Readings: Jeremiah 33.14-16; Psalm 25 (Rejoice and Sing, no.682); Luke 21.25-36.

In the name of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The week before last, one of our students went to London, to join those marching in protest at the state visit of President George Bush. A former naval officer, this student was perhaps one of the last people we would have expected to go on that march. Afterwards he spoke of the experience of being among that noisy crowd, of his excitement that people of so many different backgrounds, Christians, Muslims, Jews, people confessing no faith, had joined together. But he had gone on his own, with a particular aim in mind. He had wanted to make the march a kind of pilgrimage, to find a way of stepping aside from all the people there, to pray at the significant places on the way. At Buckingham Palace, at Trafalguar Square, outside Whitehall, at the end of Downing Street he found his own space to say the Lord’s Prayer. He told of how at Whitehall, while he was praying, he was interrupted by three policemen, intent on moving him on. In spite of his own size, he was frightened and intimidated by their action. "I’m just praying the Lord’s Prayer" he said to them, "I’ll be about another twenty seconds." It’s interesting that in that situation, prayer had definitely become a kind of civil disobedience. "There are plenty of churches. If you want to pray, go there", one of the policemen said. The police were clearly intent on stopping his pilgrimage, and fearful of the consequences of continuing his prayer, he quietly moved back into the crowd.

That story will no doubt suggest different things to different people. When I heard it, I reflected on what it says to us at the beginning of Advent, the time of expectation of the coming of Jesus into the world. The policeman’s reaction, "there are plenty of churches, if you want to pray, go there" speaks powerfully of what is happening to religious life in our country. Christianity, along with other faiths, is seen as the sort of thing you’ll like if you like that sort of thing. But it has to be removed, confined, kept separate. Church buildings, far from being a sign to the world of the all pervading presence of God, are places where God is held in check, safely kept within God’s own sphere. The Christmas story is still enormously popular and meaningful for people, but perhaps for many it has that significance because it is kept on a small scale, a story which everyone can relate to about a man and a woman having a baby. Contained, domestic, homely.

Every year, the "inner Daily Telegraph reader" that is in all of us can find new reasons to be outraged at further signs of the secularisation of Christmas. This year, I became "Outraged, Cuddesdon" when I saw being sold in a local supermarket "countdown calendars".

The Church celebrates Advent precisely because Christian theology cannot allow Christmas to become essentially a domestic story. Advent is about the big picture which puts the local events surrounding a carpenter, his young wife and their unplanned baby in context. It is about waiting, it is about being prepared, about the constant interplay of hope and fear in our lives. It is about the expectation of judgement. It is about our constant intercession "your Kingdom come", and about understanding what saying that prayer really means. It’s easy for us to project outside the church our dissatisfaction, our anger even, at those who hijack "our" festival without "getting it." Before we do so, we should also ask ourselves whether we have appreciated what the Advent season is saying to us.

I think back to our student who almost got arrested for saying the Lord’s Prayer, and his realisation that praying "thy kingdom come" was demanding of him more than he bargained for. In his act of faithfulness he found himself in a situation where he needed to move beyond fear.

The readings associated with Advent can seem quite frightening, with their talk of the need to be on guard. "Watch out", says Luke, "so that the day does not catch you unexpectedly like a trap." For much of Christian history, readings like these have been used to make people frightened, and therefore pliant before authorities which set themsleves up as God’s representatives.

In a small village church I once visited in the north east of France there were mediaval frescoes of the last judgement which must have terrified the congregation as they sat through impenetrable sermons, with their images of roasting sinners so vivd that you could almost smell the brimstone. But the thrust of the early Christian texts about judgement are not about inducing fear. Rather, they speak of lives which have moved beyond fear, into a trust which sees the power and love of God as greater than the difficulties that we face in our lives. Luke says "When these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near."

Not fear, but moving beyond fear to confidence in God’s love is at the core of Luke’s message. The Christmas story which we shall read again in the next few weeks is punctuated with the same saying, "Do not be afraid": Zechariah, when he learns he is to become the father of John the Baptist, Mary when she leanrs she is to be the mother of Jesus, the shepherds in the fields when they receive the announcement of Jesus’ birth are all told the same thing: "do not be afraid".

Advent is a season when we are reminded of things that are frightening in our lives. Before anyone passes judgement on us, we judge ourselves, and fear the opinion of others. We long for a glorious future and confront our mortality. Advent does not leave us there, however, but points us to Christ as the one who can move us beyond fear, through our hearing his demand on our lives, to be loyal to his teaching, through his identification with us in his living and dying, and in his victory over death in his resurrection. I can think of people I have known in my work as a minister who have faced terminal illness with a faith that has not removed their fear of dying, but taken them beyond fear to an assurance of the all-powerful love of God. Christians I had as friends in South Africa still in the days of apartheid knew that their lives were in danger, but found a way of living beyond fear because of their understanding of the justice of God. What are we frightened of? What do we need to help us to live beyond fear?

Tomorrow "World AIDS Day" will be observed by people in many different ways and in many places. Mongezi Guma, who preached her earlier this year, will be launching a report on health policy on AIDS in South Africa tomorrow in a township outside Cape Town which has one of the highest rates of infection in the country. It is interesting that when he suggested launching the report in a township there was resistence, because many of the people who form policy, whom the organisers of the event wanted to be there, generally go to events in posh hotels. The situation of people affected by HIV and AIDS in the developing world is a disaster on a huge scale, one which is terrifying for those who face it in their daily lives. Any thought of a solution still lies a long way off. Testimony of those who work with affected people repeatedly makes the same point, that people can be helped towards a place beyond fear when others provide for them simple acts of love and respect, at a time when some others project onto them all sorts of feelings of guilt and unacceptability.