Was there really a Star of Bethlehem?

admin 20/12/2019

Adapted from an article first published in the Bridge Magazine, December 2019

Was there really a Star of Bethlehem?

No Christmas nativity scene is complete without a glowing star in the night sky, leading the wise men to Jesus’ birth. But what was the “Star of Bethlehem”? What have scientists and theologians suggested down the ages? To answer that, let’s start by looking at what the Bible says about it.

Matthew chapter 2 tells us that after Jesus was born in Bethlehem, wise men came from the east to King Herod’s palace in Jerusalem asking,

Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” (Matthew 2:2)

Herod asks them

the exact time the star appeared” (Matthew 2:7)

and then sends the wise men on their way,

and the star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overjoyed.” (Matthew 2:9-10)

So what was the star? What did those wise men see? Well had you asked a first-century astronomer, probably the first thing they’d tell is that the Greek word the Bible uses for “star” (astera) was used to describe pretty much any glowing object in the sky.

So the “star” could be a conjunction of planets. Sometimes the planets in our solar system, when viewed from earth, appear to overlap – creating a temporary larger “star”. This solution was first suggested by German astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), discoverer of the three laws of planetary motion. Jupiter and Saturn, the two largest planets in our solar system, were in conjunction during 7 and 6BC, which is close to the period when a lot of historians think Jesus was born.

Others have suggested the “star” was a supernova, an exploding star. Archaeologists have discovered writings by Chinese and Korean astronomers noting the appearance of a supernova in 5BC.

The problem with both the supernova and conjunction theories is that they don’t do justice to Matthew’s description of the star leading the wise men west to Jerusalem then south to Bethlehem, before stopping over the place where Jesus was. For an object in the sky to do that, it needs to be able to move, and conjunctions and supernovas don’t.

So perhaps it was an alien spaceship! On Christmas Eve a few years ago, the Daily Express published an article suggesting Jesus was an alien shapeshifter, and that the Star of Bethlehem was a UFO! Thankfully, even the article’s author seemed sceptical, saying,

As ludicrous as this idea is, it’s the only [way to explain] how the object could have suddenly appeared, moved and stopped for the apparent purpose of pinpointing Jesus’ birthplace.”

But it isn’t the only way to explain star’s movement. In 2015 a biblical scholar called Colin Nicholl wrote a book suggesting the star of Bethlehem was a comet. Nichol worked with a team of astronomers and mathematicians to build a computer model showing how his “Great Christ Comet” could have travelled through the inner solar system and been visible in the parts of the sky it needed to be visible in to fit the descriptions the Bible gives us. Praised by biblical scholars, mathematicians and astronomers alike, the book offers a plausible and mathematically sound theory. But it is just a theory, and until an archaeologist unearths an early edition of the Sky at Night we have no way of proving whether it is correct.

And what that means is that the star will probably remain forever shrouded in mystery. Its main witnesses, a bunch of learned pagan astronomers knew enough of science and the night sky to know that star was extraordinary. That’s why they travelled to Bethlehem (probably from Babylon, so about 550 miles) to find out more. And what they found there caused them to kneel in wonder before the child who is God, our creator, and the creator of all the stars in all the heavens.

May you share in their awe and wonder as you celebrate the birth of Christ, this Christmas time.

What does the Bible say about the environment?

admin 15/10/2019

Adapted from an article first published in the Bridge Magazine, October 2019

What does the Bible say about the environment?

Burning Amazonian rainforest has been one of the year’s saddest environmental stories. In the first eight months of 2019, an area 25 times the size of Worcestershire was burned! What’s even sadder is that the Amazon isn’t even the world’s biggest deforestation programme. For that we need to look north and east, to Russia’s far east and Siberia, where over 50 Worcestershire’s of forest have been cleared by fire so far in 2019.[i]

Many years ago I attended a lecture in which all the harm we do to the planet was blamed on one cause: Christianity, an idea popularised by a historian called Lynn White Jr, who wrote in Science Magazine in 1967, before Christianity, “man had been part of nature”, but under Christianity’s influence (particularly in Northern Europe), humanity became the ruthless “exploiter of nature”[ii]

White points the finger at the creation story in Genesis 1 as the cause of the problem. God blesses the first people and says to them:

‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” (Genesis 1:28)

And it’s that language of filling, subduing and ruling over, which White blames our current environmental crisis on. In other words, it’s all God and his stupid follower’s fault. But I’m not convinced.

You see if White had read beyond the very first page of the Bible, he’d find a very different picture of our relationship with creation. Yes, we’re to rule over it, but not as exploiters. Instead, we’re to be stewards and explorers, holding creation in trust for God.

And over the centuries, many Christians have seen creation in this light. The theologian John Calvin, arguably the intellectual and theological force behind the Protestant Work Ethic, and therefore Northern-European prosperity, explained our rule over creation to mean

a responsible care and keeping that does not neglect, injure, abuse, degrade, dissipate, corrupt, mar, or ruin the earth.”[iii]

And many early Christians lived out that responsible care in very practical ways, perhaps best exemplified by the catholic saint Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals.

And whilst there have undoubtedly also been Christians who have exploited the environment, they’ve been joined by enough atheists, scientists, and people of other faiths to make it hard to blame God for everything. Does it really seem plausible to blame God alone for the Chinese business interests stripping far eastern Russian of its timber? Or is it more likely, that our rejection of God and our God-given calling to be stewards of creation has caused the damage we see around us?

So, what should Christians do to make a difference? The one-line answer is start acting like stewards! We all have a tendency to treat other people’s stuff better than our own, and stewardship means learning to see the whole world that way: cared for by us, but belonging to God, who will one day ask us to give an account of our actions. If you’re anything like me, that’s quite a worrying prospect!

So here are four simple steps we can all explore to be better stewards. They won’t solve all the world’s problems, but they’re a step in the right direction.

Let’s use what we already have, better. Rather than treating our possessions as disposable, good stewards repair, reuse and recycle! One of my secret joys about our Breakfast Church, is that all our video games are recycled! Everything was bought second hand, or donated by people. If our games aren’t quite carbon-neutral, we are at least not strip-mining Greenland and the Congo for new rare-earth minerals!
Let’s be responsible about new purchases. Do we really need that new car when the old still works? Do we really need that outfit that we’ll probably only wear once? How can we get better at borrowing or sharing things?
Next, think about our travel and utility use. Our rural bus service doesn’t make using public transport easy, but we can all choose to reduce the flights we take. If Prince Harry annoyed you with his private jet holiday plans, why not sign a no-fly commitment like Flight-Free 2020? Switching to a green gas and electric supplier is another easy way to be a good steward. Through a combination of carbon offsetting and renewable power sources, our home gas and electric has been carbon neutral for a year now – and for only marginally more than the current cheapest non-eco supplier, we could find.
Finally, we can look at ways of restoring the damage we’ve inflicted upon creation. One of the most inspiring habitat restoration stories I’ve come across in recent years is the Knepp [v], in West Sussex. Formerly intensively farmed, since 2001 this 3500 acre estate has been “rewilded”, with quite remarkable results: it’s now the home of the first pair of wild white storks to breed in the UK for 600 years. The Christian charity Arocha [vi] runs similar projects on a smaller scale, working with local churches and community groups to enhance and rewild parts of our communities.

You might not have the land to do something like that, but we can all look at ways to offset our carbon footprint by participating in tree-planting schemes. Apparently it takes 8 trees to produce enough oxygen for one person to breath for a year[vii]. What if we could all find a way to plant that many trees a year, for the rest of our lives? That would surely be good stewardship!

______________________

[i] www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-49433767 and www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-49515462?fbclid=IwAR0vvB0gWjjG_kqcRkPY8hrpxmWfqlOFsvhmwbMQXyK9Ar5FSqCWc8AlAeo

[ii] Cited from Andrew Cameron, The Environment – a Christian Response – https://sydneyanglicans.net/blogs/indepth/the_environment_a_christian_response

[iii] John Calvin, Commentaries on the First Book of Moses Called Genesis (Chapter 2, on Genesis 2:15)

[v] Visit Knepp.co.uk or read the book, Wilding, by Isabella Tree.

[vii] www.sciencefocus.com/planet-earth/how-many-trees-does-it-take-to-produce-oxygen-for-one-person/

Why doesn’t the church do more to help the poor?

admin 11/10/2019

Worldwide, the UK Church already does an enormous amount to help the poor: everything from famine relief in Africa, to foodbanks here in the UK. In recent years I’ve come across churches running community nursing projects in UK urban areas, building homes for the homeless in Mexico, funding orphanages for children living on rubbish tips in Kenya, and feeding the hungry everywhere from Zimbabwe to Southern Sudan. I’d be surprised if there was a non-government organisation in our nation that does more to help the poor.

However there is still a perception that the church is wealthy, sitting on huge assets, and that maybe it could do more with them to help the poor. How true is that perception?

Well let’s consider how it from the perspective of the nation’s largest denomination, the Church of England. Broadly speaking, you can divide the assets of the Church of England into three chunks.

First, it’s fixed assets, ie buildings. In its efforts to maintain a presence in every community, the Church of England has over 16,000 church buildings in its 13000 plus parishes all across the nation. And at a time when government services such as hospitals are being pulled out of communities into larger regional centres, we’re all very aware of the value of the “local”. Imagine having to travel to Worcester for a regular Sunday service, or a wedding, baptism or funeral? Just as with hospitals, there is benefit in the local!

So if we’re committed to maintaining a presence in every community then radically reducing the number of church buildings to raise capital to give to the poor isn’t an option. It’s also unlikely to produce much hard cash – over 75% of church buildings are grade 1 or grade 2 listed, meaning the government recognises them as being of exceptional history or architectural importance. So they can’t easily have their use changed, and are therefore hardly an attractive option to a property developer (and let’s face it, who would want to live in a graveyard?)

Even if buildings were saleable, the church’s complex ownership arrangements make them very difficult to sell because no one owns them! The Church Council (PCC) is responsible for repairs and maintenance. The Churchwardens technically own the building’s contents (but can’t sell it), and legally no one owns the building. If that sounds absurd, I couldn’t agree more! But then the whole legal structure of the Church of England looks like something that has been designed by Yes Minister’s Sir Humphrey to ensure paralysis and indecision at all levels.

The second chunk of assets the Church of England has is the £7.9bn investment fund held by the Church Commissioners. The principal purpose of this fund is to fund clergy pensions, with any surplus going to fund the church’s work across the nation – so the Church Commissioners are already one of the UK’s largest charitable givers. Short of “pulling a Maxwell” and robbing the pension fund, it’s hard to see a way to use this money except for clergy pensions!

The third chunk of assets the Church of England has is its “day-to-day” working capital. The money that pays clergy salaries, keeps the lighting and heating on in church buildings, and funds thousands of projects across the country. However this chunk of assets isn’t a single chunk, instead, it’s 13000 small chunks – each Church of England parish is a separate charity in its own right. Whilst clergy salaries are paid centrally, individual parishes receive no money from the centre. In fact, the reverse is true, each parish contributes a portion of their income to the centre (known as ‘the parish share’) to pay clergy salaries.

So to take a local example, Upton Parochial Church Council (PCC), has the financial responsibility for maintaining Upton Parish Church, and the work we do here. In 2016, Upton Parish Church had an income of just over £20,000. 75% of that came from weekly giving by the 25 mainly retired regular attenders. The remainder came from events and fees for funerals and weddings.

Expenditure in 2016 was £28,000. 31% on clergy costs (parish share & expenses), 25% on building and churchyard maintenance, 20% on insurance, and 10% on heating and lighting. The £8000 deficit was met from our not very substantial reserves. (Please note, this isn’t a plea for money – though if anyone wants to help our work, whether on a one-off basis, or regularly, or even by leaving a gift in your will, do get it touch with our treasurer, in confidence).

You can multiply that story of Christian witness and buildings maintained on a shoestring budget all across the country. But despite the stretched nature of the finances, the church still does a remarkable amount of good: nationally over 80,000 volunteers and around 2,700 church staff (plus 20000 clergy) provide support and activities for children, young people and families, and over 100,000 children and young people participate in activities connected to the church each year.

Arguably that statistic highlight’s the church’s fourth and main asset, which isn’t buildings or investment funds or working capital, but it’s volunteer workforce. The Bible is always very clear – the church is not a building – it’s a gathering of people. And our people give sacrificially of their time and money to maintain the organisation and its mission. Every year they also pour millions of pounds into charities worldwide in their own names. Could they give more? That’s up to their consciences. Could you?

To sum up – could the institution of the church give more to the poor? Probably. But the cost in terms of cuts to staffing (and therefore the work we do in our communities) or to our buildings (and therefore our presence across the nation) make it difficult. To do more, the Church of England would need a thorough overhaul of its structures – change on a par with Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries combined with Isis’s desecration of historical sites in Syria. And in a heritage-mad nation like the UK, that seems very unlikely to happen!

First published in the Bridge Magazine, 2017

What does the Bible say about Heaven?

admin 15/09/2019

Adapted from an article first published in the Bridge Magazine, September 2019

What does the Bible say about Heaven?

For a lot of people, the word “Heaven” conjures up images of white-clad angels sitting around on clouds playing harps: an old-style Philadelphia cheese advert on steroids. But is that really what the Bible tells us awaits us beyond the grave? What does the Bible really say about life after death?

Let’s start with angels and clouds, an idea that owes less to Christianity than it does to a 2nd-century religious movement called Gnosticism. The Gnostics hated the body with all its longings and urges. For them, death was a beautiful release: freed from its body the soul could soar heavenward and float uncorrupted forever among the clouds with the angels, and presumably the Philadelphia…

So what does the Bible tell us about what happens when we die? Well, perhaps the most important thing it says, is that heaven is not the final destination for Christians after death! And here’s something else that might surprise you: the Bible doesn’t really talk very much about “going to Heaven when we die” at all.

Instead of “how to get to Heaven when we die” and that Gnostic ‘cloudy floaty’ idea of disembodied souls, Jesus and the early Christians taught that after death, we could look forward to full bodily resurrection. That’s why they called Jesus “the firstfruits” of the resurrection (1Cor.15:23) and “firstborn of the dead” (Revelation 1:4). They saw Jesus rise from the grave, and because they were “in him”, they too would rise from the grave. Just not immediately. That wouldn’t happen until Jesus returns in all his glory at the second coming.

So what happens to us if we die in the meantime? Where do we go if we die between death and the Jesus return? The best answer Jesus gives is in John 14:2, where he tells his disciples not to worry because he was going to prepare one of the many rooms in his Father’s house for them. And what’s really striking about that statement is that the Greek word he used for room (mone) is the word you’d use for a room in a Travelodge, a temporary stopping-off point on the journey to the final destination!

So what’s the ‘final destination’ for the Christian? The final three chapters of the Bible (Revelation 20-22) tells us three things will happen.

First, the resurrection. Jesus returns in his glory and everyone who has ever died is raised to life.

Second, Judgment. The resurrected come before God’s throne for judgement, a judgement we’ll all fail because of our deeds (our failure to love God and our neighbour).

Third, our final destination: either eternal separation from God (Hell), which is our destiny if we’ve rejected God’s offer of mercy made available through Jesus’ death on the cross, or, “the new earth.”

And this idea of a “new earth” is the focus of the end of the Bible’s story of what happens when we die. The new earth is where Christians spend their forever, and here’s how St John describes it:

Then I saw ‘a new heaven and a new earth,’ for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away…I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.” (Revelation 21:1)

The “first heaven and earth” he refers to is the world we know today, with all its brokenness, pain and suffering. And God promises that one day, all of that sadness and brokenness will be gone forever. And then something hard to comprehend happens: God will bring Heaven down to the new earth, and make his home among us.

Many years ago, St Augustine wrote of God,

You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they can find rest in you.”

Well when God makes his home among us, we’ll finally be truly satisfied in him, and as we experience him fully for the first time, he’ll wipe away every tear from our eyes, and

there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Revelation 21:4).

Then there’s a banquet – a royal wedding feast with the finest food and wine ever. And we’ll live in a beautiful city, with extensive parklands, rivers and trees, and God at the centre. The Prophet Isaiah (Is.65:21-25) speaks of us building homes for ourselves, planting vineyards and enjoying good food. There will be animals, and they’ll live in harmony with each other, and with people. If this is sounding a bit like the Garden of Eden, that’s the point: it’s God’s original creation but made new. And this time it will never break, but go on getting better and better, forever.

So that’s the Christian hope in the face of death: a real resurrected body, living forever on a renewed earth, a place of eternal peace and joy and life, that will remind us very much of this world, but without all the bad bits, because God will be at the very centre of everything. I wonder if you would like to be part of it?

If you’d like to talk more about any of the issues raised in this article (or any of my other big questions), please get in touch: barry@hopechurchfamily.org.

Further reading: Tom Wright, Surprised by Hope, SPCK, 2007

What is church?

admin 04/09/2019

Ask most people in the street “What is a church?” and they’ll probably point to the nearest tall building with a spire.

That’s what most people think church means: an imposing building to which they come for happy events like weddings and baptisms, and sad ones like funerals. They may even come into it weekly for to meet with Christians and to worship Jesus. But for most people church is the imposing building.

Of course the building doesn’t have to be imposing. I once visited a church that met in a converted supermarket. Another time I visited one that met in a coffee shop. They ran the coffee shop Monday to Saturday and moved the tables out of the way for Sunday. Sadly, they still charged for coffee. But these sorts of buildings tend to be the exception rather than the rule in the West, so for most people the word “church” conjures up something imposing, thick stone walls, high ceilings, a steeple to draw your eyes heavenwards.

But in the Bible, the word church is totally different. The Greek word that gets translated as church today is ekklesia ( ‘a gathering’) and in the Bible it has three different meanings, none of which were a physical building (the early church had no buildings –persecuted people don’t have time to build imposing buildings).

The first meaning of ekklesia is never translated as church, because it is a gathering of citizens. In Greek and Roman culture – being a citizen wasn’t an automatic right, so the word has a sense of separateness about it; for example, although most people living in a Greek or Roman city were citizens, some residents, for example, slaves and foreigners were excluded. You can see an example of this sort of ekklesia in the Bible in Acts chapter 19, when the citizens of Ephesus call an ekklesia in the amphitheatre to decide what to do about the annoying Christians who are living in their city, and it nearly leads to a riot.
The second meaning of ekklesia is what the theologians call the “local church” or congregation. This is a gathering of Christians in a location, usually meeting in someone’s home. And again it has a sense of separateness about it: based around whether you were a citizen of the Kingdom of God or not. It amuses me to think that as the citizens of Ephesus met in their ekklesia to work out how to deal with the annoying Christians, the annoying Christians were probably gathered as a congregation (ekklesia) to pray and to seek God’s guidance as to how to respond (in the end the disciples prevented St Paul from going to the amphitheatre in case the crowds killed him!)
The third meaning of ekklesia is what the theologians call the “church universal”. This is the gathering that all Christians everywhere in the world and throughout history look forward to: the time when all those who have trusted in the risen Jesus for salvation are gathered around him in heaven. That’s the way St Paul uses it in Ephesians 1:22,

God placed all things under [Jesus’s] feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church.”

And those are the only three ways the Bible uses the word church: in other words, in the Bible, church is never about the building, and it’s always about people. But if that’s the case, how did the word church come to be associated with imposing buildings? It’s time to blame the Germans! The English word “church” comes from the German word kirche which finds its origins in the third century Greek phrase kuriakon doma (house of the Lord). Quite how and when this German meaning crept into English is unclear, but it’s similarity to an ancient Anglo-Saxon word circe meaning circle (usually a stone circle for Sun Worship) would put it as far back as the fifth century.

So “church” is a Germanic building, and also the Bible’s way of describing local and universal gatherings of Christians. But just to complicate things, there’s yet another meaning – which we don’t find in the Bible but we do find in culture: what we call The Church Visible. This is more about the institution of church, and encompasses both local gatherings (ekklesia) and their buildings (kirche) But it’s also the legal and institutional framework that holds all this together. And it even includes people who may well not even be followers of Jesus Christ– the Church of England does try its best to be an equal opportunities employer!

As you might have guessed The Church Visible necessitates that there is also a Church Invisible, but thankfully that’s really just another term for the Church Universal.

So what is church? Well clearly it’s far far more than a building! Personally I like the definition my wife is fond of, “The church is what’s left after the building burns down.” In other words, it’s all about people and God.

To find out more about the ekklesia meeting in a kirche near you visit www.hopechurchfamily.org/gatherings!

Can I be buried in one of your churchyards?

admin 15/05/2019

Can I be buried in the church graveyard?

Planning your funeral ahead of time is a very sensible thing to do. It allows you to say things like “I want a church or crematorium funeral” and it makes life a lot easier for your grieving relatives. But what a lot of people don’t appreciate is that although you can specify all sorts of details about the funeral in your will, it is much harder to ensure you are buried in a particular churchyard.

What criteria govern where you have a right to be buried?

In an attempt to be absolutely fair to everyone, the Church of England has a very simple rule when it comes to deciding whether you can be buried in a particular church’s graveyard:

CRITERIA 1: Were you normally resident in the parish at the time of your death?

If this is the case, and there is space in the churchyard at the time of your death, you can be buried there.

This means that when it comes to allocating a grave plot, it doesn’t matter who you are, what you believe about God, who your family is (or was), what you earn, or what your gender, colour or sexuality is. All that matters is where you normally lived.

The Church of England also gives the right to be buried in a churchyard to two other categories of people:

CRITERIA 2: Anyone who was worshipping regularly and on the electoral roll of that church at the time of their death.
CRITERIA 3: Anyone who dies in the parish.

What if I don’t fit the criteria, but want to be buried in one of your churchyards?

Sadly, because we have a limited supply of churchyard space, it would not be fair to our local residents if we offered you a grave that was really meant for them. To give an example, suppose a person lives in Ledbury (and therefore has a right to be buried in Ledbury) wants to be buried in Hanley Swan churchyard because 50 years ago they lived in the village. Why should they be buried in Hanley Swan if it prevents a person who lives in Hanley Swan from being buried in Hanley Swan?

Notwithstanding this, if you don’t live in the parish, you could gain a right to be buried there by worshipping regularly with us (for at least six months), joining the electoral roll, and then applying to reserve a plot in the graveyard through the Church of England’s official reservation system. Please note there is a cost associated with this which covers legal fees and churchyard maintenance.

Reserving a plot in the graveyard is also an option if you currently live in the parish but know you are likely to move out of it in the foreseeable future, but would still like to establish a right to be buried there.

But someone from the church promised I could be buried there!

Unless it has been formally recorded on our graveyard plans, these promises are not binding. The only way to properly reserve a plot in a churchyard is through the Church of England’s official system.

Do you have any leeway in this?

Not if we are to be fair, though there are some cases we’d look at sympathetically. For example, if your spouse is buried in the churchyard, or if you had met criteria 1 or 2 for most of your life, but moved out of the parish towards the end of your life.

What if I just want my ashes interred in a churchyard?

Ashes don’t take up as much space in a churchyard so this sort of request is much easier to accommodate.

Finally, which of your churches have open graveyards?

St Peter and St Paul’s, Upton, doesn’t have a graveyard though there is a memorial garden, and a civic cemetery elsewhere in the town.
The Church of the Good Shepherd, Hook, has a limited number of plots left for new burials.
The churchyard at St James, Welland, is closed for new burials, though again there is a civic cemetery in the town.
Our churches in Hanley Castle, Hanley Swan and Ripple are all open for new burials though the amount of space varies.
Earls Croome, Hill Croome and Strensham churchyards are also open for burials, though space is limited and it is possible the graveyards will fill up in the next 10-20 years.

For all enquiries about churchyard policies, please contact the church office (admin@hopechurchfamily.org) or 01684 591241.

First published in the Bridge Magazine May 2019

Why do they keep moving Easter?

admin 30/04/2019

Why do they keep moving Easter?

Every year I always enjoy reading fake April Fools stories in the newspapers. Here’s my favourite from last year, from a Devon newspaper, which claimed the Pope has postponed April Fools Day 2018 because of the clash with Easter Sunday. Quoting Papal spokesperson Pesce Daprile (that’s Italian for April Fool) they explained that instead there will be two April Fools Days in 2019: one on April 1^st and the other on March 29^th, when apparently the British government will be playing a massive practical joke on the country.

Unlike most April Fools Jokes, that’s not one we can endlessly reuse. In fact, April Fool’s Day and Easter Sunday won’t coincide again until 2029, and then 2040, by which time most of us will have forgotten the punchline, though the government probably still won’t have sorted Brexit out.

So why does Easter keep moving? Well unlike Christmas, which has a fixed date, Easter has always been calculated in relation to the Jewish Passover festival, which occurs on the first full moon following the vernal equinox (typically March 20^th or 21^st). And this means that the date of Easter comes down to a question of maths and a bit of church politics.

Let’s do the maths first. Easter moves because our calendar is based on the 365¼ days it takes the Earth to orbit the Sun. But the date of Easter is based on the 29½ days it takes for the Moon to cycle from new Moon to new Moon. If you divide 365¼ by 29½ you get 12.37 cycles of the moon a year. Which means that some years we get 12 new moons, but other years we get 13, and every year the date of the full moon shifts by 10-11 days.

Now let’s do the politics. Because they weren’t always sure when the Vernal Equinox was, the early church celebrated Easter on a number of different days. It wasn’t until the Council of Nicaea in 325AD, that a standard definition was agreed: Easter would be the first Sunday after the full moon following March 21^st. Then, to avoid a clash with Passover, they also agreed that if the full moon fell on a Sunday, Easter would be delayed by a further week. Which is why Easter can happen any time between March 22^nd and April 25^th.

And with that settled, everyone was happy until 1582. This time the problem wasn’t politics, but maths, and the difference between the 365 days in the calendar and the 365¼ days it takes the earth to orbit the sun. Over time, those ¼ days add up, throwing the seasons out of alignment.

So Pope Gregory XIII proposed a new calendar containing an innovative idea: the leap year, and over time, virtually the whole world had adopted his “Gregorian Calendar”, except for the Orthodox Church. They still prefer the old Julian Calendar, which means that even to this day, Christians in Western and Eastern churches celebrate Easter on different dates.

At various times efforts have been made to reunite the dates. In 1997 the World Council of Churches proposed a new method of calculating Easter based on direct astronomical observation. The reform should have come in in 2001 but was not adopted.

Another failed reform was the UK Parliament’s Easter Act of 1928, which defined Easter as the first Sunday after the 2^nd Saturday in April. The legislation passed through parliament, and remains on the statute book to this day, but has never been implemented because the government has always taken the view that to impose an Easter date on the church would be unreasonable.

Our current Archbishop has however indicated a willingness to allow change – as long as the Catholic and Orthodox churches agree to follow suit. Which could mean that one day soon, we’ll read a story in a newspaper, about a Pope postponing, not April Fools Day, but Easter Sunday!

This year Easter Sunday is 21^st April, and there are events at all our churches in the week building up to the big day. You can find out what’s happening in your community by visiting www.hopechurchfamily.org/easter. However you celebrate Easter, I hope you have a very special time.

First published in the Bridge Magazine, April 2019

What is confirmation?

admin 31/03/2019

What is confirmation?

So there I was, all set to write a Big Question article about Donald Tusk’s “small corner of Hell set aside for those who backed Brexit” comment when a friend suggested I should spare us all and follow up last month’s Big Question about Baptism with a Big Question about Confirmation instead. So here goes…

What is Confirmation?

The best way to think about Confirmation is as the sequel to Baptism! When a child is baptised promises are made on their behalf by their parents and godparents. They promise to follow Christ as their Lord and master and to set an example of faith to the child by their life and practice, part of which involves raising their child as a practising Christian as part of their local church. But there comes a time when a bouncing baby becomes a big strapping lad or lass, with their own mind, vision and values, and confirmation is the time when that big strapping lad or lass stands up and owns the promises of God for themselves.

Sometimes I’m asked, ‘When is the right age for a child to be confirmed?’ The Church of England’s rules don’t state a number, instead, they wisely speak in terms of a child reaching the “years of discretion”. We know that every child is different and that they mature at different rates, so what matters isn’t how many birthdays a child has seen, but what they understand about the Christian faith, and whether they are ready and willing to take ownership of their own faith journey.

To help them do this, prior to confirmation, candidates are supposed to be able to understand and say the Catechism (an interactive summary of Christian belief) which includes the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Ten Commandments. In practice today, confirmation preparation tends not to be quite as rigorous as that. The group of young people I’m preparing for confirmation at the moment are using a video and discussion based resource called Youth Alpha for this, as well as having lots of fun playing games and eating sweets!

So what are the benefits of confirmation? Well, the two most significant ones are about identity and Holy Communion. Making a public declaration of what you believe is a significant step in working out who you are as a person. It’s the time you step out from your parent’s spiritual shadow and go public about your own faith journey. And part of this journey is to regularly receive Holy Communion. In fact, a Confirmation ceremony sometimes includes a Holy Communion service so that the newly confirmed can immediately receive their first communion immediately.

One final thought. We’re having a Confirmation Service with one of our Bishops in June 2019, so now is a great time to inquire about confirmation. If you have a child who you think is ready to be confirmed, or if you’re an adult and haven’t been confirmed but would like to be, then please get in touch with me.

First published in the Bridge Magazine, March 2019

Why do we baptise babies?

admin 03/03/2019

Why do we baptise babies?

David Beckham once said,

I definitely want [my son] Brooklyn to be christened, but I don’t know into what religion yet.”[1]

It isn’t just David Beckham who gets confused about baptism. I’ve met atheists who believe having their child baptised will guarantee a place in Heaven. Others think it’s about a guaranteeing a place in a church school. Some parents think it gives their child the right to be married in a particular church building. For others, baptism is an excuse for a big party, a glitzy naming ceremony.

And then there are the churches who won’t baptise babies. For Baptists, baptism is such an important expression of faith in Jesus that it could never be offered to a baby – after all, how can a baby express faith?

So why do we baptise babies?

Let’s start by asking “Why baptise anyone at all?” This one’s easy to answer: Jesus tells us to! He told his followers to go

and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…” (Matthew 28:19-20).

St Paul explains why baptism matters: he tells us it’s the way a Christian is united with Jesus in his death and resurrection (Romans 6:3-4). In other words, it’s the route to eternal life beyond the grave. But its not the water used in baptism that does this, it’s the faith in Jesus that the person being baptised has. Baptism is an expression of that faith. The Book of Common Prayer puts it like this,

They that receive baptism rightly are grafted into the church.”

That word “rightly” tells us that baptism is all about confirming the faith already present in a person.

Does that mean if you don’t have faith in Jesus you shouldn’t be baptised? Yes! Baptism only has integrity if you have faith in Jesus: a faith which should affect how you live, including regular church attendance and a willingness to engage in Christian community. If you don’t want to do that, why bother with baptism?

So what about baptising babies? Clearly, they can’t display faith in the way an adult can, but from the earliest days of the church, believing parents brought their children for baptism because they wanted them to be included in the promises of Jesus. Infant baptism is the Christian fulfilment of the Jewish covenant of circumcision – which was how infant Jews became part of God’s family even before they could express faith themselves.

St Peter brings this mix of family and faith together in Acts 2,

Repent and be baptised, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children”.

The first infant baptisms followed soon after, as whole families were being baptised into the name of Jesus.

So what does all this mean today?

That for baptism to have integrity, it must arise out of a real desire to journey in faith with Jesus, a journey that involves your lifestyle, and a commitment to being part of a church.
Parents who bring their child for baptism need to be living out these values. To help them with this, we offer baptism preparation for parents seeking baptism.
Children eventually need to take up the promises for themselves. In the Anglican tradition, we call this “confirmation.”
Some parents should not have their child baptised! A better option might be to ask for a ceremony of thanksgiving. This is a way to give thanks to God for the safe arrival of a baby, and to name them publicly, but without all the promises and commitment that come with baptism.

Finally, a word on schools and weddings. All of our local Church of England primary schools base their selection on location, not religion, so being baptised offers no special privileges. Baptism does, however, give you a qualifying connection for marriage to a particular Church of England church.

If you’d like to know more about baptism visit the baptism page on our website.

[1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1479657/Beckhams-sons-christened-in-back-garden-chapel.html

First published in the Bridge Magazine, Feb 2019

When was Jesus really born?

admin 03/03/2019

When was Jesus really born?

Combine all that fuss about Christmas, with our Anno Domini calendar system, and you might imagine that Jesus was born in 1AD on December 25^th. The problem is, there’s nothing in the Bible to point us to December 25^th, and lots of evidence in the Bible to suggest Jesus was born several years earlier!

This lack of clarity over when Jesus was born has led some sceptics to be very critical of Christian claims about the birth of Jesus. In his God Delusion, evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins dismisses the evidence for Jesus’ birth as a load of historical nonsense[i]. But is he right? What can we know for sure about when Jesus was born?

First, let’s deal with the obvious: in Jesus day there was no system for registering births with the state, so we don’t have the sort of details about Jesus’ birth that would be a matter of public record about any birth today. The exact time and date of his birth, and what he weighed, are a mystery, though it’s reasonable to assume that Mum and baby were in a stable condition.

But this doesn’t mean we can’t make a plausible estimate about when he was born. The gospel writers Luke and Matthew tell us that Jesus was born during the reign of King Herod (who most historians reckon died in 4BC[ii]). Luke later tells us that Jesus was “about thirty” years old in the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar (28AD). So if Jesus was born no later than 4BC, and was still “about 30” in 28AD, then he had to have been born in 6-4BC.

Which would all be fine if the Gospel of Luke didn’t also tell us that Jesus was born after Joseph and Mary travelled to Bethlehem to register for a census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria. This is a problem because Quirinius didn’t become governor of Syria until 6AD, ten years after Herod died. So it looks like Luke made a mistake, and there’s an error in the Bible! Perhaps Dawkins is right after all?

Or perhaps not. As you can imagine, the historians have been poring over this question for many years, and have offered a number of possible explanations.

It could be that Quirinius was governor of Syria more than once: not only in 6-12AD but also during the period 4BC-1BC when we don’t know who was governor[iii]. If he’d begun a census in this earlier period, then there’s no problem with what Luke says. Sadly there’s no conclusive evidence to prove this, though there are some interesting hints it might have been the case. An archaeological find known as the Antioch Stones dated somewhere between 11-1BC, places Quirinius in Syria at this time, and the Roman historian Tacitus also seems to place him in the area in 4-3BC[iv]. Another archaeological find known as the Lapis Tiburtinus, refers to an un-named person going to Asia to take on a senior role for the second time. This could be Quirinius, but without a name, we can never know for certain.[v]

Another possible explanation is that Luke is referring to a census that began before Jesus’ birth, but which wasn’t completed until Quirinius was governor in 6AD (some Roman censuses took as long as 40 years to complete). This is a plausible theory, but until evidence of such a census is found, it is only just a theory.

Perhaps more likely is that many of our modern Bibles mistranslate the rather ambiguous language that Luke uses about the census. The New International Version which we use in many of our services, states:

This was the first census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria.”

However Greek word orders are very different to English, and the word translated as “first” can also be translated as “before”. The Greek scholar and historian NT Wright suggests a better translation would be,

This was the first registration, before the one when Quirinius was governor of Syria.”[vi]

This actually makes a lot of sense grammatically and historically, because the census when Quirinius was governor of Syria in 6AD was notorious: it lead to revolution and the imposition of direct Roman rule on Israel.

Sadly, until more historical evidence emerges, we can’t know which explanation is right, but as things stand, no archaeological discovery has proven Luke wrong. In fact, the opposite is true, which does rather undermine Dawkins’ “historical nonsense” argument.

What then can we conclude from all this? That the checkable facts in Luke and Matthew’s accounts, suggest that Jesus was born no later than 4BC and possibly as early as 6BC.

Which is all of course rather embarrassing for the inventor of the Anno Domini system, a 6^th century monk called Dionysius Exiguus. Either he hadn’t read his Bible very accurately, or more likely, he made a mistake when translating the Roman calendar system into his new format. And once his flawed Anno Domini system was popularised by a 7^th century monk called Bede, based in my home town of Sunderland (and former parish of Jarrow) it was more than anyone’s job was worth to correct the error!

[i] Dawkins, Richard, The God Delusion, p93-95

[ii] For details of Herod’s death, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herod_the_Great

[iii] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Roman_governors_of_Syria

[iv] Tacitus, Annales, iii. 48

[v] For a sceptical view of the evidence about Quirinius see https://infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/quirinius.html

[vi] For more information on how Luke 2:2 can be translated, see http://christiancadre.blogspot.com/2004/12/luke-census-and-quirinius-matter-of.html

First published in the Bridge Magazine, December 2018