ALL SAINTS MARGARET STREET

Sermon preached by Fr. Gerald Beauchamp at Solemn Evensong and Benediction on Palm Sunday, 24th March 2010

Readings: Zechariah 9. 9-12; I Corinthians 2. 1-12

The sixth sermon in the series Passionate about Novels What would make anyone steal a book? This is the question posed by Markus Zusack's novel The Book Thief (Black Swan London 2007). The book thief is a young girl: Liesel, Liesel Meminger. We're in Germany before and during the Second World War. Liesel's story begins when she and her brother are sent to a foster home by their mother. The mother is a communist and she's been carted off to a concentration camp. On the way to the foster home, Liesel's brother dies tragically. When he's buried Liesel steals a book which she finds on the ground.

The book that Liesel steals is called The Gravedigger's Handbook. Liesel can't read. No matter: she's fascinated by the possibility of reading. Liesel finally arrives at the home of foster parents, Hans and Rosa Hubermann. They live in a street called Hummel Street in a small town near Munich. The Hubermanns treat her well, although Rosa sometimes gives Liesel a hard time. Hans teaches Liesel to read. Rosa works as a cleaner in the house of the mayor and the mayor's wife allows Liesel to borrow books from her husband's library.

One day Max, a Jew in his early twenties appears at the door of the Hubermann's house. He asks them to hide him. Max and Liesel develop a close bond. He sketches for her and makes her homemade books. At the end of the novel the war intensifies. Hummel Street is bombed. Liesel is the only survivor and we discover that what we've been reading are the memoirs of the elderly Liesel who has ended up in Sydney, Australia where after the war she began a new life.

Books set during the Second World War especially those that deal with the holocaust are often a difficult read. The likes of Primo Levi and Elie Wiesel trawl through the depths of human depravity. But that's not Markus Zusack's style. He's not trying to shock. He's not graphic. Instead he's trying to portray some simple and sometimes overlooked truths.

One is about ordinary people. Liesel and the Hubermanns are working class. Hummel Street is a humdrum place where people live in small apartments full of noise and smells. But this is 'heaven'. 'Hummel' is the German word for 'heaven'. Hummel Street is home. Its inhabitants aren't going to change the world. They don't start wars and they don't stop them. But they are caught up in them. They contribute. Collectively they set the tone. So folks like the Hubermanns are key to the wider picture.

The Hubermanns aren't perfect. There isn't much money. They squabble. There're jealousies. But above all there is love: a love that includes others; a love that takes others in. The Hubermanns take in Liesel although to do so, given that her mother is a communist puts them under suspicion. They place themselves in danger by hiding Max. Hummel Street is searched on one occasion by the SS but Max isn't found. We know what would have happened if he was.

What would we have done? Imagine: our government today decides that our society is being damaged by the presence of Chinese Buddhists. Imagine that as I speak we hear vehicles screeching to a halt just along the road outside the Buddhist temple. Doors slam. There's commotion: screaming and shouting. Do we sit still, pulling the wool evermore firmly over our eyes? Imagine: I'm in my flat later. There's a ring at my door. I open it to find a young Buddhist nun. She pleads that I hide her? What do I do? We all know what we'd like to think we'd do. We can all be the heroes of our own fantasies. But ordinary real goodness is rare as the millions who perish in human conflict and upheaval testify.

So what makes Liesel and the Hubermanns special? What marks them out? It's their desire for education. They may be ordinary but they reach out to what is beyond them. They read and they teach Liesel to read. She learns to read from a most unusual primer: The Gravedigger's Handbook. Her reading is not just about the mastery of language and the subject of a curriculum but about the practical exploration of one of the great facts of life: that we are all mortal. From birth, death is the only certainty.

Here, for me the novel played a bit of a blinder. I tend to read quickly. When I read The Book Thief for the first time I was uncertain until near the end who was the narrator. The narrator isn't one of the characters nor is it the author detached from the action. The narrator is the one who stands in all our shadows. The narrator is Death himself. But Markus Zusak's Death is not the Grim Reaper. He is an empathetic spirit. Death has a heart we're told (p 252). At one point Death complains.

They say that war is death's best friend, but I must offer you a different point of view on that one. To me, war is like the new boss who expects the impossible. He stands over your shoulder repeating one thing, incessantly. 'Get it done, get it done'. So you work harder. You get the job done. The boss, however, does not thank you. He asks for more. (p 319)

Reading ensures that Liesel is not going to be a bystander in life but a participant. Connections are always made. Responsibilities aren't shirked. Relationships are developed, worked at, valued. There is commitment and sometimes the price is paid. The Hubermanns are stoics and survivors. Reading leads to writing and writing ensures that human stories are not lost. Nothing is wasted.

This is a book about death and what is greater than death. The transcendent is apparent when things are recorded; when people of conscience (those with ideals, with faith, with altruism) ensure that the evils of history are not repeated. Ancient wrongs are healed and a better is society striven for. We get a handle on the life that both predates and transcends death when things are written down. Heaven isn't just a home. It's a library. When Liesel first visits the mayor's library we're told.

'Jesus, Mary ...'

She said it out loud, the words distributed into a room that was full of cold air and books. Books everywhere! Each wall was armed with overcrowded yet immaculate shelving. It was barely possible to see paintwork. There were all different styles and sizes of lettering on the spines of the black, the red, the grey, the every-colored books. It was one of the most beautiful things Liesel Meminger had ever seen.

With wonder, she smiled.
That such a room existed!" (p 141)

Perhaps one of the things that we don't make enough of in churches like ours is to say that we do read books especially the Book (the bible). Here passages from the scriptures are read publicly out a loud several times a day. Sermons are bible-based. The liturgy is rooted in the church's text. We say it. We pray it. We sing it. We read it. We listen to it. We ask questions about it. We interpret it. We discuss it. We apply it. And we do all this because our identity is shaped by this ancient text. But our identities are not imprisoned by it.

Yes, we do sometimes 'disobey' the bible. We don't obey the dietary laws of the Old Testament. Here women are welcome to have their heads uncovered and their voices heard despite St Paul's prohibitions (I Cor 11. 13; 14. 34). We 'disobey' because we've allowed the bible to feed us not choke us. The bible is a springboard not a prison door. It is the great themes summed up in the coming week by which we stand not the minutiae of one or two verses.

The bible and The Book Thief stand shoulder to shoulder in asserting that it's the big picture and the ordinary people that matter. When the vision shrinks then more and more people are shut out of the frame. When the likes and the stories of Liesel and the Hubermanns and all the people they include in their lives are discounted, then life is impoverished. But the days ahead, this Holy Week places the biggest picture of all before us and invites us whoever we are to be transformed by the drama and to become passionate in the service of redemption.

We here are a People of the Book. We don't steal the Book and we don't steal from it. We do not thieve. We receive. If we do 'steal' then let it be known that we are simply stealing away to Jesus.