This came up recently when I was talking with my parish priest. I am of Reformed heritage, he is a Society Anglican. Wanting a term which did not include URC clergy as well as Anglicans and did not carry the baggage of ‘priest’ so opted for ‘Minister’ and then got caught out on his understanding […]
Category archives: Church
Twin star Biblical Interpretation
Friday was the feast of St Peter and St Paul. I would have thought they were uneasy feast day sharers, Paul’s strident certainty must grate on Peter’s impetuosity of faith and visa versa. It is too simplistic to see Peter as all emotion and Paul as all intellect. A careful reading of Paul will show […]
Easter Triduum – Iona Style 2017
I spent Easter as a guest at Iona Abbey. The communal side of the Abbey is run by the Iona Community, while the Tourist side is run by Historic Scotland. Most importantly the worship that regularly happens in the Abbey is largely under the auspices of the Iona Community. Therefore if you go to the […]
Testing the Waters – Reaching out to “Dones”
This is a think piece because I am reassessing. About a decade a book came out called “A Churchless Faith” which broadly argued that those who were leaving the Church were Stage IV in the Fowler Stages of Faith and that this made them less than docile sheep in the flock. Now I am not […]
A gym encounter and evangelism
I started going to the gym about 20 months ago. This was after a slow realisation that Ph.D. had left me in a relatively poor state. I was obese according to my BMI although nobody commented on me being overweight. I was also relatively unfit. I came to acknowledge that my lifestyle was largely sedentary and […]
Groupings – A historic memory of why
There is a lot of hitting out at groupings suggesting that they are causingdecline at present. I have a memory that goes back to the early days of grouping within the URC, and I think it is time to tell the story of why they originated. I am talking of things that happened in my […]
Mission in Urban Priority Areas (personal reflection)
I am tired after a hard week in work, it has been frustrating checking the fine details of papers to be submitted to journals and by 5:30 p.m. I am exhausted. All I really want to do is go home to my warm flat and relax with a glass of wine and a book but […]
Church poem
I write poems as a way to be creative, normally my poems try to take you into something, this one doesn’t it is polemical. Perhaps it is worth saying that this poem is actually arguing with those that claim that church is only any use because it gives you the chance to go to heaved. […]
Older Generation and the Church
This was a mini rant I was giving to my parents and thought it was perhaps worthy of a blog post. Lets be clear, there are certain things that I don’t want to hear from the older generation. Firstly I don’t want to hear them grumbling about the mess the church has got into. Not […]
Calvinist Church Finances
Yes John Calvin did say something about church finances. He said 25% should go on acts of charity and 25% on mission, I think it was also 25% on ministry and 25% on upkeep. Doesn’t sound like any church finances I have ever seen! Okay so in Geneva the council kept up the buildings. So […]