St George's Cathedral, Cape Town

Terror, Music and Faith: Still singing our song

A Sermon preached by the Reverend Bruce W. B. Jenneker in the Cathedral of St George the Martyr on the Fifteenth Sunday of the Year, 10 July 2005

The acrid smell of exploded bombs is in the air, mixed with the ash of cities burning and the dust of burnt out bodies. So it is for London today. So it was for New York in 2001. So it is every day for the people in Iraq, and in Darfur, and in Palestine and Israel, and in Northern Ireland, and in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

In the early nineties, when the Communist world was disastrously crumbling, central Europe was a volcano of violence and bombs and death. Slovenia, Yugoslavia, Serbia, Bosnia became a rope of firecrackers, exploding again and again, visiting death and disaster on people and cities. Hunger and fear, uncertainty and powerlessness held everyone in their grip. But in Sarajevo there was a baker who still had some flour, still baked bread and then distributed the fresh loaves to the starving, war-shattered people who gathered outside the door to his bakery. By four o'clock on the twenty-eighth of May 1992, a long line of hungry and desperate people stretched far into the street. Suddenly, on that fateful day, a bomb fell directly into the middle of the line, killing twenty-two people instantly, severely wounding many others, and splattering blood and gore over the whole area.

A hundred yards away lived a thirty-seven-year-old man, Vedran Smailovic was his name. Before the war he had been principal cellist of the Sarajevo Opera Company. When he saw the Bread-Queue Massacre occur outside his window he was pushed beyond his capacity to endure any more. His anguish was deep and his rage was tremendous. He could no longer stand by and allow humanity to be defined by these acts of horrific destruction. He could not allow the single-minded, cruel lust for power, that destroys and kills to have the last word about being human. Driven by his anguish and moved by his rage, he decided to write another definition of humanity into the horror that the bombs were etching into the scorched earth and chiseling into the charred flesh of men, women and children.

On the day after the massacre, and every day thereafter, at four o'clock precisely, Maestro Smailovic, dressed in his full formal concert attire, would walk out of his apartment into the midst of the battle raging around him. He would place a small camp-stool in the middle of the bomb-craters, and play a concert to the abandoned streets, while bombs and bullets flew all around him. Day after day he made his unambiguously courageous stand for human dignity, for civilization, for compassion, and for peace.

This is what humanity truly is, the witness of his music cried out for the listening skies to hear. Humanity is hope in the midst of despair, not a destructive lust for power. Humanity is the sublime poetry of a melody redolent with love and pulsing with passion, not a callous, careless obliteration of a civilization to serve an ideology. Humanity is believing that being human is a wonderful, splendid thing – and then spending oneself courageously and heroically to prove the point.

Year after year the bombs fell – in 1992 and 1993 and 1994 and 1995. The bombs fell in Sarajevo, in Palestine and in Israel, in Ireland, and in Rwanda, and in Liberia, and in Libya, and in Colombia, and in Chechnya, and in the Persian Gulf. Year after year the bombs fell. In 2001, on a clear day in September, jet planes were turned into missiles of destruction and flown into the World Trade Center in New York City. Then the bombs fell in Afghanistan, and in Iraq. They fall in Iraq still, and in the Sudan, and in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And now the bombs have fallen in London.

It matters little that every day more people are wounded and killed in Iraq and in Darfur than were wounded and killed in London. It matters little that in the midst of this disaster Londoners could depend on readily available, efficient and effective emergency services and that in Darfur the wounded are left where they fall. It matters little that the tourists visiting London could be rushed to some of the best hospitals in the world and that in the Democratic Republic of the Congo the wounded sicken and die for lack of even the most rudimentary medical care. Ours is a sick, sick world in which life is cheap, death is commonplace, and violence the order of the day.

Are the sounds of the falling bombs so deafening that they block out the 'word of the kingdom?' Are the bodies piled so high, and the devastation so vast, that the 'word of the kingdom' can no longer reach us? "Let anyone who has ears to hear listen," Jesus challenges the multitude as he tells them the parable of the sower and the seed. The seed of which he speaks is the 'word of the kingdom'. Have we forgotten what that 'word' means?

Let anyone who has ears to hear, listen. The word of the kingdom is forgiveness – for the kingdom Christ inaugurates is founded on forgiveness. The word of the kingdom is new life – for Christ's kingdom begins with forgiveness and then offers the forgiven a second chance. The word of the kingdom is grace – for in Christ's kingdom the divine power is placed at our disposal, to turn our darkness into marvellous light. The word of the kingdom is faith – for in the kingdom Christ builds among us we believe the best of one another, give one another the benefit of the doubt, trust one another. The word of the kingdom is hope – for in the kingdom Christ builds among us we can dream a future more wonderful than we can imagine and live our way into it. The word of the kingdom is love – for in the kingdom Christ builds among us we keep no score of wrongs, we bear all things, and our patience never ends. The word of the kingdom is peace – that passes human understanding and keeps all people in the justice and freedom of God, all included, all respected, everyone accorded a place and no one left behind. Let anyone who has ears to hear, listen.

Jesus told his followers the story of the sower and the seed because he knew that they would find it supremely difficult to hold onto the word of the kingdom. He knew that it would be a Herculean struggle for them to let the word of the kingdom germinate within them like a seed, and then to grow and flourish, to blossom and bear fruit. The meaning and power of his parable is not confined to the lake-shore in Palestine two thousand years ago. The parable of the sower and the seed speaks powerfully to us and to our world.

How alive is the word of the kingdom in us today? Is the seed of forgiveness, of new life and of grace flourishing within me? Is the seed of faith, and hope, and love bearing fruit within you? Or do you abandon the word of the kingdom when you are confronted by the cynicism and negativity of our time and culture? Do the depressed and pessimistic nay-sayers pluck faith and hope and love from you, leaving you paralyzed and without direction? Can the word of the kingdom be easily snatched away from you? Is the seed of forgiveness developing and blossoming within you? Or is it a shallow thing that only begins to flower before it withers and dies when troubles and difficult times arrive? Does suffering unhinge your faith? Does failure unseat your hope? Does distress defeat your loving? Is the word of the kingdom a shallow thing with you, easily withered by trouble and shriveled by stress? How alive is the seed of peace within you, is it growing to come to bud and flower in you in the works of justice and equality, freedom and joy? Or does your care for peace evaporate when you are overwhelmed by the enormity of the task, and economic justice seems to demand too much sacrifice, and gender equality entails too much risk? Is the word of the kingdom choked by the luxuries that beckon you and suffocated by the pleasures that seduce you?

Vedran Smailovic braved the bombs and bullets every day at four o'clock when with unimaginable courage he stepped into the besieged streets of Sarajevo and bravely played his cello for the sanctity of human life, the splendour of humanity, the resilience of community, the irresistible belief in a better, more wonderful world. In our world at risk, we need, each of us, to find our particular cello, take our particular camp-stool, and with unimaginable courage step into the fray, there to play, for all to hear, the music of the kingdom. May the God who calls us to do this, put a song in our hearts, and give us the grace to play it out loud and long, for all the world to hear – from Cape Town to Sarajevo, from London to Darfur, from Washington to Baghdad.

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