The Game of Tennis

On Sunday 10th July many people will be watching the men's tennis final from Wimbledon. Not so members of General Synod, who begin forty eight hours of facilitated conversations about our attitudes to same-sex relationships. One side believes that any such relationship is sinful, whilst the other side thinks that relationships are relationships and any relationship can lie on a spectrum from destructive and soul destroying to creative and a place of real blessing. The Anglican Communion is threatened by being broken by this debate. It has been likened to a game of tennis in which both sides are concentrating on serving ace after ace in the belief that their argument is a winner that cannot be returned. However, each player is on a different tennis court. Their arguments do not engage. There is no discussion. There is no game of tennis. The point of the shared conversations is not to assist either side to win, but to help them engage and at least begin to listen to each other.

I find the picture of tennis, played on separate courts, to be a useful one. It might also be used about the recent 'debate' about our place in Europe. Rather than debate, it seems that we have not engaged in discussion, but rather we have just shouted at one another. The shouting match has been fueled by anger at the way life is and our feelings of helplessness in the face of moving populations and lack of control in a world of increasing globalization. Many people wanted to stop the world and get off, enticed by the belief that we can get off and survive. To liken this exchange of ideas to a tennis match, in which there is no engagement, is to recognize the 'truth' on both side of the argument. Debate there should have been, which would have meant a coming together (on one court) to draw out and balance the different elements to find one picture in which the pros and cons could be seen. 

So I think the Brexit side does have an argument about the importance of democracy and the desire to have control over our own affairs. How we order our lives is tied up in our sense of self-identity. Being part of a constantly moving flow of people can bring riches, but it also risks a loss of what makes sense of life, in terms of culture and tradition. Feeling we are governed by faceless bureaucrats in Europe gives rise to a sense of helplessness in the face of a rapidly changing world. 'Take Back Control' became the central mantra of the Brexit campaign.  Yet, if we had taken part in discussion, and done so in a way in which we listened to each other, what was predictable before the vote was that to vote to Leave would take us into very troubled waters. The markets were bound to crash. Our credit rating was pound to slump, thus pushing up the cost of borrowing. Europe was bound to act to limit the damage we were going to do to it. A future trade deal was bound to be on worse terms than what we already have. We will be at the back of the queue for any deal with America. Immigration will rise as France takes the opportunity to ride themselves of the camps at such places as Calais and push the 'problem' and the people onto English soil. And suddenly Europe is a far less stable place than it was last week. Empires rise and empires fall and we are kidding ourselves if we think we can claim back any status as Great Britain. Indeed, a vote for Leave was bound to be a vote for the break up of the United Kingdom and maybe Europe too. It is a vote for us Englanders to be on our own. That is what we have chosen. All this was known before we cast our vote, but no one seemed to be listening to anything that was said. The argument of Brexit is that we willingly choose all of this, a loss of power, a smaller economy, a surrender of influence in the world, because  we think that is a price that is worth paying for the reclaiming of power over our own affairs. Let's hope that so high a price is worth paying for our own autonomy and that such autonomy does not just become isolation and decline. What is missing in all of this is the right leader to take us into the future. It will take an extraordinary man or woman (and supporting team) to pull our nation together again and begin to heal the wounds that we have inflicted, both upon ourselves and upon our European Community. It will take extraordinary transformation to move from being able to blame Brussels for everything to living with the reality that life will be what we make it. Perhaps the Church is called to stand with people in the midst of the ruins we have created, and to be a sign of hope that new life can be found, as we rebuild broken relationships and seek to create community together.