When the prime minister came to church…
With thanks to Rev’d Canon Lucy Davis for sharing this beautiful story on the importance and value of being an inclusive church community, where no-one is banished to behind the scenes, and all are welcomed.
Don’t underestimate the impact you can have, just being who you are called to be and keep naming your inclusive nature, it really matters and you never know who will hear it!
As clergy, we are used to slightly odd phone calls, but this one was probably unique. On a random Thursday afternoon, the call came through to see if St Andrew’s, Bedford wanted to host a visit from an unspecified ‘senior member of the government,’ although I wasn’t even allowed to tell anybody that, simply that we were welcoming a VIP. I mean, it wasn’t as though Churches had anything else to do 10 days before Easter! Cue calls to the Diocesan comms team and Archdeacon, and the agreement that it would be great to get a good news story out nationally about Church and faith at Easter.
I called our contact back (their email address ending ‘@no10.gov.uk’ was a bit of a give away) and amongst other things, asked ‘why us?’ The VIP was in the area, I was told, and wanted a piece about faith and community to release on Easter Day. They had searched Church websites, found that St Andrew’s is an Inclusive Church, and checked my personal social media. What they found there about diversity and inclusion chimed with the values of the VIP, so we were approached first.
So it was, a few days later, after security checks and site visits, and a fair amount of work on the part of the Church family, that Sir Keir Starmer was delivered by police escort to the back door of St Andrew’s. Ready to greet him was cake – of course – and also a cross section of our Church community. Young and old, black and white, neuro diverse and neuro typical, gay and straight; just us being us. The Prime Minister stayed for about 40 minutes, and genuinely seemed to enjoy engaging with us, posing of course for photos with the children. It was one of the children who thought to send him home to number 10 with a pot of soil and a sunflower seed to remind him of the seed of resurrection hope which is planted in each of us.
The reel of the visit was released on Easter Morning , and captured so much of the spirit of our Church community, not just in the images, but in the Prime Minister’s comments about the welcome we offer. Inclusion is not an add on or a political stance, it is who we are, following the Gospel imperative to welcome everybody, equally, into God’s embrace, from the man in recovery in supported living, to the Prime Minister.
As he left, the Prime Minister asked me to thank ‘all the people behind the scenes.’ Well, I told him, there weren’t any. Everybody behind the scenes had also been in the room, because that is what Church is.
Sir Keir Starmer being encouraged to plant a sunflower seed and take it back to No 10 as a reminder of resurrection hope.