{"id":701,"date":"2024-07-20T22:29:09","date_gmt":"2024-07-20T21:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rebelrebel.org.uk\/?p=701"},"modified":"2024-07-20T22:29:09","modified_gmt":"2024-07-20T21:29:09","slug":"christmas-christ-the-saviour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rebelrebel.org.uk\/?p=701","title":{"rendered":"Christmas: Christ the Saviour?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Mini-Reflection #79 (17th December 2023 at Essex Church \/ Kensington Unitarians)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s an old, familiar, story \u2013 most of us have seen a good number of Christmases come and go \u2013 and the story of Jesus, born in a manger, is one that we know well. Or at least, we probably think <\/em>we do. Various renderings of the story in popular culture \u2013 not least in school nativity plays \u2013 tend to play fast and loose with the details, everything gets mixed up, it drifts a bit from the original text. And that\u2019s OK. We\u2019re allowed to play with the story, the myth, and the archetypes it contains. This is a legitimate way of working with the text, and the tradition, to get at the deeper truth that it holds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Each time we encounter the Christmas story, it will speak to us anew, if we let it. If we really listen, instead of setting our ears and our brain to auto-pilot, and open ourselves to what it has to say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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And each of us will have our own relationship to the season, and to the wider Christian tradition; therefore the story will bring up different associations, resonances, and baggage, for each of us. As Unitarians, sometimes we get a bit hung up on the traditional language, understandably. And yet \u2013 we sing the old, familiar songs \u2013 albeit sometimes with the words tweaked, here and there. Still, today we sing with gusto, \u2018remember Christ our Saviour was born on Christmas Day\u2019 and \u2018Mary bore sweet Jesus Christ to be our sweet Saviour\u2019, <\/em>and \u2018O come let us adore him, Christ the Lord\u2019.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is the spirit in which we sing these words? I guess some of us can sing without reservation; for a few of us, Jesus is still central to our theology, and we\u2019re fully at ease with our Christian roots. For some of us, there is likely to be a feeling of ambivalence and awkwardness, possibly even a sense that we\u2019re crossing your fingers as we sing these traditional words, that aren\u2019t really our theology. It\u2019s complicated. Perhaps, for most of us, we\u2019re just enjoying a good singalong, and not probing too deeply into what it all means\u2026 but we Unitarians do tend to be concerned about such things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year I find myself wondering about the talk of \u2018Christ our Saviour\u2019.<\/em> What does that mean \u2013 and how could it helpfully speak to Unitarians \u2013 outside of the confines of mainstream Christian theology?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We don\u2019t tend to talk about salvation much \u2013 not in the traditional religious sense, anyway \u2013 our take on sin and redemption tends to be much more this-worldly. But, thinking about it a bit more broadly, I\u2019d say that salvation in a more expansive sense is still a real and present concern for most of us. Don\u2019t we all have moments \u2013 and perhaps quite frequently \u2013 when we want to be saved? That is, moments in life when everything is awful \u2013 when we feel powerless in the face of our own problems and the world\u2019s strife \u2013 and we desperately want someone to swoop in and make everything better, solve all our problems, wave a magic wand, sort it all out, smite the baddies and be home in time for tea. In those moments, at some level, we yearn for a saviour, a rescuer, one who will keep us from harm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Christ our Saviour\u2019<\/em> \u2013 my old friend Simon John Barlow, whose words have popped up several times already, he was very big on Christmas \u2013 he often reminded people that \u2018Christ is not Jesus\u2019 surname\u2019! <\/em>It\u2019s more of a job description, a role, a title \u2013 the origin of the word \u2018Christ\u2019 comes from \u2018anointed one\u2019.<\/em> So from the Gospel of Luke: \u2018unto you is born this day\u2026 a saviour which is Christ the Lord\u2019. <\/em>A saviour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What can we take from this? Perhaps, rather than being the <\/em>saviour, Jesus is anointed as a<\/em> saviour. We might say he is an example \u2013 for some of us, the prime example \u2013 of a way of being in the world that might save us, that might liberate us, from the worldly sources of suffering that drag us down. Perhaps he shows us what it might look like when a human embodies the light of God, and how transformative that can be, in a world of struggle and sorrow. Born in the humblest of circumstances, in a turbulent time, in the back of beyond \u2013 living among outcasts, at home in the margins of society \u2013 he preached a radical message of love and liberation: Love God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. And love your neighbour as yourself. (P.S. everyone <\/em>is your neighbour!) Easier to say than it is to do. But his message, and example, is one that we would all do well to follow, as best we can, in our own time and in our place. Because it\u2019s a signpost to salvation, here and now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s the message I want to leave you with today. It\u2019s not really about what happened once upon a time in Bethlehem. It\u2019s about how we can each be agents of salvation \u2013 for each other, and for this precious earth we share \u2013 if we own and embrace that calling for ourselves. If we roll up our sleeves, and get stuck in, to the messy work of saving the world. In our own humble way, each day, we too can embody the light of God. And in that spirit I want to close with the famous words of St. Teresa of \u00c1vila:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Christ has no body but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which He looks
Compassion on this world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yours are the feet with which He walks to do good,
Yours are the hands, with which He blesses all the world.
Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,
Yours are the eyes, you are His body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Christ has no body now but yours,
No hands, no feet on earth but yours,
Yours are the eyes with which he looks
compassion on this world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

May it be so, for the greater good of all. Amen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reflection by Jane Blackall<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

An audio recording of this sermon is available:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\nhttps:\/\/www.kensington-unitarians.org.uk\/pod2011\/KU_jane.blackall_hybrid_sermon_17.12.23.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n