Idealism -the new realism and elightenment

The keynote speaker at the conference I have been attending this week was The Attorney General, the Rt Hon the Baroness Scotland QC who spoke on the importance of faith in the public space. She was clear and positive about the role individuals and faith groups have to play in a society in which she [...]

Bringing politicians to their knees on 7th June

Two-thirds of voters continue to demand an early General Election. Tomorrow sees the start of the week of prayer for Parliament and Whitehall- and God knows they could do with it. The prayer most politicians seemed to have been offering up in recent weeks is that their expenses will not be  published in The Daily Telegraph. [...]

Shopping for votes

Yesterday I was shopping  in my local high street and came across a stall staffed by half- a dozen members of the British National Party (BNP). I could have walked straight passed and ignored them, but decided to ask them a simple question. I first asked the lady behind the stall with all the leaflets- [...]

Run Terry, Run

The Times Newspaper recentlycarried an interesting piece from former hostage and special envoy to the Archbishop of Canterbury on the importance of Independent MPs at Westminster. Terry says about recent events; ” As spectator sports go I have to confess to mixed feelings. I take little delight in seeing anyone publicly injured and humiliated. But [...]

Let’s renew the vision for unity and inclusion we need

This is the text of a Joint Statement from Dr Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury and Dr John Sentamu, Archbishop of York:
 ”The European Parliamentary and local elections on June 4th will take place at a time of extraordinary turbulence in our democratic system. It is a time for great vigilance over how to exercise our [...]

The tide is turning

Do you believe in miracles any more? Here in the UK the tide of public mood is turning and the politicians are beggining to smell fear for the consequences. Each day we read of more and more relevations about how badly our elected representative have behaved and their credibility is ebbing away.
 How long will it be before the [...]

A politician’s prayer for troubled times

For the past few weeks our trust in politicians has been rocked by daily revelations about over-claiming expenses or second and even third home allowances. A profession that has been for too long merely tolerated by the people rather than truly loved or trusted now finds it’s reputation at rock bottom.
How ironic then that inthe [...]

Waiting for the great leap forwards

A couple of years ago I saw Billy Bragg at Greenbelt and he belted out this old classic. It brought back memories of supporting Labour through the miners strike and civil unrest that was an integral part of the Thatcher years – now amazingly 30 years ago . It also reminded me that however passionate we [...]

Values buried under bullshit?

It’s one hundred days today since January 20th when Barack Obama was inaugurated as the world’s most powerful man-the President of the United States of America. Millions of words will be written today assessing how well he has done at this most inconsequential of milestones after just three  months. He seems to have been a busy [...]

The BNP…..What would Jesus do?

In Holy Week, I had intended that this blog would simply carry reflective observations of the stations of the cross, and, on Friday, the last words of Jesus from the cross. Alas,   when I saw a report that the British National Party (BNP) has used an image of Jesus and a scripture from John 15:20 “If [...]