The East Anglian Readers were lucky enough to have the Archbishop of York as the main speaker at their Away Day this March. The gentleman who has organised these  days for many years is now very frail and, for the first time,  came in a wheel chair. The Archbishop insisted on pushing the chair himself.  Apart from the very important fact that this meant a great deal to the gentleman concerned, this was a gesture of humility, that we all need, and we acknowledge we need when we commemorate  Jesus washing  the feet of his disciples at the Last Supper,  that it is the role of those in high authority to serve.
The Archbishop was asked a question about the hierarchical nature of the Church of England to which he replied that he saw the main advantage of his present office as one that gave him the ability to open doors that otherwise might remain closed.
We need those in high authority to do this kind of work, to focus us and to give us symbolism. For example, if the Queen came to St Mary’s and said, ,  I think we would all be deeply disappointed. Her role has a purpose, if she does not fulfil it, we are all the poorer but she is a servant of God (as I am sure our present monarch is aware) as much as the poorest of her subjects.  In the Middle Ages monarchs actually washed the feet of poor people at the Maundy Thursday ceremony as well as giving alms.
What else did the Archbishop say? The topic he was given was “Spirituality in the Church” but he does not like the word “spirituality” at the moment, he feels that it is too loosely used, he prefers “prayer and meditation”  and took the Lord’s Prayer as his example. He also urged that visiting the sick whether at home or in hospital we should use the traditional for which still produces a response in many people newer forms fail to do. As one who visits a nursing home, I would agree with him!
It so happens that I had been meditating on the thoughts of St Maximos the Confessor  ( a monk in the eastern church of the 7th century) on the Lord’s Prayer  and would select  from his writings what he says on  “Give us this day, our daily bread”,  for our commemoration of the Last Supper this evening. St Maximos  says when we pray this we are asking for One form of this is the Eucharist  which we commemorate this evening.......... but there many ways in which we can be spiritually fed, not least prayer and meditation. We are reminded of our complete dependence on God as were the Israelites in the wilderness after they had left Egypt. And we are reminded of our own mortality.
It’s a lot in seven words is it not?
St John’s Gospel from which our reading this evening has been taken does not include an account of the Eucharist but there is much throughout on feeding and of Jesus as the bread of life. One of those who was seeking spiritual food from Jesus was Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus.
Both Mary and Martha, the Archbishop said, he felt  are to be found  in each and every one of us there is conflict between the two.  Most people are doers and will attend to the physical feeding as Martha was DOING while Mary apparently doing nothing while  she was seeking spiritual food she recognised that Jesus could give her. This must have been welcome to Jesus. (I’m speaking for myself now, not for the Archbishop). Jesus, as a man, led a lonely life; he had a family but they do not seem to know what he was on about. He had his disciples but incident after incident  reveals that they only understood dimly. To meet with some one like Mary, possibly Lazarus,  must have been wonderful for HIM and, if John was indeed the disciple whom Jesus loved (when I was a little girl I thought it was very wrong of him to have a favourite),  it may have been that John just grasped things better and thus seemed closer to Jesus.
If, as the Archbishop said, Martha and  Mary are to be found in all of us how do we get the balance? There was a time when I reasoned that the Church should be making Martha, Mary and Mary, Martha but I am not so sure that both the Church and the world are not conspiring to make us all Martha. The world will do this anyway. Unless we become hermits or drop outs of one kind or another, the demands of family, work will impinge on most of us.
The demands of Martha may not be the more important but they are frequently the more urgent. Those of Mary get put off until something happens in the case of an individual  often a tragedy, a sickness giving unusual leisure in convalescence, or old age .. but we should all be making space for this, and the Church should help us, in our lives....not least with prayer and meditation one of the fruits of prayer and meditation is humility.
I return to my own Lenten reading, “The Cloud of Unknowing” I will pass on to you the two kinds of humility he sees;-
To see ourselves more and more as we are, which does NOT mean only to dwell on our sins
To have a glimpse of God as He is which will instil a true humility into us and which embraces both the glory of God in Heaven and of the humility of the earthly Jesus washing the Disciples feet.