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General Synod: Dr Sentamu responds to Her Majesty's speech

15 November 2005

Your Majesty, it is a great privilege to thank you most warmly, on behalf of all those present today for your gracious words to us.  We are all honoured and delighted that you have come to inaugurate this Synod and join with us in our act of worship.

It’s always important, too, on these occasions to be able to welcome our ecumenical guests but it has been a unique pleasure today, two years after the signing of the Anglican Methodist Covenant, to have one of our ecumenical partners as our preacher.  I would invite Synod members to express their appreciation for Professor Frances Young and for all our ecumenical visitors who have joined us today.

As we forge ahead with the Anglican Methodist Covenant, the question for us isn’t only how can the Church of England be united to the Methodist Church, but how can both churches be renewed into a deeper service of God through our common meeting with Christ.  And if I may be so bold to suggest what I believe God desires to bring into unity isn’t the churches as they are now but churches reformed in response to his judgement and renewal.  We all know how scandalous are the divisions in the Church.  “You can’t go on as you are.” so proclaimed prophet Jonah.  And what a response!

Pope John Paul II receiving in Rome leaders of the Orthodox Church of Greece, on 11 March 2002, spoke of an “ecumenism of holiness that will finally lead us to full communion, which is neither absorption nor fusion, but a meeting in the truth and in love.”  That’s it!  An ecumenism of holiness which is neither absorption nor fusion, but a meeting in the truth and in love.

As a Synod we must, in obedience to God, respond to his judgement and renewal.  We can’t go on as we are!

The roots of the word ‘Synod’ mean ‘together on the way’.  Those of us chosen to serve the Church on this and other Synods have a special responsibility to see that we walk with each other in our common discipleship and our service of those to whom we have been sent.

Discerning the mind of Christ in relation to specific issues is often challenging and difficult. It was for the early Church in Acts Chapter 15, which records the apostles meeting in synod to reach a common policy about the Gentile mission.  And the key to a problem that had become acute was by coming to a common mind that “Religion consists in casting ourselves on the grace of God.”  The paradox of the Gospel is that the way to victory is through surrender; and the way to power is through admitting one’s own helplessness.

I am glad that when we have to vote by houses we will no longer hear, “Divide!”.  But “Decide.”  And when we decide, we don’t need to divide.  As Cyprian, bishop and martyr said, “To go into schism is to break that love between believers which is inherent in the church.  He can’t have God for his Father who hasn’t the Church for his mother.  To be outside the one visible communion is to be outside the Ark drowning in flood.” 

Whatever decisions we send out from here may we learn from the early church that their decision was communicated by sending a letter with Judas and Silas.  How can we add friendly warmth to our decisions and avoid sounding coldly official?

My prayer for this next five years is that we will all commit ourselves wholeheartedly to being a true Synod, where we listen to each other, wait on Almighty God, and by His grace, learn to walk together more powerfully for the sake of the Gospel.  May we be led by the vocabulary of trust, kindness, joy, simplicity, love, justice, compassion and faithfulness.  May the quality of our relationships shine through all that we do here.  And may the presence of God here be a reality which is visible everywhere.

Your Majesty, in this world all good things come to an end and we can’t much longer delay the moment when, after fortifying ourselves with some lunch, we are going to have to turn to legislation and reports and budgets and all the other exciting things which draw us here to Church House. 

As we adjourn this part of our proceedings, may I thank you and the Duke of Edinburgh most warmly for your presence with us.  You are an example and an inspiration to us all as we seek to walk together in the service of all the people of this, your realm, and great nation.  Please accept our deepest thanks and devotion.

God save the Queen.