Hand on Heart: This is it! ~ Matt Way

A rainy Thursday reflection? Just one thing for it: Nietzsche!

Do you know Nietzsche? Even if you don’t, maybe you’ve heard the name. For the uninitiated, Friedrich Nietzsche was one of the nineteenth century’s most influential thinkers and, famously, one of Christianity’s fiercest critics.

Most quotably, he is known for provoking the believers of his day by declaring that “God is dead!”

(a viewpoint much more nuanced than one might first think, and worthy of reflection- just not here.)

But the reason he springs to mind this week is something else he is remembered to have said: that there have been two great narcotics in European civilisation, Christianity and alcohol.

He was, of course, talking about the European tendency to numb our pain and avoid reality through the use and abuse of alcohol. And he quipped that Christianity often seeks to do much the same: providing a crutch of divine and heavenly consolation to those who cannot stomach their earthly reality.

With this sentiment in mind, I think, if he had seen us gathering for Pimms and Hymns this past Sunday, he would have had an absolute eye-rolling field day.

An evening of summer drinks and old hymns? Suspect indeed. A little alcohol, a little religion, and perhaps we can all forget our troubles for a while?

But he would be mistaken.

And if you were there, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about.

Instead, one by one, members of St Luke’s community stood and told their stories. With hand on heart, and tears in eyes, they poured out their lives: stories of grief, failure, hope, help, loss, perseverance, and grace upon grace upon grace. And it was beautiful.

Nietzsche worried that Christianity dulled the human spirit, teaching us to look away from life rather than towards it. But not here!

On Sunday, in your stories, all of life could be found. And as we bore witness to it, so too did life arise in us.

This is it, isn’t it?

Not escaping life but facing it together.

And in our hymns too. Imbued with story, they were transformed. No chance of them becoming relics of a bygone age. They were revivified, alive. Lines that might once have seemed sentimental suddenly carried the weight of a funeral. A familiar chorus became a testimony of survival. The songs were no longer merely sung; they bore witness.

I’ll say it again. This is it, isn’t it?

Traditions fall flat where life is left out. But when we dare to pour life back in, they can deliver us into the very life of God.

Actually, I think they did.

Oh! Pimms and Hymns! You pulled a switcheroo. You promised us comfort, but you gave us vulnerability. You gave us the uncomfortable, the nuanced, the ever so human. You gave us life. And for that, we are grateful.

P.S. A thousand thanks to all who contributed to Pimms and Hymns on Sunday. We are honoured to have heard you share.