Andrew Lightbown Theore0 Talking of ‘thy kingdom come.’
Meg Warner ViaMedia.News Trauma, Churches & People’s Rites
Richard Kellow Church Times Questions for Fresh Expressions
“The closure of a pioneer ministry prompts searching observations from Richard Kellow”
Malcolm Brown Church Times Society needs us to be Anglican, not sectarian
“The C of E’s ability to hold together different points of view has much to teach politicians, says Malcolm Brown”
Peter Hitchens First Things Latimer and Ridley are forgotten
“A Protestant understanding of England’s Martyrs”
Thank you Andrew Lightbown. Something about the “thy kingdom come” initiative has sat uneasily with me and I’ve struggled to work out what it is. Two discernments have been: a) the language – why not “your kingdom come” – which is how the Lord’s Prayer is spoken in my church – so what is the audience for “thy”? and far more importantly b) the worry about being Pharisees who publicly draw attention to their prayer and piety instead of getting on with the kingdom actions prayer demands of us. So yes, I still think we should be humble about our… Read more »
Peter Hitchens can certainly write well. Whew.
I appreciated Meg Warner’s article. It reminded me of various occasions – of local rather than national significance – when colleagues and I have had a role in helping a community or a group within it to deal with tragedy. Several of these occurred when I was a university chaplain. When a student was murdered I helped the students organise e amen trial service – her funeral of course was in her hometown – and later supported her family and friends through the 3-week murder trial. No member of the unive3rsity staff was able to give up 3 weeks to… Read more »
Hitchens’ article was quite interesting. His diatribe in the last few paragraphs, especially about the non-use of the BCP and the King James Bible, among other things was unfortunate. However, the rest of the article was a helpful corrective to much of the misinformation that passes as fact. He is entitled to his opinion, but the facts he presents should stand alone, rather than being used to reinforce his point of view.
THere’s a valuable piece by Meg Warner on the aftermath of coping with tragedy: https://tragedyandcongregations.org.uk/2017/11/29/tragedy-and-clergy-self-care-the-heroic-phase/
Spurgeon identified these sorts of times as ‘the minister’s fainting fits’. It’s the valley after the mountaintop that Elijah experienced after his victory over the prophets of Baal on Mt. Horeb.
Warner gives some useful tips for dealing with it.
Already read Hitchens’ piece via his blog, but glad to see it pop up here, very thorough, & deserves all the clicks it can get. Whether you agree with his Burkean conservative POV or not, there’s undoubtedly been a seismic move away from a collective Protestant heritage, not just in England, but across the Anglosphere. Many, more oppressively Puritan, aspects needed to be left behind, but others, such self-sacrifice, commitment to duty, and restraint, had much to recommend them, and shouldn’t have been discarded so casually. Regardless, good to see the contemporary political background of the martyrs highlighted. It wasn’t… Read more »
It is important to realise that the Hitchins piece appears in First Things, a Catholic oriented conservative publication likely to accept the views on catholic/Anglican atrocity equivalency he is going after. The editor, a good friend, Rusty Reno, is a former Episcopalian having converted to the RCC more than a decade ago. He was once a delegate to the GC before he left.
I have only just printed Peter Hitchens’ article and look forward to reading and pondering it. Thank you as always for bringing so much to our attention. But I would note in passing that in the short reign of Edward VI, Cranmer and his colleagues in court sentenced to death by burning simple Bible Christians.