AUTONOMOUS - Madras Christian College

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QUARTOSEPTCENTENNIAL SPECIAL SOUVENIRMessage OF Very Rev. Robert Willis,Dean of Canterbury, UK GIVEN ONthanksgiving serviceMay the words of my mouth and the thoughts of allour hearts be now and always acceptable to God, our Saviourand Redeemer.It is the most wonderful privilege and pleasure to be hereto celebrate this amazing anniversary and I want, first ofall, to bring greetings of the community of CanterburyCathedral and all the Diocese of Canterbury in Englandfor the celebration today and throughout this very specialyear. I have been here a few days now and have enjoyedimmensely the courteous hospitality and sensed somethingof the atmosphere of this wonderful place to which all ofyou belong. I have also been taken out, by your kindness, tosee such sights as the heritage sites. Canterbury itself is aWorld Heritage site so I was interested to see them. The dateof the historic and beautiful carvings at Mamallapuram, theend of the 6th century, is exactly the time St. Augustine firstcame to Canterbury, bringing with him the Gospels whichPope Gregory had given him to bring in order to convertthe English to Christianity and which still exist. I felt thatthere was a parallel stream through the hundreds of yearssince then, and gave thanks for the fact that Augustineestablished the community of Canterbury Cathedral on therule of St Benedict and the ethos of that rule still guides ourlife as a community today.St Benedict believed that the Gospel was best worked out if ahuman being gave body, mind and spirit to God in daily work,study and worship in the context of a community which caredfor every member within it and was given to hospitality. Now,we are no longer a Benedictine monastery in Canterbury,but the community of Canterbury still lives according tothose principles and when I came here to Madras ChristianCollege, I rejoiced to find that I recognised all that existinghere as well - a sense of the worth of every human being inthe way in which the work, study and worship is lived out inthis community strengthened by the Halls of this wonderfulplace. One other connection made me feel at home. WhenI went to the Deanery in Canterbury I found out that one ofthe rooms was called Gandhi and it was called that becausein 1931, Mahatma Gandhi came as a guest into the houseof the Dean of Canterbury. I have therefore brought yourPrincipal a photograph of the Dean of that day, receivingMahatma Gandhi at the door, and so feel a nice domesticconnection with India and its culture as well as with thewonderful culture of this community in Madras ChristianCollege.This afternoon, I would like to speak on the two lessons whichare attached to the feast of this time of the year, the feastof the Epiphany, which, by date was celebrated yesterday,the 6th of January. The first story is the story of the Queen ofSheba, a very exotic lady which is evident if one looks throughthe paintings of her which artists have made throughoutthe ages. She had heard about the wisdom of Solomon anddecided to come test him. In the Book of Chronicles, we readthe description of the Queen arriving to test the wisdom ofSolomon, the king who was reputedly so great. She thoughtto herself “Let me go and see him and ask him questionsface to face.” And she comes and not only does she askhim questions, but she looks around at all the splendourand resources surrounding the king. Every question wasanswered to her total satisfaction and the resources were sogreat that in the old translation, it is said that ‘she had nomore spirit in her’. We say in modern times that ‘she had herbreath taken away’. Solomon was so magnificent; his wisdomwas so great that he had answered all her questions. Well,that’s the first story. The second, told in Matthew’s Gospel, isa completely different story. It is the story of the Magi, menof wisdom, usually we say three of them because it was threegifts that they brought, coming from the East. Coming withquestions again in their hearts and coming to see a kingin the same way the Queen of Sheba had come to see KingSolomon to ask questions. They come following the star thatthey have seen and when they arrive, logically enough asthey are seeking a king, they go to the royal palace and findthemselves ushered into the presence of one the cruellestkings in history. We read in books other than the Bible, of theappalling cruelty of Herod the Great, even to his own family.And there were the three wise men standing in front of him.To me, it is the juxtaposition of Wisdom and of Power. Poweris represented by King Herod in all his cruelty and he wantsto ask Wisdom, in the persons of the wise men, questions notto enlarge his understanding but questions about where the22
QUARTOSEPTCENTENNIAL SPECIAL SOUVENIRthreat to his power was located. Herod uses the pretenceof asking questions so that he may go and worship thenew-born king too, but we know from the story how Herodslaughtered all the babies around Bethlehem, so that hispower would not be threatened. Power has often behavedlike this in human history in completely different culturesacross the world. But now, the wise men themselves go toBethlehem and find the infant Jesus in a manger and whenthey come, they find themselves in a completely differentposition for, on this occasion, the wise men are kneeling notbefore a sign of earthly power but before a sign of innocentand vulnerable humanity, and not one of their questionswould be answered because the baby cannot speak. All thetreasures, all the gifts, all the symbols of their wisdom arelaid at the feet of the infant Jesus, the ultimate sign of Godsharing in our humanity - a triangle of power, wisdom andinnocence. Wisdom chooses to kneel before innocence andserve humanity in this story.The sentence which we have chosen today and for the wholeof this year “Celebrating History and Serving Humanity”could well have been used of the three wise men kneelingto offer their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh to thenewborn child. But we use it for Madras Christian College.Celebrating history. Well, I suppose that history started inthe year 1837 with three wise men not from the East, butfrom the West, who came as three friends, a threefold cord,John Anderson called them, from Scotland so I can praisethem because I am from England and so I am not praisingmy own nation! They had come here with a desire to sharenot only their wisdom but also their conviction of the divinepresence within that Christ child, that vulnerable babywhich wisdom had known before in the Epiphany story. JohnAnderson always said that the local Sabbath school sowed inhis heart the incorruptible seed which was to grow and bearthe yoke of Christ and face all challenges in life. Joininghim too was his friend Robert Johnston from the same areain Scotland, and later their friend John Braidwood, threebrothers in Christ from the same university. Thinking ofthe story of the Christ child, we might ask though who werethe learners? Those who were accounted wise and broughtwisdom, would in this world’s terms be called teachers buthaving knelt at the feet of vulnerable humanity and receivedback a gift which changed their lives forever, I think thatthe wise men from the East, after their experience of themanger, would have said: “We learnt the most. Our wisdomwas totally transformed by this experience.” And we noticethat the last sentence in our story tells us that they wenthome by ‘another way’. ‘Follower of the Way’ is the first titlegiven to those who follow the Christian path in the Acts ofthe Apostles and I believe also that John Anderson, RobertJohnston and John Braidwood would themselves have said“Yes, we brought knowledge here to Madras at that timewhen we set the school in the middle of the city but welearned much more from that situation, that community,than we taught and we thank God that our wisdom wastransformed by those we came to teach”. “CelebratingHistory and Serving Humanity.” We want, this afternoon, tosay “Thank God” for those three who began this place andset it on a particular course. One feels with the story ofMadras Christian College that its roots are so deep and itsfoundation so strong that those who learnt here and thosewho have taught have had the confidence to be brave andradical in what they said. I suppose there would be no moreconservative looking figure than the principal William Miller,who was here for an astonishing 47 years which really isamazing in modern terms. Yet, he was very sure where thetreasure that was being offered lay. We might for a momentturn to the words of Bishop Reginald Heber, whose name isalso valued here. Remember, in one of his hymns, one ofmy favourite hymns “Brightest and best of the sons of themorning”, an Epiphany hymn, he says “Say, shall we yieldHim in costly devotion, odours of Edom and offerings divine,gems of the mountain, and pearls of the ocean, myrrh fromthe forest, and gold from the mine? Vainly we offer eachample oblation, vainly with gifts would his favour secure,richer by far is the heart’s adoration, dearer to God are theprayers of the poor.”St Paul in his letter to the Colossians, tells us very firmlythat the real treasure is ‘Christ in you’. He is the sum of theriches and the treasure that God gives and shows us, andthis community has always been very sure of that and not ina narrow way. That was why I wanted to quote William Miller,for he said some very brave things indeed about the Church,which in many periods of history has gone very wrong, andalso about the fallibility of people like me who wear this sortof collar, and the missionaries in the past. One can hardlybelieve that this was being said in the late 19th century,but here he is talking to his students “You have not to do23
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AUTONOMOUS - Madras Christian College

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