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Please note:
This script cannot exactly reflect the transmission. It may include editorial notes prepared by the producer, and minor spelling and other errors.
It may contain gaps to be filled in at the time so that prayers may reflect the needs of the world, and changes may also be made at the last minute for timing reasons, or to reflect current events.

Speakers (in order of speaking):
HM – Canon Dr Hilary Marlow
TB –Rev’d Dr Tim Boniface
SS – Prof Susan Smith
CJ – Catriona James
TA – Toba Adepoju

HM: Welcome to Girton College, on the outskirts of Cambridge. Founded in 1869 as the first Higher Education institution for women in the UK, the College continues to pioneer excellence and inclusion and is home to over 800 students, together with 120 academic Fellows and over 130 administrative and operational staff. Our splendid Victorian red-brick College houses a rich sense of community, determination and passion - fuelled always by the historical perseverance of our founders, Emily Davies and Barbara Bodichon, women who, time and time again, faced prejudice in their pursuit of equal educational opportunity. We’re delighted to welcome you to our Chapel for this morning’s service. I am Canon Dr Hilary Marlow, Vice-Mistress of the College and Director of Studies in Theology. Alongside our College Chaplain, Rev’d Dr Tim Boniface, I will be leading our worship for the second Sunday in Advent. We are joined by our College Choir directed by Gareth Wilson, and a wonderful selection of the musicians who contribute to the diverse  musical life of our College.   ‘Come Thou Long Expected Jesus’,

Hymn: Come Thou Long Expected Jesus. (Cross of Jesus) Choir, congregation, organ

For centuries, Advent has been a time when Christians explore the idea of the  light of God coming into the world, and today’s music and readings draw on that theme in various ways, particularly through the image of what Luke’s Gospel calls ‘the dawn from on high’.

As well as a season of expectation, Advent is a time of penitence. Trusting God’s promise of forgiveness, we are called to acknowledge the ways in which we fail to make room for the flourishing of others and ourselves, and fail to live in the light of the God whose coming among us we are preparing to celebrate at Christmas time. 

TB: A voice cries out in the wilderness
‘Make straight the way of the Lord’.
So let us listen, and turn to the Lord in penitence and faith
Christ came in humility to share our lives: forgive our pride.
Lord have mercy
(all) Lord have mercy
Christ came with good news for all people.
Forgive our silence and our divisions.
Christ, have mercy
(all) Christ have mercy
Christ came to a world of suffering
Forgive our self-centredness.
Lord have mercy
(all) Lord have mercy
May almighty God have mercy upon you, forgive you your sins, and bring you to everlasting life, through Jesus Christ our Lord, 
(All) Amen.

Anthem: Whence is that Goodly Fragrance Flowing. Choir 

HM: We now hear our first reading from the book of Isaiah - a book that comes to life in so many ways in Advent. Here, the promise of sight to those living in gloom and darkness is paired with a vision of justice and judgement of oppression. It is read by The Mistress of Girton College, Professor Susan Smith.

SS: The first reading is from the book of Isaiah, Chapter 29, beginning at verse 15:

HM: Our second anthem, Let Justice and Judgement by G. F. Handel, draws on Psalm 89 for that same longing for justice. It is performed by the College Choir, accompanied by strings and brass played by music students and Fellows.

Anthem: Let Justice and Judgement, G. F. Handel. Choir, harpsichord, strings, brass 

HM: Our next reading, from the Gospel of Luke, is a powerful prophecy spoken by Zechariah, who will become the father of John the Baptist. Traditionally known as the Benedictus,  It is read by Catriona James, choir member and 3rd year law student.

CJ: The second reading is from the Gospel of Luke, chapter 1, beginning at verse 67

HM: Longing for that dawn that lights our darkness and guides us to peace, we sing our second hymn, after which the College Chaplain, the Rev’d Dr Tim Boniface will give the address.

Hymn: O Come, O Come, Emmanuel. (Veni Emmanuel) Choir, congregation, saxophone

TB: ‘In the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high shall break upon us.’ 

How powerful the image of a dawn is. Just as, for many of us, the newness of a sunrise itself brings the hope of a new day, so ‘the longed for dawn’ can describe those many parts of our lives where, together or on our own, we are waiting – longing for – the end to some kind of darkness, waiting for the creeping light on a horizon. 

Here in our Chapel, where the wooden paneled walls are adorned with carved tributes to many remarkable Girtonians who studied and taught here, we cannot help but think of the dawning of opportunity for women in higher education institutions at the end of the 19th century. Indeed, in the final of pages Emily Davis’ classic Victorian argument for the higher education of women – a text that lies at the heart of this very institution –  she argues that if her contemporaries fail to ‘abandon unjust privileges’, fail to ‘enact equal laws’ even when faced with ‘ridicule, opposition and discouragement in behalf of unpopular ideas’, then this is simply, in her words, ‘shutting our eyes to keep out the dawning day’. A deeply theological argument, her text leaves us in no doubt that she saw the higher education of women as a dawn of something true to the ways of God.

In some ways, the sun was slow to rise, though: it was 79 years from the foundation of this College before the University agreed to award women degrees.  79 - more than half the life of this college - years before these women were awarded their Cambridge degree, despite studying the same courses and passing the same exams as men. 

Yet during this time Girtonians like economist Joan Robinson were pioneering advancement in their fields; like mathmetician and scientist Hertha Ayrton, over 100,000 of whose Ayrton fans were used to disperse gas in first world war trenches, they were making life-changing contributions to society; like Sarajini Naidu and Amy Ida Louisa King, some of the first women of colour to study at Cambridge, they were breaking boundaries for equal opportunity. 

In all these years, these women were, in some ways, still kept in darkness – their achievements simply not truly acknowledged – and yet they refused, in Emily Davis’ words, to shut their eyes to keep out the dawning day. Their determination that equality and excellence go together continues to fuel us, today, as we seek to walk that way too – for there are many places in our world where the dawn breaks and shines light on what is wrong.

In one sense, then, dawn is an inescapable, piercing light that illuminates what is hidden, throws light on the things we pretend aren’t there because we don’t want to see them. It pierces the gloom of which Isaiah speaks, exposes the ways in which we exploit, ignore, abuse, and injure one another; and it exposes the ways we convince ourselves that this is acceptable. Light dawns on these deeds that, as Isaiah says, are in the dark – and it exposes their foolishness. We often shut our eyes when they should be open.  Only a few weeks ago here in Chapel we heard from Rev’d Jon Canessa, whose years of ministry alongside the homeless and addicted here in Cambridge - and now with the Lantern Initiative at Newcastle Cathedral - reminded us of those on and in whom God’s light shines, yet whose plight is so often put to the back of our minds. 

The light that dawns on us in the life of Jesus Christ, though, always illuminates a path to the needy. It is very hard to read the narratives about Jesus and not be challenged by his response to those in need. We are called to pattern our lives after his actions towards those beloved children of God who suffer injustice, exclusion, judgement from the self-righteous; who suffer ill-health, fear, and all the rest that besets humanity. We also have to work out what that looks like in our own particular places and contexts - as Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it, to ‘take the next step that corresponds to God’s becoming human in Christ.’ 

For ultimately, in Zechariah’s song, the dawn that will edge its way into the darkest places of the world, and into the darkness we know in ourselves, that dawn is the coming Christ, the ‘mighty saviour’.

In this dawn is the irrepressible hope of God. The Christ come among us reveals the God of tender mercy; the God of all time and all ages who meets us mysteriously in the humble manger, in a ministry of compassion and challenge, in the life poured out for us on the cross, and in the resurrected hands that bear the marks of torture and yet are held out in peace.  This is God for us, and God with us. 

In Advent, we position ourselves in anticipation – knowing that the dawn has already broken in this Jesus, but also trusting that the full day – the redemption of all things - is coming. Placing ourselves in the drama of the expectation of Jesus’ birth heightens our expectation of the age when, as St Paul says, God will be all in all, and when we will know ourselves made whole, forgiven, free and beloved.

The dawn from on high, then, is the coming Christ, the radiance of God, the one who lights a path to the needy, who illuminates the need for justice and equality, and who is the promised future for all things – the full bright day in which no-one is left in darkness.
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HM: We hear the anthem, The Lost Son, with text by our former Chaplain and Life Fellow Malcolm Guite, and music by composer and former Girtonian Milly Atkinson. It describes us as ‘those who miss the light’, and reminds us to turn towards the coming Christ who meets us in the midst of everything.

Anthem: Lost Son, Milly Atkinson. Choir.

HM: We invite you to pray with us, in prayers led by Toba Adeboju, 2nd year Theology Student.

TA:  As our Saviour Jesus taught us, so we pray:
Our Father in heaven, 
(all) hallowed be your name.
Your Kingdom come,
your will be done
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread;
forgive us our sins 
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil,
for the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours,
Now and for ever,
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HM: For our final hymn, we sing Charles Wesley’s magnificent Advent Hymn, ‘Lo, He Comes with Clouds Descending’. 

Hymn: Lo, He Comes. (Helmsley) Choir, congregation, organ

TB: Christ the Sun of Righteousness shine upon you,
Scatter the darkness from before your path
And make you ready to meet him when he comes in glory.
And the blessing of God Almighty, 
The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,
Rest upon you and those whom you love, now and for ever,
Amen.