This is the script of this morning’s Thought for the Day on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
I have been following events in Syria in recent weeks with considerable interest. Not only am I supposed to be visiting Northern Iraq again in the new year, but also I have heard the stories of people who suffered under Assad’s dynastic regime. I wonder how they are feeling this morning as a new day dawns.
Clearly many Syrians are rejoicing at the end of an era. Freedom beckons – at least, freedom from tyranny. Yet, even recent history demonstrates with bloody clarity that the euphoria of a liberation is not inevitably followed by a golden era of peace and calm. The Arab uprisings of not so long ago heralded chaos, further brutality, and created vacuums into which the demons poured.
So, this is a sober moment of contradictions. At the same time, we hold hope and joy in tension with fear and apprehension. And this is both normal and wise. But, I need also to look at these events and conflicting responses through the lens of history and human experience.
In my case, taking the long view of biblical perspectives, empires come and go. Their arrogances and terrors pass – but, sometimes only to give way to different terrors. The only way to see a better future is to pay attention now to what I call the ‘content’ of what matters. And this is where two elements of the biblical tradition offer something wise.
I can’t do much to fix Syria or shape its immediate political future. But, I can pay attention to matters of justice and love and mercy here and now. It is what one songwriter called ‘the greatness of the small’. In the Hebrew scriptures the people are told that God’s favour is dependent on their behaviour, priorities and lived-out values. As Amos put it, don’t think God is impressed by your fine worship songs if you build or accept a society in which the heads of the poor are trampled upon … or where justice can be bought.
The second element comes straight from Jesus who taught his friends to live now as if the kingdom of God were already here … now. In other words, don’t wait for peace and perfection, but live out your calling … whatever the circumstances you find yourself in. Live now as if the longed-for future was here.
This is easy to say and hard to do. As the great singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen recognizes in his epic song ‘Hallelujah’ – forty years old this month – real life means holding together both “the holy and the broken Hallelujah”.
I pray that Syria will find and make peace. While I seek to create and build peace here.
