According to Walter Brueggemann the prophetic task begins with grief – with identifying grief and articulating it. This engenders solidarity with those who suffer, from which point (and only from which point) it becomes possible to speak the word of the Lord into the situation, articulating his ‘bias to the poor’ and criticising all those who maintain the status quo.
The status quo is best characterised, according to Brueggemann, with the phrase ‘the Royal Consciousness’ – these days we might say the establishment consensus, or the Westminster bubble. It represents the shared framework within which the political realm understands itself and its role in events. In Biblical terms it is Pharaoh, the man himself and all those whose role in the society depends upon the existing system carrying on in the accustomed manner: it represents the way they think, it is the ‘common sense’ of the powerful.
In this situation the prophet comes in and invites the people to imagine something different; to grieve; to say ‘this is not God’s will’; to denounce the Royal Consciousness; and to bring down the plagues upon the establishment before leading people to a promised land.
In our situation, who is playing what role in the prophetic drama?
Let us begin with the grief: millions of those who have felt excluded from the operations of society, whose communities have been broken by shocks both economic and social, chose to articulate their grief with a vote against the status quo.
A healthy society would have responded with a heart for inclusion, working to re-engage the excluded, to seek to protect communities, to bind up old wounds, to re-establish a genuine sense of national solidarity.
Instead, the Royal Consciousness has doubled down on its condemnation of those outside the consensus. Instead of requiring more bricks with less straw, the Pharaohs of today simply say that those who cried out with grief did not know what they were doing and are probably uncultured and immoral in any case.
It is very important to the Royal Consciousness that it can see itself as righteous and virtuous. Not many human beings outside of satanic circles can live with the sense that they have chosen to be evil, not even Hitler’s willing executioners. We all cover up the knowledge of our own sin with more or less substantial rationales and justifications for our behaviour. They are all illusions.
What the referendum represents, as a cry of grief, is a shattering of that illusion – for those that can accept a new reality. However, those who cannot cope with the illusion being shattered, who wish to retain their sense of being righteous and virtuous, have to strive all the more to eclipse and efface that cry of grief, to try and restore the status quo ante, to deny this new truth.
This is unsustainable. God is not in that process – God is with those who grieve, with those who have been excluded. God casts down the mighty from their thrones and raises up the poor and lowly. God calls up prophets to speak his Word of justice and solidarity into broken political contexts.
Who, today, in British society, is articulating the grief on behalf of the poor, giving a voice to those who were previously voiceless? Might it not be a man of unclean lips? The extent to which you consider such thing impossible might simply be an index of how captured you have been by the Royal Consciousness:
“Go and tell this people: ‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding; be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’ Make the heart of this people calloused; make their ears dull and close their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”
(This has been buzzing in my head for some time. You won’t get this point of view in the Church Times – which is the house newspaper for the priests of the Royal Consciousness… Also – milkshakes are quite mild compared to what other prophets have had to endure!)
See: Does God have a plan for Brexit? and Brexit and the baking of bricks, Brexit, the Church and God’s bias to the poor and a little rant about Brexit and the Church of England.
I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that I can’t follow your argument. You say that the ‘Westminster bubble’ doesn’t have a heart for the poor, so if we leave Europe we will have a more healthy society.
Looking at Britain where I am in the North, ‘Europe’ seems to have more of a heart for the poor than Westminster.
OK – Westminster bubble excludes the poor; if TBP make progress, the bubble bursts and (I hope) poor become more included. That’s what I’d hope for. I wouldn’t demur too much that ‘Europe’ seems to have more of a heart for the poor than Westminster – see my Daniel Blake post.
Including the poor doesn’t guarantee better-serving the poor. You only have to look at the current situation in the US to see that. Donald Trump stokes up divisions along racial and economic lines, promising better for the poorer in American society; yet in 3 years as president, his standout policy has been to give a MASSIVE tax break to the wealthy, offering nothing to the poorer in return. His trade war with China has caused huge damage to farmers who have needed subsidies to survive – paid for by taxes, not China, as he keeps telling his base.
Politicians will say what they need to in order to get what they want. If your concern is really the poor, vote for a party whose policies better help the poorer in society and hold them to account if they don’t.
The U.K. was the fastest growing economy among the EU28 prior to the 2016 referendum; now it’s among the slowest. How does a slow growth, or even contraction, help the poorest in society? The first thing any government looks to do in a recession is find ways to grow the economy, which means focusing on wealth creators, not the poor. And Nigel Farage’s background and past comments tells me that, post-Brexit, his focus won’t be on serving the poor.
You want the poor to be better included? Make sure they are served better by those that lead them. The Brexit Party will not do that because their (his) goal is deregulation of financial services and an insurance-based NHS, neither of which helps those you want to help.
And take a look at some of the writings by the father of Jacob Rees-Mogg, who also claims to understand the people better than ‘the establishment’: his father, in numerous books, calls for an ending of the welfare state in order for the UKto survive in the long-term. JRM, whose family wealth comes from financial services and low tax wealth management.
These are the people leading the charge to leave Europe. How many of them come from poor backgrounds? Yet every one of them claims to be outside of ‘the establishment’.
Brexit will leave a generation of our society poorer – economically, socially, culturally – and that’s a best case scenario. Even if Brexit turns out not be a complete disaster, even if it has benefits down the line, a generation of the poor will likely be sacrificed for it. That’s not something I’m happy to trade off.
As you make Nigel Farage proper-like, you are aware that this is the same Nigel Farage who has spoken of ending the free NHS for an insurance-based system to cope with our ageing population; who, with his financial services background, has railed against the regulation that seeks to limit the excesses that contributed to the last global recession; who has advocated lower corporation tax; and who blamed foreigners when he showed up late for an interview.
How long before he blames the elderly for our problems (sorry, that’s right, he did that in my point above), or ethnic or religious minorities, when leaving the EU doesn’t help the poor in our country?
Don’t believe for one second that Nigel Farage shares the same moral values you do.
The NHS one in particular I find really worrying – but I don’t think we can sort anything out without re-establishing democratic trust. I think those who broke the trust need to face the consequences of that.
If the last three years has shown us anything, it is that democracy was not best-served by the EU referendum.
The EU has done more to bring political stability, as well as improve employee rights, than any single government has.
Nationalism, when realised, has never proven to be a force for good. The EU has brought together 28 previously self-interested nations and made them a stable force that, while not perfect, has made every one of them stronger.
Any if Nigel Farage’s views on the NHS worry you, how can you claim he is doing God’s work? You know God better than I do, but there is absolutely nothing about Nigel Farage that I believe God would make him a prophet for.
The lives of the poor of the U.K. will not be improved by weaker trade deals, poorer standards, lesser growth and becoming culturally insular.
As you make Nigel Farage prophet-like, you are aware that this is the same Nigel Farage who has spoken of ending the free NHS for an insurance-based system to cope with our ageing population; who, with his financial services background, has railed against the regulation that seeks to limit the excesses that contributed to the last global recession; who has advocated lower corporation tax; and who blamed foreigners when he showed up late for an interview.
How long before he blames the elderly for our problems (sorry, that’s right, he did that in my point above), or ethnic or religious minorities, when leaving the EU doesn’t help the poor in our country?
Don’t believe for one second that Nigel Farage shares the same moral values you do.