Orwell on The Unspeakable Wrongness of Taking a Life.

I get restless if I don’t have something to read on the bus. So I grabbed the closest thing on my desk as I ran out yesterday – which had been a recently thumbed anthology of George Orwell’s Essays. (I’d been looking at it because of the seminal piece Why I Write, recently recommended to me by the Real Grasshopper). I found myself, somewhat incongruously, sitting upstairs in the front row motoring down Park Lane, and reading a short account of an experience Orwell had in the British Imperial Police in Burma – starkly entitled ‘A Hanging‘.

Perfect potboiler plots? Rely on centuries-old Ecclesiastical Conspiracies

So… you want to write a runaway bestseller in 2012? Hoping to fill the cabin luggage of air-travellers the world over? Well, here is just thing… it’s guaranteed to hit the headlines at the same time and thus rake in the cash. An ecclesiastical conspiracy theory novel, ‘based’ on matters of ‘historical’ record and archaeological ‘certainties’. It offers the lot: corruption, scheming, sexual deviancy, hypocrisy, ancient history, power, scandals, and above all, the unveiling of secrets.

You hooked yet? I was. And it seems that the book-buying travelling public never tire of a new conspiracy thriller. So… you’ve got it made.

The Saigon School of Missiology and Graham Greene’s QUIET AMERICAN

It is not just the victims of imperialism who easily identify its sins and blindspots. Those who have wielded and then lost empires are quick to spot the parallels in others’. Perhaps that was partly why Graham Greene was such a caustic critic of what he perceived as the twentieth century’s new imperialist incarnation: the United States. Of course Greene had strong left-wing sympathies and was openly anti-American, which provided  convenient filters by which the right could ignore his perspectives. It’s no surprise that he was under FBI surveillance from the 1955 publishing of The Quiet American until his death in 1991.

West Wales Winds and Waves

Oh what joy to be by the sea over New Year. Here are a few happy snaps…

Especially good to have had an amazing sunset on New Year’s Day itself, after a couple of very overcast days. Just click on any of them for the rest.

Q marks the spot – Treasure Map 40 (January 2012)

HAPPY NEW YEAR from Q, one and all!

Sacred Treasure

• VERY grateful to have been sent this last month – Tim Keller on why Ministry can be dangerous to your health. Excellent.
• Lots has been written about the passing of Christopher Hitchens. But worth reading are definitely the appreciation by his (Christian) brother, Peter; and that of former debater Douglas Wilson. Also check out Tim Coomar’s thoughtful piece.

2011 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

A Meynell Family Advent Animation

I’m sorry for being so rubbish at posting recently. There’s been lots in my head that I’d love to speak on but it’s been manic, what with Christmas and all (quite apart from recently Langham jollies in Athens and Sarajevo). But after getting back from Bosnia on Saturday, we started the annual decoration rituals… with a difference. Bonkers, I concede, but we decided to throw together a rather rough and ready stop-motion animation of the tree going up.

When Christians disagree… priorities, challenges and imperatives

It’s a given. Christians disagree. Like pretty much everyone else, in fact. They always have. They always will. This side of the eschaton, that is.

So the issue is not whether or not we can avoid disagreement. The issue is whether or not we can disagree badly… or disagree well… This is what lay behind the recent 3-part sermon series given by Hugh Palmer at All Souls. And it deserves a wide airing in its entirety because it confronts some vital and little-appreciated issues.

An unimpressive herald of an unimpressive message: a final message under Parliament

Last week saw the final instalment of the little 1 Cor 1 series in the undercroft chapel in Westminster. Unfortunately, we had the slight inconvenience of the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement happening on the same day, and as this had been brought forward to 12.30, there were few who were able to come. No worries though. We happy few had a happy time.

And how nice it was to have a Christmas tree in the centre of Westminster Hall. No thought of winterval here… yet. But give it time I suppose. Now, was it my imagination or does this tree look as though it is leaning to the right…? I’m sure that can’t be significant, can it?

Wintry reflections at Little Gidding

Am just back from a 24 hour escape to the country with a few other guys – we meet once or twice a year and have been (on and off) for years. It was a real tonic and encouragement to me personally. I’ve realised more and more how much I need this sort of thing. But the particular treat of this time away was staying at Ferrar House in Little Gidding. As its website shows, it has all kinds of wonderful historical, and especially literary, connections. Charles I and George Herbert… and of course more recently T S Eliot. As it happened, he only came here for an afternoon and never stayed the night. But his link with the place was immortalised by the 4th of his FOUR QUARTETS, entitled Little Gidding.

Q marks the spot – Treasure Map 39 (December 2011)

Sacred Treasure

• William Lane Craig certainly made waves during his October visit to the UK. Here one person testifies to how Richard Dawkins had led him to Christ (!), and an interesting if rather provocative article in the Telegraph.
• I like this – a Periodic Table of the Bible from Visual Unit
• Woody Allen and the Evangelicals?!
• And the influence of John Stott on American Evangelicalism at Huffington Post
  

Some notes from “Speaking truth into popculture”

We had a bit of an experiment on Sunday night at All Souls. Instead of the normal evening service, we had a condensed corporate time for around half an hour, and then split into 3 seminars in different venues. Prof John Wyatt did one on Truth in the Brave New World of medical ethics, Nola Leach of CARE did one on Truth in the Public Square and I did one on popculture. The whole thing worked really well and it seemed refreshing to do this sort of thing every now and then.

Happy Thanksgiving from the New Yorker

To all my American Friends:

Happy Thanksgiving

Thought you might enjoy this from the current edition of the New Yorker.

Have a good day!

Corinthian Caption Competition: the Crunchie Winners

So at last, the time has come. The time for the announcement of the prizes. The Virtual Crunchie can be printed off and enjoyed at your leisure.

There were some excellent entries. And so I felt duty-bound to aware a number of prizes in two categories: Topical and Exegetical. Runners up are honour-bound to share their crunchie with someone else. I’ll know if you eat the whole thing yourself.

Friday Fun 16: Corinthian Caption Competition

Am in Greece this weekend for the launch of Langham Greece. It’s gone really well so far – lots of great discussion. Around 35 attending the conference and around 15-20 watching streaming of it online. REALLY encouraging.

But yesterday we had a free morning and so headed off to Corinth (obviously). I’d no idea that it was only an hour or so from Athens, which was great. We clambered up the Akrocorinth, and wandered around the remains of Ancient Corinth – which are extensive but in parts hard to imagine as intact buildings. You can see the snaps here.

An unimpressive people for an unimpressive king: another message under Parliament

Back in Parliament yesterday, and I unexpectedly arrived a little early – so found myself waiting for around 15 minutes in Westminster Hall. It was idyllic – the sun streaming through the great south windows. Perfect for reflections on the extraordinary events that occurred on this very spot: from monarchs and statesmen lying in state (the most recent, of course, being the Queen Mother), to grand inquisitions and historic orations (such as Mandela in 1996, the extraordinary moment of seeing a Pope address both Houses in 2010, and then Obama this year, the first US President to address both Houses from the Hall).

A natural cantata for a frozen planet: Rautavaara’s Cantus Arcticus

I’d guess that only the most hardened petrol-heads and urbanites will fail to be moved to awestruck wonder by episodes in the BBC’s latest natural world epic, FROZEN PLANET. Quite apart from the stunning (ant)arctic panoramas, there are the focused dramas of a pack of killer whales harassing and (hours later) overwhelming a minke whale. Or comic moments, like the waddling penguins slipping on the ice, or the traffic jam of two narwhal clusters, equipped with their unicorn-like tusks and having to negotiate a head on meeting in a narrow, one-way only ice channel.

Spinning an unspinnable message – why bother? A message under Parliament

One or two have asked for this, so here it is: the first of 3 talks given in the gaudy riot of Pugin-inspired colour that is Parliament’s Undercroft Chapel. This is a group that meets mostly weekly under Christians in Parliament. The next two are on 15th and 29th November. We’d decided to do 3 sessions from the opening chapters of Paul’s extraordinary and thoroughly contemporary first letter to the Corinthian church.

11:11 11/11/11 – WE WILL REMEMBER THEM

Ashamed though I am to admit it, I never realised that the famous “We Will Remember Them” words used on Armistice Day come from a much longer poem by Laurence Binyon so it seemed sensible to quote it on this uniquely binary Remembrance Day.

Three blind-spots of the Western Church from Vinoth Ramachandra

Vinoth Ramachandra has had links with All Souls for quarter of a century – and he and his wife Karin have been mission partners for many years. So it was a joy to have them join our staff meeting last week, while they were passing through en route between two conferences before heading home to Sri Lanka. One of the things that was often said of John Stott by those from the ‘majority world’ (including Vinoth) was that he was very good at genuinely listening to their perspectives and concerns, rather than following a paternalistic, one-directional relationship.

So in that spirit, Hugh asked Vinoth to speak about what he perceived as the blind-spots of the western church.