On the displaying of flags

 Here's my sermon from this year's Remembrance Service at Broughton:

First Reading (Ephesians 6:10-17)

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.  Put on the full armour of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.  For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armour of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled round your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

Second Reading (John 15:9-17)

Jesus said “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love.  If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.    I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.  My command is this: love each other as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.  You are my friends if you do what I command.  I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.  You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit – fruit that will last – and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.  This is my command: love each other.”

Sermon

This year we've celebrated the 80th anniversary of VE and VJ Day – commemorating the end of the Second World War.  A common feature of these celebrations is the use of flags, often as bunting and also in parades and on promotional literature.  And today, as every year, we've paraded the Union Jack, and the flags of the Ex-Service Association and the Guiding and Scouting groups.

In recent years, flags have become more common on lamposts and cars and houses; and this use of flags has become the subject of much debate and heat in both the traditional media and on social media.  Much of the discussion being around what it means to fly these flags and if, where and when it is appropriate to do so. 

Flags and banners have always been used to communicate: we think of semaphore and naval flags being directly used to communicate messages.  Flags also signify belonging to a particular group, for example to indicate where a group is on a battlefield or to whom a property belongs.  Sometimes the group is one whose purpose is clear: think for example of the Nazi flag or a pirate flag.  People who display those flags are very clear in what they are communicating about themselves.  

Part of the problem with the contemporary flying of flags, particularly national flags, is that they are flown for many reasons, and the flag itself doesn't convey the motivation.  Therefore people make assumptions about the motive behind the display of the flag, and will often angrily defend or condemn it based on their assumption.  That is not to say that there aren't good and bad reasons to fly a flag, but merely to say that without other evidence it is impossible to know the reasons behind flying a flag.  

So let's think about what might be good and bad motives for flying a flag, without judging which of these motives lie behind any particular flag that's displayed.

Someone might fly a flag to show that they are proud to belong to that group or nation or region, and this is generally a good reason for displaying a flag, assuming, of course, that that the group is not an evil one!  For us, to be proud of being part of our nation is a good thing.  We are a nation grounded in Christian values, and although we are not perfect we are not irredeemably immoral.

Linked to this, the national flag is sometimes a desperate cry from those who are proud of their nation for their nation to take better care of them, and who fear that the values of the nation they love are being eroded.

However, when this spills into an attitude that their nation is far superior to others, the flag becomes a symbol of xenophobia and hatred of people of other nationalities.  Racism is, of course, a bad motivation.

So how should we respond?  Firstly, we need to remember that the motivation behind displaying flags is often unclear.  We need to go beyond what we perceive the message of the flags to be and to give a space to actively listen to the those who put them up.

But secondly, and more importantly, we need to look more closely at the flags themselves.  The Cubs and the Scouts came into church last Thursday and we were thinking about flags and we noted that the Union Jack is made up of three national flags that all have crosses on them: the cross of St George for England; St Andrew for Scotland and St Patrick for Ireland.  We also thought about why the cross is important; because it reminds us of the cross Jesus died on.

There are two aspects of the meaning of Jesus' death that are particularly relevant to the issues we're considering.  Firstly, the issues of national identity; interaction with other nationalities; and class division were all around in Jesus' day, but he didn't take sides on these issues because he knew the problem wasn't really a political one.  He knew, as the Apostle Paul wrote to the Ephesian church:

our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

The real battle is a spiritual battle: there are malevolent spiritual forces that love to stir up division, fear, anger, hatred and pride.  But, as Paul wrote to the Colossian church, Jesus disarmed those forces, triumphing over them on the cross (Colossians 2:15).  However, though Jesus has won the war, there are still battles for us to fight, so we need to stand firm with the armour of God.

On Thursday we also listened to a song we're going to be singing in a few minutes: “When a knight won his spurs”.  This song reminds us that we battle against the dragons of anger and the ogres of greed, which lie behind so much conflict, from personal to international.  But the song also reminds us of the characteristics we need in these spiritual battles: the shield of faith in the victory of Jesus to protect us, but we also need to be gentle and brave, and gallant and bold, with joy and setting free truth.  So to remind us of that the Cubs and Scouts made an English flag and chose four of those words to put one in each quarter of the flag (see the picture above for the results!).

But the second aspect of the cross is that it was the way Jesus showed his love for us (John 3:14-18).  He laid down his life, so our sins, which separate us from God, could be punished and therefore forgiven (Colossians 1:13-23).  If we want to accept his forgiveness we also need to accept his commands ("If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love") and the chief among them is this: “love each other as I have loved you.”  Jesus died for us while we were still sinners, while we were his enemies (Romans 5:6-10) and, in the same way, he calls us to love others, even our enemies – even those who fly flags for a reason we don't agree with.

So as we see those flags flying, let's not rush to a conclusion about why they are there.  Instead let's look at the cross on them, as the Bishop of Blackburn, Philip North, has written:

...each one pointing us to the saving work of Jesus Christ through which we are reconciled to the Father and so to each other.  We listen, we understand, but above all we hold the cross high, for in that symbol is the only true and lasting source of unity.