St Lawrence, Deacon, Martyr, and Friend of the Poor...

 

Sermon. 6 August 2023.

Feast of St Lawrence (transferred from 10 August).

 

[On the day I preached without notes, and said less than this, so as to combine the theme of St Lawrence with the Feast of the Day – whose readings we had had – Transfiguration.]

 

Today is a day of great poignancy for me. I truly hope that it is not the last time we meet, nor that it is the last time I serve you by leading worship in some capacity. But what today is is the last time I will be rota-ed to serve you according to the pattern we have had. I will be moving much nearer to my place of work.

 

So today I do want to reflect on my time with you.

How lovely, then, that I do this on your Patronal Festival, when we keep the Feast of St Lawrence.

 

Let me first of all say that, while I do from time to time, like to bring in elements of my learning (such as it is) from my various courses over the years, and most especially concerning the Bible and its languages, when it comes to St Lawrence, I can only say that I know the basics. You may very easily know more about St Lawrence than me. So today will be back to basics!

 

St Lawrence, who lived in Rome in the 3^rd century, was a deacon. It is always good for a priest to have a deacon as a focus and hero. I do have one friend who says that a priest is not a deacon. He says that priests are ordained a deacon first, and then a priest, and the diaconal ministry is as it were dispersed into the priestly ministry. It evaporates. But this is very much a minority report. Everyone else says: once a deacon, always a deacon. A deacon is a servant, not in the sense of slave, but in the sense of one who waits on tables. One who waits on tables. What a lot is said in those words! The very language suggests a courtesy, an attentiveness, a wish to respond to the others’ needs and wishes. It is not for me to say if I have managed any of that courtesy with you. And we know if anyone has waited on tables, it has been you serving me, on those rare Sundays when the boss has let me stay with you!

 

But however bad I have been at it, on this Feast of St Lawrence, we – you and I – can recommit to sitting with the question of how we share in the deacon’s role, each in our own way. As Christians we are called to serve each other and others, to be attentive to them, to be… kind.

 

St Lawrence was also a martyr. It is easy to get things wrong, when Christians speak about martyrdom. In the early centuries, Christians not infrequently spoke about longing for martyrdom. Some say in this desire for a martyr’s death, the early Christians show how they hate life, hate life in the body. Others say that is reading too much into it, and it was rather just a psychological way of coping with the fact that it was quite likely that you would face death at the hands of the enemies of the Church, in those early centuries of persecution. In any event, longing for martyrdom is something we can surely leave behind.

 

We can also get it very wrong when we speak about martyrdom in our days. We might think it is something that we have left behind. Globally, we have not. We may think of the Coptic martyrs murdered by ISIS in Libya in 2015. And unquestionably there are others barely known, or not know to us. On the other hand, we may see martyrdom or at least persecution where it does not exist. In our context, here in the UK, the Church has lost and will continue to lose some of its privileges, and much of its sense of a right to be heard and respected by all. This – let’s be perfectly clear – is not persecution. The Church of England should not “play the martyr”, as it adjusts to a new place in our nation.

 

So how do we look to our saint and martyr, Lawrence? With admiration, with gratitude for his example, his fortitude. We might also ask ourselves: is there anything about my life as a Christian which disturbs anybody? Do I run away from even a hint of opposition? I have insisted we are called to be kind. But that doesn’t mean we are called to be nice. Kindness and niceness are very different.

 

So, on this Feast of St Lawrence, maybe we all – you and me – need to sit with the question of whether we have some prophetic edge in what we say and what we do. Are we ready to say that Christ stands for things which can be troubling for the complacent, for the powerful?

 

This brings me to the most famous story about Lawrence. When the Roman prefect demanded that Lawrence handed over the riches of the Church, he distributed as many of the items as he could, and instead gathered those who were poor and needy in his own community, and said to the secular authority: “Here are the treasures of the church. You see, the church is truly rich, far richer than your emperor!”

 

You can see how this would get him into trouble. Undoubtedly, in context, this was a prophetic statement. Laurence spoke truth to power. But it’s not a statement without difficulty. From another perspective, the poor persons themselves may well have thought themselves patronised. They may not want their own suffering, perhaps their cumulative agonies, to be dressed up as something good, because it shows the Church in a good light.

 

Bluntly, I don’t think the Church has ever quite settled the matter: Do we want to help the poor, or do we want to abolish the poor? Help, or abolish? Please do hear this right. I mean: Do we want to help those who are poor, those who are the mercy of others, in this way or that, bringing in comfort in some capacity? Or do we want to change society so that no one is poor, in the sense of being at the mercy of others? Do we want to play our part in building the very Kingdom of Gd?

 

I do feel that the Bible and the Christian tradition can be read in either way. And perhaps something would be lost, if we lost the tension between the two positions. Help, or abolish. On this Feast of St Lawrence, we – you and I - can commit to sitting with the question, whether we have the balance right.

 

I will leave you with a linguistic point. (How else was I going to finish?) Lawrence come from the Latin Laurentius, meaning “laurelled”, wearing laurels. You have never let me rest on mine, and you do not rest on yours, as you care as you do for this Church, congregation, village, and benefice. I thank you for it. I thank you for your consistent welcome to me. I rejoice in it. Indeed, on this Feast of St Lawrence, let us – you and I - rejoice. Amen.