Sermon - Tears that talk

Jurij Solovij, Untitled (Tears) - Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago

A sermon given at Choral Evensong at Holy Sepulchre London on Wednesday 9th November 2022, commemorating the life of Margery Kempe, mystic, referencing the readings set for the day (Isaiah 6, Matthew 5.21-37)

“Then they went to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre….and they were let in on the one day at Evensong time and remained until Evensong time on the next day….the friars lifted up a cross and led the pilgrims about from one place to another where our Lord had suffered his pains and his Passion…..And this creature wept and sobbed…as though she had seen the Lord with her bodily eyes suffering his Passion at that time….This was the first time she cried in any contemplation. This kind of crying lasted for many years, despite anything that anyone might do.”

 

A quotation from the fourteenth century Book of Margery Kempe, which was rediscovered and translated into modern English in the 1930’s.

 

Before you settle down for a vigil here after the service - which you are most welcome to do by the way - in the interests of full disclosure I should clarify that Margery’s post-Evensong vision occurred at another Church of the Holy Sepulchre - 3,000 miles away - in Jerusalem!

 

 

Her life commemorated by the Church of England on this day - 9th November, Margery Kempe is known as a mystic - but she was not a nun (she had fourteen children) nor, like her contemporary Julian of Norwich, was she a recluse or anchorite. 

 

To some, Margery is a pioneer of “urban spirituality.” She professed her faith in the streets of her home town - Kings Lynn - and spoke of her visions in towns and cities across the world.

 

This was a dangerous thing for a lay person - and especially a woman - to do at a time when the church had introduced restrictions on what lay people may hear, read or even discuss. On several occasions Margery was hauled before the church authorities accused of heresy; but she refused to be silenced. 

Despite her privileged upbringing, Margery is not thought to have been able to read or write, so the story of her life was set down by a priest or scribe. In the book she refers to herself in the third person - as a “creature”. However, her account is far from distant or impersonal. 

 

After her first vision of Christ, during a period of illness following childbirth, Margery refuses to give up her self-described “showy manner of dressing”! There were to be no hair shirts in her closet! Unless they were by the medieval equivalent of Alexander MacQueen. She sets up a number of businesses so she can afford to remain the best dressed woman in town. One such venture was a horse drawn mill. But she bought the most stubborn nags in Norfolk and became a laughing stock herself. The animals refused to move. 

 

I am sure that Margery would have been interested to hear Sally Beamish’s setting of the canticles we’ve just heard - which are inspired by Celtic quern songs - melodies sung while grinding corn! The glorious sound of our choir singing these would have surely got these horses back to the grind stone! 

 

Thanks to her petulant ponys, Margery’s business failed. She took this as a sign from God that she should relinquish her vanity and pride. She asked God for mercy - literally crying out to Him. Her tears - for which she became renowned - were at this time shed in remorse for her sins. 

 

After her father died, she used her inheritance to pay for trips to the great pilgrimage sites of Compostela, Rome and Jerusalem. 

 

Her constant weeping and talking about God infuriated the pilgrims with whom she was making the long trip to the Holy Land; who were already suspicious of a headstrong woman travelling alone. They cut holes in her clothes and made her eat at a separate table, making it look as though Margery were mad - perhaps to protect themselves against charges of harbouring a heretic.

 

One cold night a priest stole her bedclothes. She suffered a number of other nocturnal interruptions by men of the cloth. But, despite all the unkindness shown to her, shortly before arriving in Jerusalem, Margery - remarkably - asks her travelling companions for their forgiveness (!) - putting the radical message from today’s gospel reading into practice: 

 

“if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.”

 

It was during her visit to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre that Margery’s emotions intensify. She experienced a vision of the suffering Christ, causing her to fall on the ground and writhe about. 

 

She begins crying again. But from now on, she explains, her tears are different; no longer shed in remorse for her own sins but in consolation for the suffering of Christ. After this experience she begins to see Christ in all those around her who suffer - children and animals on the street, the sick and wounded, the oppressed and outcast. Her tears were transformational. A turning point in her faith.

 

In Margery’s time it was believed that spiritual tears were the result of the heart melting. In her book she talks about her body being filled by the flame of the fire of love - the heat of the Holy Ghost.  

 

But society rejected Margery and her tears. She was not a nun or an anchorite; so these could not be spiritual tears but the wailings of a madwoman. Even the priest who transcribed her story initially questioned her account. 

 

 

Today, we still don’t really know why we cry. Recent scientific studies have suggested that the chemical composition of tears seems to change depending on different circumstances. “Emotional” tears contain more protein, sticking to the face more easily than - say - when we cry while chopping onions. Perhaps these emotional tears are meant to be seen? An unspoken cry for help; showing the world that, we cannot go it alone; that there are times when we the need of the support of others. 

 

 

In our first reading we heard Isaiah’s glorious vision, which always calls to my mind John Stainer’s fantastic anthem “I saw the Lord”. But this powerful description of God’s presence shaking the doors of the temple; and the fantastic appearance of the seraphs who call Isaiah to be God’s messenger to his people, is only half of our text; the rest of which describes the message he is called to share with a world that has turned its back on God. 

 

A message which is enough to make anyone cry. And I wonder if that’s the point?

 

Isaiah is told that the people will be unable to see the glory of God which fills the whole world. Their minds will be dulled; their ears stopped, their eyes shut. Until it seems that all potential for communication has been cut off. Neither speech nor music heard; no signs or symbols seen. 

 

All communication that is, except perhaps tears. The tears of the people - their unspoken cries for help. Tears that would be seen by no-one but God.

 

Tears that might be a turning point in the lives of this rebellious people.
Tears that acknowledge that they are not self sufficient.
Tears that talk to God. 

 

Margery Kempe was once summoned to appear before the Archbishop of York, who asked “Why do you weep so, woman?” The illiterate mystic replied “Sir, you shall wish some day that you had wept as sorely as I."

 

You see, in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre after Evensong, Margery Kempe learnt that tears turned to God are transformational; drawing us closer together to each other, and to Him. 

 

May the same be so for each of us.

 

Amen. 

Image : Jurij Solovij, Untitled(Tears)