Plenary, 11 Jun 2003

Meeting date: Wednesday, June 11, 2003

Official Report 422KB pdf

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Time for Reflection

The first item of business this afternoon is time for reflection. Our time for reflection leader today is Maggie Lunan, who is a member of Wellington Parish, Glasgow.

In the past month, I have heard three prominent figures say something that has stopped me short and challenged me greatly. There is nothing unusual in that; it was what they said that was unusual. They said, "I got it wrong."

How difficult it is for us to admit to being wrong, and how much more difficult it is if we are in the public eye. Confession is good for the soul, but bad for the reputation.

Admitting to being wrong makes us vulnerable and easily ridiculed, so that we will do anything in our power to pretend that we have not made any mistakes. The interesting thing is that, instead of thinking less of such people, I hold them in greater respect. I am attracted to the integrity that allows them to admit that they need to change. It is so counter-cultural, whether in religion or politics, to waver from our received truth.

I have a good friend who describes the situation as follows: we should be very firm at the core but fuzzy around the edges. Today, we have often become somewhat fluffy at the core and rock hard at the edges.

How did those folk discover that they were wrong? They did so by being fuzzy at the edges, by being open and by not letting their ideologies block their ears. They listened to people. In one case, they listened to people of little importance in the world's eye and, in the other cases, they listened to people with a different point of view.

To be fuzzy at the edges requires a second trait—an ability to take time out. We need time to reflect on the changing realities around us. Often, what has aye been just does not work any more. We need time to take stock and to ask whether what we say, or what we stand for, still makes sense. We need the quiet to get a different perspective and to consider whether our sheer busyness is changing the world or whether we should look again at the bigger picture.

It is a message common to all the faiths that, regardless of how important we are and how much we think we have to do, we were made to live a life in balance. Such balance involves work and rest, action and reflection. Getting that perspective might help us not only to say that we might have got it wrong, but to accept it with grace when others admit their mistakes.

I will end with words from someone much wiser than I am, who, if he had lived in the 21st century, I am sure would have been inclusive. Alexander Pope said:

"A man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying … that he is wiser today than he was yesterday".