It is a very strange feeling beginning to write my last magazine   letter here in Stanley.  I am grateful for the many messages of encouragement about the opportunities in retirement.  Time to visit family and friends and do the things that full time work makes impossible.  Never the less there is also a real sense of loss too.  Being a vicar is an extraordinary privilege.  One has an opportunity to come alongside people and families at the most significant times in their lives.  It has been wonderful to see God at work as we have prayed and struggled together over the years.  I will miss the community that we have become so much part of.  Thank you to all those who been part of our journey together

One of the most disturbing aspects of the world around us is the prevalence of violence; whether it is the suicide bomber or a school massacre.  Even in many films and cartoons there is a theme of violence that in the end wins the day.  There are ’good’ guys that win and ’bad’ guys that need to be destroyed.  A Theologian called Walter Wink has written of the ‘myth of redemptive violence’, that is the idea that violence saves.  So for some people the answer to school massacres is more guns in school with teachers being armed.  There is the terrible image of gun fights in crowded class rooms.  Wink traces this idea back to the Babylonian creation story, that tells of a violent battle between gods, that leaves some victorious and dominant.  In contrast to this, Genesis tells of a     creation that is made out of love and made well.  In the beginning a place of Peace and beauty, though it is then messed up.

In the story of Jesus we have a stark contrast to the idea that victory comes from violence.  At Easter we remember that Jesus chose to use his power not to bring violent victory, but to choose powerlessness and allowed himself to be killed.  His saving act was then vindicated by his resurrection.  So when Jesus challenges us to take up our cross and follow him, he is calling us away from a reliance on violence to a radical response to conflict that is non violent and that seeks to build relationships with each other rather than fight.

This is difficult but has a deep logic.  Violence begets violence, and it is easy to see the danger of a never ending cycle of tit-for-tat that continues to escalate.  By contrast, a response that creates a relationship of trust and a growing understanding can result in genuine peace.  We can see that ’evil’ is just as much part of us as our enemy.  My prayer for our community and our world is that we can follow Jesus in this way of Peace.

Rev Bill Henderson