I have to admit that I can no longer get too worked up about politicians saying the kinds of things that Robert Jenrick said about Handsworth yesterday. It’s power for the cause for politicians to engage in dog whistle politics. More concerning is that they use the dog whistle approach because they expect it will… Continue reading Please don’t stay silent …one further reflection on that Robert Jenrick comment about Birmingham
Posts
The Bible and immigration/ asylum
I recently saw a comment from someone to the effect that the big challenge with the current migrant/small boat crisis is a lack of Biblical teaching on the subject for the church. I agree that there needs to be more careful Biblical discussion and teaching but we also need to be aware of some pitfalls… Continue reading The Bible and immigration/ asylum
Integration, ethnicity and our responsibility ,- responding to Robert Jenrick
Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick has got himself into a spot of bother making comments about Handsworth, an area just down the road from us in Birmingham. He was caught in tape observing that he did not see a single white face there and went further by identifying this as an example of failure to… Continue reading Integration, ethnicity and our responsibility ,- responding to Robert Jenrick
October 7th Lest we forget
Today is the 2nd anniversary of the atrocity committed by Hamas, an antisemitic terrorist organisation. There are still many Israelis grieving the loss of loved ones. There are still many with physical and emotional scars because of the violence they suffered. There are still hostages that have not been allowed to go home to their… Continue reading October 7th Lest we forget
Baptism: What about those with a learning disability?
Recently in a conversation about when to baptise (paedobaptism or credobelievers’ baptism), one of the questions that came from a paedobaptist was: “What would you do about an adult with a learning disability?” The presumption seemed to be that this would be a barrier to baptism. It seems to align with a perception that credo-bapfists… Continue reading Baptism: What about those with a learning disability?
Were those demonstrations okay?
On Thursday, a terrorist attacked a synagogue on the Jewish holy day, Yom Kippur. On Thursday evening, Friday and Saturday, demonstrations went ahead against Israel despite the police and politicians appealing for them not to. A big concern regarding the regular demonstrations about Israel has been that legitimate protest about Israel’s actions in Gaza so… Continue reading Were those demonstrations okay?
sharing life, sharing Jesus
Over the summer, our church ran a series on Evangelism called “Sharing life, sharing Jesus”. Partly because we could not cover everything we would have liked to in this short series and partly because I thought the materials might be useful to others, here is a set of video talks going over some of the… Continue reading sharing life, sharing Jesus
You aren’t faithfully loving people by staying in a burning building with them
I’ve been desperately trying to think of a way that gets a message across with urgency. I’ve also been desperately trying to find ways to say that without offending friends. So several times I’ve come close to saying that you are not really providing for and protecting a flock by detaining them at a wolf… Continue reading You aren’t faithfully loving people by staying in a burning building with them
Approaching October 7th – some reflections on Israel Hamas and antisemitism
We are approaching the 2nd anniversary of the October 7th attacks by Hamas on Israel. Since then, Israel have been involved in an ongoing military attack into Gaza which started as an effort to free the hostages taken but has become more than that, an existential struggle to try and destroy Hamas completely. Here are… Continue reading Approaching October 7th – some reflections on Israel Hamas and antisemitism
If you don’t like the choice of Archbishop, remember the principles were conceded a long time ago
There are two primary reasons why conservative evangelicals within the Church of England might object to the new Archbishop of Canterbury. They may object due to gender and due to theology Let’s deal with them in turn. The gender issue is the more complex and in fact should be the lesser in importance. It’s important… Continue reading If you don’t like the choice of Archbishop, remember the principles were conceded a long time ago
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