Heaven on earth

The morning prayers at the Assembly are well prepared and well thought through. There is a book with all the songs, and they really represent the whole worldwide church. In front there are so many different persons leading us. Regardless of gender, faith tradition, age, or other variations. We are children of God in unity. The woman that worshipped next to me said what I had already thought.

This is heaven on earth.

It is of course sad that we cannot share Eucharist. Be this as it may, we still praise God together, we listen to the Word, we lament, and we turn to God in prayer for this broken world.

Having said this, I need to stop and deepen the analysis. Since we cannot share Eucharist in this ecumenical space, we don't reach the profound unity that Jesus prayed for the night before his death. I lament this.

When I reflect on other spaces I lament even more. Nominations yesterday were depressing. Less young people are nominated to the central committee, less laity and I guess maybe also less women. We are moving in the wrong direction.

What is it that we don't understand? We read from Galatians 3:23-29 in the morning prayer:

There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

And a fantastic drama over the text about the Canaanite woman, from Matthew 15:21-28. The text was not read but it was there to be understood for us that a woman approached Jesus and Jesus changed his mind and listened to her prayer.

The Canaanite women makes Jesus listen.

It is hopeful and at the same time troublesome. But the singing together still gives me more hope than despair. We sang so many songs but I especially remember the short chorus with the text

Act justly

Love mercy

Walk humbly

With your God 

After the morning devotion the Thematic plenary followed with the theme:

Affirming Justice and Human Dignity

Different persons representing people with disabilities, women, youth and racialised people were talking.

The best part, however, was a dance. Fadi El Halabi from Lebanon sits in a wheelchair. But he danced with Karen Abou Nader who is an international dancer. Have a look at it. You won’t regret it. It starts 23.30 into the YouTube clip.

I was also glad that Samson Waweru Njoki - who is blind - made a comment on yesterdays Bible text about the blind man whom Jesus cured. Samson asked the question about who needs to have his or her sight back?

The drama from the morning prayer continued. I was proud to see a number of my friends from A Just Community of Women and Men acting. The whole plenary also ended with the words from the song:

Act justly

Love mercy

Walk humbly

With your God

The drama included a journalist who asked questions and summarised
the impact of the encounter between the Canaanite woman,
who was given a name: "Justa" and Jesus.

Christ’s love moves the world

I feel at home in the school setting. In South Africa in the eighties many
congregations met in the schools, both for youth meetings and services. 

Once a month a group of Christians worship in a school canteen in Uppsala. It is not common in Sweden, that members of the Lutheran Church (Church of Sweden) use school facilities. Church of Sweden was a state church for centuries and there are Church buildings almost everywhere.

In this area, however, the Church was demolished. Saint Olof’s Church was built in 1983 but due to financial constraints in the Parish, it only lasted until 2008. Before that a group of parishioners volunteered to continue with Sunday services. The first two years they did so every Sunday but since 2005 once a month. I am part of a group of ordained priests who take turns to preach and preside. Likewise organists come there on a voluntary basis to accompany the congregation in the hymns.

The link with the Congregational Council is very good. The chairperson is part of the initiative. The basis however are ordinary church members who come there early in the morning to move tables and chairs, put altar cloths on a table, decorate it with flowers, and prepare coffee and cookies for the fellowship after the service, just to mention a few examples.

Today we focused on Jesus’ baptism. In the choir I belong to we have sung an old Christmas Carol, which I used as a kind of structure for the sermon. The song is a Cornish Carol from the 17^th Century, probably based on a much older medieval mystery play.

Tomorrow shall be my dancing day

It consists of fourteen verses and unfortunately – although not surprisingly – some contain anti-Semitic material. The version we sang in our choir – with music by John Gardner – only has the four first verses. They are fine. The reason for using the song for my sermon was the fourth verse. About Jesus’ baptism:

Then afterwards baptized I was;

The Holy Ghost on me did glance,

My Father’s voice heard from above,

To call my true love to my dance.

The song thus combined the Christmas theme with Jesus’ Baptism, which our lectionary does. I also like the idea of Jesus inviting us to dance. This idea is not unusual. There is a modern song named

The Lord of the Dance

Sidney Carter wrote this song in 1963. He might have been inspired by the older song.

When I prepared the sermon I saw a post on Facebook. Marianne Ejdersten, WCC Communication director, posted another song text. Well known song and hymn writer, Per Harling, has written a song for the upcoming 11^th General Assembly of the WCC. The text is based on the theme:

Christ’s love moves the world to reconciliation and unity

Well, I thought: if Christ’s love moves us – couldn’t that be a description of a dance? If Jesus is the Lord of Dance?

I asked both Marianne Ejdersten and Per Harling if the song could be used this morning and the answer was yes. Maybe it was the first time it was sung in a Swedish Church setting. I don’t know. It became obvious that a Church Service in a school canteen in Uppsala is as much at the centre of the World Council of Churches as the WCC Assembly Planning Committee meeting in Cyprus. 

So, we were happy to be part of the preparation of the 11^th General Assembly of the World Council of Churches, by singing this song in Uppsala:

Tanzania 8

The dance experience demands a blog post of its own. The project is called 'the Cultural Arts Centre Project at Makumira' and has the European Union, amongs others, as partners.

First we went to a piece of land that has been given to the project, where they intend to build a cultural centre. Right now there is only a stage.

From there we went back to campus and the room where the group were going to perform. There show was a new production and we were the first persons to watch their first dress rehearsal. 45 very intensive minutes!

At the centre was a young woman and she was courted by three men. One sang a very sad and sensitive song to her. The second was a Massai who danced forcefully, making sounds of cattle and also carrying a stick, which he hit the floor with several times. He was joined by four friends and the woman clearly became scared when they danced around her. So she fled.

Finally she finds her drummer.

Lastly a drummer approached her and he did it in a way which she liked. They had close eye contact and he waited for her to respond positively before every move he made.

The dance was very emotional and sensual. I thought about the discussion I had had with the students and realised that Africa really have so many arenas where the conversation around relations and especially sexuality can take place.

The last twenty minutes were a long, vibrant explosion of feelings (and sweat). We were totally overwhelmed. And impressed!

I hope that this project will be supported also in the future and hopefully could this group be invited to perform abroad. Why not in Sweden?

With this powerful demonstration of the rich, African culture, we were both ready to go to airport as well as a bit sad to finally part with Africa.

But we know that we are not parting. We will be back! And Africa will anyhow remain in us.