Any statement by Tony Blair used to generate big headlines until he stepped aside to let Gordon Brown take the helm at 10 Downing Street. That’s not the case anymore and Tony used his more sheltered position to announce that while he was Prime Minister, his Christian faith was “hugely important” in his decision making. He’d chosen to keep quiet about this until now for fear of being labeled “a nutter”.
Now “nutter” isn’t high on the list of bad insults for most Brits. It’s like calling someone crazy, but in a good-humored kind of way. But, being the Prime Minister and a nutter (especially a religious nutter) is not perception you want to cultivate. Now all your decisions are suspect, all your priorities are questionable and you obviously have no realistic sense of what’s happening around you. Thankfully for Tony Blair, no-one really cares if he’s a nutter, religious or not, now he’s away from number 10.
So why does having faith bring your sanity into question? Inherent in this fear of religious-people-in-high-places seems to be the idea that when you have a relationship with God your feet leave the ground and you drift away from earthly reality. You are happy all the time, unencumbered by the things of this world, no longer burdened by other people and their problems. Instead you are gazing upwards, looking at……….clouds, rainbows, angels playing harps? Can the rest of the rational world trust a person like that in a position of power, making decisions with huge consequences?
Although it sounds like the position of cynical atheists, I can recognise this idea in my own life. I push through the day with all it’s routine and a fair amount of drudgery and then try to float upwards into some elevated state of consciousness to talk to God in quiet time. I push through Monday-Saturday and then try and think spiritual thoughts in the car on my way to church on Sunday. We’ve all pushed through 2007 with its ups and downs but now, can we put the brakes on and muster up some warm, peaceful heavenly thoughts just in time for December 25th? It’s no wonder that stuff doesn’t work.
If there’s anything that the story of Jesus birth shows us it’s that we cannot float upwards to meet God where He is. We cannot raise ourselves up from our everyday lives to join God. God came down to earth to meet us here, in routine and drudgery and ups and downs, in a stable with donkeys and smelly straw. Although some may have preferred the idea of God taking us away from it all, to me this is the greatest relief. I don’t have to deny my “ordinary” everyday life to be with Him. I don’t have to pretend to be perfect or holy or even extra-spiritual to see Him or hear His voice. And, I don’t have to take my eyes off the people around me who are also living ordinary lives but without a sense of God’s presence and the hope that brings.
“O come to us, abide with us, Our Lord Emmanuel!”
Merry Christmas!
Philomena
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