My two previous posts about the Nectar Card provide the context for what follows. Very briefly, I previously explored the issues around the linkage of the Nectar Card with promotion of the Daily Mail, especially for those whose values, practices and lifestyle are shaped by a commitment to following Jesus Christ. In the absence of a clear course of action, or effective protest, and recognising that all of our economic relationships are compromised, interconnected, often anonymous and constantly changing, what can a Christian do? We can think Christianly, and pray faithfully and prophetically. We can insist on looking at the world as those whose ultimate loyalty is to God, not the market, not the powers and the powerful, and not the values that endorse the economic disparities and cultural imperatives of the way the world is today.
But is the more? I haven't found the answer to the dilemma of the Nectar Card and the Daily Mail. What started out as an exercise in clarification hasn't delivered the desired security of knowing what to do. But it has compelled me to ask, in the absence of a list of practical actions, what else does Christian faith bring to the way I look on, live in, and care for the world?
The following 8 Considerations are not exhaustive, but they are demanding, and arise out of the theological depths of the Christian gospel. Living as we do in the grey complexities of a culture of flux, fluidity and increasing polarisations, these 8 Considerations act as points of re-orientation, permanent markers for people of The Way. What matters most? What makes our lives count? Where are the resources to help with the journey? Where is hope to be found? Lacking clear answers to troubling questions, is there a wisdom on which we can stand, and that will bear our weight?
So the result of thinking about what makes me uncomfortable and sad about finding myself inadvertently promoting the Daily Mail,is a list of 8 Considerations. I place these over and against the broken complexity of globalised trade and economic inequality. I take them as first principles of a Christian mindset, and as a composite of correctives to the seductions of a culture in which everything is a commodity, everyone is a consumer, and everywhere part of the market.
So here they are,
Eight Considerations foir Christian Disciples.
Consider the Kingdom of God: when it comes to power, disciples of Jesus believe in a Kingdom where the Lamb is on the throne. In the community of Christ's followers, as signs of the Kingdom of God, bread is broken and shared, wine is poured and sacrifice remembered.
Consider Reconciliation: The God revealed in Jesus reconciled all things to himself, making peace by the blood of the cross. He has given to his followers the ministry of reconciliation. We are therefore ambassadors of Christ in the service of the Cross.
Consider Resurrection: God raised Jesus from the dead and therefore death is defeated by life, hate is overcome by love, violence is outmaneouvred by peace, despair contradicted by hope, oppression conquered by freedom, and the status quo given notice of final transformation.
Consider Grace: The God of grace saves and regenerates human existence into the new creation. Saved by grace we are called to live by the grace of God, as people of the gift, as forgiven forgivers, as reconciled reconcilers, as generous beneficiaries, who love because God first loved us.
Consider the Holy Spirit: God is Light, Truth and Love, actively present in all of creation, in the Church, and in the people of God. The Spirit of Truth leads us into truth, to know Jesus deeply and to live as the Body of Christ faithfully; the Spirit produces the fruit of our renewed humanity in Christ, pouring the love of God into our hearts, gurgling up as living water irrigating the life we live.
Consider Love and Compassion: God is love, therefore those who love God are constrained by the love of Christ to love others. Love is a practice, a habit of the heart, expressed in redemptive gestures, determined in peacemaking patience, imagining just initiatives, and kenotic in spirit and sacrifice.
Consider Prayer: God is personal, relational, and faithful. Prayer is the environment within which foundational trust grows and is tested. In a broken world prayer is prophetic practice and imaginative hope. Intercession is to join our prayers of longing, and tears of sadness, to the eternal longing love of the Triune God, self-given for the redeeming and renewing of creation.
Consider Worship: To worship the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is to render all other claims relative, penultimate and provisional. Praise and thanksgiving subdue the urge to possess; confession and penitence are incompatible with power and dominance; intercession places others in the centre and is a voluntary displacing of the ego, the self, me.
Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. Romans 12
Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things. Philippians 4
Thank you for these thoughts on a complex issue !
A simple suggestion for the specific situation: keep shopping at Sainsbury's (which supports the local staff) but stop using your Nectar card (which is used to analyse your shopping patterns as much as to keep you shopping there). That way you are not affiliated with the scheme linking to the Daily Mail.
And write to Sainsbury's (or start/sign a petition) expressing your displeasure...
Posted by: David Bowler | September 06, 2017 at 01:19 PM