TRUTH . . . IS PERSONIFIED
(continued)

Over recent decades there have been many 'Christs' declared, usually demanding we abandon our common sense and own inner witness, often with disastrous results, even mass suicides, sexual promiscuity, denial of natural family relationships, harsh regimes, control over people's lives and - almost inevitably - monetary demands. All this is veiled as serving God. These bogus claims have preyed upon our insecurity and vulnerability.

We do not need to encounter highly charismatic personalities who are persuasive with words, nor speakers with grand ideologies or with some rigid teaching called 'The Gospel'. What makes all the difference to our lives is an encounter with the presence of God. A quickening, usually located inside ourselves. We all have our own gospel, our own good news, which may differ from that of others. This may not come through an overtly religious experience involving holy men, holy books and holy places, or with special this or special that. There is nothing to sign and nothing to join. A spiritual encounter may happen gradually or suddenly. It can come while wearing our old blue jeans or our best pinstripe.

I am speaking of a breaking down of barriers between sacred and secular, barriers to discovering the life and person of God everywhere and in everything. Infuriating of course to those who insist that Omnipresence be located only in their place and in their way.

For me, though perhaps not for you, the first remembered realisation of the presence of God was located in a Man who was a humble carpenter and was nailed up to die in his early thirties. Jesus looked no different to those about him we learn, but he grew up to know he was The Son of God - the incarnation. I found I could trust him personally, not in so-called facts and teachings about a virgin birth, a sacrifice or a physical resurrection.

I have discovered at some cost that not everyone wants The Christ to be too human. Incantations of 'Very God of very God, very man of very man' may be acceptable dogma to many until one begins to flesh out how this 'very man' lived his daily life among rugged fishermen, swindling tax-gatherers and alluring prostitutes. Speaking at a conference in Minnesota I heard angry cries of 'Heresy!' 'Licence!' and 'Sit down!' as I told of my own love for the Friend of Sinners who loved people for themselves, not because they represented good conversion material.

He was 'touched with the feelings of our infirmities' as Bible teachers are keen to point out; but when I suggested he may well have been turned on when Mary Magdalene washed his feet with her hair, these leaders were incensed. As usual, temptation was confused with sin by those who so insistently proclaim. 'He was tempted in all points such as we are'. I suppose he was not supposed to actually feel the infirmities after all. Was his humanity somehow contained in a kind of holy remote control? How I hate this sanitised religion.

//Continued