There was a time when governments might have been more subtle about cutting support for disabled people in order to spend more money on weapons. Keir Starmer’s government are not even trying to frame it differently. They’re celebrating their increase in “defence” spending at the same time as they’re boasting about making disability-related benefits even harder to claim.
This bizarre decision reveals a class-based clash over what terms such as “security” and “defence” refer to.
For some people, these terms are simply about preparations for war. Indeed, even some opponents of increased military spending have fallen for the euphemism and talk about “defence” expenditure. But if you’re queueing at a food bank, unable to access mental health support or facing discrimination when applying for jobs, then security means much more than not facing a Russian invasion.
As your livelihood is snatched away, are you meant to rejoice that at least you’re being harmed by Keir Starmer rather than Vladimir Putin? As you shiver in the cold because you can no longer afford heating bills, should you celebrate at the thought you’re being impoverished and frozen by rich people in London instead of rich people in Moscow?
The expenditure on weapons seems to be based on the unquestioned assumptions that violence makes us safe and that spending more on violence makes it more effective. In reality, the combined military spending of NATO governments has been much higher than Russia’s for years. This failed to deter Putin’s vile invasion of Ukraine. I have yet to hear a journalist ask Keir Starmer why he thinks that throwing even more money at the military will somehow deter Putin when that has failed to work up until now.
Meanwhile, US troops whose Commander-in-Chief is Donald Trump are stationed at various bases around the UK. There is almost no media discussion of the presence of the troops of a dangerously erratic far-right regime in Britain.
Sadly, many of the opponents of benefit cuts seem unwilling to criticise military spending levels.
Thankfully, however lots of them have clearly framed the cuts as a political choice and presented meaningful taxation of the super-rich as an alternative. This is a message that can really hit home and that we need to keep repeating: the government is choosing to cut support for some of the poorest and most disadvantaged people in the UK rather than take even slightly more from the millionaires. They are taking millions from people with nothing, and nothing from people with millions.
Ministers are benefitting from misunderstandings that they seem happy not to correct. Anyone with an even basic knowledge of disability benefits knows that Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is not an out-of-work benefit. It is to help with the extra costs of being disabled. Many recipients of it are already in work. For some, cutting this benefit will make it harder for them to work. For example, it can help with costs of transport or assistance that may for some disabled people be more expensive but which enable them to get to work. The number of disabled people in work will not go up if PIP is cut. In reality, it will almost certainly go down.
Yet someone casually glancing at the media would easily get the impression that PIP is given only to disabled people who don’t work. I can hardly blame people for thinking this, given the way it is often presented. But I can blame the ministers and right-wing journalists who know very well that this assumption is factually untrue, yet seem happy to benefit from it all the same.
Even if a minister somehow misguidedly believes in the benefit cuts that they are proposing, nothing can excuse their willingness to benefit from the lies, half-truths and uncorrected misconceptions that are being used to encourage support for their cuts. There has been a spate of stories in newspapers such as the Daily Mail demonising disabled people. Such stories are only going to get worse and more numerous in the coming days and weeks. Ministers are able to gain support for their agenda at the cost of encouraging prejudice and hatred of a large group of people.
Anyone who thinks that PIP is too easy to obtain has almost certainly never gone through the process of applying for it, or supporting someone who has. Having supported friends to apply for PIP, I find myself thinking that anyone who manages to complete the contorted and degrading application process in the midst of mental ill-health should be given a medal and celebrated as a hero, let alone getting a benefit.
While the government may have decided that they will cope without the support of people who receive PIP, they may have overlooked the reality that a significant percentage of the population know somebody who receives PIP (or other disability-related benefits). They thus know that these lies are not true. And the message “tax the rich instead of cutting things for the poor” is a straightforward proposal that is simple as well as realistic. Thus I am not convinced that austerity and attacks on disabled people will work as well for this government as they did for the Cameron-Clegg cabinet 15 years ago.
Groups such as Disabled People Against Cuts (DPAC) have done great things in the last 15 years in challenging austerity. I’m now planning to contact them and similar campaigns to find out what I can do to join the resistance to Starmer’s evil policy.
It is a long time since I voted Labour. While I tend to vote Green, I have tended to hold out the possibility that I could vote Labour in certain circumstances in the future. But now we have a Labour government with a domestic economic policy worse than anything that I can remember even Tony Blair doing. They are demonising and impoverishing disabled people, including people with mental health problems, while increasing military spending and letting the rich off the hook.
I will never vote Labour again. I would rather saw off my own arm. Although I dare say that Starmer’s new friends in the Daily Mail would accuse me of only sawing it off in order to gain benefits – and then they would deny them to me anyway.
I wrote the following article for Premier Christianity, who published it on their website on Thursday 13th March 2024. As I was writing for a Christian audience I focused on the faith that I share with them, although (as I hope all my writing makes clear), I believe passionately in working alongside people of many faiths and none.
Two and a half years after I was put in the back of a police van, my hands cuffed behind my back, Thames Valley Police have admitted that I was unlawfully arrested.
I am acutely aware that most people who are wrongly arrested receive little or no publicity and are not in a position to take legal action against the police.
I was able to take legal action only because of Liberty, whose excellent lawyers advised and represented me. I was helped, practically and emotionally, by a wide range of friends, comrades and strangers. They included fellow Christians, along with people of other faiths and of none.
I remained silent as the High Sheriff of Oxfordshire read out expressions of grief for Elizabeth Windsor. But then he declared Charles to be our king, stating that we owe him “obedience”. I had just been in church, celebrating King Jesus. Unlike earthly kings, Jesus calls us to choose to follow him. He does not demand our obedience based on accidents of birth.
I find it hard to stomach the description of Charles Windsor as our “rightful liege lord”. To me, it seems to be demeaning to God’s image to expect one sinful human being to bow down to another.
I called out: “Who elected him?”
A couple of people told me to shut up. I said that a head of state was being imposed on us without our consent.
I might well have left it there. But three security guards came over and told me to be quiet. When I asserted my right to speak, they began to push me backwards.
The police intervened – not to arrest the security guards for assaulting me, but to arrest me. I was led away and handcuffed.
I will forever be grateful for two complete strangers who followed us down the road, asking the police why they were arresting me. They said that while they didn’t agree with my opinion, they thought Britain was a “free country.”
Several other people were arrested around the same time, for similarly minor acts of dissent. A woman in Edinburgh who prefers to remain anonymous was arrested while peacefully holding a republican placard.
Three months later, I was charged with breaking the Public Order Act 1986 through behaviour likely to cause “harassment, alarm or distress.” I had not harassed, threatened or insulted anybody. Two weeks later, the Crown Prosecution Service dropped the charges, saying there was little prospect of conviction.
After my arrest, I was taken aback by the level of media interest. I received hundreds of supportive messages, dozens of abusive ones and a few death threats. I have also heard from many other people who had been wrongly arrested.
Anti-protest legislation introduced by the Conservative government – which Labour has failed to repeal – has been used against non-violent anti-war and climate campaigners. But it is not only legislation that is the problem, but the culture within the police force.
I have lost count of the number of times I have attended protests at which Black and Asian people are the first to be questioned or arrested. Police ignorance about free expression has been highlighted by clumsy attempts to enforce buffer zones where abortions take place. While it is reasonable to prevent intimidation or aggression, this should not be confused with quiet and respectful praying.
Meanwhile, various celebrities claim that they are being “cancelled” when voluntary organisations such as Students’ Unions decide not to invite them to speak.
But it is not the rich and powerful whose free speech is threatened. Free speech is at risk in the UK because police are arresting people for nonviolent protest and expressing their opinion. Unlike Vance and the supposedly “cancelled” celebrities, most have limited power to do much about it.
As Christians we believe that all people have value and worth, and that Christ died for us all. The voice and dignity of one person is as valuable as those of any other. Called to love our neighbours – whatever their faith or lack of it – we cannot call for our rights to be respected without recognising the rights of others.
This is why I urge all Christians to uphold freedom of expression and principles of equality. This means urging Keir Starmer’s government to repeal the anti-protest laws that Tory ministers put in place. It also means calling for a major overhaul of policing.
In calling for our rights to freedom of speech, we are asserting the value, dignity and equality of every human being, made in the very image of God.
I wrote the following article for the Morning Star, who published it in today’s issue (11th March 2025).
Two and a half years after throwing me in the back of a police van for opposing the monarchy, Thames Valley Police have admitted that I was wrongfully arrested.
I am pleased and relieved of course. But I am also acutely aware that most people who are unlawfully arrested receive little or no publicity and are not in a position to take legal action against the police.
I was able to do so only because of Liberty, whose excellent lawyers advised and represented me. I was helped, practically and emotionally, by a wide range of friends, comrades and strangers.
But this is not about me. It never was.
It is about the rights of all people to speak out, to express themselves, to challenge the powerful, to refuse to bow down, to assert the dignity and equality of all humans.
Leaving church in September 2022, I found myself amid crowds of people trying to negotiate their way around town despite roads being closed for a ceremony declaring Charles Windsor to be king.
I remained silent as the High Sheriff of Oxfordshire read out expressions of grief for Elizabeth Windsor.
But then he declared Charles to be our king and “rightful liege lord.” I called out “Who elected him?”
A couple of people told me to shut up. I said that a head of state was being imposed without our consent.
I might well have left it there. But three security guards came over and told me to be quiet. With no sense of irony, they stood menacingly right in front of me and said they were asking me “nicely” not to express my views.
When I asserted my right to speak, they began to push me backwards. I briefly feared that I would be knocked over.
The police intervened — not to arrest the security guards for assaulting me, but to arrest me for expressing my views. I was forcibly led away and handcuffed.
I will forever be grateful for two people — complete strangers to me — who followed us down the road. They repeatedly asked the police why I was being arrested. They said they didn’t agree with me but they thought Britain was a “free country.”
The police contradicted themselves several times about which law I had been arrested under.
I was called back for a police interview and told that one of the security guards had alleged that I had assaulted him. This was a reversal of the truth.
Three months after my arrest, I was charged with breaking the Public Order Act 1986 through behaviour likely to cause “harassment, alarm or distress.”
Two weeks later, the Crown Prosecution Service dropped the charges, saying there was little prospect of conviction.
On the same day that I was arrested, a 22-year-old woman in Edinburgh — who has preferred to remain anonymous — was arrested while peacefully holding an anti-monarchy placard. Shortly afterwards, Paul Powlesland was threatened with arrest in London if he wrote “not my king” on a piece of paper.
When it came to the coronation, Graham Smith and other staff at Republic were arrested as they arrived to set up for a lawful demonstration. The police used powers that had been rushed into law less than a week earlier.
After my arrest, I was taken aback by the level of media interest. I received hundreds of supportive messages, dozens of abusive messages and a few death threats. Andrew Schraeder, a Conservative councillor in Basildon, tweeted that I should be sent to the Tower of London.
I also heard from many other people who had been wrongly arrested, or otherwise mistreated by the police, who had received far less publicity than me.
Several anti-monarchists were arrested at the royal wedding in 2011. We all know how anti-protest legislation has been used against nonviolent anti-war and climate campaigners. And I have lost count of the number of protests I have attended in which black and Asian people have been the first to be questioned or arrested.
Certain cases of appalling police behaviour at least make the news, such as the vile police assault on a vigil mourning Sarah Everard in 2021. At other times, police behaviour receives little attention. A homeless woman in Oxford told me of how she had been beaten up in the back of a police van. She did not, of course, have the resources to take legal action.
Yet it is rightwingers — including some on the extreme right — who misleadingly present themselves as defenders of free speech.
This claim reached the heights of absurdity when JD Vance criticised Britain for a lack of free speech, with an outrageous lie about people in Scotland being prevented from praying in their homes.
Similar claims about the suppression of free speech are made by Nigel Farage — a far-right multimillionaire who receives excessive media coverage in inverse proportion to the coherence of his arguments.
Far-right types on social media claim to be upholding “free speech” when they want an excuse to peddle racism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia and other doctrines that demonise their fellow human beings.
Meanwhile, various celebrities claim that they are being “cancelled” when voluntary organisations such as students’ unions decide not to invite them to speak.
Vance, Farage and their gang do not of course mention the arrests of peaceful people resisting war, monarchy or climate change. The excessive prison sentences for Just Stop Oil and Palestine Action campaigners receive no criticism from them.
It is not the rich and powerful whose free speech is threatened. Free speech is under threat in Britain because police are arresting and charging people for nonviolent protest and the expression of opinions. Unlike Vance and Farage, most people have limited power to do much about it.
But as every socialist and trade unionist knows, we all have more power when we act together. Now is a vital time for the left to seize the narrative and take back the cause of free speech from the hatemongers.
In demanding our rights to freedom of speech, we assert the reality that we have equal value to the kings, presidents, generals and billionaires who are so keen to be heard while expecting the rest of us to shut up. Let’s make sure they know that shutting up is the last thing we will be doing.
I owe many, many thanks to the friends, comrades and strangers who have encouraged and supported me through the bizarrely confusing process of taking legal action against the police. In particular, I am grateful to Katy Watts and her colleagues at Liberty, who have done such an excellent job of advising and representing me. I could not afford to take legal action on my own. I have been able to do this only because of the support of Liberty.
However, I am very conscious that most people who are wrongly arrested are not able to take legal action or even to gain publicity for what has happened.
This is not just about me. It never has been. It is about the rights of all people to dissent, to express their views, to refuse to bow down, to assert the dignity and equality of all human beings.
With the vague anti-protest laws as they are, anybody could face arrest for expressing an opinion in a public space. The law must be changed and the police must be held to account.
If you want to know more about my case, there are more details in various media reports, such as this one from the Independent. I gave slightly longer interviews to the Big Issue and Byline Times.
But I am really sad to see that they have undermined their own argument with their comments about the increase in military spending that the aid cuts are going to fund. Not only have they failed to challenge the military spending increase, they have also bought into misleading militaristic myths that equate “defence” with preparations for war.
The leaders of the Church of Scotland, Methodist Church, Baptist Union of Great Britain (of which I am part) and the United Reformed Church have produced a statement that rightly condemns the aid cuts and points out some of the horrifying consequences that can be expected to follow. However, they declared:
“While there is a case to be made for increasing defence spending to support Ukraine in resisting Russian aggression, that shouldn’t come at the cost of vital humanitarian and development programmes, which play a crucial role in promoting human security around the world.“
While not quite expressing support for the military spending increase, the church leaders have explicitly stated their acceptance of an argument for doing so.
While politicians are tripping over each other in their enthusiasm for increasing military spending, few if any of them have made any attempt to explain how this will defend us. NATO’s massive military budget did not deter Putin’s vile invasion of Ukraine. Given that the combined military budget of NATO countries is much higher than Russia’s, it’s entirely unclear how increasing it further is expected to deter Putin now.
The wording of the churches’ statement implicitly accepts the notion that military spending is about deterring Russian aggression. In reality, much of the UK’s military budget is spent on supporting military aggression, such as through the provision of military training to Saudi Arabia and Israel, whose forces are killing civilians in Yemen & Palestine.
Meanwhile, the UK military is closely linked with the US military, with US troops stationed at various bases in the UK. Those troops are now Trump’s troops: they have a Commander-in-Chief who is a far-right despot. The UK government’s “independent” nuclear weapons system is in reality depending on US technology to operate. Morally, I cannot see how funding a military that is linked to Trump’s forces is any better than funding a military linked to Putin.
Most of all, I am dismayed that the church leaders undermined their criticism of aid cuts by going along with the use of “defence” as a euphemism for war and preparations for war. Five years ago, the Covid pandemic came as a deadly reminder that weapons cannot make us safe from many of the threats that humanity faces. Spending on defence should mean spending on things that keep us safe in a variety of ways and protect us from all sorts of threats: poverty, pandemics and climate change, as well as war. The aid budget is an aspect of defence.
I am pleased that church leaders pointed out the role that humanitarian programmes play in human security. However, military expenditure and aid expenditure symbolise two very different views on what security really means. These church leaders are right to condemn cuts to the aid budget, but on the wider issue of building a safer world, they are sadly sitting on the fence.
This morning (Sunday 16th February 2025) I preached at Sherbourne Community Church in Coventry. I was very pleased to be asked to do so. Below is the text of my sermon.
To be clear: this is the text I wrote beforehand but in practice I deviated from the wording at times and added in a couple of extra comments. But the substance is the same.
The sermon followed two Bible readings, and focused particularly on the first one:
“Blessed are you who are poor… woe to you who are rich”. These are striking words from Jesus in the passage we’ve just heard. I’m sure many of us have heard this passage before. Some of you, however, may be more familiar with a similar passage in Matthew Chapter 5, at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount, in which Jesus blesses “the poor in spirit”. Luke’s version is sometimes known as the Sermon on the Plain. In Luke, we get blessings for the poor, the hungry, the suffering, the persecuted – followed by woes for their opposites.
But what does Jesus mean by poor and rich? Are you rich or are you poor? I am going to resist the temptation to ask for a show of hands. Now I don’t know anything about the financial circumstances of anyone here. I don’t want to make assumptions. I suspect that many of us would not necessarily describe ourselves as rich or poor. Some of us might say that we are not poor compared to many people in certain other parts of the world. It may be that many of us would say we’re not poor compared to many other people here in Britain. I suspect that most of us are not millionaires or billionaires either. We are not the people who run the world. So it can be difficult to fit ourselves into these categories.
But we cannot get away from the fact that we live in a deeply divided and unequal world. According to Oxfam, the richest four individuals in the UK own as much as the poorest 20 million people in the UK. That’s nearly a third of the population, owning as much as four people. You don’t need me to tell you that internationally, the inequality is even greater.
I suspect it’s likely that most of Jesus’ original listeners would have recognised themselves as poor, perhaps as hungry. It is widely noted by historians that this was a society in which many people were struggling to make ends meet. Roman rule hadn’t made things any easier.
Jesus lived in the Roman Empire, in which the emperor’s wealth and power were seen as an indication of his divine status. And in many other cultures also, it has been assumed that the rich and powerful are blessed by God. Despite Jesus’ teaching, Christians are not immune from this attitude. Following Donald Trump’s election victory, there were Christians in the US saying that Trump had survived the recent assassination attempt because God had chosen him to lead America. Some of them are giving thanks for the role played by Elon Musk, the richest person in the world. Meanwhile, Patriarch Kirill, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, says that God has blessed the rule of Vladimir Putin.
To declare that God has blessed the rich and powerful is the opposite of what we see Jesus teaching here!
You’re not alone if you find yourself struggling with this passage, or finding it uncomfortable. Jesus is proclaiming good news, while appearing to side with some people against others.
So let’s have a look at precisely what he says.
Firstly, what does Jesus mean by “blessed”?
The Greek word translated “blessed” – Μακάριοι – is sometimes translated as “happy” or “fortunate”. At least one translation uses the word “congratulations”: “Congratulations to you who are poor!… Congratulations to you who are hungry!”.
But how would that have sounded to someone who had just turned up to hear Jesus? If you’re poor or hungry or weeping, do you want to hear someone congratulating you for it? It sounds absurd. It’s bordering on being insulting. But I don’t think Jesus is saying that it’s a good thing to be poor, or hungry, or suffering, or persecuted. Jesus’ comments make sense when we realise he’s talking about something that is going to change. “Blessed are you who are hungry, for you will be filled. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.” You are blessed because things are going to change! This is good news!
Well, it’s good news for the poor and hungry people who turned up to hear Jesus. But what about the woes? Is Jesus proclaiming bad news to the rich?
A woe is not a curse. Jesus did not curse the rich. “Woe” is a warning or an exclamation of alarm. It’s like saying “Oh, no!” or “How terrible!”. I came across a commentator from the US who suggested translating it as “Yikes”: “Yikes for the rich!”.
Jesus is saying “Congratulations to the poor… But how horrible thing are for the rich!”. On some level, it makes no sense at all. Who congratulates people who are suffering and commiserates with the successful? Again, I don’t think that Jesus is saying that poverty, hunger and suffering are good things. Rather, he is lifting the lid on the reality of the world. It is the poor who will succeed in the end, while the apparently successful will discover the poverty of their notion of success.
Jesus is siding with the poor, the hungry, the suffering and the persecuted. He doesn’t say “Blessed are you who weep, as long as you believe in all the same things as me”. He doesn’t say “Blessed are you who are poor, as long as you have tried to help yourselves and are not feckless”.
Jesus is on the side of people who are suffering because they are suffering. He says that those who are poor and suffering are blessed – because things are going to change.
Reading Jesus’ words in the gospels, we find that Jesus talked about wealth and poverty more than about any other topic. Throughout Christian history some people have found this uncomfortable. We all face the danger of picking out the interpretation that we like the most, or that challenge us the least. People who are comfortable with the status quo have found reasons to downplay Jesus’ comments and predictions about wealth and poverty.
Some argue that when Jesus talked about such things, he was referring to spiritual poverty and spiritual riches. Now of course Jesus frequently used metaphors. And many of his teachings are relevant to spiritual poverty and spiritual riches. But Jesus contrasted spiritual riches with earthly riches: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth,” says Jesus in Matthew 6. “But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven… For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
Given that Jesus spoke about wealth and poverty more than about any other topic, I find it hard to believe that all his comments on the subject were intended metaphorically. Surely the hungry people who turned up to hear Jesus in first-century Palestine would have taken him to mean material hunger.
Others argue that when Jesus tells his audience that “you will be filled” and “you will laugh”, he is simply talking about what will happen to them beyond the grave. It’s a promise of pie in the sky when you die. But the gospel is good news in this world as well as in the next. In the second reading earlier, we heard Paul’s passionate words to the Corinthians, insisting that the dead are raised because Christ was raised. If Jesus was not raised, he says, then our faith is futile! The resurrection is a world-transforming reality. It changes our lives. The Roman Empire thought they could execute a troublemaking Jewish peasant. But God sides with the poor and oppressed, not with empire and oppression. So the troublemaking Jewish peasant rose from the dead and the powers of this world are put on notice that their days are numbered. Sin and death may look strong, but the resurrection reveals that love and life will ultimately triumph.
The change that comes with resurrection cannot simply be put off until we die! Resurrection means that the dead are raised and that the living can live differently – whether individually or collectively. It also allows us to look at the effects of our actions beyond the time of our own lives. Jesus’ resurrection makes the world’s transformation possible.
We could get very hung up on definitions, worrying about whether we as individuals are poor or rich, or how we fit into Jesus’ categories in this passage. But I don’t think that’s the best use of our energy. Jesus is not calling us to go hungry or make ourselves suffer for the sake of it, but to take the side of those who are.
If we take sides with somebody, does that mean we will have to take sides against somebody? Well, yes – but Jesus shows us a different way of doing so. If we read on beyond the passage we heard today, we will find that immediately after announcing the blessings and woes, Jesus says we should love our enemies! It is love of enemies that makes it possible for us to take sides while recognising that the Gospel is good news for all people.
I would like to share a personal experience with you. Just over 12 years ago, I stood and watched a man staring into space. His wife was nearby, crying. His children were nearby, also crying. But the man didn’t go to help them or comfort them. He just stood there, staring into space.
It wasn’t because he didn’t care about his wife and his children. It was because he was in a state of severe shock. His house had just been bulldozed down.
I was in the West Bank, in Palestine. Many Palestinians build houses without official permits, because it is almost impossible for them to gain a permit from the Israeli authorities. The house may be left standing for years. But at some apparently arbitrary moment, the authorities will turn up with a bulldozer, the residents will be given half an hour to remove all their possessions, and the house will be destroyed.
I stood there, alongside this family, the other journalists who were with me, the family’s neighbours and an Israeli human activist, an Orthodox Jew, who travelled to the sites of such demolitions to show solidarity with Palestinians who had lost their homes.
Many positions can be taken on who is to blame for the conflicts and atrocities in Israel and Palestine. But as I stood there, it struck me that not by any political argument, not by any distortion of religion or any analysis of history, could those two small children be held responsible for what had befallen them.
In all the discussions I had heard around Israel and Palestine, there had been a lot of talk of sides. On the Israeli side, on the Palestinian side, on this or that side. On that day, I realised whose side I was on – or whose side I wanted to be on. I wanted to be on the side of children who had nowhere to sleep tonight. I wanted to be on their side, not because of their nationality, not because of their religion, not because of how they fitted into this or that argument about the situation, but because of their needs. I wanted to be on the side of the victims and not the perpetrators of injustice.
Of course, distinguishing victims and perpetrators may not always be so easy. Political situations and international conflicts are complex and morally confusing, to say the least. But if we take Jesus’ words seriously, we must not use this complexity as an excuse to avoid getting involved. As Desmond Tutu said, if an elephant is standing on a mouse’s tail, and you say you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.
I wanted to side with those children whose house had been destroyed – but I am not called to hate, or dehumanise, or harm, or kill, those who destroyed it or those who ordered them to do so. I am not better than them. Later in Luke’s Gospel we read of Zacchaeus, a wealthy and corrupt man who encountered Jesus. Zacchaeus gave away half his wealth to the poor and repaid four times over the people he had defrauded. Zacchaeus recognised that Jesus’ message was good news for him too – and his repentance brought him joy.
So when will the hungry be filled and when will the people who are weeping laugh? While the Kingdom of God can only reach it fulfilment with the return of Jesus, the New Testament makes clear that the Kingdom of God is constantly breaking into our world. When people are fed, when love appears, when injustice is challenged and kindness triumphs over cruelty, the Kingdom of God is breaking in. And while we differ from each other in some of our political views and understandings, I suggest that all Christians are called to take sides with people who are poor, people who are marginalised, people who are oppressed. Even when a cause seems hopeless, the reality of the resurrection gives us hope. It can be hard to believe it in the darkest times, but as Martin Luther King put it, the moral arc of the universe bends towards justice.
I know that many of you are already doing amazing things to show solidarity with people who are suffering, to alleviate suffering and to tackle the causes of suffering. We can be successful in such things only by trusting in the power of God, revealed in the resurrection of Christ, and not in any power of our own. As Christians we believe in life after death, and in life before death. And that is good news.
The General Synod of the Church of England have raised their weapons, taken aim and shot themselves in their collective feet.
They voted yesterday to improve the Church’s safeguarding procedures, handing parts of the process over to an independent body.
This in itself is a good thing. It’s an improvement on the current situation, and there’s no doubt that many grassroots Anglicans are working hard to prioritise safeguarding (even if others are not).
But what they have voted for is less than what we were led to expect.
Faced with two options for improving safeguarding, the Synod voted for the weaker option (“Model 3”). The proposal to fully hand over safeguarding to an independent body (“Model 4”) was not passed.
Some who voted for the partial measure had understandable reasons for doing so. As the Church Times reports, there were fears that full independence would take too long to implement, leading some to suggest that partial independence would be a better option as it would get things changing more quickly.
This seems to me to miss the point that the Church of England must act far more quickly than it has usually done in the past. Moving at their usual speed should not be an option, whatever the details of new systems and procedures.
At least as important as the new procedures themselves is the message that was sent, however inadvertently, to victims, survivors and the public in general. Most survivors who were involved in the issue were calling clearly for fully independent safeguarding to be introduced.
To choose the weaker of two alternative systems is not only – as the journalist and anti-abuse campaigner Andrew Graystone put it – a “punch in the gut” for victims of survivors of church-based sexual abuse. As Joanne Grenfell, Bishop of Stepney and lead bishop for safeguarding, said after the vote, “The Church has missed a huge opportunity to send a message to victims and survivors that we hear their concerns about trust and confidence.”
This is another step in turning large chunks of the British population away from churches.
The abuse crises are not affecting the Church of England only. Those of us in other churches have no right to complacency. This is not only because of our own safeguarding failings but because much of the public no longer distinguish between one Christian denomination and another. Far fewer people know about the distinctions between churches than was once the case (and why should we expect them to?).
Today, the General Synod have reaffirmed in many people’s minds the impression that Christian churches are not on the side of victims.
This is utterly contrary to the teachings of Jesus, who sided with the poor, the marginalised and other victims of injustice and kept his harshest words for the rich and powerful and religious leaders.
He said we should love our enemies. He did not say that the perpetrators of injustice should not be our enemies.
There is an alternative for churches in the UK now. Radical changes to safeguarding systems should be only a starting-point.
Beyond this, we could address the cultural and structural problems that lead to abuse. As Jonathan Gibbs, the Bishop of Rochester, pointed out in yesterday’s debate, the recent abuse crises in the Church of England were due to less to poor procedures and more to a culture whose workings are “so supple and so powerful that at times we don’t even realise it is happening”.
We could ask God to guide us in the painful and challenging work of changing the culture of our churches, overhauling our power structures, centring the voices of victims and affirming our solidarity with the people with the least power. We could signify our repentance by voluntarily giving up our privileges, such as opt-outs for faith schools and bishops in the House of Lords. We could show our willingness to stand in solidarity with people of all faiths and none as we recognise our own failings and stand against abuse, injustice and sin.
The Church of England’s General Synod have indicated now that they have not even reached the starting-point.
Last Sunday (29th December 2024) I preached at Sherbourne Community Church in Coventry. I was very pleased to be asked to do so. They made me very welcome. Below is the text of my sermon.
To be clear: this is the text I wrote beforehand but in practice I deviated from the wording at times and added in a couple of extra comments. But the substance is the same.
The sermon followed two Bible readings, and focused particularly on the first one:
At Christmas time, I’m sure many of us tend to think about memories of childhood Christmasses. As a child in primary school, I assumed that large swathes of the Bible were taken up with accounts of the birth of Jesus. Christmas seemed such a dominant event. Later, when I learnt more of the structure of the Bible and became aware that there were four gospels, I still imagined that a sizeable portion of each gospel must be focused on the nativity.
So it was a surprise to me as a teenager to discover that two of the gospels – Mark and John – don’t even mention Jesus’ birth. The other two – Matthew and Luke – give only a small portion of their story to it.
Other than the nativity narratives, this is the only story about Jesus’ childhood that has made it into the Bible. In the second and third centuries, a number of writings claimed to tell the stories of Jesus’ childhood, but most of these were written long after the gospels that we have in our Bibles. So this very short story is quite exceptional.
I think it’s quite a strange story. Sometimes, if we’re familiar with a story, we can get so used to it that we forget how strange it would sound to someone hearing it for the first time. I’m not a parent, but I have sometimes had responsibility for children as an uncle and a godfather. I think you’d all be a bit alarmed if I told you that I had lost my goddaughter on a trip to London and had searched for three days before finding her in Westminster Abbey, discussing theology with the Bishop of London.
As we listened to this passage earlier, we heard that Jesus’ parents had been travelling home from Jerusalem for a day before they realised he wasn’t with them. You might find this surprising. Indeed, you might look at it and say, “A day! How did they go a day before noticing he wasn’t there? What extraordinarily unobservant parents!”
If we react like that, it’s because we’re making assumptions based on our own culture. Today, a child is the responsibility of their parents. They need to know where they are. But Jesus’ culture was a culture of extended families. The care of children was much more widely shared than it is now. With members of an extended family travelling together – possibly with other families – it is very likely that Mary and Joseph simply assumed that Jesus was with other relatives as they all travelled together in large groups. It must have been a shock to them to realise he wasn’t with any of them.
We can only imagine their fears, worries and possible panic as they searched for days before finding Jesus in the Temple. It’s understandable if we find ourselves a bit annoyed with Jesus at this point: surely he was old enough to realise his parents would be worried?
I suspect that is not the question that concerned Luke. The gospel-writer is interested in showing us that Jesus prioritised God’s ways over human ways and could discuss important issues. A number of scholars suggest that Luke’s was following a practice common in the life-stories of Roman emperors and other powerful figures in Greco-Roman society. Caesar Augustus, who was Roman Emperor at the time of Jesus’ birth, is said to have delivered an intellectual speech at the age of 12. Perhaps Luke is telling us that this Jewish peasant, Jesus, who began his life in a smelly room full of animals could be a match for the ruler of the Roman Empire.
Indeed, many of the titles that the New Testament gives to Jesus – king, saviour, son of God – were also titles used for Roman emperors. The gospels challenge the empire’s whole notion of what it means to be a king, saviour or god.
I’m struck by Luke’s wording towards the end of the story. He says that afterwards Jesus went to Nazareth with his parents “and was obedient to them”. The word that stands out to me is “obedient”. Jesus doesn’t seem to have been very obedient when he left his parents to go and chat in the Temple. Perhaps Luke is keen to encourage us not to think of Jesus as disobedient and to emphasise that after this point he obeyed his parents.
But I can’t help thinking that if Jesus had behaved like a model obedient child, he would never have gone back to the Temple at all. Jesus was not the model of an obedient child. Despite this, some people have clearly put quite a lot of effort into using – or misusing – Christian teaching as a way of controlling children – and indeed adults. It seems to me that this tendency is especially strong at Christmas.
Take Cecil Frances Alexander, the writer of Once in Royal David’s City. She tells us in Verse 3 of the carol that Jesus was obedient to his mother. The lyrics then declare, “Christian children all must be/ Mild, obedient, good as he”.
Well, if children are to follow Jesus’ example, should they leave their parents and wander off to debate theology? That’s probably not what Cecil Frances Alexander had in mind when she wrote the hymn. The other hymns that she wrote include All Things Bright and Beautiful, which originally contained the verse ‘The rich man in his castle/ The poor man at his gate/ God made them, high and lowly/ He ordered their estate.” Thankfully that verse is now generally missed out. But it’s clear that for Cecil Frances Alexander, God is a god a who has created and blessed the social order, a god of order, obedience, hierarchy and control.
Don’t worry! I’m not suggesting that God wants children to just randomly ignore their parents or disobey their parents. But I am worried when we give the impression that Christianity is all about following rules and doing what you’re told. As Christians, and particularly as Protestants, we celebrate a God who saves us by grace because God loves us, not through any goodness of our own. We are not saved through obedience. We are not saved through rules. We are not saved because of our actions or because we’re somehow better than others. Salvation comes through God’s grace – God’s unmerited favour, flowing out of God’s love for us. We cannot earn God’s love. We cannot earn God’s forgiveness. We seek to do good in gratitude for God’s love and because we want to follow his way – not because God’s love can be earned.
Earlier, we heard those words from Colossians: “Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.” It is love, not obedience, that saves us.
What has this to do with Christmas? As a child, I found that stories and songs around Christmas time were dominated by two individuals. One was Jesus. The other was Father Christmas. Unfortunately, I think I had a tendency to confuse their characteristics with each other.
Sometimes, Father Christmas is a friendly, cuddly figure, part of a nice, entertaining story to tell children. But he can also be misused. I remember a few years ago sitting at a café in December and gradually becoming aware of the conversation at the next table. A woman was telling her grandson that if he didn’t finish his dinner then Father Christmas might not bring him any presents. How would Father Christmas know, asked the child? He’s outside watching you, said the grandmother; I can see him through the window. The child spun round, trying to catch a glimpse of Santa through the window behind him. “You can’t see him,” said his grandmother. “Only I can see him.”
Thankfully, I restrained myself form leaning over and saying, “Well, that’s convenient, isn’t it?”
Even Santa Claus can be turned from a nice story for children into a means of control. The cheerful tune of Santa Claus Is Coming To Town might distract us from the lyrics, which are basically a series of threats: “You better watch out”, “You better not cry”. And so on.
As a child, I found that God and Santa Claus blurred with each other. Santa Claus is apparently watching us, ready to punish or reward us. We have to “watch out” because he can see us all the time. He’ll divide us up into “naughty and nice” and we don’t want to be on the wrong list.
And as a child, that is exactly what I thought God was like. And there are many, many people – adults as well as children – who seem to think that this is the sort of God in which Christians believe. But this is exactly the sort of God that I don’t believe in now. And I want to suggest that the God revealed in the birth of Jesus is the opposite of that sort of God.
The message of Christmas is summed up in the word Immanuel, meaning God With Us. In the birth of Jesus, God has entered into human life in a new way. At Christmas, we see that God is not a big, bearded man in the sky looking down on us. God is a refugee baby lying in a feeding-trough. God has appeared among us, born not as an emperor or a military leader but as a persecuted child in an obscure corner of a brutal empire. God is not simply up there, compiling lists of our sins and categorising us as “naughty” or “nice”. God is down here. God is with us. He shares our lives, he shares our pains, he shares our joy. Whether we enjoy Christmas or struggle through it, whether we laugh or cry on Christmas Day or any other day, God is with us, laughing and crying with us.
At times, it can be hard to believe it. It can be hard to feel it. But God is more than a feeling. God is with us whatever we’re feeling.
This is the God made vulnerable in the child Jesus who walked away from his parents to return to the Temple. This is the God who as the man Jesus lived so much by the power of love and justice that the Roman Empire considered him a threat and executed him with one of the most painful forms of murder that human cruelty has ever invented. This is the God whose subtle, transformative power cannot be defeated by all the powers of sin, injustice and empire, and who as Jesus Christ rose from the dead and continues to be with us. This is the God who offers to rule in our hearts if we commit ourselves to him and reject those same forces of sin, those same idols of injustice and empire today.
God is not Father Christmas. There is no naughty-and-nice list in the Kingdom of Heaven. Jesus’ salvation does not come through obeying rules or fitting into structures. Of course, some rules are worth following. Some structures are good structures. But Jesus made clear that rules were made for people, not people for rules. Obedience cannot save us.
Jesus can save us. To be clear, I am not suggesting that it doesn’t matter how we live or what we do! That is the last thing I am saying. Jesus’ own teachings point to a way of life, to a way for the world, that challenges so many of the values that dominate our broken, unjust and unequal society. But he is down here with us as we resist them – and he will forgive us when we fail. So let’s rejoice in God’s salvation. Let’s seek Christ’s help to follow his teachings. Let’s pray, as the Letter to the Colossians puts it, that the peace of Christ will rule in our hearts. But let us also ask for forgiveness when we turn away – and let us be prepared to forgive others, just as the Lord has forgiven us.
And as we prepare for 2025, let us be ready to support each other, trusting in the reality that whatever we face, whatever the world faces, God is with us.
I write the following article for the Morning Star. It appeared in the weekend edition of 21st-22nd December 2024. You can read the original article on the Morning Star website.
It is not only about sex and religion. It is also about power and class.
As we approach the end of 2024, the Church of England is in chaos. Just weeks after Justin Welby resigned as Archbishop of Canterbury, his colleague Stephen Cottrell is facing calls to resign as Archbishop of York. A swathe of senior church leaders are accused of failing to address sexual abuse.
We are at a decisive moment in the history of Christianity in Britain.
As the Bishop of Rochester, Jonathan Gibbs, put it, “This is one of the biggest existential crises that the Church of England has faced since the Reformation.”
The question is: which direction will churches go in now?
The answer will affect the whole of society. Will churches be allies of progressive people of all faiths and none in resisting abuse and injustice? Or will they side with privilege and power?
Ever since the first century, Christians have been pulled in contrary directions. Some Christian movements have championed Jesus’s example of solidarity with people who are poor, oppressed or marginalised. Others have accommodated themselves to wealth, war and empire.
These struggles affect all Christian denominations. All churches are tainted by the Church of England scandal. Other churches cannot dismiss it as a problem for Anglicans alone.
The hideous abuse that has come to light is a stomach-churning reminder of what happens when powerful and influential people twist Christianity to justify violence and obedience.
Welby resigned in the wake of the Makin Report into abuse perpetrated by John Smyth, a prominent right-wing barrister. Smyth was influential on the conservative evangelical wing of the Church of England.
Welby rightly, if belatedly, accepted his responsibility both as an individual who should have done more and as the Church of England’s leader. Some who behaved far worse remain in office.
In 1977, John Smyth prosecuted Gay News for blasphemous libel. In public, Smyth condemned loving same-sex relationships between adults. In private, he abused teenage boys in his shed.
Many of these boys came from the elite Winchester School near Smyth’s home, which he visited regularly to talk to Christian students.
Some boys were invited back to Smyth’s home — although he was accused by one member of staff of taking only “the good-looking boys.”
Such was Smyth’s influence over these teenagers — living away from home and deprived of emotional expression — that he was able to persuade many of them that they should accept severe canings as punishment for sins. Makin concluded that there was no doubt that Smyth gained sexual satisfaction from beating boys until they bled.
Smyth’s power base was the Iwerne Trust, a conservative evangelical group focused on privately educated boys and young men who were likely to go on to top careers. They aimed to change society by influencing people at the top. That was how they thought society worked.
The theology of Iwerne camps is described as “banal, stern and cruel” by Charles Foster, an academic who attended them as a boy.
Looking back with horror on the snobbish culture, Foster recalls how participants were effectively discouraged from following Jesus’s teachings about feeding the hungry and welcoming strangers. “If someone was a stranger, we wouldn’t dream of taking him in,” recalls Foster. “He might not have gone to a strategically significant school.”
Rev David Fletcher was one of a small group of influential conservative Anglicans who learnt of Smyth’s behaviour in the early 1980s. He later revealed the grotesque logic that led him to cover up the truth. “I thought it would do the work of God immense damage if this were public,” he explained (Fletcher died in 2022).
Caring for the needs of victims and preventing further abuse did not seem to fit Fletcher’s notion of the “work of God.” He and his collaborators helped Smyth to move to Zimbabwe, where he ran Christian youth camps — and continued to abuse boys.
Perhaps Fletcher and his colleagues thought that Zimbabwean boys were of less value than British boys. Such an attitude is utterly contrary to the teachings of Jesus.
No wing of the Church (or society) has a monopoly on abuse. I know of liberal and apparently progressive churches in which abuse has been tolerated.
But it was the theology and politics behind Iwerne that allowed Smyth to persuade teenagers to submit to beatings. They proclaimed a judgemental god who blessed hierarchy, obedience and brutal discipline.
Ironically, the most conservative wing of the Church of England is celebrating Welby’s resignation not because of their opposition to abuse but because they regard Welby as too liberal.
These people are now urging churches to respond to the current crises by becoming more conservative and more authoritarian.
The only positive way forward for British churches is to show real repentance by making root-and-branch changes. This means not only changes in safeguarding procedures — important though those are.
Imagine the impact if the Church of England and other churches demonstrated their repentance by giving up their privileges. The bishops would walk out of the House of Lords. Faith schools would give up exemptions from workers’ rights legislation. Military chaplains would tear up their oaths of loyalty.
This is the way forward for Christianity — showing solidarity with people of all faiths and none against the sinful structures of capitalism, militarism and other abusive systems, as well as the victims of abuse in general.
Churches must choose whose side they are on: abusers or abused, oppressors or oppressed. It is not just the reputation of Christianity, but the future of progressive causes and of society itself, that will lose out if the wrong choice is made again.
I am on the way to London to join the national Alternative Remembrance Sunday Ceremony. We will commemorate all victims of war of all nationalities and lay wreaths of white poppies in their memory.
Sadly, some people will today misuse Remembrance Sunday to avoid recognising the reality of war and to fuel the values of violence, militarism and nationalism on which war depends.
Keir Starmer will lay a wreath at the Cenotaph even as he contributes to more war deaths through the provision of arms to Saudi Arabia, Israel and elsewhere. Tomorrow, on 11th November itself, BAE Systems will encourage their workers to pause for two minutes’ silence at 11.00am – before they return to making and selling weapons that supply regimes around the world. The Royal British Legion – distributors of red poppies – continue to insist that remembrance should be only for British and allied armed forces personnel, excluding civilians and people of other nationalities.
It seems that even the majority of red poppy wearers do not agree with the British Legion. Polling in 2019 revealed that over 80% of the British public believe that victims of all nationalities should be commemorated on Remembrance Sunday.
Militarised “remembrance” has little to do with remembering and is much more about forgetting – forgetting the realities and complexities of war, forgetting the suffering of people of other nationalities, forgetting to ask why former British armed forces personnel should be left by the state to rely on charity for support.
The question facing many Christians today is: which of these approaches to Remembrance is your church taking?
Some churches, I know, will focus on remembering all victims of war, on the need for reconciliation and peacebuilding, and on resisting war in the present and the future. Some will go for a full-on militarised ceremony, with marches, national flags and pro-war interpretations of history.
Most churches will fall somewhere between these two approaches. This sometimes reflects a middle-of-the-road position on the part of the church in question, although in my experience it is often more about an attempt to include people with different approaches to the issue, or even to avoid opening up difficult discussions.
In England (I realise the situation is slightly different in other parts of the UK), the Church of England is more likely than other churches to go for a nationalistic, militaristic narrative. This is unsurprising given that it is a state church. To be fair , there are many CofE churches who will not tow this line, and I applaud them. Sadly, however, there are those who view the upholding of nationalism as part of the Church of England’s job.
What surprises and worries me is how many non-conformist churches are happy to promote nationalism on Remembrance Sunday.
By non-conformist, I mean Protestant churches outside of the Church of England, also known as dissenters or as free churches. Many of these churches grew out of seventeenth-century struggles that saw King Charles I and his bishops being overthrown and replaced with a disappointingly short-lived republic. Several non-conformist denominations – such as Baptists – have always placed a strong emphasis on the separation of church and state.
As a Baptist, I am sad to see Baptist churches co-opted into militarism today.
I know that several Anglican churches will include the singing of God Save the King in their services today. More shockingly, I have heard of non-conformist churches doing the same – even Baptist churches.
This is outrageous.
A monarchist, militarist, nationalist song has no place within an act of Christian worship.
God Save the King is described as the British “national anthem” but in reality it says nothing at all about Britain or the British people. It is solely about royalty. Early Christians were persecuted for refusing to say that Caesar is lord. Only Jesus is lord, they said. Within three centuries, Christianity had decided to bow to Caesar, and even now people sing their allegiance to an earthly king in church.
I could not in conscience sing the words of God Save the King. If we had a national anthem that actually celebrated the British people, I might well sing it in other contexts – but not in church. In Christian worship, let’s not celebrate any one nationality but rejoice in God’s love for all people and Jesus’ breaking down of barriers.
Remembrance Sunday is the very last occasion on which we should be singing the so-called “national anthem”. We need to remember victims of war of all nationalities and to reject the nationalism that fuels war. More than on any other day, churches should not be nationalistic on Remembrance Sunday.
There are churches that do great things for much of the year in service of God and their neighbours. Why do some of these same churches undermine their witness for Jesus by singing a militaristic, royalist anthem on a day dedicated to remembering the horrors of war?
Symon Hill 