Have you been involved in an Occupy camp, the Indignados movement or campaigns in support of Occupy? If so, please take a moment to answer a few questions (mostly multiple choice) to help with a book I’m writing about activism. The questions can be found here. You may be quoted in the book, but only if you give specific consent.

The book will be called Digital Revolutions: Activism in the age of the internet. It will be published by New Internationalist in spring 2013.

Please pass on the questions to anyone you know who might be interested. If you’d like to share your experiences of Occupy/ Indignados at more length, you’re welcome to email me at symonhill@gmail.com.

Thanks very much!

Have the leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church got no sense of irony? Jesus was arrested after leading a protest in a religious building.

Members of the band Pussy Riot briefly sang a song in a cathedral, attacking Putin and the Orthodox Church’s subservience to his regime. Amongst other offences, they have been accused of inciting religious hatred. In this context, this seems to be a euphemism for “having a go at the dominant religion”.

While the trial has been criticised around the world by civil liberties campaigners, politicians and singers, there’s been a marked lack of comment from the world’s religious leaders. Many of them doubtless regard the Russian Church’s reaction as ridiculously over-the-top, but probably don’t want to be seen to be attacking another faith group. They could avoid this by giving their backing to those members of the Russian Orthodox Church who are speaking out against their leadership.

Sadly, the Church of England might not be in much of a position to offer criticism, given its role in the eviction of Occupy London Stock Exchange. It is now clear that the authorities at St Paul’s Cathedral colluded with the police to remove peaceful activists from the church steps in the final hours of the eviction. Along with several others, I was dragged from the steps as I knelt in prayer. But horrible as that experience was, it’s very different to the prospect of three years in prison, which will await the Pussy Riot singers if Putin and the Russian Orthodox leaders have their way.

The Church’s leaders have been criticised by Russians who say that a Christian response would be to forgive the singers, or at least to call for more lenient sentences. There is some truth in this, but it understates the Christian case against the prosecution. The reality is that the Pussy Riot singers followed the example of Jesus far more than the Russian Orthodox Patriarch they were challenging.

Jesus’ protest in the Jerusalem Temple was a key event in his life. Historians differ over the various events described in the gospels; there are a range of views on the historical accuracy of particular incidents. However, the protest in the Temple is regarded by most scholars as one of the events most likely to be historical. It seems to have led, either directly or indirectly, to Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion.

In protesting against the commercialisation of the Temple, Jesus was not resisting a one-off misuse of a religious building. Commerce was central to religious buildings in a number of cultures (and still is).

He was attacking those who exploited the poor, particularly those who benefited from religious hypocrisy. For example, the gospels say he turned over the tables of those selling doves. Doves were the cheapest animal to sacrifice in the Temple. Poor people were spending money they could ill afford on ceremonial sacrifices. Jesus knew very well that the prophetic traditions in the Hebrew Bible declared that God wants lives of love and kindness, not religious ceremony.

Similarly, the moneychangers, who exchanged Roman money into Temple money at exploitative interest rates, were benefiting from the actions of those religious leaders who colluded with the Roman occupation and were prepared to ignore the oppression in return for their own position and privileges.

In short, Jesus was attacking political oppression, exploitation of the poor and a religious leadership that colluded with both. He staged a protest in a religious building in a way that would have shocked those who heard about it. If you’ve been reading about the Pussy Riot trial, this might sound familiar.

Jesus refused to go along with oppression and hypocrisy, living by the power of God within himself and free from the powers of the world. They killed Jesus because he was too free. One of the Pussy Riot defenders, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, said at the trial yesterday, “We are freer than those who are prosecuting us. We can say everything we want, and they have their mouths shut and are puppets.” Every Christian in the world should be cheering her on.

I’m pleased to report the launch of a new radical blog site: Queers for Jesus.

Queers for Jesus aims to challenge both the legalism found in many churches and the shallow, exploitative and consumerist attitudes to sexuality that are so dominant in our society. It operates with a broad definition of “queer”, seeing queerness as being about asking questions, crossing boundaries and challenging legalism with love.

I’m honoured to be co-editor of the site, along with Jay Clark, a genderqueer Christian-Quaker activist, who writes on issues of gender, art and spirituality and edits Movement magazine.

Since we began the site a couple of weeks ago, I’ve written about the reality of the “Keep Marriage Special” campaign and the bizarre claims of Christian Voice regarding Tesco and the Pride festival. Jay’s written on “queer bouncy castles” and the need for queers to stand alongside disability activists. Today we have a post from Susannah Cornwall, a theologian at Manchester University, pointing out that the existence of intersex people challenges assumptions about sex and gender and poses a challenge for opponents of same-sex marriage and women bishops.

Your thoughts and comments are welcome!

Rabbi James Baaden has written a very challenging and helpful blog post in response to a recent article I wrote same-sex marriage. James challenges aspects of my approach to the issue, particularly as they concern Judaism and the Hebrew Bible.

My article – written in response to the Church of England’s statement on same-sex marriage – appeared on the Ekklesia website. James’ article has been posted on the blog of Ray Gaston, an Anglican priest and activist who I have long admired. I am sorry that James and Ray have had to wait a while for my reply. I wanted to wait until I had time to reply carefully and in detail.

James describes my article as Ekklesia’s contribution to the debate on same-sex marriage. However, Ekklesia has made a number of contributions to this debate. This article is a response from me, written as my Ekklesia column on the week in question, rather than an official response from Ekklesia. It is in line with Ekklesia’s general response to the issue. However, any blame for inaccurate portrayal of Judaism or the Hebrew Bible really lies with me rather than with Ekklesia as a whole.

I agree with about ninety percent of James’ article. I have also learnt quite a bit from it. It has challenged me to rethink some of my assumptions and to be careful about the language I use. However, I also have to say that I think James has misunderstood some of my views. At points in his article, he associates me with views that I have not expressed. I very much hope that nobody would regard me as anti-Jewish. I am also delighted that Jews and Christians are campaigning together – and with others – in favour of legal recognition for same-sex marriage. I remember how delighted I was a few months ago when I heard the news that the Movement for Reform Judaism had decided to support marriage equality. Had I been at home – rather than in the office of The Friend magazine – I could quite literally have danced around the room. I remember remarking to a colleague that Jews seemed to be making more progress on the issue than Christians.

James’ article includes some fascinating observations about the lack of anything we would recognise as “marriage” in the Hebrew Bible. I find this really helpful and would like to hear more from him (and others) about this. I admit that I am no expert on the Hebrew Bible and would never claim to be. I am inspired by his observation that “this creates a blank space – a space in which people had to and have to respond to the needs of their times and create new institutions, new possibilities, new practices”.

I also agree that the Hebrew Bible includes many powerful, independently-minded women who are, as James puts it, “independent agents”. It also includes far less positive portrayals of women. The picture is mixed. However, I would be the first to acknowledge that this is also true of the New Testament: Jesus treats women as equals and Paul says that “there is no longer male and female”, but the writer of Ephesians (who most scholars believe was not Paul) tells women to obey their husbands.

I acknowledge the diversity of views and images found within both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. This is important. It is a different position to one with which James seems to associate me early on in his article. He writes:

“As in so many areas, the implication is that the religion of the Old Testament was something rather nasty and was replaced by something thoroughly nice in the form of the changes introduced by Jesus. This is a very common model and maybe it helps advance Ekklesia’s cause and its concerns, but I don’t like it – and I don’ t think it’s accurate.”

This is indeed inaccurate, as well as simplistic and ridiculous. However, I was not not proposing this model. It is not something that I – or Ekklesia – would ever endorse. Nonetheless, I can understand that James is used to coming up against people proposing this model and that what I wrote may have inadvertently given the impression that I was coming from a similar perspective. I am sorry for my poor choice of words.

I want to make it clear that I think that both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, both Jewish tradition and Christians tradition – as well as the scriptures and traditions of many other religions – include a mixture of oppressive and liberating elements, of teachings that uphold injustice and teachings that resist it, of excuses for the love of power and calls for the power of love.

I think James misunderstands my position on the issue of legalism and power. He writes:

“Ekklesia in its statements clearly seeks to depict history in this way – with Jesus as a reformer who rejected the ‘legalism’ and ‘power’ of the ‘Old Testament’. I am not comfortable with this characterisation – and I do not think it serves this particular cause very well.”

I have just re-read my article. It is true that I suggested that Jesus challenged legalism and relationships based on power. But at no point did I suggest that this legalism and power was based on the Hebrew Bible. My thanks go to Keith Hebden, a Church of England priest, who wrote in a comment on James’ post that “Symon doesn’t set up an OT/NT binary in that article. He refers to ‘culture’ obliquely.”

In response, Ray Gaston – who clearly agrees with James – made his own comment, quoting from my original article. However, I would like to suggest that the quote reinforces Keith’s observation that I was referring to “culture” obliquely and not talking about the Hebrew Bible. The passage I wrote, and which Ray quotes, is:

“In a time when only men could initiate divorce – often throwing their wives into social disgrace and even poverty – he [Jesus] criticised casual divorce. In a culture that blamed women for giving men lustful thoughts, he encouraged people to take responsibility for how they dealt with their own thoughts, and be aware of what they did in their hearts.

“In other words, Jesus challenged relationships based on power and money in favour of relationships based on love, equality and self-control. It might be said that he redefined marriage.”

There is nothing in these paragraphs about the Hebrew Bible. I did not suggest that what Jesus was challenging was an authentic interpretation of the Hebrew Bible’s teaching on marriage and relationships. I did not suggest that Judaism is (or was) inherently legalistic, oppressive or sexist. I think Jesus was following the prophetic traditions of the Hebrew Bible in calling his listeners to a deeper and more liberating understanding of scripture. I am, however, truly sorry if I did not make this clear. I also accept that, while the New Testament shows Jesus debating marriage with Pharisees and Saducees, historians differ on the extent to which they consider these two groups to have been representative of Jewish society at the time. I should perhaps have written about Jesus challenging certain groups of people and been a bit less vague when I wrote about the “culture” and “society” of his time. I also readily accept that – as James points out in his article – early Jewish rabbis also sought to make divorce rules fairer.

It seems to me that many societies – including most that have considered themselves Christian – have upheld relationships based on power more than those based on love. I believe that Jesus posed a challenge to this situation, as did many prophets in the Hebrew Bible, later Jewish teachers and many prophets and teachers from outside both Christianity and Judaism.

In saying that Jesus arguably “redefined” marriage, I was not suggesting that he changed the Hebrew Bible’s understanding in favour of something better. I was trying to challenge the perception that marriage has always been the same. I was seeking to satirise the language of Christian opponents of same-sex marriage, who argue that it “redefines” marriage. I was pointing out that understandings of marriage have varied widely over time and space and that Jesus challenged people who seemed to think that their understanding was true for all time.

Please note how I am quoted in Ekklesia’s news story on the Church of England’s statement on same-sex marriage:

“Hill said that Jesus had arguably ‘redefined’ marriage when he challenged casual divorce and disputed the views of some who used selective quotes from the scriptures to back up their own position. He said, ‘In all areas of life, Jesus upheld relationships based on love, equality and respect, rather than on power or legalism’.”

When I say that Jesus’ opponents used selective quotes from the scriptures, I am of course comparing them to those Christians who do the same thing today to justify opposition to same-sex relationships. In my experience, their selective quotes come much more from the New Testament than from the Hebrew Bible. For me, the contrast between Jesus and the Pharisees is not about a Christian versus Jews (Jesus was as Jewish as they were). It is about approaches to scripture, tradition and life that are liberating and honest, rather than those that are legalistic and oppressive.

As we look at Jesus’ words today, the primary challenge is for those of us who consider ourselves to be his followers but who too often fall back on trusting in human institutions rather than recognising the “blank spaces” and seeking God’s guidance. Sorry this post is so long! I feel I have a responsibility to make my position clear. I suspect that James and Ray may still disagree with me after reading all this, but I hope that they will understand my position better. Many thanks to them both for encouraging me to think more deeply about this issues, to question my own assumptions and to be more careful in future about choices of wording that may give an inaccurate impression of my beliefs. I look forward to working alongside them on both marriage equality and other issues.

There’s more than three months to go until the Greenbelt Festival gets underway, but a pre-Greenbelt event will take place this Sunday in London. I’m really pleased to be one of ten speakers who will talk for 8-10 minutes each on an aspect of the theme of Greenbelt 2012, Paradise: Lost & Found.

My topic will be The Occupy movement – a signpost to paradise? I’m also looking forward to hearing the other speakers, who include Tamsin Omond, Lucy Winkett, Paul Vallely and Ann Pettifor.

I was one of several Christians to be dragged by police from the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral as I knelt in prayer during the eviction of Occupy London Stock Exchange. My emotions took some time to settle, and the controversy over the cathedral’s complicity in the eviction is still unravelling.

This experience will be my starting point, as I look at what the incident says about the future of Christianity in Britain. I’ll consider the Occupy movement’s challenge for Christianity and whether it can tell us anything about the kingdom of God. A lot to cover in 10 minutes!

Tickets are still available and can be bought online. If you can’t make it, I understand that videos of all ten short talks will be posted on the Greenbelt website.

Wallace Benn, the Suffragen Bishops of Lewes, has sent me an apology for his endorsement of a booklet the promotes the legalisation of rape within marriage and the criminalisation of same-sex relationships.

Along with several other bloggers, I drew attention two days ago to Benn’s endorsement of a booklet called Britain in Sin, written by Stephen Green of the fundamentalist group Christian Voice. The booklet opposes the welfare state, legislation guaranteeing equal pay to men and women, power-sharing in Northern Ireland and the UK’s membership of the United Nations.

The following morning (yesterday), I received an email from Wallace Benn’s office, saying that he wanted to “completely and absolutely disassociate” himself from the booklet. I blogged about this, saying that I very much appreciated the complete withdrawal of his endorsement but that I was disappointed by the lack of an apology.

This morning, Wallace Benn’s press officer sent me an email, saying that the bishop was responding to my blog post by issuing an addendum to his statement of yesterday. It reads as follows:

“I have asked Stephen Green of Christian Voice to immediately withdraw my apparent endorsement of his booklet. I apologise for any hurt caused or misunderstanding given”.

I’m very grateful to the bishop for apologising, although he has still not explained how he came to endorse the booklet in the first place or which part of it (if any) he agrees with. The endorsement still appears on the Christian Voice website, though it seems that this is Green’s fault for not responding to Benn’s request to remove it.

In response to some comments I’ve received about my blog, I should emphasise that I’m not trying to whip up personal hostility to Wallace Benn. I believe in forgiveness. This does not mean the issue should be ignored. If the bishop’s apology leads to fewer people trusting Green’s booklet, that will be a good thing.

I remain alarmed that a situation can arise in which a Church of England bishop can endorse a booklet that encourages rape, apparently without this being a major disciplinary offence or a big media controversy.  In 2010, the Suffragen Bishop of Willesden, Pete Broadbent, criticised the monarchy and made some ill-judged personal comments about members of the Windsor family. Despite apologising, he was lambasted in the right-wing press and temporarily suspended from his job. Is it is worse to criticise the monarchy than to sanction rape?

I’ll soon be off to Greenbelt, a Christian festival that I really love attending every year. Thousands of people gather at Cheltenham for music, performances, worship, talks, debates and much more. I love it.

That’s why I was particularly excited when Greenbelt endorsed my pilgrimage of repentance for homophobia earlier this year. As some of you know, I walked from Birmingham to London, giving talks and joining in worship on the way, before joining in the Pride march the day after I arrived. 

If you’re going to Greenbelt, you can find me speaking about my pilgrimage, and answering questions, at 9.30 on Monday (not a great slot for those who like to stay up late chatting at Greenbelt!). I’ll also be participating in the “OuterSpace” (LGBT-focused) worship at 11.00pm on Sunday night.

Also, I think my book, The No-Nonsense Guide to Religion, will be on sale in the Greenbelt bookshop.

And I’m pleased to say that my colleagues from the Christian thinktank Ekklesia will also be at the festival, involved in a number of panel debates and other events.

I’m really delighted to have been asked to speak about my pilgrimage by a number of different groups. I’ll soon have given more talks since the walk than I gave on the walk. I’ve spoken to Courage (a gay and lesbian evangelical group) and at the Student Christian Movement Theology Summer School. I’ve now been invited to speak about the pilgrimage to student groups in Sheffield, Warwick and Southampton, and at churches in Cardiff and Leeds.

I hope these talks will help me and others discern where to go next in terms of the issues and possibilities that came up on my walk. Your thoughts and suggestions are welcome.

Greenbelt’s a great place to catch up with old friends and meet interesting new people. I look forward to seeing some of you there.

During last year’s general election campaign, Nick Clegg said that the Tories’ economic policies could lead to riots in the streets. It seems that Clegg was more accurate in his predictions about the Tory policies he is now implementing than he was in his claims about how Liberal Democrats would behave in government.

When I mentioned this on Twitter a few days ago, I was accused of making excuses for the rioters by blaming the Tories. It’s been hard to talk about the root causes of the riots without being accused of supporting the rioters. David Cameron attributed the events of the last week to “criminality pure and simple” – a convenient way of avoiding any responsibility.

I wonder how anyone manages to tackle a problem without considering the causes. Do these people invite a plumber round when the sink is blocked and then take offence when he starts talking about the cause of the blockage. “The cause of the blocked sink?! I want to defeat the blocked sink, not make excuses for it! Whose side are you on?!”.

Right-wing columnists have been having a field day, using the situation to peddle viciously insulting messages about single parents, benefit recipients, working class people and anyone else they don’t like. Melanie Philipps in the Daily Mail attributed responsibility to “a liberal intelligentsia hell-bent on a revolutionary transformation of society”.

A number of them have responded to the riots with sweeping assertions about people they know nothing about. Christina Odone wrote in the Telegraph that “the majority of rioters are gang members”. How can she possibly know that?

Max Hastings literally dehumanised the rioters in the Daily Mail, writing that “They respond only to instinctive animal impulses – to eat and drink, have sex, seize and destroy the accessible property of others”. I cannot accept that this is true of any human being, even those who readily engage in violence and intimidation. But even if it were possible, there is no way that Hastings could know the details of the rioters’ psychology. 

He also claims to know the details of their everyday lives. His most bizarre assertion is, “They do not watch royal weddings or notice test matches” (I don’t watch royal weddings either, Max). He goes on to insist that “The notions of doing a nine-to-five job… are beyond their imaginations”.

This claim seems to be in tension with the screaming headlines about the apparently respectable jobs of several of the rioters. Several youth workers, a trainee accountant and an estate agent are among the accused. This fact also undermines the assumption behind the online petition calling for rioters’ benefits to be removed.

Right-wing columnist Alison Pearson, who has made a career out of stirring up class hatred towards people poorer than herself, joined in the guessing game. Writing in the Telegraph, she asked “How many [of the looters] come from homes without a father? I reckon we can guess the answer.” Pearson’s columns are based on guessing. Some of us would rather wait for the facts.

At least she didn’t advocate murder on national television, unlike Kelvin Mackenzie. “All we hear about is these scumbags on the street,” he said on Newsnight, “Shoot them. I would be in favour of shooting them.”  

The attitudes of these professional right-wing ranters – most of whom are far removed from the riots – bear a marked difference to the approach of some of the rioters’ victims.

Ashraf Haziq, who was mentioned by David Cameron after he was mugged by people pretending to help him, has said he “feels sorry” for his attackers.

Abdul Quddoos Khan, whose two brothers were murdered in Birmingham, says he spent Wednesday night persuading other young Muslim men not to resort to violence and revenge. He said, “I am angry but violence won’t achieve anything except make another mother and father lose their child. What good would that do?”

Given that those of us who talk about root causes are accused of siding with the looters, let me make clear that I oppose the violence, intimidation, trauma, devastation and destruction of livelihoods that have been taking place in the last few days.

Indeed, I think I’m far more consistent in my attitude to looting than the likes of Max Hastings and Alison Pearson. I oppose violence and looting by young, poor men in hoodies and I also oppose violence and looting by respectable middle-aged people in suits.

I oppose the corporations who have looted the treasury through their tax avoidance, the bankers who assaulted society through the financial crash and the arms dealers who profit from selling weapons to tyrants. I oppose Cameron, Clegg and their gang of thugs who are launching a daily assault on the poorest members of society with their vicious cuts to public services and the welfare state.

David Cameron said “The root cause of this mindless selfishness is.. a complete lack of responsibility in parts of our society”. Clearly, in Cameron’s eyes, selfishness and a lack of responsibility are traits that are acceptable only among the rich.

———-

This blog post appeared as my latest column on the website of the thinktank Ekklesia. To read more of my Ekklesia columns, please visit http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/news/columns/hill.

The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, appeared on Radio 4 this morning and was asked about the underlying causes of the recent riots. He attributed them to a “sense of entitlement” among young people who were showing the effects of a lack of discipline in school.

When Johnson was a young person, he attended Eton, the most elite school in the UK, before making the natural progression to Oxford University. At Oxford, he was part of the Bullingdon Club, a gang of upper class yobs. Other members included David Cameron.

For Johnson to criticise young people who have a “sense of entitlement” shows either a staggering lack of realism about his own past or a reckless level of public hypocrisy.

Blaming a lack of discipline conveniently ignores the realities of economic and social injustice. The gap between the richest and poorest has got gradually worse over the last forty years and Britain is now more unequal than any other western country, with the exception of the USA and Portugal. The coalition government is slashing services on which the poorest members of society rely, while managing nothing more than feeble criticism of bankers’ bonuses and corporate tax-dodging.

None of this excuses the violence, intimidation and looting that have taken place over the last few days. None of it should stop us condemning the horror of ordinary people suffering the effects of riots that have seen small businesspeople’s shops burnt down and their livelihoods potentially destroyed. To tackle this situation effectively, we need to look at roots causes.

Boris Johnson prefers to criticise a “sense of entitlement” while being part of a party, and a political trend, that has spent the last three decades destroying any sense of social solidarity and defining success in terms of possessions and personal status. He condemns a lack of restraint while calling for a cut in the top rate of tax, which applies only to the richest one percent of the population. He attacks thuggery, but supports a government that consists of a gang of thugs launching a daily assault on the poorest members of society.

Next month, Boris Johnson will welcome one of the world’s largest arms fairs to London, where representatives of some of the world’s most brutal regimes will stroll round the Docklands viewing sophisticated weaponry. Then we will see the reality behind his condemnations of violence.