Has one man the right to change the constitution?

I ask the question not because I don't think he has, but because I honestly don't know the answer.

Apparently, according to The Times, in dismissing an appeal by Gary McFarlane, a Christian counsellor working for Relate, against discrimination on religious grounds, Lord Justice Laws has announced that, 'Christianity deserves no protection in law above other faiths [in this country] and to do so would be “irrational”, “divisive, capricious and arbitrary”'.

I find myself wondering whether he has read, or is even aware of, the Coronation Oath taken by Queen Elizabeth II, at her crowning by the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1953:

Archbishop: Will you to the utmost of your power maintain the Laws of God and the true profession of the Gospel? Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law? Will you maintain and preserve inviolably the settlement of the Church of England, and the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government thereof, as by law established in England? And will you preserve unto the Bishops and Clergy of England, and to the Churches there committed to their charge, all such rights and privileges, as by law do or shall appertain to them or any of them?

Queen. All this I promise to do.

Now I am not saying it is right that the Queen should have taken this oath (though presumably it seemed a good idea at the time). Nor am I saying that Prince Charles, should he ever become King, ought to take the same oath (indeed, I cannot see how he possibly could). Nor, indeed, does it matter one whit whether Mr McFarlane is in the right or the wrong.

What I am saying is that this oath surely 'privileges' Christianity in the constitution of England. And I am therefore asking whether Lord Justice Laws can simply say "This is no longer the case" and it is so, with regard to such a profound issue.

I may well have misunderstood many things in this situation. Perhaps others could clarify?

John Richardson
29 April 2010

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Expository Notes on the Song of Songs

Something else I've been working on, which I thought I would post. As the text indicates, it is one in a series, in fact the last of three.

Introduction

As we look at the Song of Songs, the outstanding challenge is to find the Song’s theological centre — what has the Song got to do with God and with the great theological themes of the Bible?

To answer this, I want to take our minds back to thinking about the Song’s genre — what kind of book is it?

I said in my first talk that it belongs in the genre of Wisdom literature — works in the Bible that basically look at the meaning of life, what life is all about and what the godly life consists of.

And here, the Song’s mention of Solomon performs a very important function, for — whether or not Solomon had anything to do with the authorship, and whether or not he is the key character — it draws the thoughts of the reader not just to a person but to an era.

In 1 Kings 4:20-22 Solomon’s reign is identified as the ‘golden age’ of Israel:

Judah and Israel were as many as the sand by the sea; they ate and drank and were happy. Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the Euphrates to the land of the Philistines and to the border of Egypt; they brought tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.

1 Kings 10:21-22 emphasises the practical results:

All King Solomon’s drinking vessels were of gold, and all the vessels of the House of the Forest of Lebanon were of pure gold; none were of silver, it was not considered as anything in the days of Solomon. For the king had a fleet of ships of Tarshish at sea with the fleet of Hiram. Once every three years the fleet of ships of Tarshish used to come bringing gold, silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks.

And thus 1 Kings 4:25 presents a picture of contentment:

And Judah and Israel dwelt in safety, from Dan even to Beersheba, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, all the days of Solomon.

A ‘rose-tinted’ view

This picture in this part of King’s is deliberately presented through ‘rose-tinted’ spectacles. We also read in 1 Ki 5:13 that,

King Solomon conscripted labourers from all Israel —thirty thousand men.

Later this formed the basis of the complaint brough to Solomon’s son and heir, Rehoboam, by Jeroboam on behalf of the people in 1 Kings 12:4:

Your father put a heavy yoke on us, but now lighten the harsh labor and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you.

But we are encouraged to think of Solomon’s reign as a ‘golden age’, even though, realistically it was not entirely golden. And this has important implications for the Wisdom literature.

The ‘end’ of the Exodus

In terms of biblical theology, the reign of Solomon, and specifically the bringing of the Ark of the Covenant to the Temple, marks the end of the Exodus.

This is the point at which the wanderings of the Ark come to an end — it finds its permanent home in the place God promised would be built for his name to dwell. At the same time, this is why God brought the people out of Egypt — so that they would come into their own land, where they could serve him “without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all [their] days” (cf Lk 1:74-75).

And yet, as the ‘wisdom’ books survey the situation in which Israel finds itself, it turns out that the ‘golden age’ is, as they say, ‘not all that’. At one level, there is satisfaction, as the passages from 1 Kings suggest. At another level, however, many of life’s great questions are as imponderable as ever.

Thus, for example, as the Preacher in Ecclesiastes looks out from his palace at what life is like in Jerusalem under his rule, you can almost hear him ask, like Bob Geldof after the first Live Aid concert was over, “Is that it?”

Is this all we’ve been aiming for, all these years? Because if it is, then it does seem a bit of a let-down.

The Fruits of Salvation and the Hierarchy of Needs

And by its dedication to Solomon, the Song of Songs places itself in the same context and therefore can be claimed to address the same question: Is that it? Is this what we were aiming for?

The psychologist Abraham Maslow was famous for identifying a so-called ‘hierarchy of needs’. Our essential needs are air, water, food, shelter, sleep and so on. When these needs are met, however, we turn our attention to other needs — security, friendship, social belonging, status, entertainment, etc.

According to Maslow, we cannot attend to the ‘higher’ needs until the basic needs are met. But once those basic needs are met, we do indeed move on to the quest for othe things.

Israel’s history can similarly be thought of in terms of a ‘hierarchy’ of needs. At first, the need was sheer survival — a child for Abraham, then the threat posed by the Egyptians to the survival of the tribe. Later, there was the need of a land, and security from their enemies.

But by the ‘Golden Age’ of Solomon, these needs had clearly been met. The Israelites are “as many as the sand by the sea”. They have security and prosperity. God’s promises have been met, they have what they had hoped for.

In this situation, as Maslow says, our attention can finally turn to the highest of our needs, and so the Wisdom literature of the Bible, asks what life is, finally, all about. What do we need, for example, when we’ve got everything else? To this question, the Song of Songs gives a surprising answer.

The greatest is love

In 8:7 we read this:

Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If a man offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned.

According to the Song of Songs, love — specifically, the kind of love that the Song has been describing — is better than all one’s material blessings combined.

Compared with other blessings of life, this is the greatest blessing that one can receive in the providence of God.

The Death of the Beloved and the Death of Love

And yet — in the same breath, the Song of Songs recognizes that even this love cannot satisfy. 8:6 reads:

Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm; for love is strong as death, jealousy is cruel as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a most vehement flame.

Within the present world order, this verse immediately forces us to recognize two potential threats to human love - the death of the beloved and the death of love. Love is strong as death — but death still happens. And jealousy —the the response to love threatened by an outsider —also happens.

And so towards the end of the Song, when we might have hoped for a note of ‘happily ever after’, we have a reminder that the death of the beloved, and even the possibility of the death of love —threatens the lovers.

But the Song has the threat of loss hanging over it generally. 3:1-4 and 5:2-8 particularly express this threat, but it is echoed in 1:7; 2:15; 6:1, 11-12, 13; 8:1-2 and 11.

And then there is the refrain found in 2:7 and repeated in 3:5 and 8:4:

I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, by the gazelles or the hinds of the field, that you stir not up nor awaken love until it please.

This suggests that even love itself may come at the wrong time, in the wrong place or (most frequently) for the wrong person. So whilst the Song on the one hand points to love between a man and a woman as the greatest blessing, it also points to the fragility of love. Love is great, but it is not ‘the answer’ for which the Wisdom literature looks.

The Land as Theological Contact

So what is ‘the answer’. Naturally, it is God, but how does the Song of Songs point us to God, if not via the approach of medieval allegory?

One of the things we may overlook in the Song of Songs is its references geography. Jerusalem is mentioned eight times, Zion once and there are a number of other geographical references:

1:14 En-Gedi; 2:1 Sharon; 3:9 Lebanon; 4:1 Mt Gilead; 4:8 Lebanon, Amana, Senir, Hermon; 4:11, 15 Lebanon; 6:4 Tirzah; 6:5 Gilead; 7:4 Heshbon, Bath Rabbim, Lebanon, Damascus; 7:5 Mt Carmel; 8:11 Baal Hamon.

These references may easily be missed, because we expect to see them, but also (paradoxically) because we are generally unfamiliar with the locations. On the one hand, they give us a vaguely ‘religious’ impression of the environment, as we expect in the Bible, but on the other hand, they stir no particular emotion.

Yet, as I said in the first week, the emotions are exactly what the Song of Songs should stir. And we ought to consider the possibility that there is meant to be an ‘emotionality’ arising precisely out of some of these geographical references.

This is even more so, I would suggest, when we consider some of the geographical references that do catch our eye.

The land as an image of the lovers

Take 4:1 and 4, for example:

Your hair is like a flock of goats, moving down the slopes of Gilead. [...] Your neck is like the tower of David, built for an arsenal, whereon hang a thousand bucklers, all of them shields of warriors.

Or 7:4-5,

Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon looking toward Damascus. Your head crowns you like Mount Carmel.

Michael Fox comments,

... the metaphors offer little information about how the lovers look, often seeming actually to interfere with the formation of a mental picture of them ... For me it is the imagery itself that makes the sharpest, most enduring impression, and I think that this is the author’s intention.

And I agree with him — we are meant to be thinking not just about the girl, but precisely about the thing to which she is being compared. But why is this, and what is the effect?

Love songs of places

 Let us consider, for a moment, some modern examples of love songs which use a similar device for their effect. What, for example, are these words talking about?

Summer journeys
To Niag’ra
And to other places aggra-
vate all our cares
We’ll save our fares

I’ve a cozy little flat in
What is known as old Manhattan
We’ll settle down
Right here in town.

We’ll have Manhattan
The Bronx and Staten Island, too
It’s lovely going through
The zoo.

So far, you’d hardly recognize it as a love song. But then we come to the chorus:

The great big city’s a wondrous toy
Just made for a girl and boy
We’ll turn Manhattan
Into an isle of joy.

It is a love song — but is it a song about love, or is it a song about a city? Well, of course, it is both. But the impact of the song depends to some extent on how well you know the reference points. Very few people this side of the Atlantic will know what street might possibly compare with Mott Street in July, for example.

And there is another level on which the song works, for the better you know these locations, the more the song will have other resonances — to other times, to other experiences and to other significances. To take an example, think of the different resonances produced in the older resident of England by these words (even though they have an American author!):

That certain night, the night we met,
there was magic abroad in the air,
There were angels dining at the Ritz
and a nightingale sang in Berkley Square.

Once again, any English speaker can appreciate the sentiment, but for certain people, of a certain generation, this is not just a love-song, it is an anthem!

A love song of a place

Now let us try to put ourselves in the position of an informed reader of the Song of Songs — someone for whom Lebanon, or the slopes of Mt Gilead, or Heshbon or, of course, Jerusalem are not just vague far off places, not even locations on a map, but icons of an era and symbols of an identity.

Michael Fox, mentioned earlier, takes the view that a major aim of the Song is to give a picture of the land as well as the lovers. And here, Harold Fisch argues in Poetry with a Purpose, the Song finds its point of contact with the rest of Scripture:

There is a kind of imaginative overspill, as the rapture of the lovers overflows into the sphere of geography, transforming the whole land into an object of love.

But this is not just any land — it is not Assyria, or Egypt, much less America or England. It is the land of God’s promise — and moreover, the land which God himself loves.

In Isaiah 62:4, speaking of the restoration of Israel, the prophet says:

You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate; but you shall be called My delight is in her, and your land Married; for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married.

Fisch also observes how in 4:12-15 the Song, as he puts it, “becomes a poem about a garden rather than a girl”:

A garden locked is my sister, my bride, a garden locked, a fountain sealed. Your shoots are an orchard of pomegranates with all choicest fruits, henna with nard, nard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense, myrrh and aloes, with all chief spices — a garden fountain, a well of living water, and flowing streams from Lebanon.

And Ellen Charry, in an article on the Song of Songs, comments, “By use of garden and plant metaphors, the erotic garden of the Song becomes the woman herself”.

Thus, I suggest, the language of the Song of Songs finds its meeting point with the rest of Scripture —and hence with the others themes of Scripture —in its geographical and metaphorical references to the land.

The Song of Songs focuses our thoughts on the land as a metaphor of love, and finds there a contanct point with the theology expressed elsewhere in Scripture of God as the lover of the land in which he has caused Israel to dwell.

Summary

Our own experience of the use of geographical references in love songs shows how they can evoke in us feelings of pride, patriotism, nostalgia and so on. My suggestion is that the theological message of the Song of Songs begins with similar associations that ought to form in our minds (and would form, if we were similarly ‘brought up on’ the geography of this land at its associated history).

As informed ‘singers’ of the Song of Songs, we would sing of love, and be reminded, perhaps of our own loves. But we would be subtly sidetracked into other meditations — on the time when Solomon ruled and the children of Israel were as many as the sand on the seashore, whilst every man dwelt under his vine and fig-tree.

And we would think, maybe, of what happened to the Covenant Promises of God, and whether Israel would rise again. And we would think, ultimately, of God’s proclaimed love for Israel — a love for which, the Song of Songs suggests, the experience of love between a man and a woman is, in some way a signpost and a foretaste.

Conclusion

In fact, if we understand the Song of Songs working at this level, then we find ourselves sharing the same conclusions as the medieval allegorists — that the Song of Songs is indeed about the love of God for his people and the love of Christ for the church.

The difference is that we have reached this point without needing to allegorize. The Song of Songs remains a song about (and for) human lovers. And it extols human love and its accompanying sexual expression as the greatest of divine blessings.

But at the same time, through its theme of loss (rather than through the mechanism of allegory), it pushes us beyond human love to ‘something more’ and, through the language of the land, points us to the Covenant of God and hence to the God of the Covenant.

And, as the rest of Scripture points out, he is our true divine lover preparing us for a marriage with him of which human love and marriage are but a pale reflection.

John Richardson

28 April 2010

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Is there a Christian economic ethic?

Apart from its (almost mandatory) snide headline, and a couple of "nudge, nudge" witticisms in the accompanying text, The Independent has published an article on Christianity and ethical investment which could be a useful discussion-starter.

The second paragraph reads,

Cash has always been a thorny subject for the devout. How can one be rich and pious? There can't be too many Christian bankers who are unaware that, according to Christ, camels have a better chance of passing through the eye of a needle than bankers do of getting into heaven. Yet the wealthy may be able to sleep more soundly following the creation this week of Europe's first "Christian equity index". The Stoxx Europe Christian Index is the brainchild of a German investment firm that has spotted a gap in the market to provide a list of companies that the faithful can happily invest in without feeling like they are sinning at the same time.

Of course, Christian interest in ethical economics has been around for a long time. In the 1970s and 80s evangelicals in this country were trying to think through some of the issues involved. Sir Fred Catherwood penned a number of works which I seem to remember were regarded as quite controversial for not saying that Capitalism and wealth-creation were bad (remember, this was in the days when Christians either worried about, or rather approved of, Marxism).

And there have long been Christian groups and companies developing means of 'ethical investment'. The Ecclesiastical Insurance Group, for example, has certain standards it maintains for its 'Amity' funds.

But back in the sixteenth century, Martin Luther and others were writing about what we today would call 'economic justice'.

In the last couple of decades, though, it all seems to have gone rather quiet. One of the few solid works I'm aware of on the subject is Andy Hartropp's What is Economic Justice? Biblical and Secular Perspectives Contrasted. This is a very solid work and deserves to be widely read and known. But the commitment in the 'Five Marks of Mission' to "seek to transform unjust structures of society" and to "strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth" don't seem to be translating into very much except (still!) a vague hostility towards and discomfort about Capitalism, which has meanwhile so richly blessed us in the West.

What the article in The Independent might usefully prompt is a discussion on precisely what is a 'Christian' view of economic life. Regulars on this blog, for example, will know that I have a 'thing' about the biblical mandate against usury in any form. (And, contra an opinion in The Independent, I did not take my cue in this from the Muslims, though I do think they usefully show that an ethical principle can actually have an economic application.)

Most of us are also dimly aware of the examples of past Christian entrepreneurs, especially amongst the Quakers.

I cannot help wondering, though, whether from a Christian point of view what matters is not the great scheme of things but the small - the 'insignificant' - details. It is surely as great a challenge to be personally honest in one's business dealings in the office as it is to come up with some 'macro-economic' theory.

Many years ago, I heard someone who was regarded as something of an evangelical leader advocate that Christians in the workplace should go along with the 'dodgy practices' and 'petty' dishonesties so that, when the time came for them to speak up in the Trade Union meetings, they would not have lost the respect and the hearing of their workmates because of their 'stand-offish' attitude. That has got to be mad, hasn't it?

Personally, I think that telling the truth at work because you are a Christian is just as likely to get you 'crucified' as wearing a cross - and I have to admit to being frankly relieved that my own form of employment lets me off most of these ethical challenges.

John Richardson
28 April 2010


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Expository notes on 1 Timothy 2:9-15

We are preaching through 1 Timothy on Sunday mornings, and I’ve been working on these notes for the benefit of our lay preachers. Given the effort involved, I thought I’d post them here.

As before, the key to preaching/interpreting this section of 1 Timothy is to set it in the context as a whole. Overall, this is the command to be given through Timothy in 1:3 that ‘certain men’ (undoubtedly, people in the Ephesian church) should cease teaching false doctrine that, according to 1:7, had something to do with the Old Testament law.

This false doctrine was imperilling the spiritual lives of individuals (1:6;19, cf 6:21). It was leading to ‘speculations’ (1:4 —NIV “controversies”), rather than encouraging faith in the gospel and the love which flows from it, and “meaningless talk” (cf 6:20, “godless chatter”), instead of true teaching and the testimony of the gospel.

The heart of this gospel is given in the ‘trustworthy saying’ of 1:15: that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and the fact that one of the sinners saved was Paul, saved when he was persecuting the church, shows that it is all of grace.

Meanwhile, the false teaching was disrupting the church, and an internally disrupted church becomes a socially disruptive church, known for its faults, and disturbing the local community rather than acting as salt and light.

Thus at the beginning of chapter 2, Paul recalls the church to what it should be like: a community of prayer for the salvation of all people, because this is what God wants (2:4). They are saved through the mediatory death of Christ, which is itself the testimony born by Jesus (2:6 —which he upheld publicly before Pontius Pilate, 6:13, cf the kings and those in authority of 2:2). And from this flowed Paul’s (true) commission to preach the gospel of grace to the Gentiles — the gospel which Paul now wants re-emphasised in Ephesus.

The men, specifically and in particular, should be giving the lead here, not quarrelling amongst themselves but praying as Paul has instructed all should pray.

But why has Paul picked on the men? (The word in v 8 is anēr, which can be an adult male or a husband, but only rarely ‘people’, and certainly not here.)

He now goes on to address ‘women’ (NB, not ‘the women’). Clearly, therefore, there is something about the men as men that matters to what he is saying, and equally there is something about women as women.

The genders, however, are not treated by Paul in isolation but in relationship to one another. Almost invariably, where Paul speaks about or to men as men, it is in relation to women as women.

And so here: we must assume Paul speaks as he does to the men and the women because he has something to say about their relationship with one another — as indeed is born out in 2:12. But still, why this concern here?

The answer lies, I suggest, in the subject matter which begins in chapter 3 with the same words as began 1:15, “This is a trustworthy saying ...” It would be very easy to overlook the importance of this, and also its positioning in the flow of the text.

In 1:15 it introduces the central tenet of our faith. In 4:9 it introduces another fundamental statement about our faith (given in 4:10). In 3:1, then, it cannot merely be an aside, or a ‘please note’ comment. Rather, it is central to the points he is making.

He is writing the letter because false teaching is disrupting the church. How is the false teaching to be eliminated and replaced with true teaching which will stabilize the church and restore it to its proper role and function towards the world? 

Overall, what he is writing is about “how people ought to conduct themselves in God’s household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth” (1 Ti 3:15). Central to this will be the “noble task” of the overseer. This is why he draws attention to this aspiration. But what should the overseer be like? The qualities to which Paul refers in chapter 3 are familial, relational, qualities (beginning with being “the husband of but one wife” — Lynn H. Cohick, Women in the World of the Earliest Christians, gives examples of polygamous marriages around this time). And this is why Paul has first had to deal with the individual qualities of men and women, addressing their weaknesses and failings.

Significantly, Paul did not go straight from the false teachers of chapter 1 to the ‘noble overseers’ of chapter 3. If he had, then those who thought of themselves as possible candidates to replace the false teachers might not have seen the faults prevalent throughout the whole church and, no doubt, affecting themselves. First, he has to recall the church to its true task of seeking the salvation of all people — this is why Christ died for sinners (1:15), and this is what God wants for everyone (2:4). The aspiring bishop must first know that is purpose behind the task to which he aspires.

The discussion of men and women is introduced first in this context. Before Paul can talk about the households from which the leaders should be drawn, he must talk about the failings of the men and women who individually and collectively comprise those households.

The failings of the men were addressed in 2:8 by the command to them to be leading in prayer, not taking up their time in the business of disputing amongst themselves.

The instructions to the women begin in 2:9 with a call to ‘clothe themselves’ appropriately. The English translations treat this first of all as a literal instruction about dress: “I also want women to dress modestly ...” (NIV). However, the section ends with an instruction which is clearly metaphorical: “... [dress] with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God” (2:10). 2:9, referring to the mode of dress also uses a word which is used at the end of v15 with reference to the manner of life: “propriety”.

Moreover, the verb translated “dress” elsewhere means “adorn”, “make oneself beautiful”:

For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. (1 Pe 3:5, NB Peter refers to the godly qualities of the women as the means to this beautifying.)

I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. (Re 21:2)

I would suggest, then, that Paul begins his admonition to the women by calling on them to beautify themselves with the qualities of modesty (NIV “decency”) and propriety (not to ‘dress down’ with ‘modest clothing’) and to compliment this with outward “good deeds”. It is these qualities, not expensive clothing and hairstyles, which the women of the church should ‘display’ to the world, because they ought to accompany a profession of godliness (2:10). In other words, Paul does not encourage ‘dowdiness’, but he does encourage personal qualities as the thing which should be most sought after and most noticeable amongst the Christian women.

Secondly, what women are learning about the gospel should also not lead to them being a ‘disruptive’ force. In those times women sometimes did learn ‘esoteric’ subjects, such as religion and philosophy (see Cohick, op cit). As we see later, however (5:13), some were not putting this new learning to good use.

Such instruction and learning, however, generally took place in the home or homes of disciples (see 2 Tim 3:6), and would have been much more personal than the situations we tend to envisage when we think of ‘teaching’. And one thing Paul does not allow is that (at very least in that context) a woman should instruct a man.

Why not? Modesty and propriety might have something to do with it, but so too does the fundamental relationship of men and women. It is possible that Paul means no woman should instruct any man. It seems more likely, however, that he means no wife should instruct her husband (NB the change from plural to singular: “a woman to teach or to have authority over a man”), or perhaps (also?) someone else’s husband.

For Paul, Adam and Eve are the archetypal ‘couple’ (compare 1 Cor 11:3-12; Eph 5:31). In the creation order, Eve was formed as the companion to Adam and (as Eph 5 indicates) their relationship ought to have modelled or imaged that of Christ and the Church, just as every marriage ought to now. The Fall, moreover, entailed some reversal of this ordering. Adam “listened to” (ie obeyed) his wife (Ge 3:17) — and apparently was silent when the encounter with the snake took place (Ge 3:6). There is thus not only an impropriety in a woman exercising authority over a man but a danger in the man being on the receiving end of this.

In the context, we should, I suggest, see this as addressing the issue of what godly families should be like, and indeed Paul ends with a reference to such. The meaning of ‘being saved through childbearing’ is difficult, but most likely it refers to the life of the godly household and partnership. In 5:10, the godly widow is “well known for her good deeds, such as bringing up children (teknotropheō, compare 2:15, teknogonia)”.

In short, we have here instructions for the example women should set in the community and the life they should lead in the family.

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Should internet commentators use their real names?

I've just noticed The Guardian is running a piece on this here.

Personally I'm with the writer who says this:

Why should people be allowed to post anonymously? I'm damned if I know. I've always found it sinister. In the Agatha Christie novels I loved as a child, the anonymous letter was a standard trope for evil in an otherwise ordered and safe community. Those who advocate web anonymity seem able only to marshall the most feeble of arguments in its favour.

A while ago I used to post comments anonymously - and I could see the point in it if there were a serious discussion going on where it might be appropriate to try out radical ideas you didn't want everyone quoting as 'your' view, or where you wanted people to read the remark carefully rather than judge by the contributor (so avoiding the ad hominem reaction).

But the fact is, the only general 'value' in anonymity seems to be that it can mask people's identity whilst they're being rude.

I've tried various ways to get people to comply with this (see the note in italics) and I still can't understand why, especially on a Christian blog, people want to be able to post comments but not own up to them - but there you go.

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Hospital phone charges

I wonder if anyone else has had this experience.

I've just opened our monthly phone bill (on the envelope it says, "Don't worry, this is from Talk Talk") to discover our bill for this month is over £114! The reason? My wife's father has had an extended stay in hospital and she has been ringing him on his NHS provided bedside phone. What she and I didn't realize is that this costs the caller 50p per minute.

The result is that about 160 minutes of call time translated into £80 on the bill.

So if its your relatives in hospital, let 'em sit there, I say.

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The Bishop of Chelmsford and Human Sexuality — here we go again?

Long-term readers of this blog, and that under the heading Chelmsford Anglican Mainstream, can hardly have been ignorant of the significant difficulties experienced by conservatives and traditionalists in the Diocese of Chelmsford caused by former Bishop John Gladwin’s stance on human sexuality.

Bishop John was, amongst other things, a patron of the campaign group ‘Changing Attitude’. The fact that he took up this position in 2006, whilst already in difficult face-to-face discussions with representatives of those conservative and traditionalists in his own diocese did much to heighten the tension.

The stance of Changing Attitude, incidentally, may be gathered from the following comments in its Tenth Anniversary Report on the ideas put forward in a book titled Same Sex Intimacies: Families of choice and other life experiments:

Social changes are affecting both non-heterosexual and heterosexual lives alike, underpinned by a widely accepted friendship ethic in which men and women who have rejected the ‘heterosexual assumption’ are creating ways of being that point to a more diverse culture of relationships than law, tradition and the church have sanctioned. [...] Many individuals in contemporary society have a strong sense that opportunities now exist on a greater scale than ever before for the construction of more open and democratic relationships than are allowed by the traditional family.

The disquiet with Bishop John’s approach began before his appointment to Chelmsford. Interviewed on Channel 4 news at the time of Gene Robinson’s election, Bishop John was asked rather directly, ‘Either a practising homosexual is to be appointed as a bishop or he is not. Which way should it go?’

His reply was thus:

Well, that’s just exactly the sort of way not to approach this problem and this issue. If this move is something which is good to the Holy Spirit ... um ... and to the people of God, it will flourish. If it isn’t then time will wither it upon the vine. So I think we need to exercise a little bit of patience and to allow some space to see whether a development like this is going to be wholesome to the Church or otherwise.

The response of many us would be, well we’ve waited and now we know.

As a Diocese, therefore, Chelmsford does therefore have ‘form’ with regard to the position of incoming bishops on the issue of human sexuality and their comments to the press. It was thus with some concern that I read the following in the Church of England Newspaper for April 1^st, regarding newly-elected Bishop Stephen Cottrell’s views on Bishop James Jones’s recent highly controversial remarks to the Liverpool Diocesan Synod:

Bishop Cottrell said: “I think it was a very helpful and interesting contribution to the ongoing discussion. I think one of the things which probably distresses me the most is that we’re not very good at actually having an open discussion about these issues. It can often be a kind of megaphone diplomacy, or megablog diplomacy!”

‘Helpful and interesting’ was certainly not how Bishop Jones’s remarks were regarded in conservative and traditionalist circles — ‘alarming and divisive’ would be more like it, especially when one takes into account Bishop Jones’s apparent attempt to position his diocese halfway between Africa and TEC (and therefore not with the rest of the Church of England!)

The really difficult point to accept, however, is Bishop Stephen’s assertion that there has been a lack of ‘open discussion’. On the contrary, one sometimes feels there has been discussion about almost nothing else for more than a decade. I myself was on a working party, put together by the Bishop of Chelmsford before John Gladwin, which drew up a study document on this subject for use around the parishes.

In any case, one must ask whether more discussion is what is required. It has long struck me that the first ‘dialogue’ in Scripture, recorded in Genesis 3, did not end well for the human race — and that one also began with the famous word, “Has God indeed said ...?”

Bishop Cottrell is well-known as a member of the Liberal Catholic body ‘Affirming Catholicism’, which also includes Dean Jeffrey John amongst its members. It is perfectly reasonable to ask about the Bishop, therefore, what it is in the ‘AffCath’ approach to life and faith that he finds particularly appealing. It is also reasonable to ask, since he has called for “open discussion” what exactly he thinks on the subject of human sexuality and how and why he has reached these opinions.

The truth is, though, that I wish it were unnecessary.

John P Richardson
17 April 2010

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Antony Garrard Newton Flew, died 8 April 2010

I was very sorry to read today of the death of my old professor of philosophy, Antony (Tony) Flew.

I only knew Professor Flew for a short time, whilst I was a student at Keele University between 1968 and ’72, but although I didn’t realize it at the time, he would have a massive influence on my life.

In those days, Keele University still held to the bright vision of its founders, that a proper and rounded education should introduce students to every field of human knowledge. Thus, all courses were Joint Honours, spread over three years, and in addition, all students were required to take the full Foundation Year course.

Every weekday morning of ‘FY’, students would therefore attend two lectures by a member of one of the faculties, beginning (as I recall) with Astronomy and Physics, and proceeding via History, Biology, Politics, American Studies, Psychology and, of course, Philosophy at the hands of the good Professor himself.

My chief memory of him at this stage is his dismissal of the existence of God whilst standing on one leg with his foot propped up on the front of the podium in order to tie his shoelace. It was rip-roaring stuff, and (as with all the FY lectures) I only with that I’d paid more attention.

In addition to studying almost literally every subject under the sun, FY students were required to read two ‘Sessional’ subjects, at least one of which had to be outside their main area of study. One of my chosen Sessionals, for want of a better idea, was philosophy. And thus it was that I found myself struggling with propositional logic and the works of David Hume.

It was in the third term, in 1969, that we got to meet the great man, and one sleepy morning I presented a seminar paper that I had been up all night writing and which, to be honest, I scarcely understood myself. All the way through, however, Professor Flew kept stopping and observing that I’d made a good or important point, etc. I’d determined to drop philosophy at the first opportunity, but when the essay came back marked, it not only scored well, but had a short note at the end where Professor Flew expressed his hope that I would continue the subject in the second year. Flattery, it turned out, can get even a philosopher quite a long way, and so I continued into my first ‘Principal’ year with the Philosophy of Science as one of my two ‘Subsidiaries’.

And how glad I am now that I did, for those two years of philosophy, even for someone who worked as clumsily and reluctantly as myself, were invaluable in teaching me to think. And it was this, more than anything else, which laid the foundations for my later study of theology — even though in this subject I was an equally slow learner!

At the end of the second year, driven more by the fear of failure than a love of the subject, I gained a ‘distinction’ in the philosophy course. A few days later, I found in my pigeon hole (and have in front of me now) a short note of congratulations, signed by Professor Flew himself.

There was one another way, however, in which Professor Flew was also an unintentional influence on my life. He was, of course, famously and overtly an atheist. At the same time, one of our other Professors, Donald MacKay, who led the pioneering Department of Information, was a keen Christian.

As a young student, as yet undecided about Christianity, it was obvious to me that both men were of vastly superior intellects to my own, and yet each had come to an entirely different conclusion about the Christian faith. The one thing this told me was that finding the answer as to whether Christianity was true or not could not depend on mere intelligence. If people a lot smarter than me could not agree, it was no good thinking I could wait until I was smart enough to work it out!

The decision I reached, on a late August afternoon in 1971, was not irrational, but neither was it the fruit of an intellectual journey. It was, rather, almost a case of having nowhere else to turn: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

Ironically, in his final years Professor Flew’s intellect seems to have persuaded him into a form of Deism. Some have been infuriated by this ‘lapse’. For myself, I think any suggestions that this reflected a fading of his powers is patronizing in the extreme. He was clear that this was his own, reasoned, viewpoint. Yet he was equally clear that this was not the same as accepting the revealed faith of his Methodist father.

Personally, I respected the man and I respect his decision. I must hope, though, that his intellectual conviction may have been accompanied, at another level, by a relational suasion towards the person of God.

John Richardson
15 April 2010

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Sunset at Blakeney

(Click the image for a larger view.)

The sunset has to be one of the classic 'themes' of visual art. (Sunrises are less so. Is this because artists don't like getting up early?) As I was taking this, I found myself musing on the reasons for this popularity. I wonder if it is because a sunset is not only beautiful in terms of its colours, but also evocative regarding the passage of time.

Sunset, as compared to sunrise, is an ending of another day, which itself takes each of us nearer to the end of life itself. Indeed, it takes us nearer the end of time. I remember many years ago as a child walking with my family on a beach with an astonishingly calm sea lapping the sand, and my father said that it reminded him of the scene in H G Wells's The Time Machine, where the traveller finds himself millions of years in the future, on an ancient earth orbiting a dying sun. As you can tell, his comment and the imagery made a deep impression!

In Genesis also, the transformative 'ending' comes in the evening: "And the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day ..."

What should have been a joyful encounter marked, instead, the end of the first 'Sabbath rest' (begun in Genesis 2:3). From here on, it has all been wandering "in the land of Nod, east of Eden". But "there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God," and so the sunset also marks, as my first vicar's wife used to say as she moved the ironing out of the living room, "a day's march nearer home".


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I'm sorry, I'll read that again

From The Independent:

"Man admits having sex with horse and donkey"

"Requesting he be released on bail, [defence counsel Amar Mehta] said: 'The defendant does not have a stable address although he says his daughter can provide an address.'"

Presumably that would just be in a house or flat.


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Venus and Mercury

Just had a pleasant week away at Blakeney in Norfolk, during which I managed to shoot this picture on Thursday night of Venus and Mercury in conjunction at sunset (7.30pm, looking west). Click on the picture above for a full-size version.

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Happy Eater

I just can't help remembering them at this time of year!

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Mark Ashton: Sorrow and Joy

It was with a mixture of sorrow and joy that I heard a few minutes ago about the death of Mark Ashton, the vicar of St Andrew the Great in Cambridge.

Sorrow, because there is always sorrow in death, in the suffering of sickness and the separation from loved ones. Joy, because, as I am always reminded by the words of 1 Thessalonians 4:13, we are not to “grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope.”

Mark was definitely one of those who, faced with his terminal diagnosis, could say with the Apostle Paul, “I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better” (Philippians 1:23).

My first recollections of Mark were at a meeting back in the early seventies. I think this was the one where I had my ‘Bateman’ moment, as “The evangelical who didn’t know where All Soul’s church was.” (Well, I just didn’t — there’s a first time for everything!)

Mark was, then and later, a lot of things I wasn’t — big, loud, confident, very much of the ‘public school’ Iwerne Camp model (though I’ve no idea whether he actually went to public school or saw the inside of a Iwerne Camp).

To be honest, I found him a bit intimidating. I could also find him a bit irritating. He didn’t seem to have much time for the ‘sophistications’ of church politics or wider strategy.

Mark was a ‘simple preacher’ and a gospel man through and through — which is not a bad thing, but could sometimes be frustrating. I remember at a clergy conference some years ago suggesting that evangelicals ought to involve themselves strategically in diocesan synods, etc. “Yes brother,” he replied, “Preach the gospel, just preach the gospel.” (Rarely can a ‘yes’ have had quite the same meaning of its precise opposite!)

Well, I still think he could have had a different vision at this point, but his work at St Andrew’s produced one of those flag-ship congregations which have been a feature of the English evangelical Anglican tradition at its best.

Mark would undoubtedly have attributed it all to the grace of God. And of course he was right. But as 2 Timothy 2:20-21 reminds us,

... in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonourable. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honourable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.

Mark was, without doubt, “a vessel for honourable use”. He has left us an example to follow, and a legacy in which to rejoice.

Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day, and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing. (2 Timothy 4:8)

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Help with Genesis

I have been working for some time on a project to do a short, practical commentary on Genesis 1-4. I've done the standard commentaries, and have a grasp of the general issues. The trouble is, I can't find much to read that is really stimulating - something that fires the imagination, rather than simply goes over the text (again)!

Has anyone who reads this blog read anything on Genesis - a book or an article, or even something online - which has really made them sit up and take notice? I'm thinking of things like J V Fesko's Last Things First - something which might throw up some new ideas.

If you have, please notify me with a comment. If you want to say why you commend it, that would also be helpful.

John R

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Lovelock: Trying to save the planet 'is a lot of nonsense'

I was actually quite impressed when I read James Lovelock's Gaia a few years ago. Forget the New Age stuff you may have heard, or assumed, about Gaia as a 'Mother Goddess'. His was a perfectly sensible theory about the nature of an ecosphere (and, incidentally, I think he is spot on about detecting life on other planets - just look for entropy reduction and the signs for this in an 'unsustainable' atmosphere).

Here he is being interviewed by the BBC - with some sobering things to say about climate change and our response to it. And here is a link to the whole interview.

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Some of these must be wrong

Yes, it's that time of year again. Some of the following headlines are untrue. Some of them just ought to be. I'll let you decide.

UPDATE: Labour's election strategy: bring on no-nonsense hard man Gordon Brown

Ferrets key to bridging the digital divide between cities and rural areas

Mormons: ‘We don’t want Bible bashers’

Parole chief: release more prisoners

Hadron Collider II planned for the Circle Line

Condoms can help on poverty - Catholic leader

Airborne Association: Flying to the rescue of stranded motorists, the AA rocketmen

England, the sick woman of Europe: Our poor cancer detection and bad diet mean Slovenian women live longer

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