Just in case we had been lulled into a false sense of security by the Covid-19 decline, up pops the soon-to-be Archbishop of York, the Rev Stephen Cottrell. Currently lying in wait in Chelmsford, he is about to be unleashed on us via York, this coming Thursday. By Zoom, no less. In The Sunday Times …
Continue reading Archbishop Cottrell: the gift that keeps on giving
Photo: https://www.thedolectures.com/ The Archbishop of Canterbury appears, in his recent stint on the BBC’s Today programme, to have come up with a new theology of forgiveness. Interestingly, this seems to have passed most clergy by. Or perhaps they have simply given up trying to balance what the Archbishop says with actual life in the pews. …
Pic: bereeanresearch.org Searching the web recently for what other churches are doing during the lockdown, I came across quite a number of parishes and Christian organisations that were promoting a 'prayer' from Nadia Bolz-Weber. For those readers not familiar with Bolz-Weber, she is a Lutheran pastor in the US who is now viewed as a …
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has announced a new 'commission to review and improve diversity' across London’s public realm to 'ensure the capital’s landmarks suitably reflect London’s achievements and diversity'. Would anyone outside current activist circles like to hazard a guess at what this actually means? The Mayor of London's London Assembly website states: …
Are you aware that if you die tomorrow, as an adult in England, your organs and any other bits someone in the NHS takes a fancy to, can be 'harvested' for the use of others? Whether you want this or not? Wales enacted similar legislation in 2015 and Scotland is planning to do so in …
Continue reading Whose body? Legal issues and religious beliefs in England
https://www.mayflower400uk.org/education/the-mayflower-story/ Can we see any connection between the 400th anniversary celebrations of the Mayflower’s voyage to the Americas and the line that has been drawn in the sand by the Church of England’s leadership during the virus lockdown? I suggest that we can. Both illustrate a picture of western culture’s views about the place in …
The BBC has started broadcasting the Muslim call to prayer as part of its services to Muslims during the coronavirus epidemic. Apparently, Muslims need this in order to feel a sense of community while they are in isolation: Chris Burns, head of BBC Local Radio, said: “Many Muslims will feel a void in their lives where prayers …
Continue reading BBC broadcasts Muslim call to prayer: some religions more equal than others?
Following on from my previous post about clergy being banned from the bedsides of patients in the current crisis, things continue to develop. Various clergy around the country have been expressing their frustration with the ongoing ban on them entering their own churches; news of the bedside-ban on voluntary chaplains seems to have heaped even …
Zeitgeist = 'Spirit of the age' or 'Spirit of the times'. Holy Geist = don't bother asking an archbishop (or archbishop-designate) as they probably won't know. Talking via email last week to the admirable Ian Paul, I happened to comment that criticizing the Church of England at the moment is as easy as shooting fish …
Continue reading English Archbishops: Zeitgeist or Holy Geist?
Ah, the great British blitz spirit. Long gone, apparently, in certain sections of our population. The TV-drivel-fed, media-influenced hordes nowadays seem to have no will to engage their brains before acting like lemmings in supermarkets and pharmacies. Who knew that the go-to items to buy in the face of the Black Death would be …
