Viewing all items in Resource Category: Editorial

The number of female clergy in the Church of England continues to rise with more women than men entering training for ordained ministry for the second year running, according to recently published statistics. More women, 54%, than men began training for ordained ministry in 2018, for the second year running. Just under a third, or...

By Martin Saunders, SPCK, £9.99 What makes a man?  The answer used to be easy. You chopped wood, you wrestled bears, and never showed an ounce of emotion. Today, thankfully, we’ve started leaving some of those ill-fitting gender stereotypes behind. But what replaces them? How do you make sense of masculinity in a world of mixed...

The Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly has recently passed a bill to criminalise religious conversion in the northern Indian state. The Bill intends to extend a law that was introduced in 2006 which criminalised conversion by ‘fraud,’ ‘force’ and ‘inducement,’ by adding ‘coercion’ to its terms. Inducement has also been redefined under the new bill as...

Whether you’re scared of Brexit or the EU – everything is temporary, says Tim Farron. Former leader of the Liberal Democrats and Christian politician, Tim Farron, has reminded people to live for “something even better” as both Brexit and the EU “will be in ruins at some point in the not too distant future”. Tim...

Expectant The rector of a church had just made the happy announcement that a member of the congregation was with child.  Then he reminisced a bit: ‘As far as I know, there have been no pregnancies in this church for years – until I arrived!’ ** Apostolic An old lady went to church and heard...

Editor:  As saints don’t go away, we add to them each year rather than start afresh.  The saints with an asterisk appear on this site for the first time… 1          Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury – the Poor Man’s Earl 1          Remigius 1           Theresa of Lisieux 2          Your Guardian Angel 3          Hewald the Black...

Think of Piccadilly Circus, and that small statue of the angel poised with bow and arrow. Most people think it stands for Eros.  It does not. It stands for Anteros, his brother, the god of selfless love.  It is a memorial to the greatest Christian Victorian philanthropist, politician and social reformer of his generation –...

Theresa of Lisieux (1873-97) should be the patron saint of teenage girls and young women who want to make the most of their lives, despite being constrained by family and school or work. Theresa grew up in a strict, devout Roman Catholic middle-class family in France, one of four sisters.  Her father was a watch-maker. ...

If you’ve ever prayed for the ill children of non-Christian friends, then you are following in the steps of Remigius (d.533). Remigius was bishop of Reims late in the 5th century, and the king’s son was ill.  The queen, Clotild, was a Christian, but the king of the Franks, Clovis I, was not.  Then Remigius...

The teaching of Jesus encourages us to believe in guardian angels.  He once said, ‘See that you do not look down on one of these little ones.  For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.’  (Matthew 18:10) The existence of angels was suggested in various...

With Islamic State’s current savage persecution of Iraqi Christians in mind, here are two saints for this autumn:  Hewald the Black and Hewald the White (d.c. 695).  These 7th century Anglo-Saxon priests were living peacefully in Frisia among the Old Saxons, worshipping the Christian God by daily Mass on a portable altar, and reverently devoting...

Just about the only thing most people know about Francis of Assisi is that he talked to the birds. Church-goers also know the popular hymn based on his famous prayer, ‘Make me a channel of your Peace’, which was sung at the funeral of Princess Diana. However, Italy’s patron saint, whose feast day is this...