OF MARTYRS, MOTHERS, MUSLIMS, AND MASS

Muslims attending Mass at St Ouen, North of Paris, after the murder of Fr Hamel

(NB: white is the Muslim colour of mourning)

I was asked the other day why on this blog I hadn’t written anything about the murder of Fr Jacques Hamel, the old French priest stabbed to death at the altar by two ISIS-encouraged 19-year-olds. I thought about it, then answered that I wasn’t sure what sensible things I could say that hadn’t been said already a hundred times by the media, social or otherwise. Outrage, horror, grief. One Facebook meme had his picture with the overlay “MARTYR DE FRANCE”. I wasn’t happy with that: “martyr for Christ” would have been nearer the mark. However, two things happened – one big, one small – that persuaded me to write something here, if only to give them wider and encouraging publicity.

In the first place – and this is big, really big --, on the following Sunday when Masses were said in his memory, thousands of Muslims all over France spontaneously went to the Catholic churches to attend the service, many if not most of them for the first time. It was an extraordinary deed of solidarity and should have been given far more coverage. All those who were interviewed said that they had come to support their Christian neighbours and to show the world how appalled they were at what these young thugs had done. Many added that they were impressed with the closeness of the two faiths, and convinced that we serve the same God.

I find this, as we say nowadays, beyond decent; a genuinely noble gesture that I hope will be amply repaid by Christians. A few more visits to mosques during prayers might be a good beginning.

The small thing that I found extremely encouraging was that at a small local talk-plus-prayer-service I heard the visiting priest – and to me this was a first, I’ve written about it – praying, and urging us to pray, for the murderers and their families. I’m not sure how much this will directly touch the brainwashed, but in the context of my last post more intensive intercessory prayer for our enemies is urgently needed.

I remember, only a few years ago, reading a number of Collects and Psalm texts about “the assaults of our enemies” and thinking that nowadays, mercifully, we should perhaps learn to take them as part of a spiritual war. But no: the enemies are back, they are real, they are armed, they are intelligent, and they hate us. We can start rereading a lot of those texts (taking some care to apply Jesus’ teaching to some of the more vindictive Psalms), and looking at the ways they teach us to react. Note, for instance, that in the case of the Anglican Church’s Second Collect at Matins at no time do we pray to God to take away our enemies and their attacks: “defend us thy humble servants in all assaults of our enemies; that we, surely trusting in thy defence, may not fear the power of any adversaries.” And in the Second Collect for Evensong: “that we being defended from the fear of our enemies may pass our time in rest and quietness.” What we ask God to do is take away our fear. Perhaps, if he does that, we can become like St Stephen who, as he was being stoned, prayed that God might forgive his murderers. And pray at once for the soul of Fr Hamel and for the souls of Adel Kermiche and Abdel Malik Petitjean; for  their families and for their neighbours who have done us the honour of attending Mass.


PS: I have been reminded that the Muslim attendance at Mass was in response to a call by the CFCM, the French Council of Muslims; so not technically spontaneous -- but the response was huge, and deeply moving.

THE FEAST OF STEPHEN (a couple of days late)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945)

A friend sent me some thoughts on St Stephen, the first martyr, celebrated the day after Christmas. Here is my reply:

“The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.” This is an old, old proverb, and it shows us how close old Christianity was in some ways to current (I erased “modern”) Islam. A “màrtys” in Greek is a witness: originally in a secular sense, later someone who testified to a religious truth. And in controversial situations, one who held nothing back, who was ready to affirm his faith out loud even when facing the barrel of a gun or a team of torturers. There have been martyrs, in this sense, in my lifetime: Dietrich Bonhoeffer for instance, one of the leading lights of Nazi Germany’s “Confessing Church”, a church that opted to speak out against the barbarity: a deeply civilised man who wrote some lasting texts of faith and was hanged with piano wire. And, of course, anyone willing to die for his faith tends mightily to impress bystanders.

On the other hand, said Oscar Wilde, “an idea is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.” This statement, true in itself, is also deliberately provocative and thus a lie on another level. But in today’s Western world, the idea of the martyr is seriously uncomfortable. It smacks of hysteria, of over-dramatization, of Cecil B. DeMille, or alternatively of bearded Muslim fanatics with explosive vests.

So what do we do with Stephen? He was not subtle. He was all of a piece, a good speaker, and spoke out when it was a damn fool thing to do. And he was stoned to death for it, which is not a pretty way to go. (Google it and see some horrid things.) I can’t really write about this, as I have not (and I thank God for it) have been in such a situation, and know not what I should do if I got there. I have dire suspicions about myself.  So in one sense, obviously, I admire the ones who find themselves in the situation and have the courage.  

But if life has denied us Stephen’s fate (at least so far), what conclusions can a meditation on martyrdom lead to? One: it is a healthy church consensus that it must never be sought. If it happens, if the person facing the situation has the courage to persevere and die for the cause, well and good; but my own feeling is that while it can be an inspiration if it happens, it should not in itself and for itself be glorified.

Secondly, the Church has another interpretation, beyond the simple story. For the Church, the Feast of Stephen, coming directly after the Nativity, is a bridge upon which to look forward already to Easter. A reminder that birth leads to death, but that death leads to resurrection. For what we have not mentioned, so far, is what Stephen spoke out about, what he witnessed to. And that, of course, is the Risen Christ.

So the Feast of Stephen is a celebration of witnessing, of carrying the story of the Resurrection out into an unbelieving world. In 1615, in 1715, in 1815, this would have chiefly meant taking ship for unknown parts and preaching to “natives”; for the world at home was one in which every village had a church (sometimes two) and every church had a priest or minister. Now, however, the unbelieving world is all around us. It may not stone us if we talk about the Risen Christ, but it is quite likely to turn away in vague irritation and wonder if we have gone a little soft in the head.

Moreover, this same unbelieving world is periodically assailed by strident “witnesses” who purport to proclaim the Risen Christ but do so in loud, tactless and simplistic ways. They make a number of converts, but for every convert they make they alienate one or two other listeners, some definitively. Perhaps a modern Stephen in the Western world is well advised to learn what the Church calls “discernment”: the application of (prayerful) intelligence and tact to faith and its situations.