It is finished? Easter is not a 'happy ending'

So, it is finished; I made it through my challenge - Lent on a Food Bank budget. My first visit to the Co-op after the challenge was strange. And yes, to the right wing cynic who criticised me for holding on to the values of ethical shopping, I managed to keep to my convictions. Just as I did all those years ago when I was unemployed and living in Yorkshire. The poor have the right to principles, too, it just costs them more.

That visit was strange because  Lent is a long enough period to become accustomed to a change and suddenly I was free of the self imposed constraints and the liberation was not all positive. I experienced a range of emotions from a flatness that it was over to an embryonic, anxious frenzy that, left unchecked, could have taken me into a huge shopping spree. These emotions were real, even though the imposed poverty was not. There is something about taking on the reality of others that is 'magic' in the way that any story is magic because the experience makes it true.

And this is the magic of the Easter story, too. It is not in the recounting of historical events that we are transformed, but in the hearing of the story which touches our stories. For me, the cross has never been about atonement; it's not the whole 'Jesus died for my sins' thing. This is an  understanding of the events that is precious to many, but for me misses the point.

'It is finished' ; the very worst has been done, the cycle of abuse has been halted and love has, ultimately, won; not in an egotistical, vain and pompous sense, but in soaking up all that is dark and negative and arrogant and replacing it with all that is light and positive and humble. Because it is finished, it is possible to walk away, to let go, to move on.

But Easter is NOT a 'happy ending'. Jesus still has the scars of crucifixion, still remembers the betrayal and denial, the torture and the agonising death. Everything has changed, even when it appears to be the same. He is back with his friends and they still love each other, but there is a space in their loving that will forever be a scar; a beautiful scar that speaks of love, but a scar nonetheless. Even though Mary has her Jesus back after the agony of losing him, she can't hold onto him forever. Even though Peter is given the chance to put things right after denying him, he will spend the rest of his life making sure he never lets him down again.

It's no more of a happy ending than any story of a marriage begun again after infidelity, or the painful new life after bereavement.  But in this story that has come to be called The Easter Story, is a great truth; that it is only when we become lost that we can be found, when we know real fear that we are truly brave and when our hearts have been broken, that we can really love.

When the story of Easter meets our own stories, nothing is ever the same again, but we carry on living; wounded but whole, lost but found, broken-hearted but lovers.

Eva

Holy Week Blues

We're mid way through Holy Week now and this morning we walked through the installation I've set up in St Michael's Church. A bit like 'the stations of the cross' but instead of pictures or statues, hints of human activity that tell the parts of the story of the last week of Jesus' life. Beside the crucifixion area, we have the collection box for the Food Bank.

I cannot separate out current suffering from past suffering - perhaps it's the influence of so many Latin Americans I met through my work with Christian Aid; they see the agony of Jesus on the cross as their agony and struggle. They say they are 'Good Friday People' because Easter has not yet come; they have not experienced resurrection in their lives, communities and countries.

I remember a post card from Margaret Thatcher's time as Prime Minister; Jesus in dungarees with a badge saying '3 million' and the caption 'They won't employ me, either'. That's how I feel now; that the poor have been sacrificed, crucified while the wealthy sit down to expensive meals and good wine. It makes me feel sick. And I am glad that I am not financially wealthy because I'm sure that I, like most rich people today, would find it very difficult to part with my wealth. I'd salve my conscience with donations and sponsorship. I'd spend it nobly on expensive charity dinners (that's the way Charities get the money of the rich, isn't it?!) and speak noble words. But I'd still be too comfortable, too sated, too self-absorbed. I'd be like that rich young man who meets Jesus in the bible story; I wouldn't be able to take the risk of giving up my wealth to find true riches. I'd be disconnected from my soul and from the souls of my fellow human beings, and from the souls of the rest of the creatures on this planet. I would be half living. Cutting myself off from the parts of me and you that are too difficult to look at; like how I can spend money on a treat for myself while thousands are hungry, thirsty, naked.....'Lord I don't want to know when I saw you and walked past'.

Charity is not enough; I don't just mean not enough because there is too little of it, but not enough because it makes people beholden, denies them their dignity. What we need is justice. We need the vision of the Magnificat, the song given to young, pregnant Mary to sing in Luke's Gospel.

"He has cast the mighty from their thrones and raised up the humble and meek.
He has filled the hungry with good things and the rich he has sent empty away."

I seem to be reading a different Bible from the one our current Government has.
But never mind because I can defiantly sing with Mary,
"He has shown the strength of his arm, he has scattered the proud in their conceit."

It is time for thinking differently; when we celebrate Easter this weekend, we can only sing a broken Alleluia because too many in the UK and around the world are left at Good Friday with no ability to see how resurrection can happen in their lives.

No Cause for celebration

I was feeling rather positive today when I set out to the Co-op to do my shop. The experience of juggling the budget and the feelings engendered by it, soon had my mood plummeting and instead of the planned trip to Hopley's Farm Shop to pick up some fruit and veg, I headed home unable to face any more shopping.

It's not the food that's the problem; if challenged, we could all cut our food budget and still eat healthily and creatively. It's all the other stuff that we need to get by. This week I needed toothpaste, oil and loo rolls. I hesitated in the aisle with the washing liquid in; the economy brand wasn't there and I found myself deciding to eek out the little left and wait until next week to replace that. By the time I'd bought the few items on my list, I headed to the checkouts - knowing I'd got around £25 worth of items in the trolley, even though there weren't many items. It's the 'other stuff' that's expensive. I paused to think about what I was going to eat over the next few days, as I knew I was out of vegetables.  I still had some chick pea stew in the fridge that would do for today and if I saved a bit for tomorrow, it could go with that single baking potato I'd put in the trolley. I headed over towards the veg; mushrooms (bargain price) could be used for a risotto, and two large carrots could go with the red lentils I'd picked up to make a soup that would cover 3 lunches. I knew there was a tin of tomatoes and some pasta at home, so I could get a meal out of that. So off to the checkout!

Something that makes me angry is this; that the poorest people here are forced into exploiting people who are even poorer around the world. The cheaply priced items are so often produced in pitiful conditions by people who are paid less than £1 a day; we know this - whether we choose to think about it or not. Those of us who are able to pay for Fair Trade, environmentally friendly products that are not tested on animals can live with cleaner consciences. This is a 'luxury' denied to the poor along with the tempting items placed close to the checkouts.

There is only one week left of my challenge; Easter is a week away. Yet, I can't look at the end of this challenge with the kind of glee and celebration that I might had I given up chocolate, for example. A chilling thing that Jesus is quoted as saying is 'The poor will always be with you.' A fact of life because the greedy and self seeking will always rise to the top, whatever political persuasion is in power. Those who are unable to help themselves will always end up at the bottom. I wonder what kind of mental acrobatics those receiving massive bonuses have to engage in, in order to sleep at nights. Surely, they can't all be high functioning psychopaths and sociopaths with little capability for empathy? Can anyone justify a 'need' for more than the 'one' million?? Well, at least we're all equal when we exit this life, even if we can't grasp this truth while we're alive.

Tonight, in this country, people will go to bed hungry. They will be cold because, unlike me, they won't be able to put the heating on when the evening chill sets in. There is enough food in the UK to feed them. There is enough wealth to pay their fuel bills.

Across the world today, more than 20,000 children have died because of hunger and thirst. Lack of food and safe drinking water. We have the technology to change this, but we don't. They are poor because we are rich; we are rich because they are poor.

I can't look forward to celebrating the end of this challenge because I am ashamed by the reminder of these uncomfortable truths. If Easter celebrates resurrection: hope in the midst of despair, life out of death and light in darkness, Easter cannot come until ALL are seated at the table.

Sacred hospitality

On Wednesday a colleague arrived unexpectedly just as I was making my lunch. I had run out of all my veg and was stretching what I had until my next shop. He was embarrassed and protested that I shouldn't worry about feeding him. Hospitality is sacred to me - probably the Celtic blood - and I couldn't possibly not offer him food. I would normally have spare food in the fridge or cupboard to concoct something on such occasions but of course, the cupboard was bare. I didn't even have any bread. So I eked out the soup I'd planned to have for supper followed by the pasta I'd cooked for lunch and we both had enough. It reminded me of the Jewish saying 'Just enough is plenty'. My colleague had forgotten about my Lent challenge and said he felt guilty but I think he cheered up quickly enough.

Sharing food is an essential part of our lives together in human families and society. Eating together, both for host and guest, creates a bond and changes our relationships. My ancestors were with the MacDonalds at Glencoe. Like other stories of brutality, what is most disturbing is the fact that the perpetrators had accepted hospitality; the violation of hospitality is a sacrilege in all ancient societies. It is, of course, the real sin of Sodom and Gomorrah that the sacred bond and duty of hospitality is violated ; it has been wrongly claimed for too long that this story is about homosexuality.

To keep people in poverty, to deny them the basics of life - enough food, adequate shelter and sufficient warmth- is immoral on many levels. One of those levels is to deny them the right to offer hospitality, which is to diminish their humanity. I have visited areas of the world where sacrificial hospitality has been offered to me from those living in poverty, so important is it to them to offer a fellow human being the basics of life. The more sacrificial the hospitality, the more affecting it is.

As I did my shop this week, I way aware of things that I would have liked to buy and couldn't: there were things like washing up liquid that needed replacing, so the items of food had to be adjusted to allow the money to suffice. This is the constant reality of some people living amongst us, to constantly battle with buying what can make a healthy meal as well as fitting the budget. The monotony of eating the same things and treats being out of the question week in, week out is life draining and diminishing. Watching others enjoy the simple extra pleasures that you are denied makes one feel of less value: a mistake that we value ourselves too often by what we have, not who we  are.

There are two weeks left of my challenge but I know that I can't simply go back to my old way of shopping: this experience will stay with me for a long time. We all have to exercise an element of denial to carry on living a financially privileged life (whether like me you have a modest but adequate  income or you have significant wealth) as countless people in the UK and across the world struggle to  make it through the day or the week. I remember a visit to Tegucigalpa in Honduras some years ago. I stood in the road in front of some houses, looking at the view beyond. The backdrop to the city was a large shanty town with makeshift houses, no sewerage, water or electricity.  In front of me were expensive houses  surrounded with high security fences and protected by armed guards and dogs. In the front of one yard was a car with a bumper sticker saying "Jesus es Señor de Tegucigalpa" which translates as "Jesus is Lord of Tegucigalpa" . I found myself wondering what kind of theological gymnastics make it possible to come out with such a statement and to live in such wealth while overlooking such poverty! But in reality, it's what we all do every day of our lives, it's just that the poor don't live next door, so we can 'forget' them more easily.

Eva