I was talking with some theological students.
One of them was decrying the fact that there was never any conversation in his church about Brexit. He had a point. It is an issue of immense consequence. But I said that perhaps the reason was that it is such a contentious question (a bit like Trump/Clinton in the US elections) and Christians were keen to keep the peace in the churches (Ephesians 4.3). He wasn’t convinced.
Shades of grey
But why should Brexit continue to be so divisive? I believe it is partly because at the referendum on 23 June last year people were asked to choose between two extremes (a bit like Trump/Clinton) neither of which most people really wanted. It appears that most UK citizens maybe wanted some kind of mutually beneficial trade deal without being sucked into a United States of Europe. Mrs May has spoken about taking back ‘control of our money, control of our borders, control of our laws’. Since we were expected to choose between black and white when we wanted a shade of grey, it has become easy for either side to perceive the opposition as composed of unbelievable lunatics. But actually many of them voted the way they did ‘on balance’, not as unequivocal zealots.
The re-emergence of heavy shepherds
What would you think if you received a letter from your church leaders that read like this? ‘Are church members …