THE Church is no different from any other charity or branch of social services unless social action and the Easter message are held together, the Archbishop of Wales, the Most Revd Cherry Vann, told the Governing Body of the Church in Wales, meeting this week.
Her presidential address in Llandudno, on Wednesday, drew attention to the fear, uncertainty, suffering, and grief of Christians in Ukraine, South Sudan, Iran, the Middle East, and the Gulf States, as “almost beyond our imagining. . . The meaning and significance of Easter is brought into sharp focus in those contexts, which today feel much more like Good Friday than Easter Day.”
Hence, the actions that many were taking to support families, friends, and communities could feel “very small, insignificant and inadequate when set against the horrors that we see and hear about on our news feeds”, she said. “They are, nevertheless, acts of care and compassion and expressions of solidarity, which in some small way can be signs of hope, bringing small chinks of light into the darkness.”
Acknowledging, too, the additional hardship that many were suffering as a consequence of war, she reiterated: “The gospel of Jesus Christ is the motivator, the driver, the shaper of our life and witness as individuals and as a Church. We live out and share the good news by serving others. And, in serving others, we draw them into the love of Jesus and the salvation he offers.”
The Archbishop went on to speak of the forthcoming Senedd elections, and to urge voters to be informed by their faith. “Of course, there are Christians in most political parties. I am not for a moment saying one party is more Christian than the others,” she said.
“But there are values that our faith teaches us which might inform our voting, as they do our behaviour: values that encourage us to look beyond ourselves and our own self-interest to the interests of others and to the common good.”
Politicians, whether Christian or not, were elected to foster a society in which all were valued, could find a place, and could have a sense of agency and belonging, she said.
“It’s a complex picture with no easy answers or solutions, but the Hate Hurts Wales campaign that has has been running in this country for the last five years is surely a timely reminder that hate, fear, and mistrust not only hurt the people or groups that are the specific targets, but all of us, the whole country, because it breeds suspicion, division and all too often violence, which affects us all.”
Turning to the Church itself, she spoke of the “fear and mistrust” within it, and of conversations with groups and individuals “who are anxious, fearful, uncertain of their future within our Church; fearful of being excluded or further excluded from the Church’s life and ministry; uncertain of where they are going to find themselves in the next 12 months. And, just for clarity, those conversations were with people from both the Catholic and Evangelical wings of the ecclesiological spectrum.”
Love, she said, was “not just about us being nice and polite to one another, but about generously, genuinely wanting the best for one another, genuinely wanting to create a Church where everyone feels affirmed, valued, and cherished for who they are in Christ, and what of his gifts and mercy and grace they bring”.
She went on to remind the Governing Body of its commitment to promoting “an environment which values all people’s differences”. She emphasised: “Being an inclusive Church means having to admit to each other that we are flawed and only God is perfect; that we may disagree, but we can still love each other; that no one needs to be outside the love of God.”
She urged: “Let’s work at building relationships of mutual trust and respect that will, little by little, cast out the fear and mistrust that is between us, and enable us to learn just what it means to ‘love as he loves us’.”