St Lukes, St John the Baptist, 20 October 2019, Father Patrick O’Ferrall
It is a great privilege to be invited to take part in your worship and I am very grateful to Peter Wolton for his invitation.
Today we celebrate the feast of St Luke. He was a gentile and in fact the only gentile writer included in the New Testament. He was a physician and accompanied Saint Paul as his physician on his second missionary journey from Troas to Philippi as we heard in the reading. He cared for Paul in his imprisonment in Rome and he was described as the beloved physician.
As a writer he wrote in elegant idiomatic Greek, some of the best in the New Testament. He was a master of description and some stories like the prodigal son, the Good Samaritan and the journey to Emmaus are masterpieces in their own right and certain phrases like Damascus road conversion have passed into our language. He wrote as much to proclaim, persuade, and to interpret Jesus’s teachings as he did to record events for posterity. The main characteristic of his gospel is to emphasise that the life death and teaching of Jesus is a message of salvation for the whole world not merely for the Jewish nation. There are also many more references to women than in the other gospels. It is thought he got the stories of Jesus’s childhood from his mother. Also he records poetic hymns like the Benedictus Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis. He wrote his gospel in Greece and died unmarried at the age of 84.
He is the patron saint of artists, bachelors, surgeons, students, and butchers. According to legend he was one of the seventy, the unnamed disciple on the road to Emmaus and the first painter of icons.
There is also a legend that he intended to write a third volume. You can perhaps see why. Acts ends somewhat abruptly and inconclusively with Saint Paul in prison. It was widely known that both Saint Peter and Saint Paul were martyred shortly afterwards. It would have been interesting to have had a contemporary account tracing the development of the early church after the deaths of its two great protagonists. Sadly for whatever reason saint Luke never got round to it.
Now in a flight of fancy I have been reflecting how Saint Luke might write about the present day history of the church and society. From the evidence of his gospel and acts we can speculate where his sympathies might lie.
I think he would despair of all the differences and divisions that persist today. In acts chapter 15 he describes how the council of Jerusalem managed to agree amicably on the terms under which the church could include the gentile converts as equal members. This was achieved with open discussion and without rancour but also with prayer together by all those present. I think that this was a model for settlement of controversial issues – prayer, open discussion, and good will. At the same time however Saint Paul had to deal in his letters with arguments and dissension in the churches he founded, the church in Corinth in particular. Anger is often rooted in fear. I have experienced a parish where love and nurture were absent and arguments and dissension prevailed. Fortunately I have also experienced the opposite. When parishioners are nurtured and encouraged, they can go out with confidence and serve the lord. Today we are faced with strong divisions within the church and society. Brexit and extinction rebellion have divided the nation and even families. We cannot brush these fundamental issues aside and say that we can’t cope any more. Prayer is all about staying with difficulty and not avoiding it. A woman at the People’s March in London yesterday said “the mood now is that you’re a traitor if you speak to the other side. The base of democracy is dialogue and we need to get to the issues below why Brexit happened”. She is right; we need to concentrate on the ills and injustice in our society.
One of the burning issues of today is the uneven distribution of wealth in our country and around the world generally. In the early church there was a consensus that contributions should be made according to people’s means. This ensured that there was enough for those on the margins. Nowadays, charities, like Christian Aid, the Church Urban Fund, Crisis and St Mungo’s, just to name a few, play a vital caring role. Many food banks are organised by churches. We have diverged a long way from the practice of the early church. Life is very different 2000 years on but it does not in any way diminish the need for us to reflect about and find answers to the problems of inequality.
I mentioned earlier that Luke was believed to have taken part in the mission of the seventy. I also said he was writing to proclaim, persuade, and interpret the sayings of Jesus. He would perhaps be recording how the church now proclaimed the gospel and find examples of the many unsung people who strive to live out the gospel in their lives and witness to their faith.
I believe that Saint Luke would commend the role of Archbishop Tutu and many others in the apartheid era in South Africa. They went out and stood their ground. That was their witness to the gospel. Not many of us are able to give such costly and courageous witness. But we can be witnesses to our faith when the opportunity presents itself and not hide or be embarrassed by it. We are now part of a minority group in this country and it is sometimes hard to give this witness
As a doctor Saint Luke would be writing sympathetically about advances in medicine. He would record stories of those who devote their lives to the relief of suffering in war zones, natural disasters and epidemics like the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa. The heroic work of doctors and nurses who work for charities like Medecins Sans Frontieres and medical aid for Palestinians would be approved as would the organisations caring for the many refugees around the world.
I would like to reflect for a moment on the environmental crisis. Many of Jesus’s parables were drawn from his observation of nature and its precious fragile beauty. I believe that this would lead Saint Luke to comment adversely on our environmental stewardship. He would encourage us to reflect on how the way we live affects our fragile planet and on our duty to be witnesses of the need to take urgent action on this global crisis. This is going to require uncomfortable changes for us all. In the past we have taken the easy option to defer action. To accept change and move out of our comfort zones is painful but both urgent and essential. But we do have the example of Luke and other Christians who embraced change.
Flying back from seeing friends in Athens last week I had an uncomfortable thought. Wasn’t I being hypocritical marching in a climate change demonstration a few weeks before? Should I not instead contact friends in distant places by skype or letter? And what about flying to holiday destinations? There’s the rub. What sort of world has my generation passed on to our grandchildren?
So today, we are celebrating the life of a remarkable man, a man of many diverse talents. He was a consummate artist both with words and with a paint brush. We are indeed fortunate that his writings were preserved; we would be much the poorer if we had never known the Emmaus road story or the parables of the Good Samaritan and the Prodigal Son which have inspired masterpieces by Rembrandt and many other painters.
As the collect for Saint Luke’s day says his praise is in the gospel. He used his talents for the glory of God and the spread of the gospel. The challenge for us is to be witnesses of our faith in the face of a world that is largely indifferent and sometimes hostile to the message of the gospel. There are pressing issues, like the divisions within the church and society, the uneven distribution of wealth and the protection of our planet that cannot be ignored, may God give us strength to pray and play our part in the process of healing and reconciliation. Amen.
Father Patrick O’Ferrall
20 October 2019