Dissembled

Having spent a busy May Day holiday weekend at home and serving my church and a nearby fellowship it's been time to catch up on what I missed.  I missed the Baptist Assembly in Plymouth so the best I could do was to catch up by reading some of the bloggers who had been there.  Some made me a little envious, others (these are Baptists and no two ever agree entirely) a little grateful that I was not there.  Then this - from one College lecturer much admired in the higher Baptist world -

Delegates (and this is very impressionistic) – nearly all rather elderly, middle aged, middle England, conventional, dated, Isle of Wight, Daily Mail/Telegraph. Not that all of those things are in themselves bad but they are certainly not representative of the wider population – overall really rather dull in comparison. On the way down I read Cole Moreton’s "Is God Still An Englishman". Moreton paints a now largely familiar picture of the last fifty years and the changes in English society and in particular how we do God. This certainly feels much more like the old England, and not in a good way.  

Can't get much more middle in England than Wycombe, more middle in age than me (currently - but heading for elderly I guess - ah, but so are you!), dated (at least my daughter thinks so), conventional (Bran Flakes nearly every morning), read the sports pages in the Daily Telegraph and do the crossword, even went to the Isle of Wight on holiday once.

Perhaps I should be glad I didn't go and comprehensively contribute to the gentleman's perceived problem.  But while we have Christian leaders who treat their brothers and sisters in these stereotypical ways we will never have the Church that Jesus came to bring.  After all, his first disciples were all Jewish, male, young adult, mid-Galileans as far as I can tell. 

Or perhaps it isn't only the politicians campaigning in Rochdale that need to learn to value people for what they are rather than dismiss them for what they're not.