Cities of the Plain (Rant 107)

What’s the name of the most famous city in the Holy Land? Come on, absurdly easy quiz, Fr Frank – wouldn’t pass muster on Chris Tarrant’s ‘Who wants to be a millionaire?’ show. Jerusalem is the answer, obviously, what else?



Yeah, but that was only a warm-up, my friend. What are the names of the two next most famous cities?



I can hear the deafening silence. Think, think…No use? Let me give you a clue. Two towns in Southern Palestine. Of them only memories, but very tenacious ones, remain. Their ruins probably lay beneath the dead waters of the Dead Sea. Still no joy? All right then. It will set a few bells alarmingly ringing: Sodom and Gomorrah.



Er…Fr Frank, we get you. This is a prelude to a rant about today’s consecration of openly gay bishop Gene Robinson in New Hampshire, is it?



Yes and no. Of that egregious episode, a temptation is to imitate sourpuss art critic Brian Sewell’s verdict on the Turner Prize, ‘none of us needs to be serious about it’ – and, stifling a yawn, perhaps add, with the March hare: ‘I am tired of this. Let us change the subject.’ Unfortunately, such cavalier posture might overlook that event’s potentially dire effects. Think of the warnings by third world bishops that Christianity’s enemies are now free to portray it as an immoral religion. They fear a frightening spate of violence, murder and mayhem on innocent Christians living in partibus infidelium. Will their blood then be on Gene Robinson? Up to his conscience to decide. But Sodom and Gomorrah’s dark spell on history and culture transcends present, preposterous Anglican shenanigans. It is too important a matter to joke about it. Because at the heart of the Bible’s message of salvation – no less.



Gosh, sounds like fundamentalism is beginning to rear its ugly head. What next? Leviticus? St Paul’s fulminations? The Apocalypse? St Thomas Aquinas’ sins against nature? Ulster’s Ian Paisley? The Taleban (RIP) or…what?



Abraham, actually. Yes, him. Patriarch Abraham. The father of faith – of all true believers. The figure the three monotheisms revere as their chief spiritual ancestor. The same man who prayed to God on Sodom’s behalf.



Wow! Never heard that. Did he really?



Look it up. Genesis 18, vv.20-33. The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah’s iniquity is so great that God threatens destruction. Whereupon Abraham intercedes to the Lord: “Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will you then destroy it? God softens, so Abraham continues – “Suppose there forty five…will you then destroy it?” And so insistently on, six times. Anyone who believes in the justice and mercy of God, as well as in the value of intercessionary prayer, ought to meditate long and hard on this splendid passage.



Still, God hardly lets Sodom off the hook. He later does destroy it.



Read and ponder on the next chapter. You will then discover something interesting. The emphasis is crucially on the men of Sodom’s sin against hospitality. The contrast is with Abraham’s earlier, friendly reception of three mysterious strangers (angels? Foreshadowing the Trinity?) by the oak of Mambre. Andrei Rublev’s celebrated Russian icon of the philoxeny of Abraham, the Patriarch’s loving welcome of visiting strangers, illustrates that mystical scene with minimalistic artistry. In this sense, it is true to say that Sodom’s behaviour sadly inverts our God-given duty of being hospitable to the foreigner, the refugee, the needy and vulnerable. But, again, the focus is maltreatment of guests, not sexuality. Something similar goes for Isaiah, Ezechiel and Christ himself - references available on request, folks.



Hmm, Fr Frank, pardon our saying this, but you have changed the subject after all. Admirably liberal but also very naughty of you…



Liberal, moi? What an atrocious slander. I shall prove it. I am taking up the gauntlet. There is no question that the Bible, church teaching and traditional moral theology all declare homosexual practice to be wrong. It stands to reason it must be so, with stronger reason, within the very ark of salvation, the Church. Even a distinguished, thoughtful, non-self-hating gay commentator as journalist Matthew Parris recently came out in support of this self-evident truth. Anglican liberalism has allowed gay clerical subculture to overreach itself. But, achtung! – never, never forget: Christianity is a religion of redemption. No one, no sinner, no matter how awful, is excluded from, is beyond God’s grace. Jesus’ ministry of course perfectly incarnates that. He got a lot of flak from the right-thinking, self-righteous, haughty Pharisees for his willingness to rub shoulders with sinners. Christ, ‘the friend of sinners’, may well be one of his official titles. OK, guys, I know, all this is unexciting theological old hat but it had to be said, just in case. And I’d rather be right with the Lord Jesus than stunningly original by myself.



So, what’s the way ahead, Fr Frank?



Abraham’s example shows it. To pray, to intercede constantly for the conversion of the scattered descendants of Sodom and Gomorrah, the ancient cities of the plain. Before you think this too pious or unreal, stop. The great Islamic Christian scholar, Louis Massignon, liked to refer to Sodom’s fault as essentially spiritual, ‘a desire for a perverse heaven without God’.(Might the West’s brazen enthronement of sexual desire at the centre of its culture, combined with rejection of religion, amount up to the same thing?) It follows that real remedies have to be spiritual too. He commended frequent reception of the sacraments, Holy Communion, spiritual exercises, retreats, pilgrimages, spiritual direction, a whole panoply of fine devotional practices – sometimes, why not, even marriage. Scoff at this as much as you like. I bet the ineffably stupid, heretical Church of England authorities would, too. To hell with them! I won’t.



Stoking up the fires, eh, Fr Frank?



Spiritual fires, for sure. Hellfire was never like gas fire. But God forbid I should close with that. Hellfire isn’t one of my things. I prefer a little story from those great characters, the Desert Fathers of Egypt. Set amongst a community of monks in a secluded oasis. One day they discover a brother had committed fornication with a woman. It causes grave scandal. ‘You are a sinner’, they sternly reproach him. ‘You cannot live with us. You must therefore leave our community.’ The wretched fellow bows his head and makes preparations to depart. At the same time, a very old monk, the holiest, most ascetical, most irreproachable brother in the monastery is seen as if he is about to go away too. Astonished, the brethren inquire: ‘What on earth are you doing? Where are you going?’ Quick is the answer:



‘I am leaving – because I, too, am a sinner.’