Harvest Thanksgiving and Giving Campaign Launch, Sunday 5 October 2008

Harvest Thanksgiving at St Peter’s Eaton Square,
Sunday 5 October 2008,

Address given by the Vicar at the Parish Eucharist



I have to own up to something of an internal tussle this morning, as I debated where I should address you from - behind a lectern or not behind a lectern. Those of you who are students of politics will know that in the last year or so whether or not to speak from behind a lectern has become a rather hot issue. Mr Cameron first came to prominence when he made a speech to his party’s conference in which he shunned the lectern and strode about the platform. It was such a good idea that his rival Mr Clegg addressed his party conference this year doing exactly the same thing. The following week the Prime Minister - declaring himself a serious man for serious times - stood very firmly behind a lectern to address the party faithful; and last week, not wishing to be outdone, Mr Cameron too retreated behind a lectern there to address the gathered flock.

This morning I have to address you in serious times on a serious matter and so I suppose - following conventional political wisdom - I ought to do so from behind a lectern because I have to talk to you about one of the things that we cannot talk about in church, which is money, and giving, and that, in this of all weeks, is a serious matter that needs serious attention. But my brothers and sisters I am not going to speak to you from behind a lectern - not because these are not serious matters to which I pay serious attention. They are, and I do, but because this is Harvest Thanksgiving, when the focus of our worship is on what we have been given; it’s on what God is doing here among us; what God’s purpose is for this community; what we are achieving on his behalf; and when I speak to you about those things I am not going to hide myself behind a lectern so to do, even if it means there is nothing between me and the rotten eggs that may follow. I am not going to speak behind a lectern because I want to celebrate, I want us to spend a moment or two thinking about what is God is doing with us and among us.

Let’s just pause for a moment and consider what it is that we give thanks for at Harvest Thanksgiving. We can try it this way, I suppose: please raise your right hand if you believe yourselves to be part of a decaying, defensive and dwindling community which is dying on the stem. I see no hands. The fact is that the growth of worship at this church continues, the trend that began under my illustrious predecessor and to which even I have not been able to put an end. More people are worshiping at St Peter’s today than there were two or three years ago. We are growing community - none of us, I hope, has a sense of our being a declining community. Please raise your right hand if you believe that the quality of music we offer or the quality of worship we offer here is sub-standard and dull and tawdry and boring. I see no hands. That is because we have in our midst some of the finest musicians in London. I know. I have worshipped in two of our neighbouring parishes in the last fortnight and the quality of the music that we offer here from Stephen and the 10 o’clock choir through to Andrew and Dan and the 11.15 choir leave other musicians in this Deanery and Diocese standing. We are blessed with an extraordinary quality in what we offer here Sunday by Sunday. Put your hand up please if you think that the school - that we founded and that we continue to support financially and through our time - is a school which deserves a place at the bottom of the bottom most league table. I see no hands, because our school is a vibrant, lively place that children like to attend and where the quality of learning and education is good and high. We are a growing community, we offer vibrant worship, we sponsor a good and lively school. Put your hand up if you find this a depressing building that’s dark and dusty and filled with unwanted clutter like some other churches you all have visited. It isn’t. It’s warm and it’s welcoming; it’s beautiful; it’s a place of tranquillity, and a place where it is possible to feel near to God. We are a growing community, a community that offers authentic and beautiful worship, we have a wonderful school, we have a marvellous building, all this we have to give thanks for at Harvest Thanksgiving.

But there is more because in twelve months time when I address you, I don’t want to be able to say, twelve months ago I spoke to you and today St Peter’s looks the same as it did then. We have plans for the parish, we have ambitions. We want to refurbish the public address system, so that at last you can all hear what is being said at the front. We want to kit the servers out in new albs, a closer look will reveal that the ones they are wearing more properly belong in a jumble sale than in this glorious building. Those are very internal matters. We don’t stop there. We want to send the young people of our parish on pilgrimage to Canterbury, to follow in the footsteps of Thomas Becket, and learn for themselves what it means to live a holy life. We want to send our teenagers to Taize (and bring them back again, or most of them at any rate), so that they can experience what it is to be part of a global church, a world wide Christian family. We want to build a school in Angola because we believe education is important, and we believe it should be shared. We want to partner the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust, a local charity which works with the poorest of the country’s poor. We don’t want to stand still and rest on our laurels: we want to grow and to build and to do more. And as I look at you, my brothers and sisters, I am more convinced than ever of what I said to the first PCC meeting I attended here, which is that I do not believe that there is anything that this community cannot achieve for God, if it is determined to do it.

That is why I am not going to retreat behind a lectern to talk to you about the financial problem that we have at the moment, because I am quite sure that once we think about it, once we focus on it, the problem will go. And the problem is quite simply this. If we are to keep going as we are now, next year, we need to raise an extra £30,000. Why? Because our utilities bills have gone up, because our insurance costs have gone up and because the costs of what we pay to the Diocese, the costs of belonging in the Church of England, have also gone up. Not because of profligacy or waste on our part, but because our bills have gone up and because we don’t expect to receive as much from giving this year as we had hoped to. We need to raise £30,000 extra just to stand still. If we want to do some of the things I have spoken about if we want to achieve some of our ambitions we need an extra £8,000. The target before us is to raise an extra £38,000 next year. I am well aware that in this of all weeks that sounds like a huge sum, but your PCC has thought about it in these terms. There are roughly 250 households associated with our parish. If every household in the parish was to look at what it gives at the moment week by week, and was to give £10 extra per month, then we would raise what we need - if the £10 was given through the Gift Aid system. Gift Aid is the Giving Plus system which means that Alistair Darling gives us money for free, if only we can be bothered to fill out the Gift Aid declaration form. £10 extra per family per month given through Gift Aid, £2.50 per family per week given through Gift Aid. £2.50 will almost buy you a tall latte in Starbucks; it will buy you I suppose almost a third of a bottle of Prosecco from Oddbins; it will almost hire you a James Bond movie for a week from Blockbuster Video. £2.50 will be beyond some of us but it will not be beyond all of us and, I dare to say, it will not be beyond most of us.

My brothers and sisters again raise your hands if you believe you are part of a community that is dying. We are not. We are eminently capable of doing this. At this time we are all thinking about what our commitments are: the global situation is making us all consider what we really value, where we really place worth, what we can really afford week by week. When you look at this building, at this community which welcomes you, when you think of our school, when you think of the music we offer here, I want to suggest that that £10 extra per family per month is easily achievable; that we will raise £38,000 and that in a year’s time we will have balanced our budget for next year, spent the extra we want to, and have grown our plans and ambitions accordingly.

In a few moments we are going to make Harvest offerings at the altar and as you come forward to bring up what represents your offering to God for this year, please think and pray about the extra that you can give, as a thanks for all we have received and to help us to continue to grow.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen