Cardinal Ratzinger, prior to becoming Pope as Benedict XVI was severely criticised partly within the Roman Catholic Church and partly in other denominations for his firmly negative opinion on homosexuality and the ordination of women, on whether Anglicanism is really a Church and so on. If you have read anything about him in the past or if you saw the programme about him on Channel 4 this last Monday evening, you doubtless have your own opinions about him. You may or may not approve his opinions; but however that may be “Turn to God, turn to the Living God” – words which I understand to have been the nub or core of the message which the new Pope brought to Germans, and particularly to young Germans, in his recent pilgrimage. Cardinal Ratzinger did not fear criticism for his opinions and now as Pope he speaks those words Turn to God, Turn to the Living God, which have been spoken down the centuries from way back into O.T. times by the prophets and which have often brought vilification if not worse to the prophets who spoke them.
The Pope, like other prophets before him, has looked out over the seeming Godlessness of the age, and noted what a small number percentagewise are churchgoers, how many have fallen away from being churchgoers and how the vast majority of those who claim to believe in a God seemingly take no notice of Him, or, if you prefer, of her, when the cure of so many of our ills might be found if we turn to the Living God, which, for us as Christians has a special meaning, because for us Jesus Christ born, living, crucified and risen is the only true expression of the Living God.
In our reading from the Acts of the Apostles this evening, we find Paul enduring that vilification which I have mentioned and being attacked and hauled up before the magistrates who fortunately would have nothing to do with the Jews’ claims against Paul.
Paul is, in effect, telling the Jews of his time to Turn to the Living God, he was preaching Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and they were so deaf to his words that he lost patience with them and, we may imagine, stormed out as he said “The blood be on your heads, I shall go and preach this good news to the Gentiles instead.” In these days in particular, I personally believe it to be important to bear in mind that Paul was never afraid of giving offence, if necessary, as he preached Christ. Indeed it was almost inevitable that he would.
What a contrast with today when we and our leaders in the Church of England seem so careful not to give offence. It is apparently important today to be politically correct, to be religiously correct, and in our multicultural society not to offend people of other faiths.
The result seems, to me at least, that we are so silent in the Church of England about our beliefs that it is by no means clear to the outsider, and to ourselves, what our beliefs really are and what Gospel, what good news, if any, we are seeking to proclaim.
“Turn to the Living God” – as we look out and see – or think w see – the Godlessness of the age, let us remember that those words are addressed not just to “them out there”, but also to us, to you and to me.
I am an old man now – I admit it! – but the older I get day by day the more important it seems to me to look into my own heart and find out if the god within me is dead rather than alive. Are some of my opinions, for example, about how I or others should be living a Christian life, what a Christian life should be for myself and others, dead rather than alive and need to be swept away? How many of my opinions are the product of prejudice, created by my particular upbringing, by class or, yes, indeed, by race? I am increasingly aware of the need for the Holy Spirit to blow away some of the cobwebs in my life, dangerous though it may be for the small ego to be touched by the Holy Spirit.
It was that great Archbishop William Temple who once said – Well, I have little doubt that he said it more than once, but I do know that he said it once – that if we ask the Holy Spirit to come into our lives, it will be wise to realise what we are asking, for if He does come the wind of that spirit may lead or blow us into paths which we had never expected and might never, at the outset, have wanted.
Nonetheless, if we will only turn to the Living God, if we will allow the Holy Spirit to work in us, the old, the dead wood will be swept away and we shall be free at last to be that person, those persons, whom Jesus Christ wants us to be, namely ones who truly love and communicate that love to others, as we pass through life. The judgmental God within us will have gone, we shall no longer place conditions on our love for ourselves or others, but love each other as we are, and fear of this life and the next will have vanished away. The old will have passed away and all things will have become new. While we turn to God we cannot ourselves make all these things happen, but God who is all in all will change us and bring these things about. Why? Because he is both a Living and a Loving God
Derek Spottiswoode