“All you need is love … da, da, da, da …”
Who said it? Yes, the Beatles, in the song of the same name first broadcast in July of 1967. Even so, Saint Paul said it nearly two millennia earlier:
“Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet’; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbour; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.” (Romans 13:8-10)
Paul may not have had Lennon and McCartney’s melody, but the message is the same: love is all you need.
These are threatening words for me, of course, as a priest for, if it’s really that simple – that all we need to do is love one another – then why would any of you need to pay a highly trained and credentialed cleric like me to unlock the secrets of the Scriptures for you. If love is all you need, you can work out the details for yourselves!
It does bother me when I see religious clerics who address us in a tone that suggests that they hold the keys to secret knowledge that we can only pray we will one day gain access to.
It makes sense for a Rabbi to be that way as the Torah is a complex legal tapestry. For a Sheikh, likewise. interpreting Qur’an and hadith requires a fair degree of scholarship. But if the early church really decided not to build itself on any labyrinth of laws but simply on one command – love one another – there’s not a lot left to keep professional interpreters like me going!
Of course, the real problem with the church is not that it has overcomplicated things but that it has consistently failed to make love its priority.
This hit home for me recently when I was told that if I wanted to renew my license as a functioning priest in the Diocese of Sydney, I had to start by completing a twenty-two-page questionnaire designed to weed out the unworthy. It asked about sex, pornography, alcohol — but nowhere did it ask whether I had tried to love God and neighbour through my years of ministry, and it did make me question whether I wanted to belong to an organisation so fixated on personal purity and so apparently uninterested in love.
Of course, this is not just a local problem but is the basis of the worldwide schism of the Anglican communion. We are, at this very moment, in the middle of a historic rupture of the global Anglican and Episcopal church, and, sadly, it’s not over Gaza or Ukraine or Iran. Indeed, it doesn’t have anything to do with the terrible suffering going on around the world at the moment. The issues at stake are:
- Same‑sex marriage
- LGBTQ+ clergy and
- Women as bishops
I’m not saying that each of these are not important conversations, but they are not the centre of the gospel either, and they are not worth sacrificing love for.
Sadly, it has always been this way. If the history of crusades and inquisitions have anything to teach us, it’s that the church has always chosen truth over love! We burn people at the stake, not because they are unloving but because they are wrong!
Over the last two thousand years, the church, at least at an institutional level, has consistently chosen truth over love, but what if love is the truth.
I’m not trying to be romantic or poetic here. On the contrary, I remember many years ago reading some of the work of German philosopher, Martin Heideggar, on ‘Truth as Aletheia (which is the Greek word for truth used in the New Testament).
Heidegger challenged what is commonly called the ‘correspondence theory of truth’ where we understand truth as a correspondence between what we say and what scientifically is. When what you mean corresponds with the facts, that’s truth – that’s how we generally define the word truth, but even in English ‘truth’ can mean other things, such as when we say, ‘be true to yourself’ or when we speak of a ‘true friend’.
Heidegger suggested that the ancient Greek word for truth was more focused on the process of uncovering rather than on any static correspondence between word and fact. In other words, maybe, biblically speaking, you don’t have truth if you don’t love and, conversely, if you live in love, you live the truth, just as Jesus was the truth!
I don’t mean to end on too philosophical a note. Let’s go back to the Beatles – “All you need is love, love, love …”
Whether or not the Beatles were inspired by Saint Paul, I’m not sure, but I am pretty sure that Paul was inspired by Jesus. After all, it was Jesus who taught us that all the law and the prophets came down to love (Matthew 20:40)!
It’s not that hard to figure out, is it, and you don’t really need me to unlock any of the hidden mysteries for you. That’s why I’ve got my backup career as a professional boxer – for when you realise that you don’t need me – and I can only hope that some of my fellow priests and bishops will consider similar career paths when their time comes as I think I’ve still got my best fights left in me and I’d love to take a shot at some of those … sorry, that’s not a very loving path to go down, is it?
“Owe no one anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.” (Romans 13:8) Amen!
Our Sunday Eucharist
We enjoyed another wonderful Eucharist together last Sunday. It was great to have Nathan Thomason join Scotty Minchin and me on the panel. I’ve clipped our discussion on Romans 12:9-21 which includes Paul’s timeless exhortation, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Romans 12:21) – a powerful prelude to the text we’ve focused on this week.
Our new friend, Nathan, had plenty of wisdom to share on the passage, and Scotty said he’d considered getting Romans 12:21 tattooed on his body! AI Saint Paul also chipped in with some timeless wisdom. You’ll find that clip towards the end of today’s post. I’ve also added the two most popular short videos directly below. Enjoy!
Our upcoming Eucharist is on the first Sunday of the month so we’re looking forward to having David Baldwin and Tom Toby back with us on the panel. Tom is definitely in Sydney this time and I’m very much looking forward to our time together. As ever, we’ll be going live at midday (Syndey time) and you can catch us on Rumble, Facebook, Twitter (X), LinkedIn, Instagram, Faithia and StreamYard.
Let me work your corner
If you’d like to see my work continue, please click here to make a one-off donation. If you can afford a monthly contribution, sign up at Patreon.com and choose either:
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What’s On?
- Sunday, September 6 – Our Eucharist from noon @thesundayeucharist.com, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Faithia, StreamYard and Rumble.
- Monday, September 7 – Boxing at Brofit Gym in Bankstown from 6.30 pm
- Tuesday, September 8 – Boxing at the Mundine Gym in Redfern from 7 pm.
- Thursday, September 10 – Bible Study @www.thesundayeucharist.com/bible from noon.
- Thursday, September 3 – Boxing at the Mundine Gym in Redfern from 7 pm
No Saturday training this coming week as Joy and I will be celebrating another wedding – this time the wedding of our friend, Joel Jammal, to his beloved Amanda.
I think Joel has been an inspiration to many of us through his role as National Director of Turning Point, Australia. I first met him after he organised the first protest march against the lockdowns back in July of 2021. We’ve maintained the friendship since, and I was particularly chuffed when he told me that he and Amanda met for the first time at the Fighting Fathers’ Fundraiser Ball of April 2023! Accordingly, I’m privileged to have been asked to say grace at the wedding banquet!
Our hopes and prayers are with Joel and Amanda for a union that generates joy, hope and peace for many years to come! 😊❤️
I mentioned last week that God has sent us a new man to help develop the ministry at Binacrombi – Daniel Hays. He only moved in last week but has already got a team of locals training out there in the remote bushlands during the week (see pic below)!
Moreover, our brother, Bryn, who resides in Taralga (the nearest town to Binacrombi) somehow simultaneously came up with the idea of offering boxing training to young people in his area that sorely need it and incorporating Binacrombi into the program!
God clearly has something in mind here. Say a prayer please for Bryn and for Daniel as we discover what comes next! 😊🥊
If you tuned into last Sunday’s broadcast (or if you watched the short video clips above) you’ll be well aware that our dear brother, Dr Hassoun, the former Grand Mufti of Syria, was given a life sentence last Tuesday
I gave thanks to God when I heard the verdict – not because he deserves more time in prison, of course, but because they had been seeking the death penalty and I was greatly relieved. Having said that, I’ve heard since that the prison conditions there are so terrible that the verdict is the equivalent of a death sentence. Having saved him from death-row, we now need to get him out of custody altogether!
Accordingly, I may head to Syria in the next few weeks. Dr Hassoun’s supporters in Damascus want me to be there and, if I do go, I’ll be trying to make as much noise as possible about his imprisonment and about the show-trial that put him there.
Of course, such a trip is risky for me, and it is possible that I will be imprisoned myself or will quietly disappear. If that happens, I expect my friends around the globe to make as much noise as possible to try and uncover the truth.
Say a prayer, please, for me, for this initiative, and for dear Dr Hassoun.
Finally, I hope you had a chance to try out the Healing Sounds for Evenings that I included with last week’s newsletter. If you did, I’d really love to get your feedback.
I’ve been finding these healing frequencies tremendously beneficial, but I won’t persist in pushing them around unless others are experiencing a similar benefit.
I appreciate that frequency healing is not a broadly accepted therapy and some may even associate it with a form of Eastern mysticism that they want to avoid. It occurs to me though that, according to our creation narratives, all of life begins with sound.
The God’s voice generates life! Is it any coincidence then that the book in the Bible with the most chapters in it (ie. the Psalms) is the one designed to help us generate our joyful noise back to the Creator?
With that in mind I offer you ‘Healing Sounds for Mornings’ – to be used at the beginning of each day to give you greater energy, clarity and emotional balance.
Please give it a try and let me know if you benefit from it. Next week I’ll give you a final video, guiding you in the breath-holding routine that completes my daily cycle.
Sometimes even I think it’s a bit odd that I get so excited about things like frequency healing and breath-holding. Even so, I know for myself that without these daily disciplines, I don’t have the energy or focus to do what I feel called to do. I share these things with you because they work powerfully for me. I hope they benefit you.
May the Lord bless and strengthen you for the work to which you have been called.
Your brother in the Good Fight
www.fatherdave.org
www.fatherdave.info
www.fightshop.biz
www.fatherdave.com.au
www.binacrombi.com.au
www.savethesheikh.com
www.prayersforsyria.com
www.fighting-fathers.com
www.boxersforpeace.com
www.softwareresales.com
www.warriorweekends.com
www.israelandpalestine.org
www.thesundayeucharist.com
www.oldschoolboxing.academy
www.christiansandmuslims.com
www.christianswithdepression.com
P.S. And a happy Father’s Day to all my fellow fathers out there, and to all who remember with thanksgiving their fathers and those who have been fathers to them.
P.P.S. I’m including below an interview I did last week with my old friend, Eva Bartlett – an amazing Canadian activist and journalist whom I first met in Damascus in 2014. Eva shares my great love for Syria’s former Mufti, Dr Hassoun. Like me, she’s been deplatformed from some social media, but you’ll find her on her Substack (click here)
About Father Dave Smith
Preacher, Pugilist, Activist, Father of four
