A Word For All Seasons

Month: August 2022 (page 3 of 4)

August 30, 2022 / 0 Comments

LE04 Unitec Graduation Address

Auckland Unitec graduation:: who will you be in 2040?

Thank you for the invitation to address you this evening at this graduation ceremony. Before I congratulate the graduates, let me first congratulate Unitec itself for the fine vision you have of your purpose and objectives. Reading a recent Unitec report I noted in particular :

  • your mission statement to inspire people to discover and apply their intellectual and creative potential and contribute responsibly to their societies and cultures
  • your commitment to sustainable development and the development of an eco-campus
  • your commitment to partnership under the Treaty of Waitangi
  • but at the same time a commitment to a multi-cultural student body, so evident this evening.

An educational institution which is based on robust principles such as these, and with a clear purpose to be of service to the wider community, models the best of aspirations.

Then let me congratulate those of you whom we have come to honour tonight in this proud moment of graduation. Your presence here is an indication that you have applied yourself creatively and energetically in your studies, studies which have not merely been academic, but have had a significant component of what is described as Real World Learning. Your studies have been undertaken with hands-on experience in the fields of endeavour where you will be working. Lectures and papers have been complemented by practical experience and application.

This is the third Unitec graduation event today. The earlier ceremonies were for graduates in fields such as business, IT, landscape architecture and building. This graduation is for you who will be engaged in front-line people-centred work such as education, health, social work and counselling, environment and voluntary organisations. While it is true that all jobs are done best when people-centred outcomes are in mind, yet the fields you have chosen to work in have some distinctive characteristics :

  • they will have no doubt attracted you because you have a natural sense of empathy with people, along with compassion and a care for the well-being of others
  • they are fields where you will encounter a number of people we might describe as difficult, or a challenge, and there is always a temptation to avoid such people so that they become marginalised
  • yet people of that nature are usually so because they have already been rejected and marginalised by others in their life to date : yours is the challenge to be there for them, however difficult that might be, so their lives may change for the good. There can be nothing more satisfying than helping another person to greater fulfilment in living.

I want to ask you now to look ahead and imagine it is the year 2040. That’s the year I would turn 100 if I live to see it, but for many of you today it will see you in a state of mature experience in your chosen life and profession. Ask yourself how you might judge your achievements in your life and work. One traditional marker of success would be that you have made a lot of money, but I imagine you know (as I did) that you are not choosing your job because it is well paid. Many people get far more money for doing jobs that contribute very little to social well-being, or even impact upon it negatively. Or you might measure your life by having carved out a brilliant career and become a powerful and influential leader. Good leadership is an important ingredient in society, and a desirable thing when exercised creatively.

But the ultimate measure is what good you have done in terms of making a difference in other people’s lives. Through your work in education, health care, social work and voluntary organisations, have you helped people find confidence and hope, develop their talents, and become fulfilled so that they in turn go out and make a difference for others?

Media stories bombard us with accounts of society’s wrong-doers such as drug-dealers, dangerous drivers, swindlers and thieves, rapists and murderers. They create tragedy and distress enough, but a greater wrong occurs when ordinary law-abiding citizens forget their primary objective, as in the Unitec mission statement, to contribute responsibly to their societies. We forget this objective when we become preoccupied with our own personal prosperity and advancement. Institutions lose their way when they are dominated by financial goals, and lose sight of such ultimate objectives as providing education, health, or justice in the interests of all.

Sin is not a fashionable concept today, but it is linked to an interesting Greek word amartia. Amartia is an archery term meaning to miss the mark, shooting wide or falling short of the target. It is easy for a society to fail to achieve its full potential not because a minority sets out to do what is wrong, but because the majority lose sight of the larger targets to be aimed for. The sins of omission can be greater than the sins of commission.

A contrasting word, also a little out of fashion, is vocation. Vocation is not exclusively an ecclesiastical term but has universal application. Vocation is to do with the spirit in which any job is undertaken. If a job is done purely for what one will get out of it, the ultimate objective is lost, the target is missed. But if a job is done with a greater purpose in mind, such as working for the well-being of the community, it may be seen as a vocation.

So if in 2040 you can look back and say you have you have taken a vocational approach to your work, with a commitment always to the well-being of others, then I predict you will view your life with a great sense of fulfilment and satisfaction in what you have achieved.

Let me conclude by offering you six qualities to aspire to as you set out on your journey :

  1. Integrity – which means being honest and fair in all you do, but at a deeper level being true to your own best self, your values and beliefs
  2. Compassion – so that you have sensitivity to others, and a care to do the things that will be best for them
  3. Leadership – which is a quality that may be displayed at all levels of an organisation. It is seen in anyone who has an eye to what is right, and speaks and works for it
  4. Courage –  to do the thing that is right even if it costs you something in the process
  5. Kaitiakitanga – guardianship of the earth, the seas and the land, the rivers, the mountains and the forests, and all that lives so that this planet will be a treasure and a source of life for all generations
  6. Taha Wairua – the things of the spirit, whether our spirituality be expressed in religious or non-religious categories. Spirituality is what gives us a sense of being part of something bigger than ourselves, so that we see all people and the Earth itself as whanau/family, and we live mutually rather than exploitatively.

No reira, kia tau te rangimarie o te Atua kia kotou : congratulations on reaching this milestone in your life, and may the peace and blessing of God be with you in the years that lie ahead.

_________________________________

LE04 Unitec Graduation AddressDownload
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LE02 Goals of a University

UNIVERSITIES’ PRIMARY ROLE TO SERVE SOCIETY

An organisation’s core objectives can often be lost sight of by the pursuit of lesser objectives or the pressure of day-to-day demands. The following address was given at the Commencement Service at the University of Auckland on 23 February 2005.

The University of Auckland’s mission statement outlines three sets of goals. There are operational goals such as ethical standards, equal opportunity and transparent administrative policies. These indicate how the university goes about its work, and are important to ensure effectiveness and right conduct in its life.

The university’s core business is spelled out in its academic goals. Listed here are advancement and dissemination of knowledge, fostering research and creativity, excellence in teaching and learning. The record is that the University of Auckland achieves highly in these areas.

Alongside operational and academic objectives are some more far-reaching goals which indicate the purpose of academic research and excellence. These are the university’s ultimate goals which enshrine a commitment to serve the community, and to advance the “intellectual, cultural, environmental, economic and social well-being of the peoples of Auckland and New Zealand”.

The latter is an all-encompassing goal which may be easily forgotten in the pursuit of lesser objectives. Several years ago I attended our daughter’s graduation at another university. The graduation address was given by the vice-chancellor. The occasion was a prime opportunity to inspire and encourage new graduates with a vision of how they might use their gifts and training in the service of those who would call upon them.

Turning aside from such an opportunity, the vice-chancellor instead fished in his pocket and produced a plastic credit card which he promoted as part of the university’s new money-raising strategy, urging all present to switch to this card and thus support their alma mater.

Financial pressures on universities have been heavy these last 20 years, and vice-chancellors have had to use every ounce of energy and wit in wrestling with them. But finance is only a means to an end. It is an operational goal, not an ultimate one. At a graduation ceremony the vice-chancellor’s error, in my view, was to mistake the nature of the occasion by addressing a lesser goal rather than the greater.

This I believe to be indicative of one of the gravest omissions in society today, and the institutions that shape them. Media stories bombard us with accounts of society’s wrong-doers such as drug-dealers, dangerous drivers, swindlers and thieves, rapists and murderers. They create tragedy and distress enough, but a greater wrong occurs when ordinary law-abiding citizens forget their primary objective to contribute to what the university mission statement names as the well-being of peoples.

Individuals forget this objective when they become preoccupied with their own personal prosperity and advancement. Institutions lose their way when they are dominated by operational goals, and lose sight of such ultimate objectives as providing education, health, or justice in the interests of all.

Sin is not a fashionable concept today, but it is linked to an interesting Greek word amartia. Amartia is an archery term meaning to miss the mark, shooting wide or falling short of the target. It is easy for a society to fail to achieve its full potential not because a minority sets out to do what is wrong, but because the majority loses sight of the larger targets to be aimed for. The sins of omission can be greater than the sins of commission.

A contrasting word, also a little out of fashion, is vocation. Vocation is not exclusively an ecclesiastical term but has universal application. Vocation is to do with the spirit in which any job is undertaken. If a job is done purely for what we will get out of it, the ultimate objective is lost, the target is missed. But if a job is done with a greater purpose in mind, such as working for the well-being of the community, it may be seen as a vocation.

Both individuals and institutions have vocations. This university has spelt out its vocation in terms of seeking to enrich the life of the peoples of Auckland. Should this goal drop from view and become overlaid by lesser goals, the ultimate objective is not achieved. Fiscal health is essential, academic excellence a desirable outcome, but the end which these achievements serve is all important.

The same perception and choice faces every graduate and each one of us in the way we direct our endeavours. Do we have wider community outcomes in view in what we do? Do we simply ply our craft, or are we thinking vocationally? The CEO of a hospital board told me recently that he detects a lessening of vocational attitude in young doctors who graduate with huge student loans. The burden of debt, accompanied by a strong user-pays ethos, is producing a climate, he senses, where fiscal preoccupations impinge upon a mindset of service.

This is not a criticism of people in the medical profession, many of whom work tirelessly and sacrificially in dealing with their patients. It is rather an example of something that can happen in any walk of life when the well-being of the community is lost sight of. The erosion of attitudes of public service may well be one of the intangible costs of the economic restructuring of recent years.

While every profession has the opportunity to contribute positively to the lives of its clients, there are also situations which require a collective endeavour. Crime, for example, cannot be solved simply by the police. Policy-makers, social workers, families, educationalists and community leaders need to work together to solve a problem which is multi-faceted. Addressing the roots of social and economic deprivation requires a similar mix of expertise and commitment.

Universities are well placed to play a lead in this collective function, drawing together the many skills represented by different faculties. But a community component is also needed. People in business and the professions, civic and community leaders, need a forum where issues with wide-ranging impact are debated and strategies devised. In this way the wisdom dispersed across the community may be focussed for the common good.

I commend the University for the far-sighted nature of its goals, and encourage you in the pursuit of them. They are very much in line with two scriptural readings. In Matthew, chapter 20, Jesus tells his disciples that “the one who would be great amongst you must be the servant of all”. And in Micah, chapter 6, we hear the timeless words of the prophet: “What does the Lord require of you but that you do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God?”

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LE01 Law Society Address

Address at the Annual Church Service of the Auckland District Law Society  Maclaurin Chapel, University of Auckland, 2 Feb 2005

In his book The Lexus & the Olive Tree, Thomas Friedman names two symbols of life in the 21st century. The Lexus (motor-car) indicates global aspirations for consumer icons known the world over. The olive tree symbolises our local roots in our own place, in our own culture, and among our people. It gives us identity as we engage in a new world which can destroy identity.

The inter-play of global and local is symptomatic of our age, and the cause of conflict if we do not get it right. We see it right here in Auckland, which in the 1950s was largely pakeha and based on western-style Christian. Today, with successive migrations of Maori, Pacific Islanders and Asians to Auckland, we are multi-cultural and multi-faith.

In 1950, in the absence of other cultures, it was easy to imagine that pakeha culture was the norm, and that naturally our race, our culture and our faith were pre-eminent. Today such attitudes lead to tensions which can explode, as we have seen in debates about the Treaty of Waitangi, the desecration of Jewish graves in Wellington, hate mail against Muslims after the events of 9/11, and the rise of fascist-type groups. On the world scene larger conflicts play out as cultures clash, backed by military and economic muscle.

In December last year I attended a government-sponsored Inter-faith Dialogue in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. It was attended by 125 delegates from thirteen Asian and Pacific nations representing ten different faiths. Governments of the region promoted the event as part of an effort to address issues of peace and security in the region. They see religious leaders as representing large sections of any nation’s population, and want to assist them to be pro-active in building bridges in the community across divisions of creed and culture.

The conference expressed clearly its conviction that there was but one God (as St Paul said to the Athenians in Acts 17.24). And because there was but one God, so too there is but one global family on earth, as has been poignantly made clear to us by the many images of people in Asia affected by the recent tsunami. The conference agreed that no religion can properly be claimed as the basis for terrorist activity, but that all religions share in common convictions such as those expressed in Micah 6.8 : “What does God require of you but that you act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God”.

It is idle to pretend there are not significant differences between religions : the differences may cause conflict, but they are often used as a platform for far greater differences in culture, politics, economics. To achieve unity globally in the face of diversity, the conference suggested :

  • A national statement on inclusiveness, such as exists in Indonesia and Singapore, which affirms every culture and creed, no matter how small, as an equal and valued part of society. This nurtures everybody’s olive tree, and helps to ensure that minorities do not feel excluded and turn to extremist strategies.
  • Education in schools and communities on different cultures and religions. Instead of suppressing the religious dimension of Christmas, as some propose, we promote awareness of major festivals of all religions.
  • We need to work on our attitudes to people who are different from us. As the late bishop John Robinson said : we can live with diversity while preserving our own identities if we have a faith which has a “firm centre but open edges”.
  • Commitments and choices : all of us have choices as to whether we are agents of division or agents of building community. Leaders who start picking at other groups foment division, and the community reaps the whirlwind. By contrast those who steadily and patiently build bridges shape a future where everyone has a place, and communities unite in common endeavour.

In a new age the interplay between unity and diversity, the Lexus and the Olive Tree, is a pervading characteristic. The choice is ours, whether to build or divide. The words of Micah have great pertinence : “What does the Lord require of you but that you do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God”.

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GS07 Paul in Athens

Acts 17. 16-31

A stopover in Athens is not without its delights, as Jackie and I found on pilgrimage there.

For Paul, cooling his heels, waiting Silas and Timothy.

  • A Pentecost story – the Church moving out to engage with the Gentiles.
  • Goes into market-place – listens and observes
  • Athenians open to anything new – cf 21C
  • Distressed to find many idols
  • “Stand for s.th or fall for a.th”
  • Invited to Areopagus – council or hill
  • Unknown God –“Just in case we missed one”

An unknown God – very powerful image. For God is mystery, and yet not unreal because of that. We don’t talk about unknown gods today, and yet the experience of something transcendent, something that lifts us up above the ordinary experiences of life, is quite common.

Think of ANZAC Day:  People felt lifted beyond themselves, into a new dimension of experience. But what sort of experience? What content would people put into this experience of mystery? Is it today’s equivalent of an unknown God?

Anzac remembers the sacrifice and suffering of thousands of our young, and others’ young. One person felt a connectedness with others. But is it for some a call to strengthen our military?  Or for others a commitment to global peace and justice?

Experiences of something transcendent may be filled with great good or downright evil. Nazism? What about nationalism? Or corporate spirit? Or school spirit? Or Jesus’ spirit of love and compassion?

The content of such experiences is all important. This was Paul’s challenge: how to preach Jesus into the empty “unknown god” space in Athens.

Not a soteriological brick!  (cf seed on barren ground)

  • He listened, then preached into their context
  • Epimenides: in him we live/move/ have our being.  Aratus: we too are his offspring
  • Distinct crossovers here with Christian faith
  • Bridges if you like for weaving faith in.
  • >>Good news of Jesus and his resurrection.

Wendy Scott’s research: contextual sharing

At an ethics conference in Auckland, Professor Karen Lebacqx gave a paper on Medical Ethics. Many of her audience expected an overview of complex ethical issues in western medicine, such as gene transfer, or when does human life begin?  but Karen opened up a far wider perspective:

During the hour that I am speaking to you, 50 children will die in Africa of disease and malnutrition. Disease and malnutrition are the causes of these children’s deaths, but not the reasons for them. These children are dying because their governments are redirecting funds much needed for social services into the repayment of loans to wealthier nations….Their health status has to do with the systemic factors of justice and injustice around the world.

Karen introduced the parable spoken by the prophet Nathan to King David (2 Sam 12). The parable tells of a rich man who, although he had many flocks and herds of his own, took a poor man’s only ewe lamb to provide food for a guest. Her reference to Hebrew scripture had no sense of religious preaching about it. Having painted starkly the realities of the gap between rich and poor nations, she drew on an ancient prophetic voice to illustrate precisely a major contemporary injustice. She wove the message with the context.

Pentecost is a time for being infilled with God’s powerful spirit, and to feel the call to proclaim the Good News of salvation. It is a call to evangelism to people elsewhere, yes, but to those close to us, our neighbours, searching for something deeper, searching for comfort in distress, open to a call to ethical integrity and social justice, to reconciliation, care for the earth.

Let’s not throw them soteriological bricks, but let us listen carefully, and then weave in context the implications of Paul’s message in Athens: “What therefore you seek as unknown, I now proclaim to you, the Good News of Jesus who died and has risen again in our own lives.”

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GS06 The Unjust Steward

Luke 16.1-13

St Peter’s Wellington,  22 Sept 2019

Bishop Richard Randerson

Jesus’ parables often used scenes that would be familiar to his listeners, in this case his disciples, with the Pharisees and the crowd listening in.

For Palestinians the image of a wealthy landowner who rents out land to small farmers, and has a steward to manage leases and rents, would be familiar.

The landowner is told the steward is squandering his money. He calls the steward who says nothing in his defence and is sacked.

The steward is in a dilemma: too old to dig, too proud to beg. Before anyone knows of his sacking he calls in some of the debtors and gives them large discounts on their bills so they will look after him when he is jobless.

The landowner commends him for acting astutely! PROBLEM! Is Jesus commending corruption and graft in business? Commentators say:

  • The landowner was a generous man: he did not jail the steward
  • Did steward decide to throw all on the landowner’s mercy?
  • The steward may have been only returning his cut on transactions
  • With the small farmers rejoicing and praising the landowner’s generosity, he did not want to appear mean and so soaked up this unexpected adulation – PR!
  • The landowner may have thought this is business: the steward is a cunning scoundrel but he recognised his dilemma.

And so you might think that with these considerations the story of the unjust steward scrubs up pretty well. A few rules were broken but  Hey! everyone came out on top – the steward feathers his own nest; the small farmers all get a big bonus; and the landowner gets his halo polished!

But Jesus is not saying dishonesty is OK or that the end justifies the means. A parable always requires us to look for a deeper meaning, which appears in v.8 when Jesus says; “the children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light”.

Now we are all children of this world in the sense of the world being the water we swim in and the air we breathe. None of us is free from daily decisions about money or contracts or tax or relationships with individuals, corporations or government.

But as followers of Jesus we are also called to be children of the light, to be seeking things of eternal worth and allowing those things to shape the way we deal with things of this world. Jesus is saying that we are smarter at worldly things, or take them more seriously, than things of eternal worth.

And what are the things of eternal worth? Quite simply, putting all our trust in God and God’s love.  And allowing that love to flow through us to bring that same love to others.

In the parable the steward uses money to benefit the debtors. He does it for his own self-interest, but Jesus calls us to use our money, resources, time and talents to assist those in need, free of self-interest.  

G B Caird: “if we invest money in benefaction then we exchange it for the currency of heaven”.

Jesus’ coming confronted the disciples with a choice, and confronts us also today. It is the choice of discipleship. Do we see Jesus as the revelation of God’s truth and love and give our lives to follow him? And are we as astute in our discipleship as we are in handling the things of this world?

In v 13 Jesus says you cannot serve God and Mammon (= Money). Paul writes (1 Timothy 6:10):  the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

It is not money that is evil, but the love of it as an end in itself. This is idolatrous. The Pharisees scoffed at Jesus because it says “they loved money”.

As children of light we operate in the world of money, but money has menace. There are powerful temptations – politics, business, church and in all the pressures of a materialistic  and consumerist society– to use money or make choices in our own self-interest, rather than for the last, the lost and the least in society.

The greatest evil in life is losing sight of its purpose, the discipleship to which we are called, i.e.to seek the well-being of all people and creation.

When individual or institutional success takes precedence over serving our brothers and sisters then we are acting as children of the darkness.

L T Johnson: The disposition of our possessions is indicative of the disposition of the self – where our treasure lies, there our heart is also.

The story of two widows

  • In a large South American city there had been a subway fare increase
  • the parish priest at a large city church knew this would make it hard for two widows in his congregation to get to church
  • So he announced a retiring collection for “anyone who might be affected by the fare increase”
  • He noticed the two widows were the first to put money in
  • They explained that they knew what it was like to be poor and they wanted to help so that no one would be kept away from church by the fare increase.

Those two widows are moving examples of what it means to be children of the light: putting their whole trust in God, and living sacrificially to help those in need.

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GS05 The Pharisee and the Tax Collector

Pharisee (PH) and Tax Collector (TC) – Notes

Luke 18. 9-14

KM Bailey pp142-156 (back of book)

150: PH asks nothing for himself: he is self-advertising

150: by finding fault in others he tears up his own spiritual fabric

152: PH – supererogation – proud of his piety

156.1: exalted in sight of God, not socially.

  • righteousness is a gift
  • to those aware of their own need
  • pride has no place, only humility
  • keeping the law can lead to pride
  • self-righteousness destroys vision.

Thielicke, pp126-136

127:TC a rough rascal; PH doing good things

128:Humility can have its own pride

130: both have come to God; both acknowledge God’s goodness

132: much of the PH’s satisfaction is knowing he is better than the TC. He is looking downwards to a lower standard. Gossip!

133/34: TC looked only upwards to God’s standard – no comparisons to justify.

135/6: and did the TC change, whereas the PH was content where he was.

RR: it’s not where we are, but where we’re heading. And it’s looking solely to God.

GB Caird pp202/203

Two men went to pray, but only one prayed. The PH recited his virtues, and avoidance of vices. His prayers were “I”. He was content with himself. PH money-lovers (Lk 16)

Sacra Pagina pp271-274.

Audience were Pharisees

PH prayed with himself

Peripheral vision to TC

TC stood far off, eyes lowered, beat breast, cries for mercy.

The name “Pharisee” means “separated one.” They separated themselves from society to study and teach the law, but they also separated themselves from the common people because they considered them religiously unclean.

Middle class business men and trades workers, the Pharisees started and controlled the synagogues.

Sadducees more upper class, Stuck to written law. Pharisees allowed oral as well as written. Sadd: no resurrection

The name “Sadducee” is closely associated with attempts to determine the origin of this group. Suggestions include linking it with an Old Testament priestly family (Zadok), the Hebrew word for “just” or “righteous” (sdq) or “fiscal officials” (Gk. syndikoi). There are problems with etymologies and all other attempts to identify their origin.

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GS03 Creation, Religion, Science

Just before Christmas an American judge ruled that the theory of intelligent design (such as a Creator God) of Creation is based on a supernatural explanation for natural phenomena, and cannot be taught as part of a high school science curriculum. The ruling is part of a perennial debate as to whether the biblical account of Creation in Genesis 1 is science, or something else.

Those who look to Genesis 1 for a scientific account on Creation point to the evolutionary nature of that account. From a formless void there emerges sequentially over six “days” light and darkness, the heavens, land and sea, vegetation, sun, moon and stars, living creatures and finally human beings. This is not strictly in line with the scientific order of evolution, but is evolutionary in concept. The parallel with science is striking, yet the biblical story-tellers of 3,500 years could not have a knowledge of science equal to our own. Nor was science their intention in crafting the Creation story.

Taking another approach, Archbishop James Ussher of Armagh, a theologian of note in the 17th century, calculated from an historical perspective that the world was created in 4004BC. Some old bibles have this and subsequent dates appended in the notes. It is unlikely that the Archbishop, armed with today’s knowledge, would make such a calculation.

Others argue that the Bible must be right in postulating God as Creator, for how else could one explain some of the many unanswered questions we have about the beginnings of the universe. The problem with this “God of the gaps” argument is that as science advances and more answers are found, the dependence on God as the stop-gap solution diminishes.

These and other such arguments that seek to prove that the writers of Genesis provide us with a scientific or historical account of Creation make a fundamental category mistake. They miss the real purpose of the Creation story which is not history or science, but theology. The story conveys the Hebrew understanding of God’s relationship with the created order, and with humankind. It provides us with a world-view as to how we should live in relationship to God, other people, and Earth itself.

All cultures have their stories about the origins of life. Maori have the story of Rangi-nui, the sky father, and Papatuanuku, the earth mother. The Maori story is no more science or history than is the biblical story of Genesis 1. But both have similar themes in the sacredness of nature, and the consequent reverence we should have for people, all life forms and Earth itself.

The Judaeo-Christian story of Creation from Genesis 1 tells us several key things :

  1. The whole of Creation is alive with the active and life-giving presence of God (Genesis 1.2 : “The Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters”)
  2. The Earth is God’s gift to us, and it is good (Gen 1.31 : “God saw everything he had made, and it was very good”)
  3. We live in relationship with Creation, respecting each person and part as created by God. It is from this concept of relationship that all our efforts for justice, peace and environmental conservation stem : this is not merely a matter of ethics, but an expression of our deep relational connection with all life.
  4. At the heart of our being is our core relationship with God : it is because we see God as the source of all life that we regard all life as sacred and worthy of respect (“When we see God as our father and mother, we see every other person and part as our brother and sister”).
  5. Having God at the centre of life prevents us from acting selfishly and exploitatively towards others or to the Earth itself.

Science is science, and theology is theology : they are not competing truths, but complementary. Science tells us how the world was made. Theology gives us a world-view which tells us how we should understand the world, and how we should live within it.

On January 1 we celebrate the feast of the circumcision of Jesus, more often known today as the naming of Jesus. It is a day of dedication, the 8th day following a birth according to Jewish custom. The name “Jesus” means salvation – a Latin word meaning wholeness in every aspect of life, wholeness because as Jesus was dedicated to God, so we too dedicate our lives afresh to God for the year that lies ahead.

Our reflections about Creation are very relevant to a feast of dedication. The story of Creation provides us with this picture of a life-giving and divine spirit at the heart of all life. It instils within us a profound sense of the gift and the goodness of God in Creation and calls forth from us a song of praise and celebration. In affirming the integrity and God-given nature of all people, other species on Earth, and the Earth itself, it calls us to a life characterised by love and compassion for all living things, and leads us into ministries of justice, peace and caring for the environment.

And by having God at the centre of our life, we are not only sustained personally by the divine love and power, but we are prevented from the self-seeking that leads to power over others and abuse of the Earth’s resources.

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GS02 The Burning Bush, Pilgrimage, Calling

Sermon at Holy Trinity Cathedral, Auckland;  17 March 2002

A few days ago I had a surprise visit from a friend of a friend from 35 years ago. It took me back to the mid-60s when I was first ordained and curate at Papakura. It was a time in my life when I was very depressed as I wrestled with faith, ministry, future, life.

The charismatic movement was strong, and I sought a pentecostal experience of the Spirit to help me, but never received one. My unexpected visitor had had such an experience and left the Anglican Church to set up a pentecostal fellowship which he and his wife have run to good effect for the years since.

He came to share his experience with me and to express his concern that the Anglican bishops seemed to lack any passion in their ministry. He saw them as kind and loving people but not drenched with the Spirit so as to inspire their flock. He said he would like to pray for the bishops.

I was a little taken aback. It reminded me of 35 years ago when there was a distinct feeling that there were some who had received the Spirit and had a true relationship with God, while others were hovering around the edge and needed the pentecostal experience to be truly Christian.

I shared with my friend my own pilgrimage in faith since that time, especially my time in New York (‘68-’70) which had brought me face to face with many of the key issues of life in a global community : racism, poverty, justice, peace. I was forced to rethink my theology and my concepts of the Church, mission, ministry, and my own personal vocation.

Those two years laid the foundation for everything I have done in ministry ever since. In retrospect, had I been drenched with the Spirit at Papakura in the mid-60s I never would have been forced to wrestle with the questions that changed my life and ministry. A pentecostal experience would have diverted me from that task, and I believe that God denied me that in order to drive me on to much larger visions of the divine purpose in the world, and the role God wanted me to play within it. I am profoundly grateful for the way my life and ministry has been shaped.

What I have learned in a lifetime’s pilgrimage is that God calls each of us in different ways, gifts us with different gifts and experiences, and sets us down in different patches of the vineyard to exercise the vocation which is uniquely shaped for each individual. On this basis my friend and I prayed together, and hopefully rejoiced equally in the way God has worked in our lives

I was glad my friend visited. It is always good for us to be challenged about our faith, and how closely we walk with God in daily life. It is easy for the Church to be no more than just another organisation we belong to. Far from seeing ourselves as members of the Body of Christ whose lives are driven by the desire to serve God in every encounter and moment, we rank the Church along with the golf club, Rotary, office social club, or the graduates association. We may not be drenched with pentecostal passion, but if we are not deep down passionate about our calling as disciples of Jesus Christ we will be no more than salt that has lost its saltiness, no longer able to make a difference for God.

The Presbyterian Church has the best logo of any church I have ever seen. It is the image of the burning bush that Moses encountered at Sinai, with the words in Latin : nec tamen consumebatur, “it was not consumed”. Exodus 3.2 : “The Lord appeared to Moses in a flame of fire out of a bush; and Moses looked and saw that the bush was burning but was not consumed” – a powerful image of the energy of God which is never exhausted, and that all of us as we are filled with that energy gain the spiritual strength to go out and change the world.

An American Franciscan woman, Sister Joan Puls, uses that image to make the point that every bush in life is burning since God shines through the smallest and simplest of human experiences. All of life is sacrament. Sister Joan writes : “Spirituality embraces all of life, breathes through its homely details and its noble intentions. It is at the heart of our efforts to be human….It is the voice of our prayer and the progress of our pilgrimage towards peace. It is the silence of our struggles and the echo of our cry for justice.”

Many will know the words of Dag Hammarskjold, second Secretary-General of the United Nations:

I don’t know who or what put the question. I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to Someone, or Something, and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self-surrender, had a goal.[1]

Filled with that power Moses went to Pharaoh to struggle for justice and for the liberation of his people from slavery in Egypt. In the same power he led them for 40 years in the desert with no other guide than his God who was to them as fire by night and light by day. Spirituality is directly linked with the quest for freedom for the enslaved and justice for the oppressed.

Today’s first reading from Ezekiel 37 has the equally powerful story of Ezekiel in the valley of the dry bones, and hearing the voice of God asking : “Mortal man, can these bones live?” Sometimes we look around at the Church and it seems like a valley of dry bones from which the life of God has departed. But God says “I will cause my breath/spirit to enter you and you shall live.” And as Ezekiel prophesied there was a rattling sound, bone came together with bone. God covered them with flesh and put skin upon them, but there was no breath in them. So Ezekiel prophesied again and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, and there were enough of them to form an army.

Is it too much to say that this is increasingly the experience of this congregation in recent months? In place of a spirit of complaint I detect a different spirit – the spirit of God at work bringing reconciliation and a new attitude of working together for the common good, and the building of God’s kingdom. As we come up to Palm Sunday, Holy Week, Good Friday and Easter we might use this time for deepening our walk with Christ and with each other, so that filled with God’s spirit we may do mighty things for God.

“Spirituality”, as Sister Joan Puls says, “is the degree of our harmony with all that is within and without us… We become spiritual when we discern the sounds of the earth, recognise signs of pending destruction, speak the words of blessing and reconciliation. We become spiritual when we know ourselves as potential sisters and brothers of everything and everyone who has lived.”

Such spirituality is a goal worthy of our best endeavours.

[1] Markings, Faber & Faber, 1963.

GS02 The Burning Bush, Pilgrimage and CallingDownload
August 30, 2022 / 0 Comments

AA06 Randerson Retirement Interview

“A devil for the detail”

5:00AM Saturday June 09, 2007
By Carroll du Chateau 


Bishop Richard Randerson is turning his back on the big lights of Auckland for the home comforts of Haitaitai.

Every morning at 7.30 a small group gathers at the Holy Trinity Cathedral chapel. It’s a simple service, just the Gospel, confession, offertory and communion. The chapel, with its simple wooden cross (no figure of Christ) behind the altar, is small and cosy, compared with the cavernous cathedral outside. Lit by a small suspended lamp and two fat altar candles, it offers pews, padded kneelers and plush carpet. But the most interesting thing on this chilly winter morning is the evident piety of the officiating priest, the Anglican Dean of Auckland Richard Randerson.

There is no sign of the “agnosticism” Bishop Randerson has been explaining over the past few months. He skips the affirmation of faith but, this is the service of a believer: “Go to love and serve the Lord,” he says as the worshippers depart.

Later, in his rather spartan office, the bishop says that despite his many scholarly articles people still do not understand his position on faith. Sitting there in a brown v-necked Rodd & Gunn jersey over his purple cassock, and wearing a pair of shoes cleaned so many times the black leather wrinkles like parchment, Bishop Randerson explains he used the word “agnostic” only when debating the theories of evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins. He was asked if he could scientifically prove that God exists. And he says, “you can’t prove God by science.”On the other hand, the bishop believes passionately in God “as in the person known as Jesus Christ. I endorse that 100 per cent. That’s what my whole life has been about.”

It is Bishop Randerson’s careful theology, his dedication to truth and bridging the gap between science and religion that has led him into controversy over and over again. He does not accept the literal meaning of the virgin birth – and many of the other stories of the Old Testament.

“It can be very upsetting for people who think, ‘well that’s the truth: it’s a gynaecological miracle that I believe in’,” explains Bishop Randerson. “Yet often in the process of that [belief] they are missing what that story is about – which is that the divine and the human meet perfectly in Jesus. The miracle can distract people from the deeper understanding.”

Similarly with the story of Adam and Eve, which he explains away as one of many “symbolic stories” attached to the Bible. “Adam in Hebrew means humankind,” he says. “Eve means life. When we’re talking about Adam and Eve, we’re talking about the generic meaning of life. They’re generic stories about the truths of human life.”

He has also stuck his neck on the chopping block over gay marriage (he would welcome it if the church did).

The bishop’s modern ideas may have an appeal. Holy Trinity still draws 150 to Sunday communion and around 80 to evensong. Although the controversy over their leader’s agnosticism may have upset some of his flock, many more “on the margins” got engaged in the argument.

Bishop Randerson’s attitudes, delivered in a warm, measured voice, may make the Anglican Church far more acceptable to the educated than insistence on literal, blind faith. As he says, bringing the church into the scientific era has been his life’s work. “That’s what it’s all about – that’s what I’ve had a passion to do … There are many people who’ll say ‘if I’ve got to believe that Jesus was literally born from a virgin I have to rubbish the whole Christian thing just on the basis of that’.”

Richard Randerson grew up in Takapuna in the 1950s when it was Sunday school for all. His father, Brian, a branch manager with the BNZ and son of a Presbyterian minister, was confirmed in the Anglican church after he married so the children would have both parents in the same faith. The “very bright” Ngaio, was a stay-at-home mum. Their other two sons went into banking and law. Tony Randerson is the senior judge of the High Court.

Richard was 17 and in his last year at Takapuna Grammar when he signed up for the priesthood. Randerson majored in Greek and Latin at Otago then went on to three years at St John’s College in Meadowbank. By then many of his colleagues had already come off those rails. “Of the 15 who applied just over half made it to ordination.”

Even he had a crisis of faith. He was in his mid-20s, a couple of years into his first official placement at Papakura and newly married to high school teacher Jackie. The youth revolution that had been stirring in the US when he was ordained in 1964, was now raging in New Zealand, and the church was suddenly uncool. “People were leaving in droves,” he says. ” I had to do some major wrestling to find my way.”

That rethinking brought him to the wider life of the church in society. In 1968 Randerson won a scholarship to do his Masters In Theology at the Union Theological Seminary in New York, followed by a year with the City Ministry. It was the time of Black Power, Vietnam and youth revolt. Next came a year as industrial chaplain at Teesside, in Britain, where Rebecca (now 37) was born, before being called home to direct first, the Industrial Mission for Auckland City, followed by 12 years as inner-city vicar at St Peter’s in Wellington.

It was an interesting life. The family lived in a succession of parish houses. Randerson was an involved father. He took Jeremy (born 1976) to his first day at school and took his turn on the Playcentre roster.

By the mid-1990s, Randerson – who had been the Anglican Social Responsibility Commissioner for four years – was known for his opinions on the new-right government policies of the time. He had written two books criticising monetarist policies and was often in the media. “The ‘new’ virtues of individualism and self-help resulted in an erosion of community responsibility and compassion for people on the margins of society,” he growled.

Even now, he says, an over-emphasis on individual effort – “you deserve it, work hard, play hard” – is working against a sense of community – as evidenced in the Muliaga case. “I think society is way out of kilter.”

His values, ethics and financial judgment propelled Randerson to Australia for six years as Assistant Bishop in Canberra. Next came his appointment at Holy Trinity twinned, two years later, with the assistant Bishop post.

Then came a major seminar on climate change at Holy Trinity and last month Bishop Randerson was a core member of the third Asia/Pacific Regional Interfaith Dialogue, which he points out with a wry smile, “was not about watering down Christianity with a dollop of Islam” but grew out of the need for keeping communities peaceful.

“It started with the bombings in Bali and attacks on the Australian Embassy in Jakarta. And Helen Clark called on different religious groups to work together to build peace within our own communities.”

As he sees it, achieving the starry-eyed diverse communities our politicians want may not come easy. “This is the big issue of the 21st century. If we see our identity threatened we get anxious, then upset, then angry.” And no, he does not believe we should assimilate other peoples’ values at the expense of our own. “We need to learn to be a culturally diverse community while recognising that we live in New Zealand under a common law.”

As for the prayer before Parliament, the man who wants to usher people into Christianity rather than exclude anyone, believes we should keep the prayer but omit the specific reference to Jesus at the end.

Possibly because he goes into immense detail, the media constantly get Randerson wrong. “There have been five mistakes about me in the Herald this year,” he says. And another glaring one in Metro magazine which accuses him of introducing a Hindu altar cloth to the cathedral altar. Not so, says Randerson. “That cloth is in Christchurch cathedral – and commissioned by their dean.”

NOW, AS he heads into the last few weeks of his ministry, Bishop Randerson is quietly happy with his achievements, not even slightly frustrated that he never made archbishop – and seriously regretful that he won’t be in the driving seat when Christianity becomes hot again.

Later this month he and Jackie head to their second, personally owned house in Haitaitai so they can be near their children and grandchildren: Rebecca is now a Johnsonville GP and mother of two; Jo, a successful writer/actor and former Winston Churchill Fellow; Jeremy, actor and co-owner of the Foxton Fizz soft-drink company.

In retirement he will probably write his reflections on the past 50 years – documenting the huge changes in church and society.

“I actually think it’s a great time for the church right now,” he says. “For the 40 years since I was ordained, people have been distancing themselves from Christianity. Now people are looking for values – what gives life meaning and purpose – and revisiting some of the great spiritual dimensions. If we can connect with the wider community it’s not an opportunity we want to miss.”

Which brings us back to the debate over agnosticism. As the dean says, it sparked a huge response from people on the edge of the church. “They were saying, thank God someone’s saying something intelligent and that makes sense about spirituality.”

AA6 Randerson retirement interviewDownload
August 30, 2022 / 0 Comments

AA05 The Treaty of Waitangi – Diversity in Unity

THE TREATY OF WAITANGI: UNITY BUILT ON DIVERSITY

The speech to the Orewa Rotary Club in 2004 by Dr Don Brash, leader of the National Party at the time, triggered a major public debate and temporarily catapulted the party up in the polls. But Dr Brash’s views had the potential to undo much that was good in race relationships, as this article which appeared in the New Zealand Herald on Waitangi Day 2004 outlines.

On the wall at Ngai Tahu headquarters in Christchurch hangs a document of formal apology by the New Zealand Government for the wrongful alienation of Ngai Tahu land in the 19th century. The document is signed by Jenny Shipley, Prime Minister of the day.

The apology followed a finding by the Waitangi Tribunal that the claim by Ngai Tahu to the greater part of South Island was legitimate. But with that acknowledged, Ngai Tahu said they recognised the place of the many other settlers who had come subsequently to New Zealand, and did not want all of the land for themselves.

Instead an agreement was reached whereby the Crown allocated $170 million to Ngai Tahu, money which has been invested for the provision of health, education, housing and the general well-being of the tribe. Ngai Tahu were also affirmed as the guardians of 130 species of native flora and fauna, and of sacred sites such as Aoraki/Mt Cook. The mountain was deeded back to Ngai Tahu, who then formally returned it to the nation.

A basic dynamic of human relationships underlies this process. When a wrong has been done the wrong-doer is called on to acknowledge and repent of the wrong, and to make appropriate reparation. The act of repentance in turn frees the wronged party to act generously and, in a spirit of reconciliation, a new partnership is established.

We understand this dynamic at a personal level, but to see it as equally valid at the collective level between different groups, nations and races is a more recent insight. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in post-apartheid South Africa is based on this same understanding. In Australia the 1997 report on the stolen aboriginal generations significantly raised the awareness of Australians, although it took ten years and a change of government for an official apology to be offered.

While National Party leader Don Brash said in his speech to the Orewa Rotary Club that he would continue the process of settlements under the Waitangi tribunal, his comments are destructive of much that is good. His pledge to do away with many Maori structures and institutions, and restore unitary systems of administration, takes us back 50 years to a time when New Zealanders harboured the romantic notion that this country was a model to the world of racial harmony.

It is easy enough to point to excesses by individuals within Treaty processes, but what race or institution is free of corruption or excess? To add emotive terms like ‘grievance industry’, ‘deeply corrupt’ or ‘pecuniary gain’ panders to populism at the cost of substantial progress made in recent years by both Labour and National governments.

Dr Brash’s words are a sad contrast to those of Ngati Whatua chairman Sir Hugh Kawharu who, in speaking of Bastion Point, said that Maori title to land bestows mana, and mana requires sharing with all. Sir Hugh says that the concept of exclusive possession of land was alien to Maori before 1840. Today as a nation we have a choice between a spirit of sharing and trust, as outlined by Sir Hugh, or one that undermines the Treaty and leads to alienation and division.

At the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840 Governor Hobson said to each chief: “He iwi tahi tatou” (we are all one people). The words are capable of different meanings. They could mean, as Dr Brash interprets, that all race-based differences should be abandoned, and everyone treated the same. In reality, they mean something else.

Article 1 of the Treaty (acknowledging the kawanatanga/governorship of Queen Victoria) and Article 3 (according British citizenship to Maori) support a concept of one nation/one citizenship. But Article 2 acknowledges a special oversight (rangatiratanga/chieftainship) by Maori over their lands, fisheries and forests.

The Treaty thus offers a vision of unity between two peoples, but does not obliterate the differences. Instead it requires a careful dialogue between the parties to ensure the promises of Article 2 are achieved. The interplay between kawanatanga (Article 1) and rangatiratanga (Article 2) is complex, but successful dialogue is leading to win-win situations such as that between the Crown and Ngai Tahu.

It is this process which Dr Brash undermines with his dismissive comments on the Treaty, and his pledge to abandon many of the institutions designed to achieve justice and well-being for Maori. It is not a question of special rights and privileged treatment based on race. It is a matter of honouring promises made by our ancestors, and correcting injustices of the past in order to lay the groundwork for an equitable future.

Dr Brash is correct in saying that not only Maori are poor, but the fact is that Maori are disproportionately poor. Maori initiatives in crucial areas such as health and education do not mean neglecting the needs of non-Maori. Rather such initiatives acknowledge that policy-making for Maori by Maori will lead to better outcomes than if Maori are no more than a minority client-group in a one-size-fits-all structure dominated by Pakeha. Tailor-made Maori solutions can also prove more cost-effective than institutional ones.

It was precisely such an awareness that led to a constitutional change in the Anglican Church in 1991. The Church replaced a unitary system whereby Pakeha could always outvote Maori with one where any matter affecting both races must be mutually agreed. This arrangement ensures that what Maori judge appropriate for the advancement of mission among their own people is not subject to control by the rest of the Church. It is an exercise in self-determination, not ethnic privilege.

Dr Brash’s policies would have precisely the reverse effect. In abolishing Maori structures they would destroy not privilege but self-determination, and return Maori to a Pakeha-dominated colonialist framework.

The Treaty of Waitangi envisages a community which is diverse in composition, but able to work together to achieve outcomes that ensure the well-being of all peoples. True leadership is not that which obliterates racial awareness so that one race dominates another. True leadership is marked by the ability to develop structures that reflect diversity but blend for the common good.

To Discuss

  1. Do you see the Treaty of Waitangi as a source of division within the nation, or does it have a positive role to play?
  2. What would need to happen for the Treaty to be a source of positive outcomes in New Zealand?
  3. What is your understanding of the three-tikanga (Maori, Pakeha, Pacific Island) model of governance adopted by the Anglican Church in 1991? Has this been helpful to the Church’s life? What might be done to enhance partnership across tikanga within the Church?
AA5-The-Treaty-of-Waitangi-Diversity-in-UnityDownload
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