The tentacles of wealth and domination
On the 9th November 2025 at 00:33 I wrote these words in response to David Olusoga’s first episode of his series on BBC television – Empire – where he tells the story of the British Empire, from its origins under Elizabeth I to the establishment of colonies in America, the Caribbean and India.*
The tentacles of wealth and domination
exploit the poor and elevate the rich,
the seats of power are turning in an instant
are sliding, twisting, now about to switch.
We mirror history in each word and action,
again we turn our values upside down.
If this is love we're cynical and empty,
the face of God is creased into a frown.
God's people what has happened to the gospel,
the grace that we accepted, now refused,
the love in which God holds us lies polluted,
the neighbours with Christ's face we have abused.
When will we turn again toward the beauty,
accept the loving kindness of God's care,
before us lies the world and all its riches,
sufficient for our needs if we would share.
© Andrew Pratt 9/11/2025
*https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002hytj
Christians may compare what Olusoga has depicted with the
Magnificat -
Luke 1: 51-53
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
Tag: Empire
An extraordinary new hymn for the Passion/Easter season by Graham Adams – The people wanted soldiers
This hymn, by Graham Adams, arose from an ‘Empire’ module at Luther King House in Manchester last week. Graham says, “feel free to use as you wish!’ It connects with the Passion/Easter season. It was particularly stimulated by a discussion around whether ‘the alternative realm’ (God’s basileia/kingdom/empire) is ‘a quaint dream’ or something more ‘threatening’ – and the destabilising language of poetry spoke to this”.
The people wanted soldiers so hope might come as curse, to smash the occupation – but change turned up as Verse: the poetry of yeasting, the parabolic sword, no match for Pax Romana* and yet this Lamb still roared. Although it claims possession of mind and heart and soul, the Empire’s grip has limits – it can’t control the whole: the surplus lives as Poem for those with ears to hear, resisting final closure, declaring what is near: This dream of re-creation, this threat of life set free, disturbing tame religion, confounding how we see: it won’t succumb to cliché where purities abound, but glimpsed in seeds’ potential, it ruptures solid ground. Where empires grow by violence, where systems blame the last and close down other futures by editing the past, the Poem can’t be silenced, though quietly it dies, and dances through the fissures to teach us how to rise! Graham Adams (2021) … prompted by the conversations during the Empire module Potential tunes: THORNBURY, CRUGER… *Pax Romana is ‘the peace of Rome’ secured through military violence; if it’s easier to replace this with ‘crucifixion’, the meaning still works.
hymnsandbooks 