Richard Cheetham November is a month of over-arching and universal themes.  We begin with All Saints’ Day and the Commemoration of the Faithful Departed - reminding us of our mortality and need for salvation both now and in the light of eternity.  Only a week later we come to Remembrance Sunday - recalling the immense and continuing suffering and sacrifice incurred in human conflicts.  Later in the month we celebrate Christ the King – reflecting on Christ’s cosmic and universal significance.  The last Sunday in November is Advent Sunday introducing the major ideas of God’s coming among us both in the human life of Jesus Christ and at the ‘end of time’ – and so into the beliefs about death, judgement, heaven and hell.

And, if that is not enough to have us reeling, there are two more ‘earthly’ issues which are still of global significance.  The first is National Interfaith Week which takes place from 15-21 November.  It is the first such week in England and is designed to encourage local and national events in which people of different faiths can meet, share and genuinely engage with our varied understandings of God and human life.  I am in no doubt that religious pluralism and how we respond to it – theologically, politically, and socially – is one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century.  So I hope that this week will see many of our Churches making extra efforts to engage with our neighbours.

The second issue is Climate Change in the build up to the conference in Copenhagen in December.  This is interlinked with more general questions of justice and poverty in a very unequal world.  Bishop Cleophas Lunga of Matabeleland will be visiting the Kingston Episcopal Area in the first two weeks of November and will be reflecting with us on the situation in Zimbabwe and how we respond.  There are big challenges to us all as we consider how we should live to create a fairer and more sustainable world.  Again, this is one of the massive issues of the 21st century and it is crucial that Christians are deeply involved in this.

The immensity of these themes could easily leave us feeling powerless and overwhelmed.  One slogan often used in response is that we should ‘Think globally, and act locally’.  There is much wisdom in this – our individual, local actions do matter.  But, for the Christian, there is a deeper understanding that can be drawn upon.  We worship God who is Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier, and words cannot contain the grandeur and immensity of God.  And yet that God also is known to us in the very particular context of the life of Jesus Christ.  The human and the divine are intertwined, the cosmic and the particular are not opposite ends of a spectrum, but interwoven.  As we move through November, and especially into Advent, we can reflect ever more deeply on the mystery of the Incarnation and all that it means for the way we live and understand our lives.

+Richard Cheetham