Movement magazine issue 154

BREXIT
THE CROSS
Since the EU referendum there has
been a rise in racially motivated hate
crimes in the UK. How can we as
followers of Christ respond and show
God’s love in the world?
I remember waking up the morning after
the result and realising that something
enormous had just taken place. I’d
stayed awake as long as I could the
night before – hoping that somehow
my attentiveness to democracy might
mean a good outcome. I was wrong.
There was a palpable heaviness in the
air, and I could see it in the faces of the
people in the pub I’d chosen to have
my morning coffee in – people were
unusually quiet. There’s something in
me that suspects that that atmosphere
was not so different to the atmosphere
on that first Holy Saturday – the day after
Jesus’ crucifixion. The unbelievable
had occurred, many people’s worst
dreams were realised – the Son of
God had died, brutally, and now was
the time to wait, to despair, to feel, in
silence and contemplation – until the
great mystery of God unfolded. Now,
I wouldn’t want to suggest that the
triumph of the Vote Leave campaign is
basically comparable to the crucifixion
of Our Lord, but I do want to share
some reflections.
As I write this there has been a terrorist
attack in Nice, an attempted military
coup in Turkey, a number of police
officers killed in the United States in
Dallas and in Baton Rouge, the United
Kingdom has voted to renew Trident,
and in the midst of all of this is the
rising threat of Donald Trump and an
increasing number of racial incidents
in the UK following the referendum. It
is not a perfect world – and the world
in which Jesus rose up from the dead
in was not a perfect world either. This
paradox – the stark reality of the cross
and the evil of the world - was made
clear for me the Sunday morning after
the referendum. My church in Cardiff
had been vandalised – someone had
covered the doors of the Church in red
paint, and thrown red paint all over the
entrance and floor. No specific shape,
no writing – just a bright red mess.
Like the disciples, in that empty space
following the crucifixion and even
after the ascension, I had to find some
way of making the crucified, risen and
ascended Christ particularly present
for the gathered people of God that
morning after a week that had been
so harsh, and which felt personal
because of this act of vandalism. In a
week of so much bad news I had to
preach the Good News of the Gospel,
and it was hard to find!
Now, as a black Methodist Minister
living and serving in Cardiff – vandalism
was nothing new, nor was hate crime.
I had experienced it at my home, and
continue to from time to time. But
this time it wasn’t an attack on me,
nor was it an attack on an ‘other’
part of the community – it was an
attack on us, the body of Christ in this
place. Like the disciples enduring the
vulnerability of losing their Shepherd,
I could see my own flock looking to
me for solace, and I was looking to
the Lord for wisdom, courage, and
patience. What I really wanted to do
was yell, break something, help my
flock to realise that this is what many
of us ‘immigrants’ and descendants of
‘immigrants’ have endured as a reality
long before Brexit was ever a thing,
and if this is how it feels to come to
Church and find this, what would it
feel like if this had been your front
door? If you could put a face or voice
to the crime?
As Christians, it can be easy for us
Like the disciples
enduring the
vulnerability of losing
their Shepherd, I could
see my own flock looking
to me for solace, and I
was looking to the Lord
for wisdom, courage, and
patience.
BLACKNESS AND
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MOVEMENT Issue 154
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