Balance

“You never really know a man until you understand things from his point of view, until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”

Harper Lee. To Kill a Mockingbird.

As some of you will already know, I do not follow a particular religion. I have posted before about how I often wish I had a strong faith. The religion I feel most aligned with is that of Buddhism, however as a child growing up in the UK I went to Christian Sunday School, and of course attended daily Christian worship as part of my education. So I have been close to Christian teaching and thinking all of my life. It is embedded in UK society whether we notice it is there or not.

Something in my character has always driven me to try to be as balanced, and as fair in my thinking as possible. I work to develop awareness of where I might be overly judgemental, or unbalanced in my thinking. It seems to come "easy" for me to feel compassion for most every human. I almost cannot do otherwise. I try to separate the behaviour from the person, perhaps at times in the past this has led to me making excuses for people's behaviour or has led to others labelling me as "unassertive". I have had to work on remaining compassionate whilst still being able to express my dislike or disagreement. I have had to work on remaining compassionate but on setting boundaries for others and myself.

It is important to me to understand how someone has reached the point at which they find themselves, and to put myself in their shoes. I do not always succeed of course, many times I fall short and have to bring myself back to mindfulness. I am always thinking and questioning - far too much sometimes it nearly drives me mad! Of course I am subject to bias like anyone else, and will set against someone's opinions too easily sometimes if they do not align with mine. I will ignore the facts if they do not agree with my view, and I will argue black is white sometimes, even if I can see someone else may have a point! I'm human in other words! I'm opinionated, fiesty, and I have an ego which if left to it's own devices can get out of control.

So after my post last week about where things are now for people who are gay or transgendered in our society, and about the responsibility of leaders to increase understanding and compassion amongst different groups; I thought long and hard about whether my post would cause offence to those I regard as friends here.

That's not why I haven't posted by the way. It's been a busy week, very busy.

I was a little worried about the absence of comments. However I had also been worried about being attacked via comments too, so it was a relief that nothing happened of that sort. Silence is much more preferable than an attack. My post was not meant to be attacking of Christianity or Christian beliefs. I respect everyone's right to hold their particular belief, but struggle with any sort of fundamentalism or rigid interpretation of rules that were written down thousands of years ago. Equally so whichever religion it is that is showing it's rigidity, doing harm, or demonstrating lack of compassion and understanding.

So this week I was cheered when I saw the BBC news article about the new Archbishop of Canterbury being named as Justin Welby. A feeling of optimism and hope was raised when I briefly heard some of his words.

 On the issue of same-sex marriage he said he had to examine his own thinking "carefully and prayerfully..........

His appointment comes as the Church of England faces controversial issues, including a vote in 10 days' time on ordaining women bishops.

"I will be voting in favour and join my voice to many others in urging the synod to go forward with this change," he said. He also said the Church faced deep differences on the issue of same-sex marriage.

"It is absolutely right for the state to define the rights and status of people cohabiting in different forms of relationships, including civil partnerships," he said. "We must have no truck with any form of homophobia in any part of the Church. The Church of England is part of the worldwide Church, and has responsibilities that come from those links. What the Church does here deeply affects the already greatly suffering churches in places... like Nigeria."He added: "I am always averse to the language of exclusion, when what we are called to is to love in the same way as Jesus Christ loves us. Above all in the Church we need to create safe spaces for these issues to be discussed in honesty and in love."

 Quoted from the BBC article above.

I feel that this is a leader who will help to bring some balance to the more extreme thinking which characterises some Christian groups and leaders. Of course I am aware that there are divisions within the Church of England and that some groups will not accept this more balanced and responsible voice, however it did bring some cheer amidst my concerns.