Friday 1 January 2010

Priest hits the Sauce over shoplifting!

I see the poor Fr. Tim Jones has taken to the sauce over Christmas, or more accurately - the sauce has taken to him. Following on from his comments regarding shoplifting being the lesser of many evils open to people who might be disfranchised, poor and simply 'out of the system'  one of his parishioners, Martin Stott, having taken offence felt the need to make an entry to the debate. The result of this entry was that Fr. Tim was treated to a Bucketful of spaghetti and ravioli combined (Perhaps Martin was indicating that Fr. Tim should be a Pasta?).
     
Now although I'm sure the pasta products are nutritious, albeit a little stodgy, but being unheated seems to me to make this a pretty unpalatable dish. Mind you, poor old Martin was obviously heated and had a point to make which is why in a world where people die with appalling regularity for want of staple foodstuffs he chucked thirty tins of the stuff away! This makes the dish even more unpalatable as I see it, but Martin has a point to make and he has the right to do it so let's hear from the bloke himself.
     
"I was offended by what he (Fr. Tim) said and I just got this thing in my head where I thought I would make my own little protest," and what a very little protest it was Martin - Well done! I assume that he bought the stuff from ASDA rather than knocking it off (which would have had a certain poetic quality I guess!).
    
Well done Martin for taking Scripture and using it to highlight the shortcomings of Fr. Tim's, "Go shoplift," comments - which were even though taken out of context by many, still of course said. Perhaps, if he was considering Fr. Tim's words as 'falling into sin' or encouraging others to do the same he might have been thinking of one of my favourite 'live by this' passages, Galatians six.
     
"Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself."
     
No can't be that one, it doesn't mention pasta products anywhere and surely by hurling them Martin's lost out as he's fallen into temptation and sinned too! Mind you, he's attacked the introduction of sin into the congregation and by using pasta products has kept Paul's commands (1 Cor 5) because after all, "Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough?" There's no yeast present in pasta!
     
What saddens me with this whole episode is that the answer was simple. If there was offence caused then the need to confront this on a one-to-one basis is a Biblical requirement. I see nothing of Spaghetti, Ravioli or any other pasta product in the Word. But I do see this in Matthew 18:
     
“If another believer sins against you, go privately and point out the offence. If the other person listens and confesses it, you have won that person back. But if you are unsuccessful, take one or two others with you and go back again, so that everything you say may be confirmed by two or three witnesses.If the person still refuses to listen, take your case to the church. Then if he or she won’t accept the church’s decision, treat that person as a pagan or a corrupt tax collector."
     
Don't chuck Pasta at the Pastor - offer relationship and through that relationship, correction, that's the WWJD thing to do.
     
Wonder what was for desert - hopefully a nice Zabaglione!

1 comment:

Vic Van Den Bergh said...

Had a great email from Gavin, thought it needed adding here:

Perhaps Martin Stott was an “anti-pastor” ;-)

Excellent - Thank You :)