Plenary, 24 Oct 2001

Meeting date: Wednesday, October 24, 2001

Official Report 359KB pdf

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Time for Reflection

To lead our time for reflection, we welcome Rev Fiona Mathieson, minister of Carrick Knowe Parish Church, here in Edinburgh.

I first started working as a minister 13 years ago. I worked in a parish in Edinburgh, in Morningside, where part of my job was to visit the elderly. One visit is etched in my memory. A lady asked me which school I had gone to. "What school?" I thought, as my west coast of Scotland upbringing kicked into play. I was a Church of Scotland minister; obviously I had attended a Protestant school. Was she stupid?

I smiled. "I went to Mearns Castle High School," I said proudly. It was brand new at that point and was recognised then, as it is now, as a good school.

"Oh," she said. "You mean you didn't go to Hutchy or Park?"—two of Glasgow's established private schools.

"Eh, no," I replied.

"And you've got a degree?"

"Two," I said.

"Well, haven't you done well!"

Prejudices are part of all of our histories and upbringings—some conscious, some subliminal.

Jesus always challenged people to examine their motives and to challenge the narrow-mindedness insidious in their culture. He said, "Everyone is my sister, my brother, my mother." He challenges us to do the same, to treat people with the same kind of love and understanding that the majority of people expect from their families. All people, especially those with the privilege of shaping and leading a country, have a duty to constantly examine their preconceptions. It is all too easy to judge others.

Jesus also said, "Take the plank out of your own eye before taking the speck out of another's."

May God make us aware of the planks of prejudice in our lives and help us to remove them, before we shout about the specks that we see in other people's lifestyles and opinions.

Amen.