LENT ACTION 2023

Let us not simply stop doing something bad for Lent

Let us start doing something good

There can be no passive Christian.  John Wesley said, “…there is no such thing as solitary religion.  To commit yourself to Christ is to commit yourself to community…”.  Unless we act on the words of Christ, we are not worthy of his name.  We face national and global challenges; our cosmic Christ inspires us to act world-wide in his name.  By modern communications networks we can do this more effectively than any previous generation.

Giving to Charities is good; acting to bring about major world change is better.  Below are some proven lobbying organisations with major aims of influencing the government and powerful businesses here and abroad.  By petition-signing and lobbying, web-based activism works.  If those who read this support any of the organisations below, that would multiply effective Christian witness.  Whatever our age, we can be a globally active Christian.  John Wesley said he did not wish to live so long as to be useless; neither should we

Fighting for climate justice
People-powered change in the UK
Opposes banks which finance climate chaos
Ending unjust debt domestically and internationally
Works to draw up a fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty
Fighting for environmental action globally
Challenges the powerful for a more just world
Defending the natural world from destruction
Lobbies for using taxes for a fairer greener world
Fights poverty, disease and global heating
Campaigns to restore ocean health
Fights all forms of poverty and injustice globally
Tries to stop big corporations from behaving badly
Works for a better tax system to benefit all
United for nature

These organisations are not all Charities.  Donating money to a Charity is necessary; but it is the equivalent of a sticking plaster on a wound.  Giving time and lobbying are more difficult and time-consuming.  Such activity aims to prevent the wound: it is essential for Christians, our Church Councils, Synods and the national Methodist Conference, if we are to drive godly change.  If in our Church meetings we simply contemplate our navels and administer our Churches, what benefit are we to the Community?  Are we living and proclaiming the gospel?  In Luke 18:11 Jesus denounces the man who said, “…god, I thank you that I’m not like other people, thieves, rogues… or even like this tax-collector…” but would not humble himself.  Gandhi reminded us that one of the things that will destroy us is “Worship without sacrifice”.  We can so easily be hypocritical, which means play-acting; we need to be transformed into society-changing actors.  As Alec Dickson, the founder of Voluntary Service Overseas, said, “You don’t have to be good to do good”: so there is hope for us all.

Words without action are like flesh without bones: they will not stand up. Christ’s words are only meaningful if we act them outside as well as inside church. Their import stretches far beyond the folk immediately around us. The Christian church can act as the yeast which is ‘the kingdom of heaven” in the bread of our community; this was what Christ commanded in Mathew 13:33. To do so, we have to stir up society. We need to be embedded in lobby groups, sign petitions, write to our MP, and join demonstrations. In other words: be visible. Marcus Aurelius wrote 2000 years ago, “All that is necessary to maintain the wonderful order of the benefits of lawful community existence is for the individual to give to the community more than he or she takes from it.”
I challenge each reader of this article and our church to support and work with one of the organisations in the table above. However pure and holy our individual lives, if we do not act to change the actions of governments both local and national, of the banks and insurance companies of the moneymaking machine which tells us our lives are ruled by the market, not God, we are but tinkling cymbals. We should instead be trumpets for God.

The greatest global challenge of all, global heating, can only be met by individuals, governments and firms, all together. Our own tiny personal actions have an infinitesimal effect compared with the impact of the fossil fuel companies, together with the banks and insurance firms that support and lend money to them. Unless we lobby successfully against the billions of pounds spent on extracting and burning fossil fuels so that they are phased out, not just phased down, the temperature will keep on increasing and the sea level rising – inexorably and suicidally – for us and all our Creator’s magnificent biodiversity.

Our gospel should live beyond our buildings; it needs watering into the soil of our communities and our country. Let us act to fulfil Milton’s truth: “God, The more communicated, the more abundant grows.” This is the time for making the world our parish.
John D Anderson.