Viewing all items in Resource Category: Editorial

In bygone centuries, Christians said their last farewells to the Christmas season on Candlemas, 2 February.  This is exactly 40 days after Christmas Day itself. In New Testament times 40 days old was an important age for a baby boy: it was when they made their first ‘public appearance’.  Mary, like all good Jewish mothers,...

With Valentine’s Day and Love in mind: It is astonishing how little one feels poverty when he loves. – Bulwer Men should keep their eyes wide open before marriage, and half shut afterward. – Madame Scuderi Two souls with but a single thought, two hearts that beat as one. – E F J von Munch-Bellinghausen...

–  on Hope & Redemption in The Greatest Showman By Rachel Mann, DLT, £6.99 Here is a Lent Course based on the hugely popular film The Greatest Showman.  The 2018 Golden Globe-nominated movie starring Hugh Jackman, about the founder and stars of the Barnum & Bailey Circus, is the basis for Lenten study of Christian...

Anskar (801-865) should be the patron saint of any Christian who loves doing mission… and who discovers that evangelists meet the most amazing people, and that their lives are full of surprises…. It was the 9th century, and Anskar had grown up in a noble family in Amiens.  He decided to forsake it all in...

– Omnibus Edition By Rachel Turner, BRF, £12.99 This book aims to help equip parents to raise God-connected children and teens. It provides inspiration and wisdom for nurturing children into the reality of God’s presence and love, equipping them to access Him themselves and encouraging them to grow in a two-way relationship with Him that...

St Blaise is the saint for you if you have a sore throat, or a pet who is ill.  He was born in Sebastea, ancient Armenia, (now Sivas, in Turkey) sometime during the late 3rd century, and became a physician.  But his compassion did not stop there: he went on to become bishop of Sebastea,...

By Jane Brocklehurst, Kindle edition, £1.99 Clutter begins in the mind, with a certain attitude toward material possessions. Decluttering with other people is as much a ministry as a job. If we own nothing at all, it makes us miserable because none of our basic human needs are met. Having food and clothes and a...

When did you first encounter Christianity?  If it was an adult, then Phileas is a saint for you.   His life shows that Truth matters, whenever you encounter it, but is also a warning that you need to count the cost of becoming a Christian. Phileas was a rich man living in Egypt at the end...

Persecution of Christians in various countries is making the headlines these days.  Believers facing such opposition might well find inspiration from the courage of the Japanese Christians of the late 16th and early 17th centuries. The Jesuit Francis Xavier had first brought Christianity to Japan in 1549, when he persuaded Shimazu Takahisa, the daimyo of...

By Megan Carter, TSL Books, £5.50 One of the Parish Pump poets, Megan Carter, has just published a book of poems, called Amazing Grace.  If you would like to order a copy, please contact enquiries@parishpump.co.uk.  A copy costs £5.50 including P&P.

All in the month of FEBRUARY ‘The day the music died’ The Satanic Verses and the fatwa QWERTY celebrates a big birthday Marie Curie and The Great Daffodil Appeal Downsizing our social life Long walks are not so long The GOOD news about chocolate National Nest Box Week:  14th – 21st February National Pizza Day...

(Luke 2:22-35) Sometimes old people see things, sometimes they understand, their years and experience lending wisdom – sometimes. But that day in the Temple was beyond human sight and understanding, beyond human wisdom. That day in the Temple, God moved. And Simeon saw, with Holy Spirit sight, with revelation light, the realisation of God’s promise....