets in
any given night. 100,000 households are
officially recognised as homeless by local authorities in England. In the South West the figure is 15,700,
representing about 37,700 individuals.
At the end of 1999, only a third of these had been found temporary
accomodation. And of course, while I
may have been referring so far to the more typical image of a homeless person
we have, homelessness is about families, the elderly, every type of person you
can think of. 30,000 homes were
repossessed in 1999. The figures and are overwhelming, and they highlight the
fact that solutions are to be found in questions of the provision of affordable
housing, rent reform, a reassessment of housing benefit administration,
addressing poverty and unemployment.
That's rather a big
agenda for one church to address on a Sunday morning. So, even while our hearts may be echoing with Isaiah’s vision,
and we feel God may be calling us to be part of the solutions, where is it that
we start? I don't have any big projects
or campaigns to put your way this morning, but I would like to suggest we start
by asking ourselves before God what kind of love we are called to show. We battle against compassion fatigue as a
society. We are so aware of the needs
that cry out to us, all clamouring for our attention. The temptation can be to become love weary. To prefer comfortable love. Comfortable love would perhaps bear all
things as long as it was reasonable, believe all things as long as they are
trustworthy, hope all things will work out in the end if people can get their
act together, and endure all things which don't demand a silly level of
sacrifice.
Uncomfortable love is
entirely different. It refuses to let
us of the hook about things. It is
patient with fools, kind to the so-called undeserving. It believes things can be changed, it hopes
for the seemingly hopeless, it endures the ridicule it receives for being
naively loving. Mother Teresa knew
about uncomfortable love. Mary knew
about it. The gift of her child at Christmas
which brought her so much love and joy was also to bring her agony and
suffering. This Friday at Candlemas
when we celebrate Jesus being presented at the temple, we shift our gaze with
Mary from looking back at the gift of Christmas, to looking forward to the pain
of Easter. Only uncomfortable,
ridiculous, naive love could have persuaded her to embrace that path.
A volunteer at Stanford
Hospital was present when a little boy decided to give the ultimate sacrifice
because he loved his sister Liza. The volunteer says the little girl was dying
of a rare disease, with only one chance for survival--a blood transfusion from
her five-year-old brother. After the doctor explained what would happen during
the transfusion, the little boy agreed to give his blood to save his sister. He
peacefully laid still during the transfusion. After a while, he asked the
doctor a question that gave great insight into his character, "Will I
start to die right away?" Apparently, the boy thought he would have to give
all his blood, but was willing to do so to save his sister.
On one level the boy was
being foolish in thinking that he ought to die for his sister. What an impractical suggestion. How inefficient. And he hadn't even inquired to see if it was necessary or
not. But in choosing to take the path
of uncomfortable love, he models for us the quality of love that took Jesus to
the cross. It's a kind of love which
doesn't settle for easy answers, or which insists on tackling difficult
questions. It's the kind of love Paul
is writing about. It's a kind of love
that remains, along with faith and hope, when other things don't.
If we know in our bones
that nothing we have or nothing we are hasn't just been given to us by our
father to look after on his behalf; if we know that we ourselves who once were
homeless have been brought home; if we know that all people underneath their
diverse appearances and socio-economic statuses are made in the image of God-a
gift to his creation, then perhaps we will be able to be those who live with
uncomfortable love as the energy that drives us.
Because one day there
will be no homelessness. God will bring
his people home. There will be no
outcasts, no social unfortunates, no broken people inside or outside the church. Like Simeon, who waited for so long to see
the salvation of God, we long for that day to come. And when we pass a homeless person on the street, God calls us to
ache for that day, to struggle and wrestle with ourselves because it has not
yet come. If, every time you see
someone homeless on the street, you have an inner discussion like the one I
described at the beginning of this sermon, then maybe you should feel
encouraged. And maybe, as we listen to
the voice of uncomfortable love, God will lead us to do things for his homeless
people which will start to bring about the church and world we all dream of.