Script:
Hymn: O Praise ye the Lord!
Laudate Dominum (NEH 427)
H.W.Baker (1821-77)
C.Hubert H.Parry (1848-1918)

Dean:
Welcome to King’s College London for this Sunday morning worship – and a particular welcome to the Most Revd Desmond Tutu, who is a Fellow of King’s College, and has joined us this term as visiting professor of Post- Conflict Societies, in this our 175th year.

The College prayer we’ll say together later in this service and the College mission statement both make clear that King’s is proud to have been founded on the principles of holiness and wisdom.

Part of the vision of a previous Dean of King’s Sydney Evans was to bring people from South Africa, so they could study here and then return to serve their country and church. Archbishop Tutu was here at King’s as a student in the 60’s and we are honoured that he has returned to Kings to have an extended stay so he can share with us what he has learnt over many years as Archbishop and chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. He’s preaching in Chapel and giving lectures to help us understand what it means to be working in post conflict societies.

We’re delighted that he has agreed to preach for us today as we explore the theme of family and love.

We pray in the words of the Collect for the Sunday before Lent:

Almighty Father,
whose Son was revealed in majesty at the Transfiguration
before he suffered death upon the cross:
give us grace to perceive his glory,
that we may be strengthened to suffer with him
and be changed into his likeness, from glory to glory;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever. Amen

So as we perceive his glory and are strengthened with him we pray that God will equip us to take his saving love to all human kind.

We ask that the Church universal – the whole company of Christ’s people – may continue in truth and unity.

And we pray for this for College – giving thanks for 175 years of studying and searching for truth in holiness and wisdom – and praying that this search will continue.

We pray for God’s kingdom to be present in our world, our church and our lives as we pray together using the words Jesus taught us:

All: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and for ever. Amen.

Dean:
The choir now sings Psalm 133 - a glimpse of God’s vision of human beings dwelling together in unity

Choir:
Behold, how good and joyful a thing it is: brethren, to dwell together in unity!

It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down unto the beard: even unto Aaron’s beard, and went down to the skirts of his clothing.
Like as the dew of Hermon: which fell upon the hill of Sion.
For there the Lord promised his blessing: and life for evermore.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be: world without end. Amen.

Dean:
Our Old Testament reading this morning comes from the book of Ruth, and describes how Ruth makes an astounding promise to her mother in law Naomi that she is totally committed to her in a new family relationship.

Reader:
Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clung to her. So she said, "See, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods; return after your sister-in-law." But Ruth said, "Do not press me to leave you or to turn back from following you! Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die-- there will I be buried. May the LORD do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!" When Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more to her. (Ruth 1:14b-18)


Choir: Magnificat (Giles Swayne)

Dean:
Magnificat - composed by Giles Swayne [twenty years ago] and inspired by his discovery of African music during the time he spent in Senegal and the Gambia.

The Magnificat is the song of praise Mary sang after she heard she was to be the mother of Jesus. It pictures the wonder of God’s plan for the world, which includes exalting the humble and meek. Our New Testament reading tells of Jesus appearing to Mary Magdalene after his resurrection and asking her – someone who in the eyes of the world was humble and poor – to be the bearer of good news to his disciples.

Reader:
Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ She said to them, ‘They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.’ When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Who are you looking for?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary!’ She turned and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbouni!’ (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, ‘Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, “I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”’ Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, ‘I have seen the Lord’; and she told them that he had said these things to her. (John 20: 11-18)

Dean:
Nkosi sikelel iAfrika - God bless Africa - is a prayer of hope which was sung by many churches in the dark days of apartheid. It now forms part of the national anthem for the new South Africa, and it’s a fitting introduction to Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

Choir: Nkosi sikelel iAfrika

Sermon: Archbishop Desmond Tutu
In St. John's Gospel our Lord says the highest title he can give his disciples is to call them friends. Therefore what he says to Mary Magdalene after his resurrection stands out prominently. And he's talking about people, one of whom betrayed him, another denied him not once but twice, and they all deserted him, like craven cowards and were now skulking behind closed doors.

We would have understood perfectly had he been thoroughly miffed with them and spoken dismissively and even derisively of them. Well, what happens? It would have been startling to have called them his disciples after what they had done. And quite mind-boggling even to have called them friends. Well, he decided to knock us over with a feather.

Just listen to what he says to Mary Magdalene:
"Go to my brothers and tell them that I am ascending to my Father and your Father. To my God and your God."

Now that really is quite unbelievable. This craven despicable lot - my brothers indeed! But clearly Jesus meant this to be taken seriously. That we, his followers, belong in one family - God's family. Is there anything else in the bible that seems to support this assertion?

This Jesus came - not to an ideal world - but came to a world that was polarised, fractured, divided. Divided into hostile and often alienated groupings. There were the much hated occupying Romans, resented by the subject natives, and Jews did not share a cup with the Samaritans. The Jewish community of His day was stratified, fragmented. There were the Sadducees and Pharisees, the zealots and the collaborating tax collectors. There were the rich, the poor, male, female, young, old - and there was a sharp divide between Jew and Gentile, represented by a wall of partition in the temple precincts to go beyond which spelt death for the Gentile unbeliever.

And people saw a veritable miracle happening before their very eyes with the advent of the new community of the followers of Jesus. They saw those who were formerly alienated and hostile flocking into this new fellowship. And they marveled and remarked "How these Christians love one another."

It would have been revolutionary for a slave to have been accepted as the equal of his former master. But no, they were not just equals - no, they were brothers. They were sisters in one family. An equal you can acknowledge once and forever after ignore. You can't do that with your sister or brother.

You don't choose who your relative will be. Sometimes we wish we could, given just how difficult some of them can be. Well, we don't always know what they think of us! No - we don't choose our family members. They are God's gift to us, as we are to them.

Do you recall when Saul went to Damascus to arrest Christians there and was blinded? And the Lord asked Ananias to go to Saul's lodgings to pray for him to have his sight restored. Do you recall Ananias quite flabbergasted telling the omniscient Lord "Lord, do you know this man? He has been harassing your people and came here to arrest us. No, Lord, you can't be serious." Well Ananias went, and when he arrived said about this persecutor of the Christian community "Brother Saul".

Yes, I believe the words of the Lord to Mary Magdalene to be his most radical utterance. We are family - all of us. We belong in God's family. There are no outsiders. All are insiders.

When Jesus spoke of being lifted up on the cross he said "I, if I be lifted up will draw.." - he didn't say "I will draw some" - he said "I, if I be lifted up will draw ALL - draw all to me to hold them" all of us drawn into the divine embrace that excludes no-one - black, yellow, white, rich, poor, educated, uneducated, male, female, young, old, gay, lesbian, so-called straight - yes it IS radical. All, all, ALL belong - Arafat, Sharon, Bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, George Bush, Tony Blair, Palestinian, Israeli, Jew, Arab, Protestant, Catholic - all, ALL, all belong in this family.

And in a healthy family the rule is from each according to their ability, for each according to their need. And so if we are serious about being family we would not spend obscene amounts on budgets of death and destruction, when we know a small fraction of those budgets would enable our sisters and brothers - members of our family - God's family, God's children - EVERYWHERE - they would have enough to eat, clean water to drink, adequate health care, education.

Go and tell my brothers. Go and tell my family. We are all, all family God's family. The human family.

Choir: Set me as a seal (Walton)

Dean:
'Set me as a seal' - words from the Song of Solomon to music by William Walton. This beautiful love poem from the Hebrew Bible contains the promise from God that ‘many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it.’ We now respond to that promise and the words of the Archbishop as we pray for a renewed sense of love in the world, the Church and our own lives.

Prayers:
In union with our Lord Jesus Christ and in through the power of the Holy Spirit let us pray to our heavenly Father:
We pray for the Church, that in its healing of divisions, in its closeness to the outsiders and the suffering, and in its reflection of your love, it may shine as a light in the darkness of the troubled world.
We pray for the nations of the world, holding before you those places darkened by violence, by famine and by political uncertainty, that in peace and justice all people may learn to work together as one human family.

Choir: Thuma mina Somandla (Send me Jesus, send me Lord)
andcopy; Utryck from "Freedom is Coming – songs of protest and praise from South Africa"

We pray for this nation, for Elizabeth our Queen and all the royal family; for those in authority that they may be strong to carry out your will; for communities overshadowed by unemployment, poverty and despair. That they may know the light of your hope.

We pray for those we know and love: for our own families and friends remembering those for whom the family is a place of darkness and pain, of neglect, of physical or mental abuse; and we remember those who have no family. That love, care and forgiveness may illuminate all our relationships,

Choir: Thuma mina

We pray for all those who suffer, the bereaved and the dying. Among the sick we remember especially ... and we pray for those who care for them. That your healing love may shine on them.

We remember those who have died, giving thanks for their lives and witness and praying that we may share with them a kingdom which is unshakeable,

Choir: Thuma mina

Dean:
So we commend ourselves to God’s unshakeable love praying that the light and the power of the gospel may continue to shine upon us and through us to the world. And we close our time of prayer with the King’s College London prayer which is said each day here in chapel:

All: Almighty God, the Fountain of Wisdom and the Giver of every perfect gift;
without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy;
Send down, we beseech you, your blessing upon this College,
and prosper the designs of its founders and benefactors.
Enable us, by your grace,
faithfully to discharge the duties of our several stations,
remembering the strict and solemn account
which we must one day give before the judgement-seat of Christ.
More particularly we pray, that the seeds of Learning, Virtue and Religion,
here sown, may bring forth fruit abundantly to your glory
and the benefit of our fellow creatures.
These and all other blessings, for them and for us,
we humbly ask in the name and through the mediation
of Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.

Dean:
Our service ends with the hymn ‘God is love: let heaven adore him’, reminding us that deep within the heart of God is the dream of wholeness for the world and all its inhabitants.

Hymn:
GOD is Love: let heav'n adore him;
Abbot’s Leigh (NEH 185)
Timothy Rees (1874-1939)
Cyril Taylor (1907-1991)

Dean:
The Lord bless you and watch over you, the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord look kindly on you and give you peace; and the blessing of God almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always. Amen.