May 13, 2007

Scripture Reading: 1 Peter 5:1-6

Rev. Wayne Irwin

Thomas Cranmer,

believed by many to be

the most important figure

in the history of the Reformation in England –

the Reformation being

the great religious upheaval

in the western Christian Church

of 550 years ago, – Thomas Cranmer . . .

the man responsible for the writing

of The Book of Common Prayer . . .

still used today

in much of the Church of England.

Thomas Cranmer,

like so many of his colleagues,

died a martyr’s death . . .

because of his beliefs.

He was working in the service of the church,

teaching at Jesus College, Cambridge,

when a plague forced him to move to Essex.

And there he encountered advisors of the King.

They brought him to see Henry VIII.

And Henry, at this time,

was busy trying to divorce his first wife,

Catharine of Aragon.

And the proceedings were appearing

to be close to failure.

He was trying to get an annulment

on a technical point, from Rome.

When Cranmer suggested

that the great minds of the universities of Europe

be consulted –

in other words, the theologians of Europe,

the religious philosophers.

Those capable of questioning

the reasoning of Rome.

And it was this suggestion

that so endeared Cranmer to Henry

that he appointed him to Canterbury

as Archbishop.

He would become the King’s chief instrument

in the overthrow of the Pope’s authority

over the Church in England.

It was the birthing of the Church of England,

independent of Rome.

And it was in his station

as Archbishop of Canterbury

that Cranmer took responsibility

for the production of

The Book of Common Prayer,

the establishment of the basic structure

of the new Anglican liturgies.

All this . . . 550 years ago.

So when Henry died, Cranmer became

one of the most influential counsellors

to the next king,

who was Edward,

Edward VI, Henry’s son –

pushing the English church more and more

in the Protestant direction.

But when Edward died,

it was his half-sister, Mary, who became queen, Mary Tudor,

otherwise known as ‘Bloody Mary.’

And she was the daughter

of that first wife of Henry, Catharine.

Queen Mary, the daughter

of the woman Henry had first divorced

with the help of Cranmer.

The disgrace and unhappiness

consequently suffered by her mother

had affected Mary, deeply.

After all, it was her ‘mother’

who had been scorned.

And her mother, of course,

had raised her daughter Mary,

as a Roman Catholic.

And in ascending to the throne,

Mary was determined

to restore Catholicism to England,

and to overthrow those scoundrels

who had engineered her mother’s

removal from grace.

And Cranmer, the Archbishop,

was her chief target.

She accused him of high treason.

And he was tried, convicted, sentenced,

and imprisoned in the Tower of London.

Queen Mary was of the mind,

that because of his influence,

a change of teaching by him

would be politically more useful

than would simply doing away with him.

So she offered to spare his life

in exchange for his public statement

that what he had said he believed

was not what he truly believed.

And Cranmer, as he later said,

“for fear of death,”

signed a statement agreeing

to what the queen demanded.

He was subsequently transported

from the prison in London

to the University of Oxford,

that he might make his denunciation

of Protestant principles

in a public speech there.

St. Mary’s Church, Oxford,

was to be the venue.

And a platform was even built

to allow him greater visibility

for the masses of people

expected to be in attendance.

And on the appointed day

a great congregation did assemble,

in anticipation of hearing

this highest-ranking Protestant churchman

renounce his former testimony

and declare his allegiance to the Pope.

But it didn’t happen.

A surprise awaited them all.

For when Thomas Cranmer began to speak,

he owned that he had indeed

signed such a thing in his prison cell,

but that it had been wrung from him

‘under duress.’

Out of a human fear of death, he said,

he had signed statements

that were against his conscience.

But now, he said,

God had given him courage

to stand before the people in public,

and recant his own recantation,

and to reaffirm his belief

that the Protestant complaint

against Roman abuses

was truly faithful.

And he added:

“I know that I will now be burned at the stake;

but I no longer fear it.

And when the flames approach my body,

I will thrust in first . . . this hand

that signed that false confession.”

Thomas Cranmer.

And it happened even as he foretold.

Charged with heresy,

he was sentenced to death.

Tied to the stake in the city square,

(a bronze mark in the street

still marks the spot to this day)

and he thrust his right hand

into the flames first,

before any fire touched the rest of his body.

Thomas Cranmner,

a man whose work still lives

with great prominence in the Church –

(there are many who still love

the traditional Anglican liturgy)

created by a Christian clergyman

of a relative timid manner –

but a man who stood steadfast

to his belief that Holy Scripture

does not support a doctrine of purgatory,

or a necessity for masses for the dead,

or a need for prayers to saints.

That these things are not required.

And ultimately, Cranmer’s martyrdom

turned the tide in England

against Rome.

And what was it that enabled Cranmer

to endure to the end? . . .

It was his belief in Jesus!

He hung his life on his belief in Jesus.

Bertrand Russell,

the 20^th century British philosopher,

whose papers are archived here in Hamilton

at McMaster University –

Bertrand Russell held radical views

on religion and morality.

And stirred much controversy during his life.

And was asked

whether he would be prepared

to die for his beliefs.

Whether he’d be prepared to die

for his atheistic philosophy.

And his reply?  “Of course not.

After all, I might be wrong!”

Belief.

It’s more than abstract thinking.

More than a statement of arbitrary preference.

But the word is used a lot,

in our day-to-day conversation,

without all that much precision.

We say “I believe” when we mean “I think.”

We say “I believe” when we mean “My idea is.”

Belief is more than that.

More than . . . a thought.

More than . . . an idea.

Belief involves an action.

Belief involves the action by which

we demonstrate

our acceptance of something as true.

And belief in Jesus, then,

involves a related action that demonstrates

that there is something about Jesus

that we accept as true.

So what did Jesus believe?

According to those describing him,

Jesus believed, among other things,

that to live life best

we are to give mercy without measure,

we are to love ourselves

and especially those different from ourselves

without limits,

and that we are to forgive, and forgive,

and forgive . . . with no strings attached.

Well, to believe in Jesus

means to believe in what Jesus believed,

and thus it also means to act

in the way that Jesus acted.

So that’s why you cannot believe in Jesus

and be a violent person.

And that’s why you cannot believe in Jesus

and be a bigoted person.

And that‘s why you cannot believe in Jesus

and be an unforgiving person.

The beliefs and actions of Jesus

serve as the measuring stick

against which our beliefs and actions

can be measured.

And belief,

being not just an idea or a principle,

is lived out in the action

by which we express our belief.

It is our action

that speaks the truth about our belief.

François Gravelet:

he was the high-wire artist

who took the stage name of ‘Blondin.’

And I expect you have heard his story.

But I’ll tell it again.

It illustrates the point.

Blondin startled the world in 1859

when he made his way on his tightrope

across the gorge of Niagara Falls.

And that summer, huge crowds watched

as he performed many stunts.

He pushed a wheelbarrow across.

He carried lanterns at night.

He walked the rope blindfolded.

And once, he carried his manager,

Harry Colcort, on his back.

But his most spectacular stunt

was to carry a cook stove out onto the rope,

balance it there, light a fire in it,

and cook himself an omelette.

All the while balanced on a tightrope

above the Niagara gorge.

And what drew the crowd, of course,

was the danger –

the prospect that, maybe the next time out,

he’d fall.

So a day came

when he had pushed the wheelbarrow across;

and the crowd, panting for his blood,

began chanting his name:

“Blondin!  Blondin!”

And being the showman and the exhibitionist,

and the dare-devil that he was,

he responded

by asking a question of the crowd.

“How be,” he said,

“that I push the wheelbarrow back across, now,

. . . but with somebody in it!

Do you believe I can do it?”

So now the crowd began to chant:

“I believe!  I believe!”

And you probably know the ‘punchline.’

Looking to the nearest man

who was shouting “I believe,”

Blondin said to him, “O.K. . . . Get in!”

But the man shouting “I believe!” . . . declined.

It turned out it was one thing

to think that Blondin could do it.

It was quite something else to ‘believe’ it.

Quite something else to hang one’s life

on that belief.

And that’s what believing in Jesus is.

It is the hanging of your life . . . on him.

Not just intellectually affirming

that he lived a life

and that he taught some important principles.

No, believing in Jesus

is hanging your life out there, over the gorge,

and trusting completely

that the way of Jesus is truly the Way of Life –

of life as God intends it,

of life at its ultimate best.

Trusting . . . that what Jesus symbolizes

about life

is truly ‘the Secret’ to life in its fullest form.

Now you may or may not believe

that Jesus was an historical figure.

Some do.  Some don’t.

It doesn’t matter.

Either way, Jesus symbolizes a timeless reality

of the incarnation,

a timeless presence

of the aspect of the Divine Mystery,

we call God,

that resides within existence.

And ‘believing in Jesus,’ at its core,

means believing that what Jesus represents

is as good as it gets,

and is sufficient inspiration

for every exigency of human life . . .

even of our own personal experience of life.

Now, I believe in Jesus.

But compare Mother Theresa

and Imelda Marcos –

both iconic figures –

also both professing to believe in Jesus.

But the one a symbol of self-sacrifice.

and the other a symbol of self-indulgence.

So to which one do we look

for a contemporary reflection

of the truth of Jesus?

Of the two, which one incarnates the Christ?

It’s obvious, really, isn’t it.

Our Scripture Reading today

in the First Letter of John,

spells it out quite clearly:

Verse 1:

“Everyone who believes

that Jesus is the Christ . . .

(in other words . . . everyone who believes

that Jesus incarnates

the presence of the God of Love in this world).

 . . . whoever believes that . . .

has been born of God. . .”

Which is to say

whoever believes that,

whoever hangs their life on that

shows themself to be a true child of God . . .”

True offspring

of the Divine Transcendent Loving Initiative.

A carrier of the divine “Genes of Goodness.”

And verse 5:

“Who is it that conquers the world,

but the one who believes . . .

that Jesus is . . . the Son of God?

Who is it that overcomes

everything the world can throw at him, at her?

It is the one who believes

that Jesus is as the firstborn child in the family,

the older brother,

and the one who models

for the rest of us . . . in the family

how we are to behave.”

The writer of First John

goes on to conclude

that the eternal life, the spiritual life,

of which we have all become aware,

has it’s origin and has its focus,

and has its energizing force

in the very Spirit that indwelt Jesus,

the actual Spirit of God.

And today particularly,

as we here in Centenary

reflect on the love of Mother,

and reflect on the love of family,

recognizing it as a divine presence

that is unconditional and unending,

without regard to our behaviour

or to our response –

we remember together

that that love. . . that life . . .

even in the experience of the unbelieving . . .

has its source in Christ . . .

has its source

in the aspect of God,

in the Love that exists within creation.

And whoever of us hangs our life

on the trust that God is with us

and that God loves us as a Perfect Parent does,

we receive the full benefit

of the subsequent grace

that we name with the name of . . . “Peace.”

The Peace Jesus spoke of,

that is beyond understanding.

That is the Peace

that enables a Thomas Cranmer

to proceed to his death

with his head held high

and with his right hand ready

to thrust into the flame.

Says Jesus to his disciples (John 14)

and thus to all of us who believe in him:

“You believe in God . . . believe also in me.

My peace I give to you.

A peace the world cannot give.

Let not your heart be troubled,

and do not let it be afraid.”

Amen.