faithactionreconciliation

I'm currently reading a compact little book called "How the Irish saved civilisation" by Thomas Cahill. It's hardly a heady historical work but is a very simple reflection on the influence that Patrick and his Christian successors in Ireland had on the world. An influence that saw the preservation of much of classical culture, history and knowledge that was under threat following the demise of the Roman empire. Central to Patrick's work of course was the creation of an organic Christian movement in Ireland that changed the face of this nation for good, and deeply impacted the history of the world Christian movement for the next 1500 years.

In the book Cahill talks of Patrick's lengthy stay in Ireland as a youth when he was brought here as a slave, years of struggle and torment. Patrick ultimatey escaped miraculously from his slavery. At the time he wouldn't have known that he would be returning to this land, of his own volition, a generation later with a determination to bring the beautiful message of Jesus to a people that had no knowledge of this first century man from Palestine. In fact Cahill believes that Patrick was the first person ever to go as a missionary to an area considered 'barbarian', beyond the reaches of the Roman empire.

At this time there were many in Britain that made journeys to Ireland to grab slaves and take them back to Britain to work for them. Due to his first hand knowledge of the inhumanity of slavery Patrick became convinced that Christians should have no friendship with any who kept slaves. He wrote a letter to British Christians imploring them to have nothing to do with slave keepers. Cahill says "the greatness of Patrick is beyond dispute: the first human being in the history of the world to speak out unequivocally against slavery". Indeed he goes on to say that "nor will any voice as strong as his be heard again till the seventeenth century" on the subject of slavery.

One of these recent 'voices' was that of William Wilberforce who was the subject of the recent film 'Amazing Grace'. He was at the forefront of the movement to abolish slavery. This abolition 200 years ago was commemorated by a month long walk down the length of England which our R-DTS joined for 4 days. This walk, in yokes and chains not only remembered the abolition of slavery but drew attention to the fact that there are over 10 million slaves in the world today, many being used to harvest cocoa beans so we in the West can eat nice chocolate. Above is a picture of our team members on the walk and it also advertises an upcoming march. I encourage you to look up www.lifelineexpedition.co.uk and think about joining this march. St Patrick walked through life consistently defying the unjust norms of the society that was around him, let us walk in his steps today in the 21st century. Peace, Jonny