The uncomfortable truth about 'hate'

Here's my sermon from this morning's Remembrance Sunday service:

Hate is a word that we hear a lot these days. And I don’t just mean when people say they hate sprouts or that they hate getting up early. Nor am I talking about hate speech which is what people tend to call any opinion they don't agree with.  The hate that I'm talking about is the hate that the news and commentators say is responsible for most of the atrocities they report. When someone kills or attempts to kill many people this is often labelled a 'hate crime’. And if we are to believe the media, this 'hate' is on the increase.

To say that these acts are motivated by hate is convenient in a number of ways.  Firstly it means that we don't have to look any deeper for the reasons, as this might mean that we have to face the uncomfortable fact that some ideologies and cultures are incompatible with our values and societal norms.  To say the perpetrators are filled with hate is to destroy the link between their beliefs and their actions.  This has a second benefit that in questioning their mental state, for they claim that no sane person would be that controlled by hate, they become a special category of people that used to be labelled psychopaths. Therefore they can be dismissed as rare exceptions. The third benefit of this is that the rest of us, who are obviously sane and tolerant, can feel comfortable on our moral high ground, satisfied with our superiority over these 'extremists'.

It seems to me, though, that the reality isn't quite so simple and is a lot more uncomfortable.  The root of these actions is not, I don't think, hate but rather seeing other people as less than human, as sub-human.  If people are human they have an inherent dignity but once they are seen as not human they can be treated as disposable objects.  Pope John Paul II said that the opposite of love is not hate it is 'use'.  To use someone like an object for your own purposes is the opposite of loving them, because loving them means treating them with the dignity they deserve. In its most extreme form, loving someone means putting their needs before your own.

Much of 'man's inhumanity to man' has its roots in seeing other humans as being less than human: this was the basis of the slave trade and the Nazi holocaust.  It was also what enabled the soldiers on both sides of the Wars to keep fighting and killing, and also fuelled the efforts of the Home Front.  The purpose of war propaganda is not only to establish the rightness of your cause, but also to portray the enemy as so evil and wicked that they deserve to be wiped out.

If this analysis is correct then what makes it even more disturbing is how easy it is to think in this way.  People who treat others as less than human are not just a few isolated extremists or psychopaths.   They are all around us; they are you and me. Every time we treat someone else as if they didn't have as much worthiness as we do, every time we feel and act as if we are better, we are like those that commit atrocities.

Our Gospel reading comes from the Sermon on the Mount and not long after Jesus said the words we've just heard, he said that the commandment “Thou shalt not kill” includes being angry with someone else, and more than that it includes calling them an idiot, or stupid, or scum.  And that's something we're all guilty of.  That's what makes the standard of living that Jesus sets out in the Beatitudes that we've just heard so difficult.  To be poor in spirit, to be meek, to be merciful, to be peacemakers means that we have to acknowledge that we are imperfect, and more than that that we put the needs and welfare of others before our own.

But this wasn't just wise and difficult teaching that Jesus came to bring.  He lived it himself.  In the most extreme form of love there has ever been, he left the glory of heaven to be born as a human; he lived a perfect life so that he could die as the punishment for our sins and failures. And he rose from the dead so our humanity could be restored.

The peace this world longs for will only become a reality when people have been forgiven and restored by Jesus, the Prince of Peace, and see the rest of humanity as he does.  People made in his image and likeness that are worthy of love and respect.  And that can start with each of us.  Look at the people around you.  They are priceless.  Tell them that.  And when you leave here today, let everyone you meet know that they are priceless too, not only with your words, but in the way you treat them.

My Advent Hope

Here's my magazine article for November:

Starting on 23^rd November our Advent talks have the title “My Advent Hope”. We're blessed to have some senior figures from the Diocese and the Methodist District coming to offer their thoughts on this topic, but I thought I'd throw in my two penn'orth on the subject!!

I went to Liverpool Hope University College and so 'hope' was a much used word. The tagline for the college was taken from a book by Cardinal Suenens: “to hope is not to dream but to turn dreams into reality.” This was a slightly more poetic way of saying 'if you want something you need to work for it'. Apart from the overuse of the word 'hope', there was always something that niggled me about it, and I only realised what that was when I learned more about the Biblical use of the word.

When we use the word 'hope' we tend to mean a vague wish that something will happen, and it is usually uncertain. In contrast when the Biblical writers use the word 'hope', they are often talking about something that is certain. This 'hope' is something that is yet to happen but it definitely will happen and it mostly refers to salvation. So Paul writes about “the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time” (Titus1:2) and “the hope stored up for you in heaven” (Colossians 1:5). God has promised eternal life to all who die trusting in Jesus, and as he can't lie, all those who die trusting in Jesus will receive eternal life. That means that those who have faith in Jesus can put their hope in a certain future and can therefore face death with confidence. So Paul writes “Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope. For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.” (1Thessalonians 4:13-14).

This certain hope is based not just on the promise of God but also in the fact that Jesus died and rose again. So Peter writes “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” and “Through [Jesus] you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God” (1 Peter 1:3,21)

November is traditionally a time when Christians remember the saints - all those who have died in the faith of Jesus, whether well-known or not - who now enjoy the eternal life for which they hoped. The focus for Advent too is on the future; as we prepare to celebrate the first coming of Jesus as a baby in Bethlehem, “we wait for the blessed hope – the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13).