Après church

Religion is: “violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children.” So says Christopher Hitchens who has just written a book called: “god is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything” and has appeared last week on Radio 4 and BBC’s Question […]

After a very interesting day for leaders, the issue of women in leadership (or eldership to be more precise) was raised, leading to some hot debating!  I just wanted to start a thread for people to voice their opinions about the matter - so please comment!  There is a chapter on this topic in Adventures […]

Some of us are going to see Muse at Wembley next Saturday.  It is set to be a great gig with support announced as Rodrigo y Gabriela, Dirty Pretty Things and The Streets.
Not being that much of a Muse fan, I started researching them while listening to their music and whilst I like the sound […]

As we have now reached the end of the excellent caffe theology book, we looked around for another source of brain and discussion fodder and have come up with “Adventures in missing the point, how the culture controlled-church neutered the gospel” by Brian McLaren and Tony Campolo.  We’ll be discussing this today in church.
I don’t […]

 
No blog-posts for ages, then 4 in one day, then nothing all week.
A question?  Should we make ourselves write blogs when we don’t feel like it, or just wait until we feel inspired? If we do the latter, we will probably go from blog famine to blog feast forever (not that I’m saying there’s anything […]

I’ve just finished reading a chapter on Worship in Brian MClaren and Tony Campolo’s book,
Adventures in Missing the Point.
It has lead me to think some more thoughts on my previous blogpost.
The previous post was written out of frustration with Worship.  Not a personal dig at any of our committed and hardworking worship leaders; just […]

Another book I have recently finished was Stephen Tomkins’ A short history of Christianity“.  Unlike the last book I reviewed, or the one before that, this one took me a long time to read, even though it is short.  Actually sometimes, because it’s so short, unless you read a whole chapter in one sitting, it […]

According to Michael Lloyd,  he who probably dwells in the urban centre of Oxfordshire, and to whom is due a degree of thanks for enlightening our ponderings over the last few weeks, ‘there is a corporate as well as a personal dimension to belonging to Christ.’
As we learnt in a previous chapter, we are redeemed as […]

I’ve just finished Rob Bell’s provocatively titled new book “Sex God”.  It’s a brave book to write, looking at the “endless connections between sexuality and spirituality”.  Once I got over the really annoying way he puts
each new thought on a new paragraph
all the time
which gets
a little irritating, I next wondered if it was brave but […]