Plenary, 27 Nov 2002
Meeting date: Wednesday, November 27, 2002
Official Report
387KB pdf
Time for Reflection
I welcome to lead time for reflection today Rev Jim Jones, chairman of the synod of the Methodist Church in Scotland.
Rev Jim Jones (Synod of the Methodist Church in Scotland):
Some days ago I was driving along the M9 towards Stirling. To my right, the sky was dark and heavy with rain clouds; to my left the sun was still shining. Against the lowering sky there was a low hill crowned with an ancient fortified tower, topped with a flag at full stretch in the wind. The flag, you will not be surprised to learn, had a blue background and the white cross of St Andrew, and was lit up by the facing sun. The combination of light and dark, the singularity of the tower, the energy of the flag and the associations of the centuries, which that fluttering symbol carries, all came together in a moment that stirred the spirit.
On the whole, our time and culture are much more prosaic and rational. We do not have much patience with that which is not obvious. Symbol has a hard time surviving the laser of our rationality. I, too, would want to hold up my hand for efficiency and effectiveness in organisation and delivery. Even more seriously, the cause of social justice calls us to take a long, hard look at many institutional practices that lurk under the rubric of "tradition".
But the point about the sun-lit, wind-stretched flag against the storm clouds is that it stirred my spirit. As a living symbol, it took me beyond the confines of my narrower self into the community of the nation, and the community of the nation carries with it the sense of responsibility, respect and reciprocity—how to live together in an inclusive and generous way. Symbols are necessary, and have the capacity to evoke and empower our actions.
The white cross is the cross of St Andrew, whose day is, of course, this Saturday. You may feel some scepticism about the stories of St Andrew's arrival on the eastern shores of this land, but, even more than his flag, St Andrew as a figure points us to depths where there are reservoirs of resources to empower and enable our quest for human being.
St Andrew points us to the mystery of God. It is there that there is light against the clouds; it is there that there is a stretching energy; it is there that we find a tower, and another cross. In God—creator, redeemer, sustainer—is a depth and a source of meaning that takes us beyond romance and rationality into a sustained and sustaining vision, and a pattern for human service.
Amen.