www.bibleinbrief.com aoroland@gmail.com
Hi Friends,
Talking and blogging
January has been quite full, but again actual writing has taken a back seat. The theme of the month for me has been the big issue of science and religion. So I have done quite a bit of reading and thinking, and gone live on electronic media.
The theme of January’s talk and blog was “Genesis 1 and Modern Science”, i.e. if you are a Christian and value the Bible, does that mean you can’t believe in evolution? For many years I have been convinced that the answer lies in Genesis itself. If you look carefully at chapter 1, it is clear that what you have is not a chronological account of the making of the world, but a 2-stage process like a poem or drama. First stage: 3 days making the stage sets (light and darkness etc.) Second stage: 3 days introducing the characters (sun and moon, birds and fishes, animals and humans).
That was, to me, quite straightforward. BUT that does not deal with science’s challenge to faith in God. Is the God we believe in actually too small to deal with a universe with at least 2 trillion galaxies? In December I started reading Richard Dawkins fascinating book “Unweaving the Rainbow”. His passion and excitement about science is catching. But it meant I had to do much much more thinking and writing.
The result is that when I finally finished the blog based on my talk, it ran to 3,594 words! The best length for a blog is 600. So I cut it in half, dropping everything about evolution and catastrophes that wipe out 50% + of species. The upshot was a Bible blog of 2,061 words. Still far too long for a blog but at least only double the length it could be.
Does that mean that all that extra work was wasted? Absolutely not! It is going to be a stand-alone chapter in a book I hope to publish next year, to be called “What Good News? Making the Gospel Credible in a Post-Modern World”. I had the idea when listening to a talk at a clergy conference on communicating the Gospel. As the morning went on, I became uncomfortable because it seemed to me that everyone in the audience assumed that they all thought the same about the gospel. But more critical was that there was little discussion about what questions were in people’s minds. It seemed to me that the questions which societies regard as important change over time. Currently my plan for the book is a long section covering 2,000 years of Christian history on “What was the question?”. Then there will be sections on parts of the Christian message which were important but have lost traction on the minds of most people, i.e. the end of the end; the history of hell; the myth of heaven (angels, harps etc.). Then there will be more positive sections: the natural history of religion, the challenge of science; living in a multi-faith world; the rise of meditation; credible models of God. Quite a task, but I feel excited about it!
But before I get down to that, I want to finish my history of the parish of All Saints Hackbridge and Beddington Corner, entitled “The Church by the Sewage Farm”. I had already written the history from 1840 to 1968. I now need to write the rest. Watch this space!
Could I please have a nine day week?
Posting and Tweeting
I have been quite active on facebook and twitter. These were my posts on facebook/revandybooks:
Be a Brexit Bridge Builder
Basil the Great – the bishop, not the rat!
Do something amazing in 2019 – Navigate the Bible in 6 months! Secret London (Tuesdays): How London started – the Roman amphitheatre
The Square of Death
The Lord Mayor’s Churches
Holocaust Day – England’s shame?
Secret Jerusalem (Thursdays): The real place of the Last Supper?
Zedekiah’s cave
the Ethiopian Orthodox Church
the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity
‘The House by the Sea/La Villa’ – wonderful French film by Guedigian
When is a murdering religious fanatic not a murdering religious fanatic?
Writer’s block
If you missed them, do have a look. And share the ones you like.
St Cuthbert’s Talks
Monday 11th February will be the third of my St Cuthbert’s talks, this time on whether the first three gospels are reliable or not. I have some definite opinions! Check it out on the eventbrite link: http://tinyurl.com/yabcb9hr
Life offline
On New Year’s Eve Linda and I celebrated by going out for a meal. When we reached the street, I realised that I had left the door keys in the flat! So instead of going to a restaurant, we went by tube and bus to our son Peter’s house in Sutton to get the spare set. Rather a silent trip! But I did give us a very nice meal on January 1st in Zizzi’s, Earls Court.
Most Mondays I attend a charming informal communion at St Mary Abbott’s, parish church of Kensington. At the beginning of January I stood in twice for Stephen who normally takes it, so I celebrated Holy Communion for almost the first time since I retired. It was lovely!
Bishop Graham told me of an opportunity to work as a volunteer chaplain at the Anglican Cathedral in Jerusalem for a year! After a lot of thinking and discussion, I decided that this year is not the time to do it. It might happen later. But it did spark off in me the idea of leading a pilgrimage to Israel later this year, and I am in discussion with a family company which does this, whom I met in the Christian Resources Exhibition last October. My hope is that it would be a group of 20, open to anyone, and we would spend 10 days in Israel and the Palestinian territories. My tentative title is ”Israel: land of tragedies and miracles”.
Finally
Do email me any comment you have. I would love to hear from you. And if you think this Newsletter is interesting, do share it!
God bless
Andy