Bishop Michael took up an invitation to write a New Year Message for local media, reproduced here:
New Year is a time when we often look forward to change. We hope for a fresh start, new energy and even make resolutions, kept through willpower and determination. These attempts are all admirable and many succeed at giving up, for example, smoking, drinking or even social media this way. All too often though, we crash in the fracture of our resolve. We’ve all been there; it’s a common human experience. When we succeed it is often because of support – a friend who walks alongside, a medical aid or our own sense of virtue. Or faith.
Maybe this Christmas was the first time you went to church. It seems that this was true for a number of people from reports of how busy services in some of our churches were. Whether you came to church at Christmas or not, you may also have seen the final of the TV’s Strictly Come Dancing.
Contestants’ ability to dance changes over a period of time because they continue on a journey supported by a dancing partner and encouragement from close family and distant viewers alike until they are eliminated. The eye-catching change this year was unexpected and different. It was the brave and humble testimony of Carlos Gu, one of the winning pair, talking about the personal change in his life inspired by his partner, Lioness Karen Carney. He talked about how he had been self-centred and never a team player, but how Karen’s team-playing and team-building approach had transformed him over the weeks into a kinder, humbler person, to the point where he felt confident to tell the world about it. That was not a change: it was a transformation! His advice: “Never give up”.
Christianity is about transformations. That one visit to church can be the start of a journey of transformation if we let it. When that involves large numbers of people, it can transform a whole society. The friend who we walk with is Jesus Christ himself.
Change like that starts with sowing a habit. From that habit comes a character, then a lifetime, then a destiny. If ever there was a time to reap a destiny as a nation, it is now.
In the uncertainties of the present times, when the darkness of war and aggression seem closer than for many decades, and when our own communities have been prey to forces driving them into factions, we can take strength and reassurance in our capacity to find the change needed to meet these challenges. This means not to become more entrenched in our views, more capable of displays of strength, more convinced that we must find some sort of victory in others’ defeat rather than our own success. This is a time to seek to become more human; to reach for the resilience of communities built on mutual care and respect; to show the compassion of individuals who know we are loved by God; to practise the self-sacrifice that comes from knowing God has come among us and given himself for us.
If you sowed the seed of coming to church and want to explore faith, let it transform you by making it a habit this year. Make it a resolution. There is plenty of help available to sustain you. Societies can change for the better through individuals’ transformations, but we must continue journeying. A very happy New Year to you all.
Rt Revd Dr Michael Ipgrave, Bishop of Lichfield