My turn to sound off!

Matthew 25 v 31-40  The Inasmuch of the Gospel is Christian socialism in action. Like 2 Cor 8 v 13-15.

Jesus is hungry.  In the 60s, I attended the Point 5 Oxfam w/e conference at Stowe School.  In 1986(?) I ran 10 Kms/miles for Feed the World, organised by Bob Geldoff.

Jesus is thirsty.  Parliamentary committee of MPs says we are going to have shortages of drinking water.

I WAS A STRANGER

Jesus is a stranger.  Our ancestors were strangers to the lands and people when they went all over the world.  First to explore, then to trade and to make disciples, and to make the most of other nations’ resources.  That led to violence and wars on other nations' land.  The "disgraceful" (Michael Portillo) Opium Wars on China.  The Boer War with us upright, honourable Brits introducing concentration camps to the world.

Jesus is not a warrior, never a soldier and never killed anyone; but he was the subject of capital punishment.  So we should be against capital punishment.

Jesus is a refugee when he, Mary and Joseph had to flee to Egypt.

Jesus is an asylum seeker wanting a better life (actually just to live, in many cases!)  and to escape the horrors of OUR wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen now and, in previous decades in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos.

I WAS HOMELESS

Jesus was thrown out of his home in Diego Garcia by us, so very democratic lot.  Everyone was forcibly deported between 1968 and 1973.  But none of them ended up in the UK!  No way was that to happen!

“Diego Garcia is an island of the British Indian Ocean Territory, an overseas territory of the United Kingdom. It is a militarised atoll just south of the equator in the central Indian Ocean, and the largest of the 60 small islands of the Chagos Archipelago.” Wikipedia

Jesus flees environmental destruction brought about by our greedy, love of luxury, over-consumption and overpopulation.  The Royal Society in the 1990s said:-  “the two main drivers of global destruction were over-population and over-consumption.“

The level of sea ice in the Antarctic is the lowest ever recorded.  And it was thought - and very much hoped - to be acting as the planet’s refrigerator.  The planet is burning, said Greta Thunberg in 2018.

Jesus was naked, sick and a slave over the 300 years of OUR criminal, disgusting, the truly iniquitous and evil slave trade.  The perpetrators got bought off, handsomely but not the victims or their descendants!

I WAS A PRISONER IN GUANTANAMO BAY and you did nothing.

Jesus is a prisoner suffering an outrageous miscarriage of justice that even the Criminal Cases Review Commission refused to act on, not just once but twice, to leave the poor guy (Andrew Malkinson) languishing in prison for 17 years when, all along, he was the wrong man because of clear incompetence, corruption and negligence by those who should have known better!!  A small charity, Appeal had to do the Commissions work for them.  Scandalous!

Last Sunday, Martyn Joseph sang on ‘Songs of Praise from Greenbelt’, about Albert’s Place in Sunderland, with these words,

“The unemployed, the homeless and the lost

The abused, misused, refused, that gather here.

The measure of a country’s prosperity is not the wealth it holds

But in the absenceof poverty and, equal opportunity for us all.”

Rose Hudson-Wilkin - Bishop of Dover and Bishop in Canterbury - “they are here because we were there.”

The work of city missions is both hands on and spiritual - a holistic ministry.  Excellent!

Do something for the lowest of the low, the Untouchables in India, rough sleepers in the UK, the voiceless and you are doing it to the Jesus Christ of the Gospels - my Lord, my Inspiration, my Hero.