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Moderator’s column: Living out the ethics of Christ

I heard a story recently about a fight between two wolves, which were both fierce and competitive. The question was asked ‘which wolf will overcome the other?’

The simple answer is whichever wolf we feed.

Ethics is rather like this. There is a growing awareness that ethics matter. We live under the shadow of the tragic findings of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. There has been story after story of the most horrendous misuse of power and of the failure to bring the perpetrators to account.

As a Uniting Church, thankfully we have become much more conscious of the essential need for the church to be a safe place for everyone, especially children. We have a strong Code of Ethics for  people in ministry and a Code of Conduct for Lay Leaders that guides us in areas where there is ethical ambiguity, and points us to ethical wholeness. Ethics must matter to all of us. While the Gospel offers grace and forgiveness, it comes with the call to discipleship, to live a holy life; to pursue a lifestyle of behaviour that models the highest Christian standards of ethics.

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What ‘Makes you Wonder?’

The new Makes You Wonder app puts a program developed by Rev Dr Ian Robinson, while on beach mission, into the hands of people in their busy lives.

Ian said the materials were originally designed for “people being people and talking to each other about what was on their hearts. And if you open your heart to somebody, they meet the Jesus who lives there.

“Makes You Wonder is a resource which helps people connect with their communities and their world. The overall theme is to help people find their voice, with their own faith, in their own world.  It doesn’t ask people to run more programs, but put this kind of authenticity into the people you already are,” said Ian.

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Genes re-Uniting

I am grateful to Rev Dr John Squires for his paper on the DNA of the UCA, which he distributed locally at the Meeting of the Presbytery of WA in May, and on the Assembly website. It helpfully identifies ten characteristics of the Uniting Church in Australia (UCA) which I warmly endorse. They are some of the reasons why my wife and I, despite many moments of disillusionment with the path taken since 1977 by the UCA, nationally and at state level, have maintained our membership of this faltering denomination throughout the past 40 years.

Rev Dr Squires’ paper also invites comment from his readers about his proposed list of key characteristics. I believe that identifying these particular characteristics – or genes, to maintain the metaphor – is a necessary, but not sufficient, clarification of the denomination’s DNA.

Despite a few unexpanded mentions of ‘God’, ‘the Spirit’, and ‘Christ crucified’ in the paper, it would be hard to deduce from this evidence alone that our denomination stands for much more than an ethical humanism shakily sustained by the unbounded slogan of ‘inclusion’. The list doesn’t yet identify as part of our DNA those ultimate beliefs about God which empower the ethic: his nature and his self-revelation in Jesus as reliably reported in the Bible; and his expectations of the species he has made in his image.

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Connecting with church, community and God

A lot of people struggle with turning 40. Perhaps the thought of walking over the hill and into the unknown is a little daunting for some. In a society where aging is seen as something to be feared, rather than valued, you can’t blame people for feeling this way.

I must say, however, that when I turned 40 a few years ago, I was in a great space. I felt very comfortable in my own skin and felt positive about walking over that ridge into the next stage of my journey. Somehow the connections between my upbringing, my experiences in life and my hopes for the future started to gain clarity at this time in my life. I lived with less fear and more peace with the person I had become.

I wonder whether communities go through this same angst in certain seasons of their life. As the Uniting Church in Australia turns 40, do we approach the next chapter with trepidation or with strength and conviction? As I hear people talk about the church in today’s world, I certainly hear a great deal of fear, but also much hope and anticipation.

At the beginning of May, I attended the SacredEdge Festival at Queenscliff Uniting Church in Victoria. Being my second year at the festival, I was particularly looking forward to the great sense of community I had experienced in 2016.

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Bible Society bicentenary

This year, the Bible Society Australia turns 200. A number of celebratory events have and will be taking place over the year, including the widely talked about and controversial partnership with  Coopers Brewery.

The company had created a commemorative Coopers Premium Light Beer to celebrate the bicentenary. After the Bible Society Australia produced a video as part of their ‘Keeping it Light’  campaign, which featured two Liberal MPs having a ‘light’ discussion about marriage equality over a Coopers beer, Coopers found themselves in the midst of a boycott. Coopers have since stated that they have cancelled the commemorative cans.

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Moderator’s column: Jungle journey

It is often said that God is a God of surprises.

Every once in a while I find myself in a situation that I could never have expected or predicted. A month or so ago, I found myself in a dugout canoe, with an outboard motor travelling along the Irrawaddy river, in a rural and remote part of Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. I had to pinch myself; how did I end up here?

The simple answer is that my jungle journey has its origins with the Karen congregation that meets at Uniting Church in the City (UCIC), Ross Memorial West Perth, and the movement of the Spirit.

The pastor of the Karen congregation is Rev S’Win Shwe, who trained in the Uniting Church’s theological college in Sydney (UTC). Last year, he invited me to have dinner with the president of the Pwo Karen Baptist church of Burma, Rev Mahn Benson, who was visiting Perth.

Fast forward four months and out the blue comes an invitation to speak at the 100th year anniversary service of the Pwo Karen Baptist church in Myanmar and at the opening of their renovated church in Yangon.

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Everybody wants to be transformed, but no one wants to change

Often, the promise that we can ‘change the world’ comes wrapped in suggestions that “For the price of a coffee a day, you can change Sanjay’s life forever.”

Is change really that easy? If it was, everyone would be doing it. The promise of transformation is attractive, but the hard work required to get there; the discipline and commitment? Not so much.

So how does real change take place?

Whether you begin with seven minutes or seventy, creating change begins with deep conviction and small steps, incorporated into daily routine. And that’s where spiritual practises can be  genuinely helpful.

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Moderator’s column: Life beyond the fishbowl

One of the greatest English rock bands, Pink Floyd, has a line in one of their songs that has always intrigued me: “we’re like two lost souls swimming in a fishbowl, year after year. Wish you were  here.”

These lyrics suggest, rather cynically, that living today can feel like living in a fishbowl. The more I thought about life being like a fishbowl, the more it seemed to me that there is some truth to the  idea.

Water magnifies every action we take, making it look way bigger than it probably should be. Life in a fishbowl means that small things appear much bigger. A rather innocuous comment can be  seen as a massive put down; a flippant remark can be taken as a serious rejection of a person; a mild, gentle criticism can be misunderstood as a character assassination.

In the world of the fishbowl, many things are exaggerated or magnified causing a distorted view of reality. Fishbowl thinking over scrutinises, dissects and then replays over and over again the  same unbalanced view of reality.

Every now and then, I think I suffer from this condition and I am not alone. Others in the church are also unconsciously affected by a fishbowl mind-set. Sometimes when I am in conversation, I  hear a grievance. They range from the trivial, to the important, to the very serious. Discerning which category they belong in is a prayerful, pastoral art. To reinforce the petty is not helping anyone. To minimise the serious is pastorally neglectful.

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Missio Dei?

When one thinks of mission, how many of us immediately think of these words from Matthew 28; what we’ve come to understand as the Great Commission?

“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

For many years I believed that ‘going,’ ‘baptising’ and ‘teaching’ were mission instructions from the king and head of the church to all of us. Lately, however, I am beginning to understand these
words as more of an invitation from God to us for the sake of the world.

Let me explain.

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Progressive spirituality: new directions

Thirteen members of the Uniting Church WA made the long flight to Brisbane to join with 300 others from around the world for the 4th Common Dreams Conference. Common Dreams aims to  promote study and discussion of progressive religious thoughts.

The conference was formally opened by Rev David Felten, co-author of Living the Questions, who highlighted the significance of the progressive movement and his experience of a co-ordinated attack on Progressive Christianity by his neighbouring evangelical churches. It was followed by a lecture for the late Rev Canon Nigel Leaves, a past Warden of Wollaston College in WA, introduced by his widow Rev Jewlz Leaves and given by theologian Dr Val Webb.

We also heard a most engaging lecture by a Muslim woman, Saara Sabbagh on ‘Living with Faith in a faithless world’. She shared the wisdom of Islam’s Sufi mystical tradition known to many of us from the writings of Rumi. Nine different elective workshops on progressive spirituality led by experts were held throughout the conference, as well as a range of keynote sessions on interesting topics.