News, views, links and resources from David, a local preacher in the Birmingham West and Oldbury Circuit of the Methodist Church (UK).
This site is unofficial and does not always represent the views of the Methodist Church. Methodist Local Preachers in the UK are trained, examined, and unpaid, normally working in secular occupations.
One of my Ministerial friends has introduced me to the world of stamp collecting- and an entirely new angle on Methodist blogging!
He is a member of a site called http://www.myphitalely.com/ which is a sort of facebook for stamp collectors. During Lent and the twelve days of Christmas he plans to blog some examples from his collection of seasonal stamps together with the Christmas message. The blog can be found here. Locals will recognise the beard!
"Theo" explains how to use the site to the best advantage: "If people go to http://www.myphilately.com/ they can access the site's Gallery by clicking on the "Friends" tab and then clicking "Gallery".This accesses everybodys uploaded images, the latest first. I am uploading images of one Christmas issue a day until Jan 6th. Furthermore, if instead of clicking "Gallery" they click "stamp albums" they will get a gallery of available albums. If my one, "Christmas", "owner theo", is clicked they get just my christmas images and no others.
Theo is clearly getting a lot out of this interest, he adds "http://www.myphilately.com/ is of course worldwide and I have friends in my network from all over."
I'll put a link on the sidebar as a blog I watch. Please pass the word on.
This is how I spent four hours of my life today when I stood in for one of the world's most famous celebrities.
His fans came out in their hundreds, well twenties, and I quickly learnt a thing or two.
First of all, if you are in a multi-ethnic area and ask the children their names, don't repeat them back because you get it wrong!
Secondly when you ask them if they have been good all year don't be surprised when they reply with an answer that is evidently not true.
Thirdly when you ask them what they want for Christmas, again don't repeat it back. Just nod sagely and say "I will see what I can do".
Finally watch out for the worldly wise. One wanted to know if he could see my reindeer, another rather implied that I was an impostor!
A third child went round the back of the grotto and helped himself to an extra present.
All in all an exhausting day which raised a few pounds and gave us a little more contact with an ever changing local community.
No I don't believe in Father Christmas and certainly didn't teach my children there was a Santa. As I get older I find my beliefs compromised! Bah humbug!
Reminder: Our first Christmas Fayre today at City Road Methodist Church, Birmingham. We open at 4 and close at 8. Some of you may recognise Father Christmas! Pop in and give us a little encouragement!
It may be the season to be jolly, but for Britain's growing number of problem gamblers Advent and the run-up to Christmas expenses will be yet another cause of misery.
Britain's problem gambling is now so serious that scarce National Health Service resources are being diverted into a new clinic complete with child-care facilities.
Sadly, for reasons that have been rehearsed on this blog many times, the Methodist Church is totally compromised. Our Public Affairs Department send out shed loads of media releases about issues we can do little to influence such as climate change, but are unable to comment on a problem that impinges on practically every British community that Methodist churches seek to serve.
Mothers addicted to gambling are to be offered free childcare in an attempt to tackle the growing problem. The National Problem Gambling Clinic in Soho — the NHS's only such facility — is offering free childminding while the women are treated.
Dr Henrietta Bowden-Jones, who heads the clinic, said the demands of childcare and the stigma attached to addiction made it harder for women to seek treatment.
The Gambling Commission estimates there are 250,000 problem gamblers in Britain, but Gambler Anonymous thinks it is nearer 600,000. Evidence indicates the number of women with problems has doubled in recent years, and they now make up a quarter of addicts.
Experts blame that statistic on the explosion of online gaming. The internet has made gambling more accessible because casinos tend not to be female-friendly while women can now play in the comfort of their home.
Dr Bowden-Jones said some women were playing up to 10 hours a day online. The psychiatrist and addictions expert added: “Women are playing online when their partners are at work then shut down the web when their husbands come home. It's made easy for you as long as you have a credit card.
“There are sites which are targeting women. But the children are placed in front of the TV so the children are not getting the emotional nurturing. By offering childcare, women can get treatment and know their children will be looked after and don't have to tell anyone where they are going.”
The clinic, at the Soho Centre for Health in Frith Street, was set up after concerns from experts that there was no dedicated NHS centre for addicts. Since opening last September, the centre has treated 290 patients but only about a dozen have been women.
Dr Bowden-Jones appealed for women problem gamblers to come forward.
Those in their twenties and thirties who need to bury the pain of depression or trauma are most at risk of addiction. She said: “Women problem gamblers have different emotional issues from men. Often they're depressed and gambling is a way of numbing the pain. They gain a short-time high.”
How websites are betting on women
Casino and poker websites are attracting large numbers of women with “female friendly” gimmicks — including Barbie pink colour schemes, “hunk of the month” pin-ups and gambling horoscopes.
There are an estimated 2,000 gambling websites, and an increasing number are exploiting the fact women feel safer playing online. The age profile for female online gamblers is 25 to 34, according to a recent Gambling Commission survey.
Simon Collins, director of Cashcade, which runs getmintedbingo.com, says it has an 80 per cent female audience.
I must admit I thought my article on Church Finances which appeared in the Methodist Recorder a couple of weeks ago would disappear without trace. However I'm delighted to see that it struck a chord with at least one reader, Richard Gould, who writes this week:
"How refreshing to read such a succinct and realistic article on church finances.
My own church, facing a finacial crisis several years ago, implemented TRIO - The Responsibility is Ours - and very successfully transformed our income to enable us to pay our assessment from weekly offerings and Gift Aid.
The 80/20 rule applies to us as well and sadly offereings are now on decline again.
The sad thing is that a minority of Methodists will read this article and few will take the message to heart."
I did like Richard's concept of TRIO and may use it in future fundraising. I suspect that many life long Methodist just take the finances of the church for granted.
So the bosses of RBS, bailed out by us the taxpayer, have threatened to resign if they can't give themselves big bonuses.
This surely should be a no brainer. Let them resign. Let's turn RBS into a mutual or coperative run for the benefit of the commununity rather than these self styled "masters of the universe".
Once again the pain of Ministerial re-stationing has been the focus of much of this evening's edition of BBC's An Island Parish. Regular readers of this blog will know that long before any of tonight's episode had been filmed the Rev David Easton had already been re-stationed to a circuit in Aberystwyth.
Sadly the film makers have left out this crucial detail and given the impression that David was still "job hunting". Good for drama, bad for the facts and the the image of Methodism. As one of our former Ministers, the Reverend Martin Freeman, used to tell us, whatever the outcome of the circuit vote "the Methodist Church has to provide me with a house and a car". David Easton was not in the process of being made unemployed. He is guaranteed a position elsewhere. Not many secular employers give such an undertaking.
Nor has the programme explained that the Isles of Scilly will not be left without a Methodist Minister. There is a well tried and tested process for replacing Ministers. This is a continual process with about 12-20% of ministers changing station each year. I don't think this point has been made in the programme. By the time this current series was filmed in early summer 2009 the replacement would have almost certainly have visited the islands and met the local Methodist community. Much of what has been shown is normal procedure and is never know or understood outside the walls of the Methodist Church.
There are some powerful lessons for the Methodist Church to learn from this exposure of our stationing system and the itinerant ministry.
However the image of Methodism was certainly improved by the actions of Steve Wild, the Chair of the Cornwall District. In earlier programmes last year he seemed a bit at sea in handling the difficulties. During this series he is much more relaxed. He is especially fortunate to have the help and support of Clarence, though quite how Clarence will go down with the Scillonians is something we will find out next week.
By chance I met Steve during the summer, (that's he and I with the Minister at Polzeath above) and even had a chance to mention this blog, which apparently he hasn't seen. I came away with the distinct impression that he loves God and God's people. This was certainly evident this evening and I have a feeling that this story will have a happy ending.
If you wish to know more about this story click the label below marked "An Island Parish"
In the past I've gently tiptoed into the difficult waters of Muslim construction projects especially when the early morning call to prayer is imposed on a wider now-Muslim population. I certainly don't believe that the minarets now being built in many local communities are intended to be silent forever.
This is not a clear cut issue balancing the right to privacy and peace by some sections of the community against the right of others to practice and proclaim their faith. This is clearly an issue which will be exploited by those who seek confrontation on all sides.
I've never been to Switzerland but I am told that the Swiss are not quite the tolerant people often imagined. The reports of the Swiss plebiscite on the construction of minarets represents a worrying and sinister development. This seems to be something of a non-issue in Switzerland. What is disturbing is that the final result apparently contradicted the expectations of the opinion pollsters with more people actually voting for the ban than had been admitted to in polling.
Earlier this year this blog exclusively drew attention to the wining and dining of the body that supposedly oversees Britain's gambling "industry" by the very people they are supposed to regulate.
I asked for an updated version of the hospitality register and immediately met a wall of silence from this ever so secretive organisation (their meetings are still closed to the public).
Suddenly this morning, more than seven months late their hospitality register appears on their website. I must say that this year it look a little thinner with a few less provocative examples of "hospitality". But on another day I will do a more detailed analysis.
So what has provoked this sudden outburst of openness and accountability? Could it be because Philip Davies the MP for Shipley has put down a parliamentary question on this self same subject? An FOI request from a Methodist Preacher is treated with contempt. A parliamentary question suddenly creates action this very day!
Incidentally when I published the daily pay of the Commissioners, one expressed her concern to me that that she was listed as earning £666 per day and that one of the published comments lightheartedly referred to the significance of 666. Well actually by an amazing coincidence the listed telephone number for the Gambling Commission ends in 666!
I spent yesterday at a very interesting conference on communications, part of which was devoted to digital comms and social media - that's blogging, facebook, twitter, message boards, youtube and the like. There are some highly paid posts being created in top companies as they struggle to come to terms with these new, and potentially anarchic, channels.
This morning I was reminded of the power and reach of something as simple as this blog. In 2007 I carried a post about a Remembrance Sunday I led at Sandon Road Methodist Church. I had researched the soldiers who were listed on the memorial in the former church building. This morning I was very touched to get a comment from the great nephew of one of the men which I have published.
I see that the author of the comment now lives in Philadelphia but today he is able to make a link with a church in the UK with which his great grandparents were involved 90 years ago. Not so long ago, and I mean as little as ten years ago, such a link would have involved a personal visit and some research.
In another ten years we will look upon this decade as being the very first few tentative steps into a new world of communication, the equivalent of the first TV broadcasts for London from Alexandra Palace in the 1930s.
How do we share our faith in the 21st Century? City Road Methodist Church is to host a one day Birmingham Methodist District course on Saturday 23 January 2010.
It starts at 9.30 am for 10.00 am with a 4.00 pm finish. A simple bread and soup lunch will be provided plus lots of tea and coffee throughout the day.
This course will be a pilot for a Connexional resource to be published next year. Pre-registration is essential. Details on the City Road Methodist Church website.
John Moss in this morning's Guardian. a self designated "lost cause"describes an encounter with the Archbishop of York. Well worth a read, though at times the article seems to be more about Moss than Sentamu.
Meanwhile over in theDaily Telegraph Melanie McDonagh neatly sums up the lack of vision and sense of unreality engulfing much of Christendom:
'While Islam is making the running when it comes to reaching out to the unconverted, Anglicans and Catholics seem engaged in a zero-sum game about which of them attracts a few hundred disaffected Anglo-Catholics.'
In recent weeks I have been mentioning some of the things we have been doing at City Road Methodist Church in Birmingham to regenerate our congregation.
For a variety of reasons attendance has fallen over recent years and there was a feeling of demoralisation and discouragement. On some occasions in the summer and early autumn we struggled to get into double figures.
A new team of stewards, together with our Minister, have been pondering how we can encourage more people to attend and engage with the local community.
We also thought through how to make our windows that face onto a main road into a shop front for church activities.
It is still early days yet but we have been greatly encouraged. This morning total attendance was 27, if we include the beat police people who popped in for a cup of tea at the end of the service.
Two things seem to be happening. Firstly the signs of activity have encouraged some of our long standing members to come more often. Several have remarked that there seem to be more people around and they like that. Secondly we have had several people who have recently moved to the area joining our services. This appears to be in response to the leafletting.
As I say, it is early days, but it does seem that this initial effort is paying off. There is still much to do. Several members have set up a community choir and we hope this will provide links into the community. In December we have our very first Christmas Fayre for at least forty years. In January we are hosting a District faith sharing course.
Our simple belief is that decline is not inevitable. A long way to go, but some early encouragement. If you are anywhere near Birmingham and currently churchless feel free to join us and be part of the regeneration.
Another Methodist blogger, John Cooper, has joined us in the town of a thousand trades. Like all who gome and live in Birmingham, after just a few weeks he has become a Brummie (jusst like me).
He has been giving some thought to the proposed takeover of Cadbury's by Kraft in the US.
A couple of weeks ago I was asked if myself and Mrs Methodist Preacher would be able to join Hereford Labour Party for a dinner.
The main purpose was to formally present Labour stalwart John Davies (right) with a certificate of merit and to meet my successor as parliamentary candidate Philippa Roberts (left). The guest of honour was to be the Rt Hon Margaret Beckett MP.
Hereford Labour Party has gone through some big changes over the last few years. Membership had been falling and a small group - Chris, Alison, Ursula, Bob, John, Paul, Barbara and several others had done their best to keep the party going. The Liberal Democrats have been successfully using their old trick of "vote for us to keep the others out" and squeezed the Labour vote. The fact that Liberal Democrats are often as right wing and reactionary as the Tories is often lost on those who seek the centre ground at any cost.
However in recent years they have been encouraged by the arrival of Bob Clay, a former Labour MP, who seems to have bought fresh enthusiasm.
What could have been a sad, retrospective affair, turned out to be an evening of real hope.
John gave a moving speech about his years as a trade unionist and Labour Party member. He moved to the city from Wales in the 1950s and it was pointed out that he faced many of the problems that newer migrants have faced in recent times. He talked about how Labour councillors led the battle to provide decent housing for working class people. It was good to be reminded of the wonderful legacy that so many unsung heroes have left for future generations, though sometimes squandered by those who hate working class people enjoying decent conditions.
Philippa Roberts was so unlike me as a candidate (except the enthusiasm!) that it was a joy to hear her speak. In her late twenties or early thirties, living in Hereford and very keen, she had clearly made links with groups in the city and surrounding countryside that were impressive. She was quietly spoken but very focused. Politically she has a mountain to climb but I couldn't help feeling she had already begun to make some progress. In 2001 I got a reasonable result for Hereford. I feel that she will surpass it.
The speech from Margaret Beckett, was, as ever brilliant. Next week I will write a little more about Margaret because I feel someone needs to put on record the tremendous contribution she has made to this country and how things could have been so very different.
It was a great evening, and there was one minor detail I did notice - the number of active Christians who were present. Thanks John for all you have done. Philippa will make sure that the battle will continue.
Two weeks ago my daughter mentioned that her class were studying the Berlin Wall as part of her "A" level work. Did I remember it coming down? Not only did I remember the wall coming down, I can remember it going up, I replied
"But the person you really need to talk to about this is Uncle Barry. He was in the army and on guard duty along the wall when it first went up....." and then my voice trailed off. I had just said something unbelievably silly: it was no longer possible to have a word with Barry.
It is six months today that I saw my brother Barry for the last time. He had been suffering from primary liver cancer for over two years. The previous day he had been taken into hospital and I had been over to see him. He didn't say much except to ask me the date, which he repeated, these turned out to be his last words to me.
The following day I had left home early for a meeting in London. Just as the train was pulling out of Birmingham I had a call from Barry's wife to say that I was needed at the hospital urgently. Similar calls were made to my sister and Barry's children.
My sister and I met and went to the hospital together. The medics were convinced that Barry would not last the day. He didn't say anything, but we were assured that Barry would be aware of our being there and able to hear what we said.
It was a really harrowing day made bearable by prayer, Bible reading, some singing and talking about old times. I was struck by how dignified Barry looked. He didn't say anything but I felt he knew he was dying and did his best to make us feel at ease. However I really wanted the whole thing to stop. I wanted Barry to sit up, get dressed and go home.
I personally felt under strain. I was Uncle David, the one who had to keep his head at all times. There came a moment when his breathing stopped, his lips filled with foam and that was it. I remember his youngest daughter saying "Go to sleep Daddy, have a lovely rest", surely the most wonderful sentence I have heard in the English language outside of the Bible. When it was all over, just after seven in the evening, the hospital staff put into place a well rehearsed but helpful process of taking us to the relatives room, laying out Barry's body and starting the paperwork.
The thing that hit me, and still does, is how upset I am about the death. I'd literally known Barry all my life. When we were kids we slept in the same bed until I was about 7. He was always there. I remember once telling him he was such a snob because he had been born in Willesley Castle (that is another story) and that was one of the kinder things we said to one another!
However I don't think I ever thought of myself as loving Barry. Let's face it boys don't love their brothers. It never occurred to me, even in the weeks before his inevitable death that I would miss him so much.
We did have profound differences of opinion about politics and Christianity for much of our lives but we mutually (to the bafflement of anyone else) shared a great deal with our sense of humour. I took the funeral and many people who did not know me commented how many of my mannerisms and turn of phrase, even my jokes, were like Barry's.
Belatedly I realise how much we shared that is almost unsharable with anyone else. We were witnesses to some of the unbelievable things that happened to us as children and young people. We both had difficult times and a later respectability doesn't tell the whole story of either life. Our testimony to the saving grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ came from a profound experience of God working in both our lives, answering the prayers of the saints who prayed for our family at a local Plymouth Brethren Assembly.
One interesting point, and it isn't meant as a knock because I'm told its the same the world over. My sister-in-law, his children and my mother were inundated with cards. I just got two and one of those was from a close friend who had lost his sister three years before. Perhaps we don't appreciate the mourning that siblings feel on the death of a brother or sister and that is something I will take on board in my pastoral work in future.
There were lots of things I wanted to share with Barry. I don't think I ever put into words my admiration at the way in which he coped with those last few depressing months.
Many times I think to myself, I must mention that to Barry or ask Barry what he remembers about this and that. But I can't and never will do now. There are one or two family issues where his view would be really helpful but he is not here to discuss these things.
At the time I didn't cry. There were others who had greater cause to mourn. However a few weeks after the funeral I was walking through St Albans where I was working, when my mind went back to something very funny that had happened to us as children. I smiled then my eyes filled with tears. I realised that Barry's death was having a greater impact on me than I had admitted to anyone else, or to myself.
When my daughter asked about the Berlin Wall and I realised my mistake my eyes filled with tears again , as they do now as I write this.
I am missing Barry and always will. See you soon Baz.
The Nazi Documentation Centre in Cologne, Germany is mounting an exhibition featuring the attempts by the Nazis to take Christ out of Christmas.
The problem for the Nazis was that Christmas was a festival with a Jewish child at its heart. They certainly had little time for the great Christian themes of peace, love and hope.
This should act as a reminder that Nazis were not Christians. In fact they were anti-Christians. Even today, once you get ever so slightly to the right of parties like the BNP you will find an adoration for such pagan gods as Thor and Odin.
Contrary to what the outside world believes Christmas is not the greatest of Christian festivals. There is even considerable doubt as to whether Christ was actually born in what is now December. There is a great deal of evidence to suggest that Christmas is actually a Christianisation of the winter pagan festivals applauded by the Nazis.
This exhibition brings to mind the various attempts to take Christ out of Christmas in our contemporary society. Zealous council officials are often blamed, for example by renaming Christmas "Winterval". However a visit to the shops in the weeks before Christmas is a sharp reminder that the commercial world got there long before anyone else! Lets face it, churches are hardly bulging these days on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. I wonder what our Muslim and Sikh neighbours make of drunken office workers on the bus bawling "Hark the Herald Angels Sing"?
Clearly much of what we call "Christmas" is sub-pagan. I always felt uncomfortable about telling my children the great lie of Father Christmas. Decorated trees look nice and jolly but have not one jot of Biblical relevance. Nor am I happy with the Maryology that creeps in during Christmas. The veneration of Christmas detracts from the far more important Christian calender which includes Easter and Pentecost, the real focus of the Incarnation.
Obviously I object to any attempt to usurp Christmas by the far right. I see it more as a time when family and friends can get together rather than a great religious festival. The history and practice of Christmas is far too flawed. In fact I don't think I have ever heard a single testimony that has the celebration of Christmas at its heart, except my own that has just a passing reference to Christmas.
But when family and friends do get together, even to eat a great meal and enjoy one another's company, we should want Jesus to be at the heart of such a gathering. But I wonder how many "Christian" families in 21st Century Britain will even say grace on Christmas day?
It isn't often I see a review for a book and decide that I ought to buy it. I recently read a review of Jo Owen's The Death of Modern Management. The reviewer quoted the first two paragraphs of the book and I realised that the author knew what the game was - both in modern business and the church:
“The theory and practice of strategy parted company some time ago. Practising managers and strategy gurus live on different planets. Occasionally they will meet at a neutral venue, such as a conference. The strategy guru will then get on stage, wave his arms and make a brilliant and inspirational speech. After which, nothing happens.
The practising manager will return to his business and discover that the best predictor of next year’s strategy is this year’s strategy. It may be tweaked a little, but it will essentially be the same. There may be more emphasis on one channel, customer or product group. Or perhaps the pace of globalisation will be accelerated, or perhaps a daring CEO might make an acquisition or two. But essentially, the business will maintain roughly its previous trajectory”.
I must admit to just a little twinge of mixed feelings about the decision to apologise to those children sent to the former colonies, mainly Australia. Where the children suffered abuse or were exploited there is absolutely no question that an apology should be offered. However I'd question whether that was the whole story in every case.
The Methodist run charity for children and young persons Action for Children, formerly the National Children's Home, has a page on its website acknowledging Methodism's role in these transportations.
When I worked with NCH in the 1980s there were still people around the organisation that remembered this programme. It aroused strong, though mixed, feelings and emotions. Some felt that they were doing the very best for the children and would talk of there being an element of choice and counselling. Others described it as shameful. By then it was something that was very much hushed up.
The nature of my work meant that I was often the first port of call for unusual visitors or telephone calls to NCH's national headquarters. On at least three occasions I met adults who had been sent to Australia as children by NCH. They were visiting the UK, and the NCH was their only link with the land of their birth.
What struck me is that all three were very much of the opinion that being sent to Australia for them had been a good thing. Had they been abused, they didn't tell me, though they may have said more to those who counselled them as they were shown their records. (Incidentally from time to time I also took calls from people who had stayed in NCH homes in the UK who did claim they had been abused). They commented about what they had seen during their visit to England and were pleased that they had been brought up in Australia.
It may be that NCH were more choosy about the destination of the children in it's care than other organisations. Possibly this minuscule sample were not representative.
As a teenager I remember seeing a leaflet from the "Big Brother Movement" that helped teenage migrants get to Australia, not all child migrants went through children's charities. In fact myself and a friend dropped into Australia House and met the staff of the Big Brother Movement who were stationed there. As can be seen from the illustration here (blow it up) there was an element of racism in the desire to get migrants from the UK.
It may seem odd now but the idea of going to Australia, New Zealand, Canada or Southern Africa was seen as a very live choice for young people and one that was attractive to me as a 14 or 15 year old in the 1960s.
There was just one little personal twist. Two of my uncles returned from Australia in the 1950s. I never quite got to the bottom of it. A few years ago the family secret spilled out. Sometime in the 1930s they had "got into trouble with the police", apparently they were convicted of arson. Their punishment was to be sent to Australia and but on their return they constantly said how much better their lives would have been had they stayed "down-under" rather than return to their home in the Midlands.
My heart goes out to those who were abused and I hope the various apologies - hopefully backed by some compensation - will go some way to giving them peace. But that is not the whole story.
Fortunately for reasons beyond our control my youngest didn't make it to the Christmas lights switch on concert at Millennium Point in Birmingham yesterday afternoon.
The organisers had predicted a turnout of 5000 and found one of 27000. Some reports say that high winds led to to the down grading of crash barriers. Several youngsters were hurt and some are in hospital. By all accounts it could have been much worse. Thankfully we were not among the families spending the evening and night in A&E.
Somewhere in the back of my mind is a similar incident at Millennium Point a few years back. High winds were a factor there too. And whoever predicted that only 5000 would turn out for a star turn on a Saturday afternoon for free?
Have you ever heard the phrase "I wouldn't wish that on my worse enemy"?
Well this week I saw a newspaper headline, my jaw dropped with horror, and I suddenly realised how protective I felt about an old enemy and his family.
To be honest I haven't really got on with the Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Hereford, Paul Keetch.
For a time we both represented Hereford at the same time, he in Westminster and me in the European Parliament. I fought the Hereford Westminster seat in the Labour cause in 2001. It wasn't a particularly pleasant campaign, made all the more difficult by the continuous trickle of title-tattle I got about Paul. Even a brown paper envelope with information of which I could not make head or tail.
Since then our paths have crossed and Paul has gone out of his way to be polite, which is much appreciated.
Even so when I saw The Sun on Thursday. I felt a real sense of outrage. Strung across the front page and across two inside pages was a scurrilous article about Paul's private life. What I found horrific was that the paper wasted no time in pointing out that Paul was married and had a thirteen year old son. In fact his marriage was a key component of the story. Were he single the story may not have had quite the edge.
The newspaper had gone to extraordinary lengths to gather evidence and take appropriate pictures. Which makes me wonder if the paper somehow got hold of some inside information about the movements of Paul and his dinner guest that evening? I can't believe that Sun photographers are randomly taking shots all over London. After all that there was only insinuation.
Now I've been in politics and am well aware of the opportunities and temptations. Sadly, over the years, I've seen some good people bought low by indiscretions that have made the front page of the tabloid press. Conversely I'm aware of very tangled private lives that never (some are now beyond controversy) or have not yet, made the front pages.
I once heard a very wise preacher preach on the portion of John 8 which speaks of the woman caught in the very act of adultery. Now I've heard many sermons on this passage and similar incidents in Jesus's life when His forgiveness was the focal point of the story.
However this wise preacher said that actually Jesus was very condemnatory in this story. The people he condemned were the voyeurs and perverts who had somehow found the woman in the very act of adultery, and were then prepared to use her as a political tool in their fevered power struggle with Jesus.
I really am appalled at this newspaper story, just as I have been in the past when I've seen other families desecrated by the media in this way. There was obviously a "tip off" and I think the honest thing to do when disturbed about someone else's behaviour is to have a quiet word. In a close knit community like Hereford I know the damage this will cause to the people involved. Let him that is without sin, cast the first stone. And pray for my worse enemy and his family.
Saturday morning is the graveyard of blogging. So just for a little fun I like to dig up a memorable piece of music from the past. Last night I saw Noddy from the Slade on TV reminding us of that all time classic Merry Christmas Everybody released in 1973 (which only seems like yesterday).
When I was the young man about London, Birmingham and Brighton town in the 1970s this is what I danced to for about a month each year. Merry Christmas Everyone! You know, it comes round faster and earlier every year (I first remember someone saying that in about 1952)
Regular readers will recognise myself and Walsall's Fat Prophet in the picture on the right. We were at a party in West Bromwich in the late 1960s. We were having a great time. We are the "baby boom" generation.
Baby boomers see ourselves as relaxed, socially aware, caring sorts. Now it seems we are not as open hearted as we once thought, in fact we are a bit tight.
So church treasurer's beware: the next generation to fill the pews adjacent to heaven are stingy!
Forty to sixty-year-olds 'don't respond to requests for small monthly donations'
People from the ‘baby boom' generation hate requests by charities for £3 a month and do not respond to emotional campaigns, according to Kevin Kibble, director of fundraising agency Whitewater. In a seminar at the Institute of Fundraising Scotland annual conference in Glasgow yesterday, Kibble discussed the results of focus groups he had held with people aged between their mid-forties and their mid-sixties.
He said the generation had "invented marketing" and could see through charities' advertising campaigns.
"They hate our £3-a-month asks," he said. "They know we can't change the world with £3 a month and they wonder why we keep telling them we can."
Kibble said the age group valued trust, individualism and tangibility, and wanted to know charities were spending donors' money wisely.
But he warned that many had what he called worrying misperceptions about charities. In one focus group, he said, a baby boomer had claimed the NSPCC spent 81 per cent of its income on administrative costs.
"The baby boomers have got money, but you're going to have to ask them for it in the right way," said Kibble. "We need to be better at communicating how effective we are."
The following article by me has appeared in today's edition of the Methodist Recorder.
Many Methodists run a mile when we speak about the business side of church. Whatever our hopes and aspirations we cannot keep the doors open unless we balance our books.
A combination of falling and aging congregations, crumbling buildings, and rising costs are catching up with Methodism.. More time and energy will need to be spent understanding the business of each individual church.
According to Connexional news releases we have 265,000 members across 5,800 churches. In addition we claim that a total of 800,000 people are connected with the Church in some way. Just for a moment let us leave that additional 535,000 aside as there is no expectation that they should contribute to our core business
A mythical but typical MethodistChurch – let’s call it TatBankRoadMethodistChurch – has a simple business model.
Tat Bank Road has 45 members (that’s 265,000 members divided by 5,800 churches). It is more than 50 years old and has a small rental income from the hire of rooms to a judo club.
It’s core business is to run a service of a Sunday morning, a monthly evening communion service, a Bible Study on a Monday and a Prayer Meeting on Wednesday.
To fund these activities Tat Bank Road’s annual outgoings can be summarized as follows:
Item
Cost
Assessment
9000
Insurance
1700
Gas and electricity
3000
Routine safety checks and boiler service
1000
Repairs and maintenance
5000
Other expenses
2300
Total
22000
The 45 members of Tat Bank Road may be surprised to learn that even before a light is turned on and the doors opened the church must find £37.70 per member in insurance alone.
They’d be astonished to hear that when the heating is on during the four or five winter months each service may cost as much as £100 in heating , however many people are present.
The reality is that the church needs an income of at least £22000 just to meet its core costs. Some corners can be cut: the false economy of not undertaking repairs and maintenance is probably the most widespread. But many costs are as fixed as any costs can be.
In theory the Treasurer of Tat Bank Road simply needs to remind the 45 members that each should contribute an average of £488 per year, just under a tenner a week.
The reality is very different. About a third of Tat Bank Road’s members will be on a small retirement income. They have given generously in the past, but cannot do so now.
Others are members on paper but only come occasionally. For them the collection is simply a matter of small change - £1 coin, possibly two or three.
It is to be hoped there are some newer and younger members. They have families to feed and haven’t given too much thought to the finances of the church. If they were asked for £10 a week, they’d run a mile.
And so it goes on until a large proportion of the membership are barely meeting the cost of insurance and heating.
Very quickly the 20/80 rule, so beloved in business, is established: 20% of the members fund 80% of the expenditure; 80% of the members contribute 20%.
That means,in order to stay afloat, 20% of Tat Bank Road’s membership needs to find 80% of its expenditure:
9 people need to contribute£17600 between them
Each of those 9 need to give £1955 per year or £37+ per week
The remaining 36 members need to give at least £122 per year, more than £2 each per week whether they attend or not.
There are ways of massaging income upwards with fundraising events and other special efforts. Gift Aid can be of considerable help, especially in raising the value of the contributions from the larger donors, but that still means a handful of members will need to provide about £1500 each per year.
The lesson is clear: in order for a church to continue funding its core activities its members must be prepared to fund it with real money. This must go beyond the casual tossing of a few coins into a collection plate.
There can be other models of church finance. Many rely on rental income from other congregations or various government or local authority schemes. As a short term measure these may provide a lifeline. However they leave the church vulnerable to changing government policies and other bodies making decisions for their benefit rather than for the church.
The reality is that in every church a handful of individuals have to accept their critical responsibility to make large donations. Unless that is understood many of our churches are unsustainable.
If we extrapolate from Tat Bank Road’s experience the core business of Methodism is being funded by just 53000 individuals. Who are these people? What is the motivation for this commitment? How old are they? How long will they be able to maintain this commitment? It doesn’t take a leap of imagination to realise that many of those 53000 people are probably office holders, local preachers and other church activists.
But the ideal solution does not rest on financial management. A church which steps outside of its doors to proclaim and live the gospel will attract people, especially the reputed 535000 people who the Connexion claims are “connected with the church in some way”. More people through the door will mean more money on the plate.
In the very near future practically every circuit in the Connexion is going to make some very hard and painful decisions. Church after church will come to the point where the critical 20% have evaporated, other sources of income has dried up and people are simply too old to hold positions.
We need to understand how the business of each church works, whether it is viable, whether it has the human resources to regenerate it self.Then we need to ask whether the capital assets would be better released for service elsewhere. The society can continue to meet in the halls of other churches, local schools, above pubs. Someone else can then have the worry of the roof.
However interesting it is to create different business models, the real answer is to seek the mind of Christ and ask for a quickening of the Holy Spirit. God has got a lot of money. Let’s be worthy of it.
Perhaps one of the reasons us Methodist are all so healthy is that we enjoy a good sing. Apparently singing is good for health - both mental and physical.
Some of my colleagues at our church in Birmingham are trying an entirely new initiative - setting up a community choir. They, we, see it as way of getting people across the threshold of a building that feels it has become detached from much of the local community.
When I first heard of the idea my immediate reaction (as church treasurer) was to wonder how we would pay for the gas bill to heat our very large church hall. My next worry was whether we had the skills within the church to create and maintain such a choir. In other words I went into negative mode.
However my colleagues engaged in a bit of "possibility thinking". Initially they would use a small easily heat able room. Secondly they contacted the local music college and two students came forward to offer their support.
Although I enjoy singing, to be honest, no one else enjoys my output, though before puberty I was a passable alto. So this time I'm deliberately taking a step back. My wife came back happy last night, having enjoyed an hour singing with 12 other people, which isn't bad for an inaugural meeting of any new church activity with a membership base as small as ours.
Next week we will start circulating 1000 leaflets around the neighbourhood to see if we can pick up some further interest. The nice thing is that it will be just for fun and we are asking God to bless it as a form of friendship evangelism.
Meanwhile if you are in Birmingham on a Wednesday afternoon at 4.30 and feel like an hour's relaxation why not pop along? Details on our website
Some real encouragement from Wales! And thanks to Richard Hall at Connexions for drawing it to the attention of the Methodist blogsphere.
The BBC programme "Week In Week Out" used an entire 30 minute slot to look at the growth and work of three relatively new independent Evangelical churches. It is available on iplayer and is well worth half an hour of your time.
Now like all churches there are some bits that I don't feel comfortable with. Churches are, after all, composed of human beings and we sometimes get it wrong. I've yet to meet an absolutely perfect Methodist Church.
But the message from Wales, if this programme is accurate, is that it is possible for UK believers to attract young congregations which are actively involved in their communities with such projects as furniture recycling and food banks.
They attract congregations of up to 400, many of whom were young (though I noticed some very happy grey haired people present), they prayed for the sick, and worshipped in a way that was similar to our Methodist forefathers and fore mothers. They were working hard to spread the gospel, getting people to read their Bibles, to pray regularly, and to care for one another. All the things that a good church should be doing.
It was a real joy to hear a young girl and her biker father explain how they had come to faith. Their lives had been turned round and the young girl was determined that she would abstain from sex until she was married to the right person: something that was the norm just forty years ago. And the witness of the young woman being baptised was enough to bring tears to the eyes of anyone who knows what it really means to be born again.
Needless to say there were negative comments from the established church with an Anglican bishop doing his best to belittle the movement, but then others external to the Evangelical churches - a parish priest and a university professor - take a more mature view.
All in all, worth watching. I think the iplayer will stay on the BBC website for a few weeks so watch it while you can. And be encouraged. God is working his purpose out and sometimes He uses flawed vessels. So look for the positives. Let God deal with the negatives.
One thing those of us who work, worship and lead in failing Methodist churches, must not do is to assume that the growing Evangelical churches have absolutely nothing to teach us. Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater!
It is good to hear a Methodist Minister talking about faith. This evenings edition of An Island Parish sees the Reverend David Easton taking a walking party around the many churches and chapels found on the Isles of Scilly.
David makes a very important point. These places of worship were built by ordinary people with whatever materials they had at hand. It was at a time when people were less "ambivalent" about their faith. Now there's a lesson for us, being less ambivalent about our faith.
I doubt if there is anyone in British Methodism today who has built a church from scratch. Yet in the past that is exactly what happened with little recourse ot committees, conferences or any central funds. Let's get back to those ideals.
If you want to read other articles by Methodist Preacher on the An Island Parish series just click the label "An Island Parish" below.
Home Secretary, Allan Johnson, seen by some as a future Labour Leader, is quoted in today's Independent as saying that a "rational" discussion about immigration would have starved the far right BNP of its recent electoral successes. He says:
"People think we have shied away from a debate on it. They may well be right," he said. "My post bag is bigger on immigration than any other issue. It is a major public concern. The public deserves a rational debate on this, rather than what they sometimes get, which is at the extreme end of the scale."
His call for a "real debate" about immigration marks a big shift in Labour's thinking. A week ago, Mr Johnson admitted that successive governments, including the present one, had been "maladroit" in handling the issue.
In the past the main political parties have attempted to win the debate about immigration by simply not having one. This has allowed the far right parties to seriously distort the position and make wild claims about the number of immigrants in the country at any one time and exaggerate the detrimental impact.
It now seems that the debate is going mainstream, but there must be some concern as to where it will lead. I worship in a church which welcomes people of all nationalities. It is part of the reason why many were drawn to the church in the first place. It wasn't white people welcoming black people, we have a long history of Black people being part of the Church. We've had three Black Ministers including Ermal Kirby who is now the Chair of the London District of the Methodist Church.
What troubles me is what it means to debate immigration with the far right. They don't simply mean a debate about who gets off the next plane at Birmingham Airport from Islamabad. They want a debate about the right of people of colour to stay in the UK, whenever they, their parents, or grandparents arrived and settled in the UK. Once they have "sorted" that issue they will move onto to other groups such as the Jews.
It is worth looking at local Conservative election material from the 1920s - it can be accessed in Birmingham public library - where many leaflets bore the headline "Britain for the British" and there were panicky descriptions of how English people were being swamped by immigrants. Where did these immigrants come from? Ireland plus a smattering of European Jews! In fact by the 1960s a Lord Mayor of Birmingham boasted that he was the civic head of the biggest Irish community in the world.
One of the reasons why groups like the BNP find it a little harder to make headway among the whites in Birmingham is that many are descended from Irish families and the old landladies' advert "No dogs, no Irish" still rings in the collective memory bank.
My experience as a child was to live in a community with a substantial Jewish minority. In my primary schools Jews were a small minority though we did have some Black children and my best friend was mixed race Indian - my mother having been born in India to an Army family made us feel we had something in common.
My secondary school was about 50-50 Jews. In our first year we had the first Black boy arrive, his name was Winston. Our community was constantly changing and by the time I left both the number of Black children was about 25% in the earlier years.
There were differences but, by and large, these were sorted. The Jewish lads, for example, took off Jewish holidays and left early on a Friday to get home before sunset. Our school assembles and the hymns were adjusted to refer to God the Father rather than mentioning God the Son. However Jewish musicians were enthusiastic and I assume voluntary participants in our annual carol service. This was all long before the right wing press headlined the phrase "This is political correctness gone mad".
What the far right want to do is to unravel all that movement and all that immigration going back to the 1950s or even the 1930s. When they speak of "immigration" they mean Black or Asian people. They don't mean the Australians and New Zealanders who arrive in this country in large numbers, settle in West London, and then price many middle income people out of contract work, including as it happens, from time to time, me!
Over the last half century the birthrate in the UK has fallen dramatically. This means that our labour force has to be drawn from a smaller, but better educated pool. There is absolutely no way that we could continue having an expanding economy without the constant replenishment of our labour force without some form of immigration.
The alternative would be a return to the days when parents had seven or eight children. I don't see a queue forming for this option anytime soon. Even in the "good old days" as my father's generation called them, there was constant movement of working people from rural areas such as Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the English countryside into the big cities. Going back to the early days of Methodism there is a good argument to be had that the Wednesbury riots of the 1740s stemmed from the Welshness of the newly arrived Methodist community.
But once we start having this sort of debate all sorts of dangers start emerging. The far right will not be satisfied with "stricter controls". They want to unravel the multicultural society. They talk of deportations. At the moment they refer to "failed" asylum seekers. Once we get beyond that group the "debate" will take a more sinister term.
Immigration will never be an easy subject. Recently I've taken a bit of stick because I nuanced the difference between an asylum seeker and an "asylum seeker". Sometimes we should be careful at taking things at face value. That means not assuming that there are easy solutions.
One other point that comes out very forcibly when you talk to second or third generation Brits who have returned "home" to visit family and friends: they all realise just how British they are. We've got problems, but this isn't such a bad country.
One of the great pleasures of the last few months has been to read an excellent article by an old school friend of mine in the Journal of the Western Front Association.
A few years ago he undertook an extensive research of the war memorial at the Brenthouse Road Synagogue in Hackney E9, not far from where I lived as a child. Sadly, as far as I can see this is not yet online
His paper begins with a explanation of his reason for doing so. One chilling reason is that he believed he had to set right the anti-Semitic myth that Jews did not contribute to the struggles faced by this country.
To some extent Martin shows where those myths come from. Within weeks of the outbreak of the First World War the Hackney Gazette was running stories alleging that Jews were not fighting. The truth was very different: in the early days of the war the Army Act forbade the recruitment of anyone not born in Britain or not naturalised. When Jews born abroad were finally allowed to join in large numbers they were subject to harassment at the recruiting offices.
In the event 24 members of the Brenthouse Road Synagogue paid with their lives. By using a whole web of resources Martin has been able to piece together the lives of each name on the memorial.
Two of his first names listed bring out the horror of that war. Second Lieutenant Robert Abrahams aged 24 of Massie Road, off Graham Road and Private Emmanuel Barnett of 82 Greenwood Road aged 30 lived just a few hundred yards from one another. They both died within a few days of each other in 1916.
Martin's paper is a wonderful treasure that brings to light a very forgotten part of British military and local Hackney history. It is a reminder that others who would not call themselves Christians were involved in the fighting. It also makes it all the more painful when fascist groups like the BNP try to hi-jack Remembrance Day.
Today it will be my privilege to lead the Remembrance Sunday service at City Road Methodist Church, in Rotton Park, Birmingham.
A few years ago I helped write the Church's centenary story. We were disappointed to find that the plaques kept by the Church during the First and Second World Wars had been lost. As each young man left for active service his name and regiment was inscribed on a plaque. As news of the deaths came in these names were bordered in black.
These plaques were hung on each side of the Lord's Table and placed in front of the Lord's Table on Remembrance Sunday each year until they were lost during building work in the 1980s. We have now done our best to remember those lads, even encountering some unexpected opposition and difficulties.
Fortunately we were able to find the names of those who died in some old paperwork and reinstated the plaques in 2004. Unfortunately our Minister at the time, the Reverend Hannah Heim, objected to their display, even threatening to throw them on the skip, and for the last six years they have been stored in a filing cabinet gathering dust.
On the very first day of the new Conexional year in September 2009 with the Reverend gone and a new team of stewards in place, the names of the City Road fallen were finally reinstated to their rightful place. Today those plaques will again be a centre point of the display on the Lord's Table during the Remembrance Sunday service.
We found six names of those that were killed on active service in the First World War. They were:
H.E Allen G.H. Bridgett V.T.Harper H.Jeffreys W.Murray H.Priest
Below I reproduce what we were able to find out about three of these men. Unfortunately as yet we know nothing further of V.T.Harper, H.Jeffreys, or W.Murray.
Private Henry Allen was aged 22 when he died on Monday 21 June 1915 while serving with the Royal Warwick Regiment. He lies buried at Hainualt in Belgium. He left a widow, Rose Allen.
Gunner Horace Priest, then aged 19, the son of B(sic) and Catherine Priest died on Saturday 30 September 1917. Horace was serving with the Royal Garrison Artillery. He is buried at West-Vlaanderen in Belgium.
Sergeant Thomas Bridgett died, aged 28, on Saturday 24 November 1917. He was in the Mechanical Transport Company of the Royal Army Service Corps. He was married to Gertrude and his father Thomas Bridgett lived at 95, City Road. He is buried at Seine-Maritime in France.
There were three men who were killed on active service during the Second World War. They were:
Leslie W Bright Stanley Hill M Roy Williams
Trooper Leslie Bright served with the 4th Queen's Own Hussars, Royal Artillery Company. He was killed in the closing days of the war in Europe on Wednesday 11 April 1945 aged 21. He lies buried in Ravenna War Cemetery in Italy. His parents were William and Florence Bright.
Private Stanley Hill served with the 145 Field Ambulance Unit of the Royal Army Medical Corps. Aged 25, he died on 11 October 1939, one of the first casualties of the conflict. His parents Ernest Harry and Rose Ann Hill, were long standing members of the Church. He lies in the Lodge Hill Cemetery, Birmingham.
We have been unable to find anything out about M Roy Williams.
Hopefully future Church historians will be able to build on this information and find out more about the young men who worshiped and died whilst members of the Church. They were our lads and we won't forget them. May they rest in peace.
For this week's Saturday morning 1960s nostalgic classic I have chosen Bob Dylan singing "Blowing in the wind". It is a reminder that a whole generation desperately wanted to claim peace as we had seen what war had done to our parents and grandparents. The visuals on this version are a little challenging
Here comes the latest storm in a teacup - with what looks like a genuine and malicious attempt to create friction between Christians and homosexuals.
A publicly funded homosexual and lesbian arts festival in Glasgow is featuring a play called Jesus. Queen of Heaven.
Anyone with the scantiest bit of theological knowledge - which I assume the author has - would understand the possible offensiveness of using the term "Queen of Heaven" irrespective of the link to Jesus. Given the difference of opinion between Catholics and Protestants, the title of this play seems uniquely to conspire to create maximum offence, irrespective of views about transexuality.
Needless to say the usual suspects have queued up to picket the production. Whilst the LGBT press have a field day having discovered homophobia among "fundamentalist Christians" who find the idea offensive.
Personally I find myself offended by the title but relaxed about its performance. The author, actors and the 25 strong audience will have to answer to God one day, just like the rest of us. I still feel sullied for watching The Life of Brian and realise that I should have walked out long before the blasphemous crucifixion scene.
A long time ago I learnt that trying to make any pictorial depiction of Jesus was asking for trouble. I remember at my Plymouth Brethren Sunday School they used, as a visual aid, Holman Hunt's famous painting "I stand at the door and knock", but they "whited out" the face on the basis that no one knew what Jesus looked like. I actually find much of the iconography in Catholic and some Protestant churches quite offensive.
A few years back a woman turned up at our church with a gift from her attic - it was a picture of a blue eyed man with long blonde flowing locks. It was, she assured us, a picture of "Jesus". Several members of our congregation took offence. Best not to go there.
Meanwhile The Independent reports a claim that an earlier exhibition at Glasgow’s Gallery of Modern Art as part of the same festival, visitors were encouraged to write comments on a Bible (something incidentally that I do all the time).
My advice to organisers of this festival is to seriously think about our minority communities. How would a similar portrayal of the Prophet or Guru Nanak go down? Would Sikhism and Islam allow anyone to desecrate their holy books? Of course not. So why offend Christians? There are many better things to be getting on with.
If anyone who has actually SEEN the play would like to comment, especially if they are a committed Christian, I'd like to know what they made of it - but don't go just to comment.
There has been a lot of publicity lately about the antics of Carnage UK. The picture of a drunk student urinating over a war memorial - just about the same time we are loosing one man a day in Afghanistan - has disgusted the nation.
But two questions come into my mind.
How can students afford to drink themselves blotto? When I was a student even the most hardened drinkers could only afford three pints of Newcastle Brown.
Whatever has happened to the charge of "drunk and disorderly"?
Occasionally I go through city centres such as Broad Street here in Birmingham and it is quite clear that one of two have simply lost control of themselves and pose a threat to others. Surely a night in the cells followed by a dressing down at the Magistrates Court would remind these youngsters of the absolute shame of being so drunk that they have lost control.
Myself and the Birmingham Evening Mail have a sort of love/hate relationship. In the 1970s I was an inexperienced and under fire press officer for Birmingham's social services department.
The senior staff were into the sport of social worker baiting and I would be their first port of call at about 7.30 am to respond to a story that had already been written.
It put me on a fast learning curve and probably explains why on occasions I know how to return fire, even when I cross swords with one or two tossers who wander around the genteel world of Methodist blogging.
However the news that it is to be reduced to a morning operation fills me with sadness. The demise of the regional evening newspaper is gathering speed. The London Standard has become a freesheet, the Plymouth Evening Herald has now become a morning operation as well.
There is one side of these contractions that may not be noticed.
Throughout urban areas the more enterprising teenage children, usually boys, have been able to make themselves a few extra pounds pocket money by delivering a few newspapers on the way home. I did in Hackney and both my sons have here in Bearwood.
I suppose it will mean more pocket money from Dad. It is a shame because I think the boys like having a stash of money that is clearly and obviously theirs. Times change.
I've just caught up with my first Russet of 2009. If you don't know what I'm on about, and a surprisingly large number of people don't, you really don't know what you are missing.
And if you do know what I mean you'll understand the crunchy pleasure I had during breakfast. Personally I like them with a little block of chocolate as a special treat.
If you want to know more click here. Though I found this morning's supply in Sainsburys at Oldbury. But hurry, Russets are a strictly seasonal fruit, that is produced nowhere else on earth except on this blessed isle, so no imports from Kenya or wherever to disturb the seasonal rhythm.
This morning's Financial Times brings bleak news for Anglican Clergy. It seems that whilst senior figures are prepared to speak out against the evils of capititalism, its own pension fund has been playing fast and lose on the stock markets!
'Young Anglican vicars are facing the prospect of a bleaker retirement after the Church of England's pension scheme succumbed to the "cult of equity" and sank 100 per cent of its investments into stocks towards the end of the 1990s bull market.'
I wasn't quite certain that the Reverend David Easton, the out going Methodist Minister on the Isles of Scilly, should have been filmed putting on a bra prior to his appearance as a pantomime dame. It gave a new angle on the concept of being "defrocked".
However the later scenes of him talking over problems with various islanders gave some indication of the sort of things that Methodists - not just Ministers - do every day of their spiritual lives. Only this morning I was rang at 5.00 am by a drunk "asylum seeker" (we have learnt that there are asylum seekers and "asylum seekers" - there is a difference) demanding my undivided attention.
There was a much more positive view of the church than in the previous series. I was a bit puzzled though, that while the programme ended with a reference to David Easton's re-stationing (he is guaranteed a posting somewhere in the UK) there was no reference to the difficult process underway to appoint a successor.
The difficulties the new Minister will face were hinted at when it was pointed out that the vet's wedding would not be held in the Methodist Chapel because David would have left by then. I don't know who the new Minister is, but I hope there is not an unofficial campaign to blank him out on Scilly. Perhaps someone on the spot would let us know?
Meanwhile it was great to see Steve Wild the Methodist "Bishop" of Cornwall. I met him briefly at conference and for about half an hour (quite by accident) when I was in Cornwall earlier this year. I've revised my judgment. I think he was poorly served in the last series - possibly deliberately by the film makers - but in tonight's piece he came through with flying colours.
Incidentally I note that the Anglican vicar has been noticable by his abscence. It would have been interesting to see an Anglican defend their policy of refusing to marry divorced people, one of the reasons why the vet had considered, then rejected, getting married in the Methodist Chapel.
I still think, overall, that the Anglicans were right to stay out of the subsequent series. Has anyone within Methodism any evidence that David Easton's contribution has helped build the reputation of the Methodist Church?
If you want to read other articles by Methodist Preacher on the An Island Parish series just click the label "An Island Parish" below.
This place has been operating quite openly for about three years. It has been possible to sit in the restaurant opposite and see both provider and client come and go. Why has it taken the police so long to getting round to stage a raid?
Meanwhile Cuddles, mentioned in the report, has now been reopened under a new name. There is no indication that there has been a radical change in the services on offer.
Another brothel on the "high street" (I am being careful not to feed the imagination of the search engines as I don't want hoards of lonely losers wandering around the neighbourhood) has been operating for about six years.
The place had its own entry on a website called punternet together with graphic "customer reviews" - this was pointed out by another local blogger, I didn't search for the material. There is absolutely no doubt what happens there. The reviews make it clear that there is more than one woman working on the premises giving the precise legal definition of a brothel rather than a lone prostitute.
If we are going to have legalised brothels in this country - and having met girls though our churchwork who have been operating on the streets there may be a case for legalisation - we should have it out in the open following the consultations and discussions that proceed regulation.
In the meantime, if brothels are illegal and the women working from them open to abuse, then there should be no question of there being a discreet policy of turning a blind eye which seems to be the case at present.
If the police have difficulty collecting evidence they can simply go to the punternet type websites or the odious mcgoys site whose proprietor I had the misfortune to meet when we were both pursuing very different, but considerably more socially useful, occupations. They will find enough material there to secure plenty of convictions.
One of my Ministerial friends has introduced me to the world of stamp collecting- and an entirely new angle on Methodist blogging!
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