Six degrees of separatoin

Six degrees of separation refers to the idea that everyone is on average approximately six steps away, by way of introduction, from any other person on Earth, so that a chain of, "a friend of a friend" statements can be made, on average, to connect any two people in six steps or fewer. So for example, each of you reading this is connected in this way to Princess Diana. How?
Princess Diana met my uncle when he was working for the British Red Cross. I am related to my uncle and you have met me or at least read this. Therefore all of you are four steps from Princess Diana.

I mention this because the six degrees of separation idea means that we are often more closely connected to an event in the news than we might think.

I am sure that you like me were shocked by the recent riots. As you’ll remember the riots started in Tottenham. You will remember those awful pictures of the Carpetright store being burnt to the ground. Just around the corner from that shop stands St Marks Methodist Church. The minister of the church Revd Dr Valentin Dedji was very active in the community before the riots and since the rots he has been trying to bring some of Jesus’ peace and healing to bear.

We in this part of Swindon are now connected to St Mark’s. Of course on one level we are connected because it is a fellow Methodist Church and in Methodism we think of the Connexion. That is the links between all Methodist churches in the UK. But our link with St Marks is more than just through the Connexion. It is personal as well.

About 6 weeks ago a couple came to St Andrews on a Sunday morning. As it happened I was taking the service and I spoke to them afterwards. I found out that they were from London and I saw afterwards they were chatting to a couple of people from church.
But it was only after the riots that I found out that the church people the visitors had been talking to had remembered the visitos were from Tottenham. So Jean (from church - not her real name) wrote to them care of the church and soon received an email back.

We are all familiar with the story of the Good Samaritan. Jesus told this story having been asked by a lawyer who he (as a devote Jew) should regard as a neighbour. And the punch line was that to followers of Jesus all people are neighbours.

The world we live in today, a world of mass communication and frequent foreign travel, means that the question “Who is my neighbour?” takes on a whole new meaning. Now we are neighbours with people in Tottenham, we are neighbours with people in Salford, we are neighbours with people in Somalia. Regardless of six degrees of separation.