I mentioned yesterday that we went to Beamish Living Museum on our holiday. You can read about that here. One of the other things we did was to walk to the most northerly point in England.

As it goes, the most northerly point in England is not very exciting. You have to cross (briefly) into Scotland by car and then briefly walk back on yourself to get to the specific point. On one side of you is a not particularly interesting railway line, on the other side some incredibly impressive coastline. You have to walk right along the edge of the cliff to get there.

Of course, once you get to the exact point of the border, you discover you are there by way of a deeply unimpressive sign. A sign which says, etched into a wooden board, “cuddy trail, England border”. That is it. You stand on the edge of two countries marked by nothing more than a wooden sign. Once you stand by the wooden sign, you kind of think, that is it and make your way back to your car. It feels very much like one of those things you do simply to say that you have done it.

Incidentally, I have now been to the most northly, westerly and southerly points of England. I am yet to go to the most easterly point, but I have close to no desire to visit Lowestoft. Don’t write in, I’m sure it’s great. But I have never been on holiday to Suffolk, and I suspect I am unlikely to ever either. But stranger things have happened! But the most northerly point of England is perhaps more significant as I head into a new role with Medhurst Ministries seeking to support churches in the North of England. It feels as though this is the extent of my contractual obligations.

Anyway, my reason for writing this is that going to the most northerly point in England is one of those things you do just to say that you’ve done it. There really is no other reason to go. There is certainly nothing else there, nothing to do, little to see. It is barely marked by anything. Yet, it seems like something one should do when nearby. You wouldn’t bother making a special trip unless you enjoy being disappointed (which, being English, makes it likely we might make the special trip).

I think there are various things associated in the church a bit like this. I am convinced that a lot of what goes on in churches, a lot of what we insist we must do, we effectively do just because we feel we ought. By ought, much like visiting the most northerly point in England, it’s not that you must do it or else you will get in trouble or be failing morally. It’s just something you feel obliged to do. Something that Jesus doesn’t demand of us but we convince ourselves that we ought to be doing it nonetheless. Things that we may do simply so we can say that we are doing them.

We sometimes fail to think in terms of why we are doing this or that thing and instead carry on doing things simply because we feel we ought. Whether that is ought because of human expectation, others are doing it or because it has simply always been done. But we would be very well served if we started more regularly asking why are we doing this instead of simply doing because we feel we should.

Sometimes the answer to ‘why’ might prove to be something that isn’t altogether excellent. Other times we might discover a more compelling reason for doing what we have always done without thinking too hard about it. In either case, knowing we are doing the thing might help us work out whether we actually ought to be doing it at all.