You’ve heard of the Jebusites – now for the Kopites

I have no idea where this comes from originally (I am trying to find out), but – despite being outrageous – is very funny. If you don’t understand what Liverpool fans have gone through in the last few years, it will be meaningless

 

A course, of course

I leave the country for less than 48 hours and interesting things happen back home. Coincidence?

I was in Germany to speak at the launch of a new initiative by the EKD aimed at getting clergy and their churches to make use of resources for reminding people of or nurturing them in the Christian faith. As here in England (and probably everywhere else), many people reject Christian faith when they are younger, but then never bring to it the questions an adult ought to have. Thus the faith of a child is still being rejected by an adult whose questioning might not have grown up with him or her.

In my parish experience this was often the case. Parents would ask about baptism for their child and, during a pastoral visit, would say that they don’t necesssarily know what it was they had left behind. Baptism preparation (lay-led and over three or four meetings in their own home) gave them the opportunity to look at Christian faith as an adult.

That is what Kurse zum Glauben is aimed at doing in Germany. The launch in Osnabrück was excellent, creative and involved lunchtime cabaret as well as a fantastic (Gospel) choir and food. I was the keynote speaker and still managed to get Liverpool and Bradford as well as Croydon into the occasion.

And while I was away? Andy Coulson resigned as David Cameron’s Director of Communications – something that was inevitable in the light of the phone-hacking haunting of his old employer. What I never understood about Coulson’s defence of his role in the News of the World phone hacking scandal was his contention that he knew nothing of what was going on. If that was so, he was an incompetent editor, boss and manager (which begs the question about why Cameron hired him); if not, then he was being economical with the truth. The truth is, he has done an excellent job for Cameron and will surely be missed – just as Ed Balls comes in (for Alan Johnson) to harrass George Osborne and a tough Communications Director is needed by the Tories.

The second thing that happened while I was away extolling the value and virtue of Kurse zum Glauben? Liverpool beat Wolves 3:0 away from home and Kenny Dalglish was spotted laughing. Mind you, Torres looked happy and the gloom over Liverpool appeared to thin out a little. Glorious. But there’s a long way to go from here.

Anyway, back to Croydon to continue the ‘ending’ while trying to get my head into what lies ahead in Bradford when we move north in April. It’s all giving me a headache and taking away the creative impetus for writing this blog. I’ll try to get more space soon.

 

Mad world

Time is tight these days – something to do with working Croydon/Southwark while turning attention to our move to Bradford in a few months time. But, I was going to write something this evening to pick up on comments about last couple of blog posts and now it seems a bit less urgent. I got home from seeing a long-time friend and opera singer Jonathan Veira (great venue, great live jazz, great food and great company) only to find

• Roy Hodgson has left Liverpool by mutual consent, allowing Kenny Dalglish to take up the reins for the rest of the season;
• A young US Congresswoman, Gabrielle Giffords, has been shot (along with others) at an event in Arizona – prompting Sarah Palin‘s people to (a) pull down her website appeal for action against opponents like Giffords and (b) delete her ‘Don’t retreat, reload’ tweets from Twitter.

The departure of yet another football manager isn’t too much of a surprise, but Roy Hodgson is a decent, honest and generous man and he goes with credit for this. I think his position was untenable in terms of confidence and I am (for the first time this season) excited about the passion King Kenny might be able to bring to the Liverpool squad. But Hodgson will get another position soon and even his opponents in Liverpool will wish him well.

But, this is trivial stuff in the face of yet another shooting in the USA. People who live by the gun will probably die by the gun. It is just hard to see from this side of the Atlantic why some people on the other side of the Atlantic can’t see any connection between an obsession with gun ownership and the number of gun crimes on their land. And if the American Right are so convinced of their rightness in this respect, why take down embarrassing websites or tweets? Words are powerful and violence starts not with a finger on a trigger, but with an idea in the mind, given shape by words.

Later I’ll write what I was going to write. In the meantime, the mad world continues to spin.

 

The end is nigh

It was too good to last. Christmas joy, lots of family and celebration, and England win the Ashes in a game I never watch. Then this: Liverpool 0-1 Wolves.

I wouldn’t so much mind Liverpool losing, if they at least played like a team that was interested in being on the pitch in the first place. It’s the lack of passion. I have no idea if it is Roy Hodgson’s fault or if the rot goes deeper. But, we Liverpool fans are not used to being in 12th position at the turn of the year – only three points above the relegation zone. Desperate. And embarrassing when half your mates are Chelsea, Spurs or Man Utd fans.

I’m beginning to wonder if it’s my support that is sporting death to any team that claims my affections. Croydon’s own Crystal Palace drew last night and remain stuck in the Championship relegation zone – Bradford City lost 4:0 to Cheltenham Town. With an effect like this, I might just start supporting Man Utd…

It’s just as well I am rooted in a theology of hope. Hope does not depend on particular circumstances, but in being constant whatever the particular circumstances of life might be. Put bluntly, Christian hope is not in God keeping me alive and happy or healthy and fulfilled; rather, it is in the God who has the final word (‘resurrection’) in a world that thinks violence and death have ultimate power. In other words, the circumstances might change – and get better or worse – but I won’t blow in the wind.

I’m even hopeful about Liverpool. I’ll stick with them, come what may. But, I feel like the Hebrew people in exile, hanging on to words that promise a better future. One day.

(I can still be miserable, though!)

 

The Word became flesh, but then grew up

Christmas Day has moved on into memory. The Boxing Day sales couldn’t be thwarted even by the latest Tube strike. Liverpool’s revenge on Blackpool has been delayed because of a frozen football pitch. The government seems to have decided that helping children to read might be a good idea after all. And I wonder if the first Easter eggs have already started to appear in the shops…

The end of December always feels like getting to the top of a very high ladder – we’ve been heading up it all year. Then the parties of New Year’s Eve give way to the feeling of being at the very bottom of the ladder again, faced with the prospect of doing the whole thing again. It’s a funny psychology, but you can see why some people love the last week of December, but dread the first week of January – especially when the credit card bills come in in the cold light of day.

Nothing ever stands still. I have just re-read the Preface to Dr Samuel Johnson’s Dictionary in which he recognises that languages can never remain fixed (despite his own desire to resist corruptions of English by referring only to its use by pre-Restoration writers), but thinks that dialects will die out as written dictionaries fix meanings.

Yet, this is one of the ironies of life. Every time we predict that we have ‘arrived’, something else pops up to thwart our sense of security. Whenever we think technology will homogenise human experience or communication, real life confounds the prophets. Just when we think that globalisation will turn the whole world into plastic, the peculiarities of uncontrollable local cultures arise and assert their place in defiance of ‘inevitabilities’.

Last week it was reported that the Chinese government is to limit non-Chinese words in their media and, thereby, to preserve the purity of the language (and, therefore, cultural identity). They should learn from Johnson, the French Academie Francaise and the failed attempts by Germans to fix their tongue in some state of  ideologically pure suspension. A living language cannot be nailed for ever – especially by controlling governments – and the attempt is futile. (Which is not the same as saying, therefore, that Humpty Dumpty was right all along and words can be made to mean whatever we want them to mean – etymology isn’t redundant and language never develops randomly.)

Yesterday we celebrated that God did not remain an idea ‘logos’, but came among us as one of us in a way any human being can recognise. The ultimate in communication. We can play games with words, but human living and dying is common experience to everyone who has ever breathed.

However, Christmas is the beginning of the story, not the end. The baby grew up – presumably, through childhood (and all the ways children grow and learn), through adolescence (and all the ways young people grow into adulthood and the challenges this brings… not least to parents) and into responsible adulthood. The ‘idea’ did not remain a generality, but became ‘particular’: someone, somehow, somewhere.

The challenge for the churches is how to encourage – creatively, consistently and imaginatively – people who get stuck with the baby in a manger to stay with the story right the way through to Calvary and beyond. Jesus didn’t stand still. The ‘Word’ became flesh and grew, changed and developed.

What that means and what that looks like is the task for the next few months. (After we’ve partied our way through the next week, that is.)

 

Memories are made of this?

So, Liverpool begin a new era today with a crucial game against Everton at Goodison Park. Both clubs are close to the bottom of the Premier League – a situation that was inconceivable even a few weeks ago. I find it hard to understand how everything fell apart so quickly – how the great tradition of a great club could be so easily rubbished and the fans of the club so humiliated.

Be patient with me. I grew up with only one question each spring: which trophy or trophies would the team be parading through Liverpool on an open-topped bus this year? We had thirty years of stunning success before it all began to sink. My memories are offended by reality and I am embarrassed to admit that I took success for granted. It’s hard to face today’s reality.

Which takes me on to a parallel line of thought that seems at first glance to be unrelated. There is a fuss in Germany about an exhibition entitled Hitler und die Deutschen (Hitler and the German People) at the Deutsches Historisches Museum in Berlin. This is the first time a major exhibition at a major museum has focussed on Hitler himself and some people are not happy about it. Their fear is that it will be exploited by neo-Nazis. (Although, as the director of the Museum Hans Ottomeyer tartly says, “They don’t read books and they don’t go to exhibitions”.)

On the surface there is little to fear in putting Hitler centre stage and trying to come to terms with how this pathetic little man came to wield such destructive power. As I have remarked before, Joachim Fest attempted a psychological analysis of the main Nazi protagonists in his 1968 book, The Face of the Third Reich. Horrific and offensive as it might be, you have to give the ‘monsters‘ a face if they are to be understood and if we are to come to terms with our own complicity in their manipulations.

The problem for Germans is that very soon ‘memory’ will become ‘history‘. The generation of those involved in Germany up to 1945 will begin to die out. That is why it is so important to capture their voices and preserve the memory from becoming ideological weapons in arguments about history (which can then be used to justify present or future action). In my book Finding Faith I briefly describe Sir Jonathan Sacks‘s view – that we must be cautious about memory becoming history and thereby losing our roots – and the opposite caution of Miroslav Volf – that memory can be held onto as an ideological weapon for justifying the violence or particularism of future generations who have nurtured a grievance. (Think of Northern Ireland and the Battle of the Boyne, for instance, or the ‘tribal’ violence of the Balkans after the division of Yugoslavia.)

I might be wrong, but it seems to many of us outside Germany that the Germans need to stare Hitler in the face and disempower him. As can be seen from this weekend’s debate about the death of German multiculturalism and the problems of German immigration, it is almost impossible to address some issues without the spectre of Hitler hanging over. Which gives Hitler a sort of ongoing victory - the power of the terrorist to scare the ‘free’ into restricting the freedom that was supposed to define them in the first place.

The Germans cannot wait until the 1945 generation is dead before getting to grips with this stuff. Then it will be too late. For the memory will be partial (recorded) and the history will be an object for discussion or appropriation by those who will use it to justify their latest ideologies, self-justifications and violences.

I just wish I could be in Berlin to visit the exhibition.

 

Ups and downs and downs and ups

While I was in Ireland last week loads of interesting things were going on elsewhere:

Liverpool finally got sold and bought. One lot of Americans went out (having done nothing that they promised when they took over the club) and another lot came in. Although we breathe a sigh of relief at the ending of one American dream, we clap the new owners with one hand while reserving the other one ‘just in case…’ If celebration is heartfelt today, there is also a great deal of suspicion. Having been fooled and humiliated once, we won’t (as The Who put it) be fooled again. Yet, it is almost embarrassing to listen to the language of the ousted Tom Hicks: he still doesn’t ‘get it’. But, at least Torres appears fit enough to play against Everton on Sunday…

Chilean miners were being released from 69 days of imprisonment a very long way underground. The world rejoiced, but this is only the end of the beginning. Mining safety has to be improved in a country where miners’ lives have thus far been cheap. And we know that the next months and years will bring huge challenges for the miners and their families: they will need massive support in the light of not only their trauma, but their new-found fame. Furthermore, the BBC overspent on its budget by covering this saga in such depth; will it now cover the stories of trapped miners in China and Ecuador similarly – or are some stories less interesting than others and some  lives cheaper than others? The Chilean saga was gripping, but it also raises questions of value and perspective for the rest of us. In brief, was it just more entertaining for us?

The Bishop of Fulham has announced he is to resign and join the Ordinariate (i.e. become a Roman Catholic). His announcement speech used extraordinary language, claiming ‘persecution’ of ‘traditionalists’. Someone should do a linguistic textual analysis of this stuff – for a start it cheapens the word and concept of ‘persecution’. But, the notions of ‘they are forcing us out’ and ‘we have no responsibility- it is all being done to us’ has reminded me of the posts I wrote about ‘future foreshortening’ and the hierarchies of victimhood.

As I have often expressed here, I understand something of the dilemma facing those who oppose the ordination of women; but they need to take responsibility for their decisions about the future and not do the unhealthy thing of simply identifying themselves as a victim of other people’s decisions. I know from personal experience something of the cost of such demanding dilemmas (twice: once in secular employment and once in the church) – and how important it is to stop blaming other people (or ‘the evil institution’ as the Bishop of Fulham puts it). The language is the give-away in all this and it will repay careful examination one day. Meanwhile we continue to pray and try to support those facing these dilemmas – everyone loses in processes such as this one.

The thing each of these stories has in common is the importance of perspective – and how difficult it is to see through the eyes of others or dare to change our point of view. I was going to write today about a German exhibition, but I guess that will have to wait.

 

Funny old week

There hasn’t been much time this week for posting. The return from Wittenberg landed me with a pile of work and appointments – all good and all encouraging in one way or another.

Apart from the total and unmitigated misery of Liverpool’s abysmal performance against Northampton Town – which silenced me for a couple of days simply because I couldn’t bear the mockery from my ‘friends’ – I have met great clergy, helped judge an interfaith award, read an excellent book and got up to date with correspondence of all forms.

However, I missed the 76th birthday of the great Leonard Cohen. How sad is that? If you follow the link, you get to a site from which you can download the Radio 2 documentary (in which I took part) on the 25th anniversary of Cohen’s song Hallelujah.

And my quote of the week? Terry Eagleton writing in the Preface to his wonderful and funny Reason, Faith and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate (which I will post on more fully when I get time):

Religion has wrought untold misery in human affairs. For the most part, it has been a squalid tale of bigotry, superstition, wishful thinking, and oppressive ideology. I therefore have a good deal of sympathy with its rationalist and humanist critics. But it is also the case… that most such critics buy their rejection of religion on the cheap. When it comes to the New Testament, at least, what they usually write off is a worthless caricature of the real thing, rooted in a degree of ignorance and prejudice to match religion’s own. It is as though one were to dismiss feminism on the basis of Clint Eastwood’s opinion of it.

Eagleton goes on to challenge Dawkins, Hitchens et al, but is also profoundly challenging to the Christian churches. The language he uses is very funny as he penetrates through the superficialities of much of the contemporary debate. More anon.

 

Vuvuzela and the Green memory

What I am seeing of the World Cup is not too bad so far. Germany were great, Italy got a shock, the Africans are having one massive party and the vuvuzela is driving everybody mad.

I wonder if it is the swarm-of-killer-wasp noise that put Robert Green off his mark when he let the ball through his hands for the USA’s equaliser against England?

This reminded me of the epic game back in the 1960s when Liverpool were playing their arch-rivals Leeds United at Anfield and the Leeds goalkeeper, Gary Sprake, threw the ball into his own net. The crowd erupted into a full and comprehensive (even sarcastically tuneful) rendering of Des O’Connor’s number one hit Careless Hands. It was funny, witty and spontaneous.

What is lacking from this World Cup is any spontaneity, wit or fun from the crowd. All you can hear is the relentless drone of the vuvuzelas. Pity, really (especially if you hate wasps and wonder what God was thinking of…).

 

Benitez beaten

So, the end has come.

While Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard are down in South Africa getting ready for the World Cup, Rafa Benitez gets edged out of Liverpool. Beaten he may be, but he will also go away very rich. I hope he’ll also go away with the gratitude and affection of a club for which he clearly feels great respect.

OK, some of his domestic tactics were inexplicable, some of his substitutions bizarre and some of his player purchases incomprehensible (er… Robbie Keane… er…), but he is a decent man who gained the respect of the fans when the club itself was becoming a mess. American ownership of the club has been a disaster – and must, surely, end soon – but Rafa kept the faith and stood up for his players and the fans. It is only a pity that he was the one to go instead of the owners. New ownership, new money and a different regime might have allowed him a bit longer to keep the ship afloat.

Rafa might have been distant from his players (according to rumours from the dressing room) and it might actually be in the best interests of club and manager for him to leave now. But I hope he has been able to go with dignity (as well as a shedload of money) and some satisfaction. Whatever else he did or did not achieve, he has always seemed to many of us a good, loyal, intelligent and honest man.

And I would forgive him anything for that night in Istanbul in May 2005 when his new team stole the Champions League from AC Milan and the thrashing of Manchester United last season. We hoped for more, but those two games left a sweet taste in the mouth.

Now we have to make sure we don’t lose Torres or Gerrard.