Thought for the Week

We have resumed Ascension’s Bible Study and we tend to ‘scratch the itch’ in terms of the topics we study whether that be biblical, confessional, doctrinal, ethical, historical, or practical – what do people want to study, know about, talk about? I was asked to prepare something on the liturgy – its history and function […]

What’s funny? A man walks into a bar. Ouch. (You were expecting something else?! 🙂 ) I have chuckled at the bulletin notice – sometimes seen on church noticeboards – ‘Don’t let worry kill you. Let the Church help.’ 🙂 No doubt we’ve heard that epistles are the wives of the apostles or about the […]

Last weekend wasn’t my ‘shining hour’ liturgy-wise. I presided at four Divine Services using three Settings. I could almost hear the advocates of only ever using the one liturgical setting smirking. It wasn’t that I did anything liturgically wrong, chanted a heresy or the like, but I was conscious that I occasionally stumbled over a […]

The Sea Cadets have returned to their outdoor activities this week. I recorded Divisional Pray-ers for Facebook from Lake Lackford on Monday by putting the laptop on the roof of the car! Everything is very much the same – scenery, boats, flora and fauna, sails, rigging, my uniform, the message and prayers I said – […]

Are you watching The Olympics? Yes, they’re happening but I find I’m dipping in and out of them and catching up on the summaries, the little video clips, the news articles, and of course the medal tallies. As everyone is saying, ‘This is a different Olympics, that’s for sure’. But I did listen to the […]

I’ve been thinking about how we live and what people draw on to make the decisions. We all draw on trust and knowledge of the world and they are the background to our decisions and our behaviour. Whether the trust is in a person or people or social systems or religion or phi-losophy – and […]

‘No restrictions on communal worship.’ That’s how the news broadcasts are describing the situation in England. And that is good news we’d all say! I’m waiting for the fine print from the GOV.UK website to know whether there are any caveats. We wait and see. In the meantime, however, is it true that there are […]

My devotion at yesterday’s Reading Day … The Lord be with you. [Read 1 Corinthians 12:31 – 13:13] This reading is found in the 3 year lectionary and in the one year lectionary so it must be worth hearing where Paul is writing to his fractious congregation – a former missionary pastor writing to people […]

Ecclesiology. It means words about the ecclesia which is a group of people – in ancient Greece, it was about civics and politics, a group of citizens – and it is a word that has come to be used in the Church to describe the people of God and how they are Church and how […]