“’I am no longer my own but yours.’
These are the first few words from the Methodist Covenant Prayer which Methodists say every year. Sometimes the Covenant Service happens in September, which is the beginning of the Methodist year, following the annual summer Conference.
Mostly, the service takes place in the first few weeks of January, coinciding, therefore, with the general context of New Year’s resolutions and other self-evaluating behaviour. It fits with a general mood of personal stock-taking and preparation for the New Year – a kind of spring-cleaning for the heart, mind, and soul.
Society has promoted individual identity, increasingly, during my 50+ years on this planet, so much so, that dependence on another seems frowned upon, or even weak.
Pictured: In a New Year message for Express, Reverend Howard Stringer, inset next to St Paul’s Methodist Church, invites Methodists and others to reflect on being “part of a wider human family” alongside the values of individual identity which have perhaps seemed more prevalent in recent decades.
If the past couple of years of world-wide pandemic has taught me anything, it is that we do not live in splendid isolation. It is not only my rights or freedoms that count – we are bound to one another as part of a wider human family; be that in this Bailiwick or as part of a ‘global village’.
Of course, the line from the prayer that I have quoted is directed towards God and it does not imply that we are owned by any other human being – that would be grotesque. What Methodists (and others who have adopted the prayer) are doing is recognising that we owe our existence to that force for Good in the universe, known to many of us as God: Loving Heavenly Father, Son and Spirit.
It helps us to realise that we are not biological accidents occurring at random in a world which is ultimately chaotic. Christians would say that we are unique creatures made in the very image of God and, therefore, bound to display God’s characteristics of love, commitment, inter-dependence, and loyalty.
We will face more challenges this year, from covid and other things, individually and as a Bailiwick. I believe we will do so more successfully if we do it thinking about the needs of others as being at least as important as our own.
It was the poet John Donne who wrote: No man is an island. It is as true now as it was hundreds of years ago – we fare better when we do not seek to go it alone.”
Best wishes for 2022
Howard J Stringer
Methodist Superintendent, Bailiwick of Guernsey Circuit
