Thought for the Week, May 19 2023

Will you to your power cause law and justice, in mercy, to be executed in all your judgements?

 

The King replies: “I will.”

 

The heart of every wedding is the exchange of promises: “I, Màiri, take you, Iain, to be my husband… for better, for worse… till death us do part.”

 

It’s an impossibility to mortgage away one’s future without the slightest idea of what lies ahead.

 

That’s hope for you.

 

And on what possible foundation? Love – nothing else. And what guarantees do you get? Faith – only that.

 

On that slight foundation, the next 70 years may be built and, if they hold, what riches grow out of those few words.

 

On Saturday May 6, words of equal weight and importance were pronounced. Britain doesn’t have a constitution; we don’t have a set of written words stating what our government exists to do.

 

We do, however, have a promise spoken at the very heart of our national life: the words written at the top of this column. Authority in these lands exists for this purpose alone: to execute law and justice in mercy.

 

Lawlessness undermines civil life. Injustice kills. But without mercy, there is neither law nor justice.

 

Any deed of government which is without mercy – disregarding people with disabilities, treading down the poor, maltreating the stranger and the refugee – is a breach of our national life, a piece of lawlessness and injustice. The law of mercy is paramount.

 

As Shakespeare reminds us: mercy becomes the thronèd monarch better than his crown; mercy is an attribute to God himself; and earthly power doth then show likest God’s when mercy seasons justice.

 

Reverend Canon Simon Mackenzie, Lochgilphead Scottish Episcopal Church.