Pentecost Sunday, and the two regular regular Eucharists to celebrate. At Almuñecár in particular we are under time pressure from the service that follows ours, to complete in no more than an hour. I'd be happier to lose a hymn and shorten the Gradual Psalm to achieve this, but I've been asked to make my sermon shorter. That's quite a hard request, as I try to pack in as much as I can into a twelve to fifteen minute address, aware of how few other occasions there are when church goers are getting live teaching. So, I made the effort to try and reduce the length of my text from 800+ words to 600, and this means concentrating the content I have to deliver, and that means spending a good deal longer on preparation, as would be the case if writing a script for broadcasting or publication. Nothing wrong with that. It's an enjoyable challenge.
Across Spain today it's local council election day. Recently we've had our fair share of election material delivered, and much of it I've been able to read and understand, thanks to the effort I've made to cram some usable Spanish into my brain, with the commendable Duo Lingo internet app. You get to speak and type answers with this, and the voice recognition routine works well most of the time, except that occasionally it leaves you no time to respond, or fails to pick up your voice unless you shout at it. This can be very annoying, but so can typos, and I make rather of lot of them, so any learning session can be an occasion for much grumpiness and swearing. It'll be interesting to see how much election news in Spanish I'll be able to follow on tomorrow's news.
Talking of elections, yesterday's Irish referendum on incorporating gay marriage into constitutional law was an astounding outcome, when you consider how socially conservative Ireland has been until relatively recently. Nearly two thirds of those who voted have declared their desire to treat equally all couples who want to pledge their lives to each other in marriage. Some interviewed spoke seriously about respecting the ability of others to remain in permanent loving relationships, and uphold family values, recognising that the nature of family life is more diverse and complex than tradition and social convention has been prepared to admit.
There are few clergy or church leaders who cannot know the truth of this, but the doctrinal ideal along with liturgical custom and practice, fails to reflect it. The Archbishop of Dublin said the vote challenged the church to take a reality check. But where will all the churches go from here? Both the conservative and progressive ones. Will they listen? What will they learn?
In so many ways, the difficulty Christians have had in coming to terms with contemporary changes in understanding sexuality and relationships, has contributed to many abandoning the church. It's meant that the spread of secular thinking at grass roots level in society has led the way to a paradigm shift in thinking, and not the vision behind Christian doctrine.
It's fascinating how often secularised societies can place high value on family life and faithful loving relationships, albeit of a much more diverse and varied nature, than the religious ideal believes possible or worthwhile. How will religious people respond? I pray we're not going to see a reactionary backlash, but a widespread change of heart. And I pray that the media will refrain from turning any kind of exchange or dialogue into confrontation or conflict, but let people use their hearts and minds to recognise each other's values and conviction, and be reconciled with each other, in order to live together well with differences.
