The Bishop's Letter: October

This month Bishop Steven writes:

My mind has been turning back to the need to teach our society the Ten Commandments.

I wonder how many people could name even five out of ten? Take a moment to grab a pen and see how many you get right.  You can check your answers in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5.

The Ten Commandments are not the whole of the Christian gospel by any means. But they are a good starting point for learning God’s standards for what is right and what is wrong. Each one is a life-giving rule for individuals and for a healthy society.

Think for a moment about the last of the commandments:  “You shall not covet your neighbour’s house; you shall not covet your neighbours wife, or male or female slave, or ox or donkey or anything that belongs to your neighbour.”

The tenth commandment aims to build contentment and appreciation of what we do have. There is to be no peering over the garden fence and longing for what belongs to someone else. That contentment is a great treasure.

But in Britain we have built our society on discontent and on coveting what we do not have. Much of our economy is driven by the engine of the advertising industry. Millions of pounds a year are invested in making us covet and stoking the fire of discontent in our hearts.

When that happens, greed becomes king and life gets completely out of proportion. So many of the ills of our society can be traced back to this root of greed. Our personal and national finances are overextended because we covet what we do not have. Some of the riot and disorder we saw over the summer was driven simply by greed: wanting what we do not possess.

The Church needs to proclaim a better way. As we celebrate Harvest this October, we remember and help others to remember that this life is God’s good gift. We give thanks and help others to give thanks for all the good things we have been given. We proclaim the need for fairness and equality in our society. Appreciation and justice are the antidote to the virus of greed. We need to learn and to teach what it means to have enough; to be content; to live a just life.

To covet the lives and possessions of others is wrong and against God’s law. We need to say so.

Bishop Steven