Sermon: Vocation

The other night there were two lambs standing here in the crossing of this Cathedral.  They were digital lambs on a screen at the farewell service for the Bishop of Jarrow.  It posed a liturgical dilemma for us in procession: how were we to acknowledge the high altar beyond? I proffered a dip of the decanal head, but wasn't sure if I ought to be reverencing lambs.  The semiotics were puzzling: the hymn we were singing was ‘Thy hand O God hath guided thy flock from age to age'.  Hardly a flock this, rather, two lost sheep that had strayed from the ninety and eight.  How very post-modern, I thought, this layered liturgical riddle carrying bits and pieces of possible meaning.  I trawled for remembered insights from that great classic of toilet literature, Buddhism for Sheep and began to deconstruct.  Were these creatures on-screen for their innocence or their foolishness, as objects of admiration or of pity?  Were they gazing at each other or at us in amiability or suspicion?  Was the expanse of grass and sky an image of beauty or bleakness?  Was the implied allusion to the Good Shepherd, Little Bo-Peep or One Man and His Dog?  Was there a sinister subtext about the slaughterhouse and dinner-plate?  Was it a warning, or just an elaborate tease with the joke at our expense? 

Well, the Archdeacon helpfully suggested that what I was bowing to was in fact our two bishops as we'd never seen them before.  Then it began to fall into place.  The focus of the service was the ministry of a bishop.  And while ordained ministry is often spoken of in terms of the shepherd because of its pastoral character, what was on-screen offered a suggestive image in its own right.  The picture of two innocents standing apart from each other and apart from life, puzzled, bewildered, even forlorn, exposed to the elements, not knowing what they were for and not capable of knowing - that is the picture some people have of the clergy.  Take it further and think about being driven by others against your will, being extinguished, roasted, eaten up, devoured - these are all metaphors anyone in a caring profession will recognise at times.  I don't want to press this too far.  But when I was a parish priest in Northumberland where there are more sheep than people, and used to roam the high and lonely Cheviot hills, I sometimes thought that being a vicar was a bit like wandering lonely as a sheep.

I am musing in this vein because today is being kept across the Church of England as a Sunday on which to highlight vocations.  Vocation, of course, means ‘calling' - any calling, not simply one to an explicitly religious role like ordination or entering a religious community.  Baptism involves each of us in an inescapable vocation to discipleship, being faithful followers of Jesus Christ, and in every aspect of life to emulate his own living and dying and rising again.  The New Testament remind us that we are ‘called to be saints', called to live before God in the world, called to the offering of our life in its totality of work, leisure and relationships.  I can't emphasise enough the importance of this.  And if Christianity is to be credible in the modern world, then it depends on our grasping hold of this insight and living it consciously, and through the authenticity and integrity of who and what we are, giving a reason for the hope that is within us.

But what about vocation to ordained ministry?  Many meanings can be given to ordination, but one of them is to be a public sign of the spiritual dimension in the world.  This is what the Anglican theologian Austin Farrer meant by his phrase ‘walking sacrament'.  He said that a priest was, so to speak, an outward and visible sign on legs of inward and spiritual grace present and at work in the world that God loves.  Of course, every baptised Christian is already fulfilling that vocation.  But the ordained do it publicly and officially.  For if we are going to have organised religion, and it is inevitable, then it needs its spokesmen and women, its representatives who will speak and act for it, and in speaking and acting for the church, will speak and act for the God who is present to and at work in all of life.  The Common Worship Ordinal says: ‘The Church is the Body of Christ, the people of God and the dwelling-place of the Holy Spirit. In baptism the whole Church is summoned to witness to God's love and to work for the coming of his kingdom.  To serve this royal priesthood, God has given particular ministries. Priests are ordained to lead God's people in the offering of praise and the proclamation of the gospel. They share with the Bishop in the oversight of the Church, delighting in its beauty and rejoicing in its well-being. They are to set the example of the Good Shepherd always before them as the pattern of their calling. With the Bishop and their fellow presbyters, they are to sustain the community of the faithful by the ministry of word and sacrament, that we all may grow into the fullness of Christ and be a living sacrifice acceptable to God.'

Today's gospel is part of that great passage in St John's Gospel in which Jesus speaks of himself as the Good Shepherd.  In it he says: ‘my sheep hear my voice.  I know them and they follow me.'  Could it be that those lambs on the screen here in the crossing were not lost but listening?  One way of speaking about ordination is that it is about helping the church, our society and individual people hear and recognise that voice that calls to us in judgment and mercy.  That requires a quality of attentive listening and spiritual focus which in turn entails being willing to live contemplatively. If you ask people what they look for in their clergy, they often say that they expect us to be at our prayers, to give an intelligent account of religious belief, and to be passionate for God. They do not want bishops and clergy to be in a flurry of relentless activity with time for nothing and nobody.  They want us to be reflective, to be able to speak from an inward spiritual wisdom.  The spiritual tradition knows that it is precisely this quality of being, grounded in relationship with God that leads to radical personal and social transformation. The vision of God always includes our vision of a world and of human life renewed in the light of God's kingdom.  ‘After Sunday' is as important a dimension of being disciples as our praise and prayer on this first day of the week.  ‘What matters for prayer is what we do next'.  This is what Christianity means.  It lies at the core of what it is to be ordained.  If ordained ministry looks uncomfortably churchy at times, this is only so that it can become a truly worldly vocation.

It's heartening that a number of people in this Cathedral community are exploring the possibility of ordination.  I hope there may be others.  After more than 30 years as a priest, I can honestly say that there is nothing I would rather have done with my life.  But I would not be standing here with any integrity were it not for you, for our life together here and in the other Christian communities that have been part of my formation.  Our partnership in the gospel, the praise of God and the pain of the world is the real privilege here.  So I ask you to pray for your ministers as we pray daily for you.  Pray too that God will call men and women of depth and wisdom to serve in the ordained ministry. And whatever your vocation, lay or ordained, think of those digital lambs and carry on listening.