Protesers in the Churchyard

I have been wondering what most of us would do if we woke up, ambled over to Church to say the Office, and discovered tents surrounding our buildings. For those of us who have paved areas (and not gravestones everywhere) it is an interesting question and the one the Chapter of St. Paul’s Cathedral has been wrestling with all week.
When I first heard Giles Fraser’s reaction my first thought was good on him – but really? Was the Dean on holiday I wondered. This week, of course, my pleasant surprise has abated and I am returned to my usual cynical state about the institution of the Church of England. Not that we don’t do good stuff, not that we aren’t brilliant in places, but just that we seem, and especially in our higher echelons, to have the ability to be like hairy mammoths in a fine china department, blundering around, trying to find a way out of this or that.
It did cross my mind to erect a tent on our churchyard (on the paved bit) and encourage others around the country to do the same as a sign of unity with the protestors and those who stick up for their moral principles – but it is not that easy. What would I be protesting for – a sense of irritation and injustice that capitalism has managed to get its fingers on the public purse and then behaved…well…capitalistically. A real concern about financial inequity in society. Yes all these things – but I am not sure exactly what I would be asking for – and this is the problem, we are in a bit of a maelstrom.
You see, when someone resigns like this one wonders whether that was the camel or simply the straw that broke his back. When the Church has to turn to litigation instead of conversation one wonders who is really doing the talking. When we know there is an issue but cannot really pin it down coherently and make positive steps forward we simply end up looking indecisive. Oh, and, Christians do not agree on everything, all the time, and that is OK – we are human.
The St. Paul’s situation is not simple, but I have to say, what I am hearing in the call to move the protesters on has money, power and influence eaking out of it in a rather ugly way. What I think the Bishop of London said yesterday was that the protesters need to move so that talks can continue with the financial institutions, but what I actually heard was run along children and let mummy and daddy continue with the grown up talk over a glass of brandy and a nice cigar. And this turns Giles Frasier into a rebellious teenager – in fact it turns all of us who have questions for institution into those who do not really understand, those who will be listened to when we grow up and conform.
The thing is the God who I believe in is not about conforming to anything except God’s own self and God’s own self is love. I was taught at theological college – and this has been a valuable lesson – that when we get into conflict with one another we should pray for the other – not pray that God will change their mind to agree with us – but pray for them, for who they are in God’s sight, asking God to allow us to see our adversaries as God sees them, and to ask God to look after them and to help us to do God’s will towards them.
Perhaps that is why I thought about taking a tent into the Churchyard – not because I have complex economic answers, but because I believe that those answers will only come about and come to bear the fruit of love when we look at each other, and ask God to see each other through God’s eyes. Then we are faced not with an institution on the inside of power, but a group of human beings, created by God, asking real questions. Then we are faced with overturned tables and angry traders.
No easy answer – but I have a very bad feeling that we are all going to have an uncomfortable weekend.