News

Preached by The Very Reverend Dean Catherine Ogle at Sung Eucharist on Wednesday 26th February 2020, Ash Wednesday.

Let’s take a moment to consider the powerful, truthful, blessed thing that we are doing here. Soon, we will kneel and receive ashes on our foreheads, remembering that we are earthly creatures, in the poetry of scripture, we are created from the dust of the earth, which with powerful punch reminds us of what we are learning again, we are of the earth, simply creatures, part of creation, what we do to the earth we do to ourselves.

Today we remember that we are dust, our lives are brief. Today we remember our mortality, one day we will return to the dust. But today we can chose to turn away from sin, and be faithful to Christ, to his light, love and joy. This is a powerful, truthful, blessed day, and it’s been a great joy for those of us who have been able to spend this day together at the cathedral, sharing this with visitors and those who pass by. There is such a joy in today, the beginning of Lent, of making that choice to turn away from what is empty, deceitful, and wrong and turn to Christ, Gods love incarnate.

Let’s also take a moment to consider the rich scripture that we have shared from John’s gospel. This text often called, ‘the women taken in adultery’. But I don’t think that’s really what this is about. Jesus goes to the temple early and teaches there. Then the scribes and Pharisees bring a women into their midst. ‘Master this woman was taken in the very act of committing adultery.’ That’s very definite isn’t it? In the very act, her guilt is beyond doubt. (Now presumably someone else is guilty, but we don’t know where he is. We just have her.) And they bring her, as a means to catch Jesus out. They ask if they should stone her, as the Law of Moses commands. The Law says ‘thou shalt not commit adultery’ and the penalty is death. The Roman law doesn’t command or allow this, so they want to trap Jesus into saying something that will get him into trouble.

So, here is a woman who is being used as an object lesson. Objectified, very vulnerable, and in real danger. The crowd could so easily turn on her, because people in crowds feel set free from responsibility, how delicious to condemn someone else and make themselves feel better, self-righteous.

In this moment of drama and tension Jesus does – very little. He stoops down and writes on the ground. Now, it seems to me that he creates and holds a space. In that space, the accusers keep on asking him to judge her and they keep revealing who they are. He holds a space for revelation. I’ve realised for the first time, this year, that Jesus own mother, pregnant out of wedlock, risked this same fate, the same accusation and possible death as punishment. I wonder if he thought about his mother.

Then he lifts his face and says, ‘Let anyone among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ And writes on the ground once again. And something wonderful happens in that place, in that space that he creates. They have heard what he said, and one by one, they start to leave, beginning with the elders. Isn’t that wonderful, the eldest ones have the wisdom to know they can’t cast a stone. A wave of revelation takes place affecting every single one of them. None are without sin. (I remember Archbishop Sentamu saying once, ‘When I point a finger at someone else, then three fingers point back at me). This passage might better be called, ‘The revelation of our common humanity’. We are all of us, just sin-prone, simply human, prone to weakness, liable to messing up. Yet, we can chose, to turn away from sin and towards the God of love.

When everyone has gone it’s just Jesus and the woman left. No one has condemned her. Jesus says, ‘I don’t condemn you either, go, and sin no more.’ We see that Jesus doesn’t treat the woman as an object, but as an agent with intelligence and free-will and choice. That’s how Jesus see us and what he says to us today. We are not condemned for the past. We are invited into new life.

In this place, in this space that he creates for us, we are invited to accept our common humanity. We are simply human and we are invited into life anew. I pray that we can each take up the offer. Have a blessed and Holy Lent.