1 September 2025 There are basic things that need to be a constituent part of any education system. People need to be taught how to read and write, count and calculate. These are basic skills without which we would not be able to deepen our understanding of the world. Throughout our formal education, it is to be hoped that we learn some facts and figures, an historical timeline, an awareness of the contours of our nation and the five continents of the world. What we remember will be unique to each person. But there are three things which are crucial for our intellectual development beyond school and university. The first is curiosity. We need to be inducted into our world and good teachers are able to open up the world in such a way that stimulates us to ask questions and pursue answers. The second is attentiveness. In many ways this is the most important quality which is nurtured in educational practice. It can be done regardless of the subject being studied. It i...
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31 August 2025 Madeleine Davies has drawn readers of the Church Times to a report by the ‘Institute for the impact of Faith in Life’. The report is entitled, ‘Faith and Happiness: How religious belief shapes Britain’s emotional well-being’. It was published in July. Christians made up 48% of the sample – and 42% of them said that they attended church at least once a month. Muslims made up 5% of the sample – and 93% of them said that they attended mosque at least once a month. The Muslim responses appeared to be stronger than their Christian counterparts. ‘Muslims consistently reported the highest levels of life satisfaction, optimism about the future and confidence in handling life’s challenges.’ wrote Madeleine Davies. For example, ‘Two thirds of Muslims said that they could handle whatever life brought, compared with 48% of Christians and 36% of those without faith.’ continued Davies. Apparently, the Report links these responses to theological ideas – divin...
30 August 2025 Recently, the Lutheran Church in Sweden removed the church at Kiruna and relocated it three miles away from its original site. As it happens, this was part of the relocation of the whole community due to the expansion of the Kiruna mine. The church weighed 672 tons and it took two days for it to be transported to its new location. It was featured in Sweden as ‘slow television’. It was consecrated in 1912 and in 2001 it was voted by the Swedish population as the most popular pre-1950 building in the country. Interestingly, the design resembles Sami huts. They belonged to the Sami people who live in the northern regions of Scandinavia. This used to be referred to as ‘Lapland’ but not any more. The Sami people traditionally herded reindeer and were semi-nomadic. For their church to move doesn’t seem so strange! The Lutheran Church in Sweden like the Church of England and the Church of Scotland has suffer...
29 August 2025 In my book of Orthodox saints, a large number seem to have lived in the fourth century. Not only that, they are not plaster cast saints. Certainly, several were martyred for their faith and as such lived remarkably courageous lives. But there are also very human characteristics evident in them. For example, I was introduced to ‘Our Holy Father Moses the Black’. I had never heard of him before. He was large in stature and had been a robber before his conversion to Christianity. Conversion did not lead him into a tranquil life for I was told yesterday that ‘he was greatly troubled by lust’. It’s a sin which besets humanity but it is not often openly recorded in a book of saints. One night, in his despair, he goes to see the monk, Isidore. He shows him the sun rising at dawn. ‘See, as the light comes, the darkness flies away, not all at once but gradually. So it is with your soul.’ Moses was encouraged by his words. I imagine we are all in need of such ...
28 August 2025 Some soundbites from my recent Safeguarding training session: If it’s not safe, it’s not church. Forgiveness doesn’t negate justice nor risk. Some relationships can be restored but you need to let others go. It is a truism that, ‘The field of Safeguarding is ever changing. It’s a dynamic not a static environment.’ There has been so much change in the last thirty years that’s why continual training is essential for everyone even retired ministers! The most immediate change for me was the introduction of a concept which I didn’t know about – Safeguarding Culture. This term is used to describe a more holistic approach to safeguarding. Instead of looking at it negatively as regulations to be fulfilled, a more integrated approach is encouraged. In this culture, Safeguarding is reframed more positively. It grows naturally out of the environment of the Church which is pursuing shalom, the well-being of everyone within the community, t...
27 August 2025 In her ‘Little History of Mathematics’, Snezana Lawrence introduced me to a French mathematician by the name of Gaspard Monge (1746-1818). I had never heard of him before but he is greatly celebrated in France with ‘a street, a square, a metro station, even shops, pharmacies and restaurants’ name d after him. One of his most widely respected discoveries was a way of teaching geometry by encouraging students to imagine ‘a movement of elements and the traces they leave behind’ in space. He called his way of understanding geometry ‘descriptive geometry’. It became very popular in France and in all its French speaking colonies in the nineteenth century. However, it never became popular in Great Britain. In fact, it never saw the light of day in our part of the world. Why was that? Gaspard Monge was a friend of Napoleon Bonaparte. He was also a mathematician with at least one theorem to his name. For most of their friendship, France was at w...
26 August 2025 Helen sent me a postcard. It featured a cottage at the Beamish Museum. That was interesting enough but on the back of the card, she hadn’t sent a message but a poem which she had written. It was simply called ‘Postcard’. And this is what she wrote: Having a great few days in Capernaum. I could amaze you with stories of a Man we’ve met. We’ve seen glories you would not believe! He heals the sick and you receive forgiveness for your sins. If you follow Him new life begins! The skies are blue and clear over Galilee. Wish you were here! (Helen Lawrenson)
25 August 2025 In my first charge, I used to take our Youth Circle to discos organised by another youth club leader in a neighbouring church. She began to talk to me about having a sense of vocation to the ministry. Although she worked in the local hospital and was in her forties, I thought it a great idea. Morag went to University and eventually became a minister. She was called to a Highland parish and ministered there for four years. She died suddenly from a heart attack. People were grief-stricken. Eight hundred people attended her funeral. Flags were flown at half-mast and shops were shut. Her husband wanted it to be a celebration of her life. ‘Morag loved tartan.’ he said. And everyone wore some tartan to the funeral. There was no doubt about it, Morag’s relatively brief ministry had made an impact on the community. Just before she was licensed to preach, Morag sent me a letter in which she shared her excitement about her future ministry. ‘No re-sits, I hope!...
24 August 2025 Kobi Yamada has written an unusual book entitled, ‘What do you do with an idea?’ It has been illustrated by Mae Besom. It features a young child and his idea which is represented by an egg shape with a crown upon its head. The child responds to his idea. There are four stages. 1. The child doesn’t know what to do with the idea so he acts as if it didn’t belong to him. He tries to hide it from other people. 2. The idea follows him and demands a lot of his attention. Surprisingly, he feels happier when it is around. They become friends. 3. He shows the idea to others. He is afraid some people will laugh at his idea. They do. And he almost gives it up. But he doesn’t. 4. He gives it his attention. He protects it and it grows bigger. It shares its secrets with him. It shows him how to walk on his hands. ‘Because,’ it said, ‘it is good to have the ability to see things differently.’ ‘Then one day, something amazing happened. My idea changed right before my v...
23 August 2025 In one of its more recent ten pound notes, the Royal Bank of Scotland featured a portrait of the Scottish mathematician and astronomer, Mary Somerville who was born in 1780 in the manse at Jedburgh and was brought up in nearby Burntisland. Her education was limited. She was largely self-taught. Her first marriage was unhappy but she inherited money after her first husband’s death which she used to enhance her education. She then married her cousin, the medic, Dr. William Somerville, who encouraged her to study science. However, when her paper on ‘Sunlight’ was to be read to the Royal Society, she wasn’t allowed to read it herself and had to get her husband to do it for her! Such was the prejudice of these Victorian times! Mary Somerville excelled as a writer. She had the ability to write about science in such a way that ordinary people could understand. It was her intention, ‘ to make the laws by which the material ...
22 August 2025 As a retired minister who is still doing some work, I am expected to fulfil the requisite Safeguarding Training. I have already completed the first two levels of training and am about to complete Level Three. There is material to read, questions to answer, reflection to be accomplished. In the Workbook which was provided, there was a refreshing perspective provided. When the Safeguarding legislation came into force in the 1990s, it was all about the legal requirements. We said to volunteers, ‘This is the law, we must follow the regulations.’ Safeguarding was considered an hindrance to working in the church especially by people who had been volunteering for all sorts of activities in the past without any legal requirements or exploration of their suitability for the roles they undertook. This has all changed with the appointment of a Safeguarding Co-ordinator and Panel, notices on kirk notice-boards about Safeguarding Policy, the expectation that an item ent...
21 August 2025 In assessing people for the ministry of Word and Sacrament, the assessors explore their sense of vocation. This is all tied up with their understanding of how they got to National Assessment Conference. They have a unique story to tell about God’s involvement in their life. In his introduction to ‘The Schoolmaster’, AC Benson writes about vocation and a type of clergyman for whom vocation did not play an immediate part. He is writing in 1902 and so I am not sure whether this character did not persist and for what reason. Nevertheless, here he is. ‘Many a man who took orders did so because the position was one which implied no great strain; which afforded possibilities of sport and quiet society and agricultural occupation. Such men had no burning desire to save souls or to supply the water of life to thirsting parishioners. In many cases they were aware that the parishioners to whom they intended to minister had no more desire for spiritual sustenance ...
20 August 2025 A million young people gathered together to celebrate a Roman Catholic initiative in Rome – ‘The Jubilee of Youth’ which was led by Pope Leo XIV. This was a tremendous affirmation of the faith alive in young people within our global Church. We can only be encouraged by such a phenomenon even if it is not reflected in the smaller, aging parishes which predominate in our declining Western Church. Is it a sign that things are changing within the Church, a reversal of the misfortune which has befallen us in secular decline? Speaking after this event, the Revd. Professor Paul Zulehner from the University of Vienna said, ‘We’re clearly witnessing a protest against mainstream secularisation, as groups of youngsters yearn for re-spiritualisation or re-enchantment.’ In attempting to unpack this phenomenon, he went on to say, ‘Many are looking for meaning beyond material success, when such perceptions have become enfeebled in our pluralistic societies.’...
19 August 2025 Covid, the readjustment of parishes, the aging profile of our membership do not need to be stumbling blocks to our ministry towards young people. If they are not in our churches, they are certainly in our parishes. And if we cannot see it, we know from the statistics at our disposal that some of them are suffering because they have no decent role models to follow. Others are suffering because their family cannot afford to buy toothpaste and soap. We have prided ourselves for almost five hundred years on being parish churches. With unions and readjustments, we do not leave our parishes behind. We still have responsibility for the physical, mental and spiritual well-being of everyone within these familiar and well-loved bounds. Our congregations can only be revitalised when the children and the young people find their home among us. On their arrival, the Christchild will be born among us and the peaceable kingdom envisioned by Isaiah will come to pass ...
18 August 2025 In Psalm 128, the Psalmist reveals how this life will be fulfilling. He begins with work. ‘You shall eat the fruit of the labour of your hands.’ he says. The image speaks to us about purposeful and fulfilling work. It makes us happy and, as the Psalmist says, ‘It shall go well with you.’ How many people find work which is meaningful and satisfying? A high percentage of young people in their twenties are finding this difficult. In a recent interview, Kate Forbes, the Deputy First Minister, talked about her decision to stand down from frontline politics. She has had a stellar career but argues that it has been detrimental to her work as a mother. She recognised that there was no joy in trying to juggle two jobs which she considers vitally important. ‘I think you’ve got to have joy in your job to keep doing it.’ The Psalmist agrees. ‘You shall be happy.’ he says about fulfilling work. Many people do not discover joy in their work. But those who see their wor...
17 August 2025 Here’s a hopeful story. Ksenia Koldin, an eighteen year old Ukrainian, risked her life to travel a thousand miles into enemy territory to rescue her brother. They had both been abducted by the Russians at the start of the war. They were two of more than twenty thousand children who have been abducted by the Russians and forced to renounce their Ukrainian identity, taught a biased history of their nation, enrolled into paramilitary structures and so on. ‘I know what it means,’ says Ksenia, ‘and I choose to speak out so that every child living in Russian captivity can return home. Without them, there will be no continuation of our nation.’ This brutal and subversive deportation of children is an astonishing assault not only on Ukraine’s most vulnerable citizens but on the future of the nation. As Ksenia says, ‘Without children, there will be no continuation of our nation.’
16 August 2025 Ted Baker had two children – Pat and Peter. Pat was only three when her dad left home with uniform and kitbag to serve in the Second World War. He had been in the forces for only ten months when he was killed in action. It was a whole year before his death was confirmed. Shortly before he left home, Ted wrote three letters – one each to his daughter, his son and his wife to be opened ‘in the event of my death’. Although Pat was five when news of her dad’s death was confirmed, she didn’t receive the letter until she was fourteen when her mum thought her old enough to read it. ‘My Darling little Pat - I have been thinking things over while waiting for my boat, and as I might not return, I think it is only right that you should have a letter from me which you can keep, to remember me by …’ he wrote. The letter is full of little pieces of advice, ‘Don’t be selfish … Try not to talk about people … Be a sport … Be a pal to your mother …’ Woven throu...
15 August 2025 There is concern about the birth rate. Young people are not having as many children as people had in the past. People are waiting until their career is established or their mortgage purchased before considering having a family. Children have vanished from a large number of kirk congregations. Out of interest, I looked back at the statements on marriage in the three most recent editions of the ‘Book of Common Order’. The 1940 version, which was widely acclaimed, states that marriage was ordained for life-long companionship, the continuance of family life and the welfare of human society. In the 1979 version, there are two orders for marriage. In both orders there is a reference to children. They are described as ‘God’s gifts’ and in a marriage they enjoy ‘the security of love and the heritage of faith’. Clearly, children are a constituent part of marriage. In these orders another reason for marriage has appeared in addition to those in the 1940...
14 August 2025 Do we try to protect our young people too much? Self-esteem is very important but so is resilience. The two are related. If we feel good about ourselves, we are more likely to be resilient to the things which threaten to undermine us. There is a danger of emphasising the one over the other. The development of self-esteem is crucial especially in Scotland where people suffer from a lack of it. But if the development of self-esteem is won at the cost of protecting young people from negative experiences and not equipping them with strategies to cope, what’s the benefit? Equally well, if we expect young people to bounce back too soon after every failure and disappointment, we may be in danger of becoming unsympathetic and dispassionate. This is a return to the bad old days when people were inclined to say, ‘Tough luck!’ or ‘That’s life!’ or ‘Make the most of it!’ Both qualities are important – self-esteem and resilience. Both can be distorted. Too much emphasis...