Viewing all items in Resource Category: Editorial

More than a hundred new churches are to be created in a £27 million drive by the Church of England to revive the Christian faith in coastal areas, market towns and outer urban housing estates. New Christian communities in areas including the Kent coast, housing estates in Plymouth and market towns in Cambridgeshire are to...

Six weeks of high summer are gone (They really did not seem very long) No more happy play For today’s the black day When we all put our school clothes back on. We weep for our summer of fun It was great, but alas, now it’s done. And so, it’s a jar To get in...

St Giles was an immensely popular saint in the Middle Ages, and no wonder:  he was the patron saint of cripples.  In those days, there were many people who, once injured, were never really whole again.  Even today, a serious injury – either physical or mental or emotional, can leave us damaged for months, years...

The General Synod recently affirmed its support for the National Investing Bodies’ (NIBs) approach to tackling climate change, including its ongoing strategy of engaging with companies rather than prematurely disinvesting from them. An amendment put forward by Canon Giles Goddard of the Church’s Environmental Working Group asked the National Investing Bodies – the Church of...

High hopes of love and gladness As wedding vows were made Faint faded in the sadness Of each forlorn decade. Love’s lost neglected traces Indifferently quenched Turned smiles to stress-torn faces; Saw fists with fury clenched. O Stranger, if you’re grasping To come and learn from me, The lover’s hand you’re clasping – Grip with...

The Anglican Church in Australia still honours the New Guinea Martyrs of 1942.  These brave men and women, 10 Australians and two Papuans, refused to leave their missionary work on the island as the Japanese military forces advanced.  As one tribute to them put it: ‘They knowing full well the risk, elected to stay with...

Christian Aid has praised the ‘prophetic vision’ of the Church of England’s General Synod after it voted to sell its holdings in fossil fuel companies by 2023 if they have not aligned their business plans with the targets of the Paris Agreement. Christian Aid’s Head of UK Advocacy, Tom Viita, said: that the vote by the...

Here is a saint for anyone who thinks Christian leaders should stand up for justice – even at the risk of angering secular powers. It all began when William was an English priest serving as chaplain to Canute, king of England, (1016-35), who decided to visit Scandinavia.  William went along, and was so shocked by...

The Church of England’s General Synod recently welcomed new measures to strengthen governance and operational frameworks for England’s cathedrals. The recommendations were made in a report by the Cathedrals Working Group, which began by noting recent failures of governance and management within a small number of cathedrals.  It went on to make recommendations intended to...

Remember the poor when you look out on fields you own, on your plump cows grazing. Remember the poor when you look into your barn at the abundance of your harvest. Remember the poor when the wind howls and the rain falls, as you sit warm in your dry house….   The poor have no...

Pope Gregory never called himself ‘the Great’, but instead ‘the Servant of the Servants of God’.  Nevertheless, Gregory was one of the most important popes and influential writers of the Middle Ages.  The son of a very rich Roman senator, he left the service of the State upon his conversion as a young man.  Gregory...