Plenary, 30 Jan 2008
Meeting date: Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Official Report
429KB pdf
Time for Reflection
Good afternoon. The first item of business is time for reflection. I am especially pleased to welcome as our time for reflection leader today the Right Rev Sheilagh Kesting, moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.
Right Rev Sheilagh Kesting (Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland):
When John the Baptist was in prison, he began to have doubts about Jesus. He had hailed Jesus as the long-awaited leader who would bring in the kingdom of God on earth. The expectation had always been that this leader would be powerful, a king, a military leader. Jesus did not seem to be fitting the bill. However, Jesus said to John's disciples:
"Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk … the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them."
This week has been designated homelessness and poverty week. It is a week when churches across the United Kingdom put the spotlight on poverty and its related issues. Because of that, I have made it the theme of my visit to the Parliament.
When in London recently, I learned of the disproportionate number of Scottish men who are among those who sleep rough in the city each night. Research is going on to see to what extent the same is true of the more hidden presence of homeless women. The lure of the city is legendary—and if that is true of Scots in London, it is also true of people of many nationalities who are to be found on the streets of our cities here in Scotland. People leave their homes—voluntarily to seek a new life, or because they are thrown out for some reason—and they come to the city with the hope of escaping poverty, unemployment and violence, and so make good. The city is also a place to get lost in when things have gone badly wrong, to escape from the shame of being with people who perhaps know too much about you. The anonymity of the city is attractive when you feel you have little self-worth.
Poverty, alcoholism, drug addiction and homelessness are all interconnected. The cycle of hopelessness is hard to break. There is a need for people who will befriend you, trust in you and identify the potential for change that lies within you—people who, because they believe in you, allow you to believe in yourself.
I spoke to some of the men in London who are being helped to find housing and to make a new start in life—in London or back home—and I learned what it meant for them to have someone to offer them friendship, to support them through hard times and to keep faith with them when the road to self-respect takes longer than anyone might want. Such patient, caring work may not seem like the breaking in of God's reign, but it is surely an example of the good news to the poor that Jesus associated with that kingdom. When it comes to addressing the needs of the poor, there is no room for point scoring and competition between different agencies, whether they are religious, political or of any other type.
When Jesus reported to John, he cut through all the religious and political self-interests of the time and put the spotlight on where the presence of God can be found—where the most vulnerable are brought good news. That, surely, is a focus for us all.