We Need Thanksgiving - but not Black Friday

A Song for Friday. "If you go down to the shops today, you're in for a nasty surprise." Or maybe not, if you knew that it's Black Friday, that annual orgy of shopping and spending that is enough to put some of us off shops for life.

The Guardian has an editorial today that makes interesting reading. It reminds us that the Black Friday custom originated in America (where else?) as a way of filling the space between Thanksgiving on the day before, and the coming weekend. You have a great celebration on the fourth Thursday of November. Families gather not only from across the States but from all over the world to be together on this the most important day in the calendar. It's a wonderful way to enter into and keep alive the founding myth of America, express solidarity with generations past and generations to come, and all under the rubric of giving thanks. There is something deeply eucharistic about that, allowing memory to foster gratitude for blessings past, present and future.

So you are gathered by the fireside in your home with those you love best in the world. Like the eighth square in Through the Looking Glass, it's all feasting and fun. And no doubt every American family, aware of how abundant are the gifts they celebrate, will also be sparing a thought and a prayer for the many who are less fortunate, left outside the warm glow of privileged good fortune. It's a time for generosity, large-heartedness, good will. Americans are among the most kind and generous people I've ever met.

But then Black Friday dawns. Everybody, it seems, gets up while it's still dark and heads for the shopping malls. You’re among them, thinking to yourself, “Christmas shopping”. There are bargains galore to tempt you, big budget items offering eye-watering reductions. You find that some people have waited all night to be at the front of the line at store-opening time. In the headlong rush for the best bargains, people get hurt. Sometimes there are fisticuffs. Extra security is brought in. (We Brits know all this if we’ve ever been rash enough to pay an early morning visit to the Boxing Day sales.) It's as if the normal conventions of polite behaviour (such as queuing and holding the door open for others) break down. The crowd acts out unusual (to them) behaviours that in other contexts we would call feral. If you ever wonder what would happen to humanity if civilisation were stripped away, just watch TV news following an eventful Black Friday.

I'd be glad to be told that this is a wicked caricature perpetrated by liberal elites who read broadsheet newspapers and would never be seen dead in a shopping mall on Black Friday. But even if it is, there's a deeper aspect to it that needs airing.

It's what question Black Friday is meant to be the answer to. The answer is that it's a direct response to Thanksgiving. It stands with it, depends on it like a parasite for its very existence. And yet, hard on the heels of the exquisite evening before that so affirms the American founding fathers’ and mothers’ spirit of gratitude, public faith, social and family values, the importance of remembering together, how can Black Friday not be bathos of a particularly glaring kind? On this of all long weekends, who wouldn't want to share memories and laughter in long happy conversations, play sports or games together, enjoy the fresh bracing air, read, make music, indulge your hobbies. Who wouldn't want to continue the spirit of Thanksgiving into the next few days, maybe linking it to visiting someone who is sick, or volunteering for at the local foodbank or sharing your foyer with a guest who would otherwise be alone?

It's hard to see how a shopping spree doesn't trivialise much of what Thanksgiving stands for. The dead hand of monetising everything always has that effect (“knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing”). It's as if Americans can't think of anything more creative to follow Thanksgiving than the emblematic cliche of going shopping. But in the UK it's rather worse. We have lifted Black Friday straight out of American culture and reinstalled it in our own country in both its physical and digital forms (except that there's nothing virtual about parting with money: it comes down to the same thing in the end). It has taken off in a big way. But what we didn't import along with it was the day before. Here there is no Thanksgiving to give it even the vestige of a larger meaning. So Black Friday stands alone, revealed in all its overt, rampant consumerism. It is a shameless day of homage to what we have largely become: a nation of shopkeepers and shoppers whose aspirations are to buy and sell, make profits and grab bargains. The infamous Greggs' sausage roll is placed in the manger where the Christ Child should be, and made an idol of for the Magi and all of us to adore.

I exaggerate of course. But The Guardian is right to argue that shorn of Thanksgiving, there is no case for this indulgence of Black Friday. Somehow the very name, a conscious shadowy echo of Good Friday, tells us that it can't be good for us. Among the seven deadly sins are named greed, lust, gluttony and wrath, all of which could describe aspects of the Black Friday Experience. A theologian might argue that the root of all these behaviours is perhaps the original sin of all, envy. (I gave a lecture on this a few years ago in which I made a case for its being the primal sin at the very core of Adam's rebellion against God in the mythical Garden of Eden.)

I don't want to be unduly portentous about this. I'm not one of those preachers whose Christmas sermons are tiresome diatribes against consumerism and commercialism. Let's be positive as Advent begins, and hopes and longings are reawakened. As Christian faith has always understood, it's thankfulness that is the foundation of a healthy, hope-filled way of life. There are more than enough shopping days to Christmas that allow us to go in search of good gifts for family and friends, not in the mad feeding frenzy of Black Friday, but in a virtuous, ethical, thoughtful, happy and above all thankful way. That will add quality and integrity to the precious act of giving to the people we love.

So don't let's encourage the worst instincts of a retail industry greedy for profits. Forget Black Friday. Make it a personal Thanksgiving Day instead. Because that's something we should certainly learn from our American friends. (And to any of them who are reading this, Happy Thanksgiving Day to you all!)

Which Side Is God On? Praying for the Referendum

I suppose it was inevitable that the Daily Mail wouldn't like it. "First the pro-EU campaign drafts in President Obama... Now GOD wants you to vote against Brexit in the referendum." (Shouting capitals are original.) Whoever the subeditor was who wrote that headline, he or she should be disciplined for it.

It concerns the Church of England's new prayer for the referendum, issued yesterday. Before I say any more, here is the text.

God of truth, give us grace to debate the issues in this referendum with honesty and openness. Give generosity to those who seek to form opinion and discernment to those who vote, that our nation may prosper and that with all the peoples of Europe we may work for peace and the common good; for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord.

I think you will agree that it is scrupulously careful to avoid taking sides. It isn't claiming, as prayers sometimes do especially in times of conflict, that God would really rather prefer one outcome more than the other. It isn't even hinting at that. What it asks for is a debate based on integrity and the willingness to think honestly, openly and carefully. It looks for a generous attitude in this process. This presumably means being generous towards people who differ from us, not impugning their integrity or their intelligence. But in a larger sense, "generosity" also means having in our minds the welfare of everyone involved in this decision, "all the peoples of Europe" as well as our own nation, summed up by the words "peace and the common good".

What's going on when we pray in this kind of way? I think the key word is "discernment". It's a word with a long history in the Jewish and Christian vocabulary. Discernment is what is needed when prophets give you different advice, says the Hebrew Bible. In the Book of Jeremiah there's a classic case of this when the Jewish people are taken into exile in Babylon. Most of the prophets are confident that it will all end very soon because God will never allow his temple to be destroyed - a bit like those who predicted in 1914 that the Great War would be over by Christmas. But Jeremiah, in a famous run-in with one of his opponents (chapter 28), foretells that the Babylonians are here to stay. Exile will be long and difficult. The Jewish community had better adjust and learn what this new situation will call for. How could you know who was right?

Discernment, then, is about testing the evidence, examining the logic, weighing things up, coming to a judgment not on the basis of dogmatic formulae but rather the wisdom borne of the experience of how God is at work in human life. It was a gift much prized by the desert monks early in the Christian era as they developed the arts of spiritual guidance. You will never be a wise soul-friend to other people, they said, without the capacity for deep insight into the complexities of human existence. But it's also a matter not only of what is being tested but who. In other words, who are the mentors we have come to trust? What's their history of being credible and wise? What is their case based on? What kind of company do they keep? In all these ways, the community of faith in both Old and New Testaments tries to distinguish between the conflicting voices that are all claiming to know the truth.

So I'm puzzled that a Tory MP, Peter Bone, sees this prayer as a sign of some sinister hidden agenda. He is quoted as saying it is "outrageous" to suggest that the Almighty would disapprove of Leave supporters. "It is extraordinary that they are doing a prayer. Project Fear has really stepped it up now.... As a churchgoer I am not going to be praying about this." Not going to be praying? As if God isn't interested in our nation's future or the peoples of Europe and the welfare of all human beings? On the contrary. "To prayers! To prayers!" cry the mariners at the opening of The Tempest. As indeed they should, and we should.

In the spirit of the prayer let's be "generous" and say simply that neither Mr Bone nor the Daily Mail seem to have had a good day. As pretty well all people of faith agree, it's not a question of whether it's right or wrong to pray about the big political issues of the day. It's more a question of how. The Church of England has been wise not to use the text of a prayer to lead its members into forming an opinion in a particular way and, in effect, instruct them how to vote. Liturgy should be inclusive, not divisive. We should be able to pray together for the discernment we all need, not only on 23 June but now as the debate is hotting up.

But let me offer an important aside. This is not to say that the Church shouldn't take a view about this or any other matter of public concern. Bishop David Hamid, a suffragan bishop in Europe, is quoted in today's Guardian: "The C of E is a national church and has to serve all people of the nation regardless of their political orientation. The church has to be seen as neutral." The premise is right but not, I think, the conclusion. It's perfectly possible to state a position without binding members to follow it either in the way they vote or the way they pray. The Church of Scotland has done precisely that in affirming that it believes the UK should remain in the EU, a position it has held for many years. Cardinal Vincent Nicholls, the Primus of Scotland, the Archbishop of Wales and other Christian leaders have all publicly spoken in support. But I doubt that any of them are praying that God will triumphantly vindicate Remainers, or confound the politics and frustrate the knavish tricks of those wicked Brexiters (an allusion to a little-sung second verse of the National Anthem in case you wondered).

The Church of England is well-practised at this. It has taken an unambiguous view about the ordination of women but has been at pains for decades not to exclude those who differ. However, in the prayers issued before the relevant votes in General Synod, you will not find that sides were taken. You will find the same language of wisdom and discernment which is the proper register for prayer. So be reassured. We can safely pray together in the run-up to the referendum. Whatever our beliefs about the EU, we can all ask for the same thing with a sincere heart and true faith: that we may be wise and generous in our discernment and hold in our hearts the common good of all our peoples in this nation, Europe and the entire world.

God has given us human beings the capacity to think and make judgments. He has put a conscience within us. We have the tools to nurture intelligence and act out of wisdom. So it's a badly formed question to ask as one Twitter post did today, "Whose side is God on?" It's our call as a nation. We are asked to make a decision in June that will shape the history of our nation and continent for generations to come. It's an awesome responsibility. God will not cast a vote. He trusts us to act out of generosity, for sake of the common good as the prayer asks. That's why we need to pray for discernment within our larger prayer that God's kingdom may come and his will "be done on earth as in heaven".