Wednesday 14 December 2011

Higgs Boson

Why does stuff have mass? One would have thought it just does, but wow, there is a reason that things bind together, to make 3D stuff. Apparently the Higgs particles are part of the answer. What they won't answer is the question why there is stuff at all, because that question can be applied to the Higgs particles. Questions about ultimate origins of anything, including the particles with no mass, which would whizz about at the speed of light forever were it not for the Higgs particles, still remain. Scientists are still scratching their heads about gravity, dark matter, anti-matter and matter and the relationship between these last two. Isn't theoretical physics wonderful?
In the spiritual realms, the great question is, why is there evil if an all powerful perfectly good God exists? The traditional answer from the Christian stable has to do with the gift of love and free will. Love, which I believe is the divine attribute alluded to in Genesis 1.26, needs free will to be love at all. Free will is the very thing which can undo love, by choosing not to. Not even God can work logical impossibilities, like making love independent of free will. The consequence of the choice to depart from the high ground of love is charted in Genesis Chapter 3. But some like Martin Luther, see in that chapter a promise to fix at least the damaged relationship between people and God: Ch3.15, where God, speaking to the Serpent says that the offspring of the woman will crush his head, while he will strike at his heel. Some see this as a promise to deal with the power of evil and as alluding to Jesus Christ. Admittedly this is hotly disputed. I like to read it as the instant response of a distraught God to the catastrophic consequences of sin. I hear him say, "I will fix this" in that moment. Christmas in my opinion, is to theology what the Higgs boson might be to Theoretical Physics. Christ has come. God keeps his promises.

Tuesday 13 December 2011

Kyoto

2 degrees celcius. If the average temperature of our planet increases by just 2 more degrees, we will be outside zones previously known in the entire history of mankind, and we have been around for around 200,000 years or so, according to science. This means a scale of unpredictability of unprecedented size. No-one knows quite what exactly this might mean for planet earth and humanity, and all life. Massive population shifts are certainly predicted, but these do not come about alone, or without conflict. Quarrels over diminishing and less accessible fuel resources and other naturally occurring necessities would be highly likely too. Quite a doomsday kind of scenario. All the more so when you listen to the experts talk with apprehension about the fact that agreements are not likely to really kick in until 2020. They talk of a tipping point beyond which it would be impossible to reverse the heating up process, because the warming itself unlocks more greenhouse gasses which in colder conditions are trapped in the seas and forests of our planet. They worry that the tipping point will be reached well before we get our act together to stop the process.The process, by our chronological standards seems slow, although the momentum is vast, but by Earth's own chronological standards we are positively hurtling into a new era. Our 200,000 years is a drop in the ocean of Earth's time frame. David Attenborough has even made his own plea, using evidence gleaned from his massive experience of globe trotting and observing the planet.
So, Kyoto, and what it represents could be as important as life and death. Unfortunately, for as long as it is not this generation's power wielders' lives and deaths, no-one is going to hit the absolute panic button. I think it probably is too late to stop us going into uncharted waters. (No pun intended.) So what is left for humanity? Well, the uncharted waters need not, might not, mean an end for humanity, nor even some kind of apocalyptic doomsday scenario, but what will be needed is a spirit of co-operation and mutual help and sharing on a scale the like of which we have never seen. History does not give us much cause for hope. However, a changed landscape and planet just might give us the motivation to give up fighting for individual national survival, to co-operating for corporate international survival. We can but hope, for the children of our grandchildren.

Monday 12 December 2011

26-1

As soon as I heard that David Cameron had faced off 26 European leaders and vetoed their agreement last week, I felt that this was indeed blogworthy. You have to hand it to him, it takes some degree of courage to face a whole roomful of people, particularly when they are heads of governments, and stand your ground and disagree with them to the point of becoming isolated from them. His cool acknowledgment of Sarkozy as he brushed past him in the meeting room spoke volumes. I was reminded of one of my favourite verses in the Bible by all this: Exodus 23.2 "Do not follow the crowd to do wrong". Now, please do not take this as a ringing endorsement of Cameron's politics in all this. It might well be that in following this crowd, he would have been doing right. I am only expressing my admiration for one act of boldness, which is not admiration of the matter about which he was being bold, nor is it even agreement about the correctness of his stance, and to be even more brutal, I shall shortly take away some of the praise I have just lavished upon him. But, to hold my theme for a moment more, I have always thought that people put more weight on what the majority do, than whether what they do is right or not. Indeed for some people, the principle of democratic decision making is so strong, that for them, the rightness of a decision almost depends on how that decision has been made. If by democratic means, then it is right. Peer pressure is a powerful thing. I had a parishoner write me on the subject of inviting the congregation to decide matters pertaining to church policy, on the grounds that democracy was self evidently the right way to do this. If this were the case, the government would hold referenda on every law change they were proposing. But within church circles, the argument which runs, "People say", or, "A lot of people are saying..." is a powerful tool.
Anyway, back to Cameron. The man vetoed the move to tighten up banking regulations because he was concerned about safeguarding the English financial and banking institutions, many of which do their main business from within the City of London. The Tory party receives over 50% of its income from the City Institutions. A moment ago I said peer pressure is a powerful thing. One might also reflect that, money talks. 

Friday 11 November 2011

Remembering

There was an interesting discussion on BBC's "Any Questions?" about whether or not a poppy burning organisation should be banned as an organisation. Emotionally, of course I want them to be banned. I find this kind of behaviour abhorrent in the extreme. I find it more difficult to know what wisdom says to me about this. Do we do better to go along with the very principles which allow people to rail against the freedoms which we have come through centuries of upheaval, wars, political effort and all the rest to win, or do we say, this is one step too far? The activity of poppy burning is about our presence in Afghanistan and is not so directly aimed at our seeking to honour the fallen in wars of this century and last, but nevertheless, it does insult this tradition. So when people dishonour our fallen, insult our traditions, disrespect our ways, what is the correct response? I know that biblically speaking, it is only ever right for those of us who accept Biblical authority to act honourably, respectfully and humbly. The editor of the Jewish Chronicle was a member of the panel, and he made an interesting point: if he as a citizen were to burn a poppy in public, he would not be banned, what the government has done has outlawed the organisation by making its activities and membership illegal. Whether that is a right thing to have done would I suppose have to do with the wider aims and activities of the group in the opinion of the government. Coming back to the question of our own response to such behaviour, I believe we are bidden to tell someone who insults or offends us that they have done so, expressing the fact that we may be hurt or angry, and to begin a conversation with them, which hopefully might lead in some cases at least, to positive places.

Friday 7 October 2011

Money from nothing

Mervyn  (Bank of England King), (parentheses deliberately misplaced), has told us he wants to help the economy by injecting some 85 billion into the system. It is called Quantitative Easing, or as Dire Straits (the Band, but it might as well be the term for our current times!) might have sung it, "money for (from) nothing". I know that Q.E. is a hotly debatable tool and I do not know enough to be able to make an informed comment about its appropriateness at this time or ever. However I did listen to Mr King being interviewed about it, and found his answer to the question, "How does it work?" interesting. He answered firstly by giving the catch all response, "It stimulates the economy". The interviewer thank goodness was not satisfied with this. "But how does it do that?" he insisted. Here comes the interesting part. The Bank buys bonds from, guess whom? Bankers! So the Banks get massive cash injections, which they are then supposed to use for stimulating growth by lending to small to medium businesses, to the construction and manufacturing industries. What are these people telling us time after time after time? That the banks are not lending to them, despite one round of Q.E. already in the system! So what are the banks doing with all this money. They are shuffling it around other banks and financial insititutions of course. You can be sure of this: substantial amounts of it are making yet more bankers wealthy. If Q.E. is going to help at all, it has to be done with major strings attached, to prevent the cash from evaporating long before it ever hits the factory floor.

Friday 23 September 2011

Money money money

The Greek debt crisis is consuming yards of press and tv footage. I cannot begin to imagine how on earth, unless the Greek nation has access to raw materials which are worth millions, they could begin to pay off yet more debt, which they will need to incur in order to go on trading so we are told. If they default on their current debts, there will admittedly be a lot of pain in the short term, but maybe it is better to bite a painful bullet now than go on suffering hugely and indefinitely and still majorly painfully. People will still trade with them. It would help if they could tax their population a bit more effectively and efficiently. Of course governments in debt is no new thing. It's been happening since time immemorial, with rich bankers and money lenders financing wars and trade initiatives for most governments since Pharaoh was a lad.  Maybe Greece should sell itself to China, which seems to be flush right now. But seriously, the whole merry go round of countries in debt rather begs the question of who exactly does control policy. In name, the government does, but O boy, the shadows in the back room must be pulling some hefty clout wouldn't you think? Kind of makes me think again about Jesus' advice about giving to Caesar what belongs to him. In those days the tax revenue probably did acrue mostly to the government. Nowadays, does it really belong to Caesar, or does it actually belong to Caesar's debtors? Speaking of which, Italy is also under the economic microscope these days. Turn in your grave Caesar. 

Friday 9 September 2011

9/11

The 10 year anniversary of the destruction of the Twin Towers is featuring large in the media. People can remember where they were, what they were doing when the news broke. It was an incredible and unbelievable act of chilling and catastrophic hatred. This weekend many churches are opening their doors in the cause of peace and reconciliation and healing. It is sad that so often it takes a catastrophe to make us look long and hard at our attitudes. This anniversary will hopefully see great progress along the road of mutual understanding and respect. Many from both faith groups have given serious thought to attitudes of suspicion and negativity which were in place long before 9/11, and  shortly after that atrocity they began to realise that it was time to review previously held racist opinions. Fear and loathing of those who are different from us will never lead to good. The Christian Faith  bids us reach out to them in kindness and respect. At their hearts, those of deepest Islamic faith feel the same, of that I have no doubt. It is sad and strange that despite the fact that Love is Lord in both faith groups, so much savagery and destruction have proceeded from them. When we humans get our hands on the pure spiritual stuff, we sure can cause havoc with our own legalistic additions and interpretations. I suppose we are in constant need of that reminder from the Cross of Christ, that the way to a better pace is laced with pain. The pain of 9/11 hopefully will take us to a place which would have been anathema to the twisted fanatics who flew into the Towers, but of great blessing to millions from both faiths.

Thursday 1 September 2011

From here to there

Some things seem easy to figure out. Our local daily paper, "The Press and Journal", has been leading for a number of days recently with articles about the controversy surrounding the proposed bypass of the City of Aberdeen. A small group of protesters have tried to block this initiative at every turn. The most recent episode in this saga had a local businessman put round a petition expressing the exasperation of around 2000 local citizens with this group. Nevertheless, they continue with their objection. The fact that Aberdeen needs a bypass is a no-brainer. Of course it will adversely affect some, but it is adversely affecting a lot more at the moment. Moving out from the local, another headline has been about the proposed merger of the police forces from regional forces to one national Scottish force. The chief constables are against it, the government is for it. It's easy to figure out that the politicians reckon it will save money. What is more difficult to establish is will it be better, or worse for policing in Scotland. One intuitively thinks, worse. Moving on to Glasgow, and Celtic Football Club, where there is astonishment expressed at the "Not Proven" verdict handed out by the jury on the charge of "religiously aggravated attack" on the manager, Neil Lennon. Having seen the incident captured on CCTV and read the evidence of those involved, one wonders what the jury knew that the average newspaper reader doesn't. I am inclined to think that for a whole jury to decide this, there must either have been complicating circumstances, or all the jury members belonged to some sectarian club or other. Finally, going global, there was a debate on the radio concerning Guantanamo Bay, and the US Army's notorious prison camp there. Barack Obama promised to close it down. He hasn't yet. On the face of it an easy decision to reach. In the backrooms, what arguments have persuaded him to stall?
Some things are easy to figure. Others seem easy, but turn out to have unforseen problems, and others we just know are difficult, like separating the investment functions of the banks from the saving and lending functions, now, or later.
Some people look at the Christian Faith, give the world's  rampant exhibition of distress, tragedy and plain evil a cursory glance, and reckon it's a no-brainer that God doesn't exist. 

Tuesday 23 August 2011

Watchtowering

The doorbell rang this morning, 20 minutes before I needed to jump in the car and head off to a funeral, which I was taking. I hadn't changed out of my ripped jeans. A very neat, thin young man stood there on the step, with a pleasant young lady in tow. He greeted me politely and then proceeded to direct my attention to a folded A4 sheet he was carrying, which had various headers on it to do with the state of the world, humanity and spiritual questions. He asked if I ever thought about such things. I said I did. He asked if I owned a Bible. I said, "Many". He said I must be a man of faith. He obviously didn't know what "Manse" written in big bold letters above the number of our house meant. I asked him where they were from. "London". I immediately commiserated with them, not because of the recent riots, but because I couldn't help contrasting the highland beauty of here, with the  cosmopolitan landscape of there. I jumped to the conclusion that they were from a Bible College in London and were out doing some missionary field work. I hadn't read the small print at the bottom of his leaflet. We had a short pleasant chat about the importance of spiritual priorities and I asked them when they were heading back. They told me they would be leaving on Sunday. I said if they had time our church service started at 11.30am. The strange silence and very non engaging stare I received on the back of that was disconcerting. I had to terminate the conversation or I was going to be late, but I wished them well. I closed the door and searched the leaflet, finding at the bottom what I suspected. This was a "Watchtower Press" publication, otherwise known as the Jehovah's Witnesses. I felt sad. I wished I had had the presence of mind to say to him, across his empty stare on the back of my invitation, "Yes, isn't it sad when we find we are unable, for reasons of our own religious dogma, to accept the warm benign invitation of another honest seeker, to join them in worship." 

Thursday 11 August 2011

Riots and Chaos and Catastrophe

If there ever was a week for news big and bad, this was it. David Cameron, initially staying away and thinking this would all go away, had to cut his holidays short. Parliament has been recalled to an emergency debate. Where have we gone wrong, who is doing what wrong, and what can we do about it? These questions are on everyone's lips not least the members of parliament. The questions being asked may not be very different from the famous debate in the Times, over the question, "What is wrong with the world?"  G.K. Chesterton, author and essayist, sent a letter in. "Sir, I am. Yours etc. G.K. Chesterton"
G.K. Chesterton was a devout, sincere and intelligent Christian. His response comes from the orthodox Christian theology of the Cross of Christ. Orthodox understanding sees the Cross as part of God's response to Sin. Orthodox Christians see Sin as something which contaminates everyone, and which when spelled out is simply our turning away from God to anything else which is lower and hurtful to ourselves and our race. Looting and rioting and violence are the kinds of actions which help us to distinguish ourselves from the real nasties. Or so we think. And whilst most of us would not descend to such abject depths, the Bible doggedly asserts that we have it in us to do so. That is why we need a saviour.
Jesus however does not stop the world from rushing headlong to destruction. Certainly he came because that is what it does. He saves us from rushing straight off the edge of eternity into the total absence of God, but he does not stop us from rioting or slaughtering one another, as our own Scottish clans did to one another just a few hundred years ago, and which others are still doing in some parts of the world today. So when the riots break out, as they always have and always will, sure, let's do all in our collective wisdom and power to stop it and stem whatever evil tides are momentarily buoying the chaos up. But, the elegant and beautiful dove of peace and the spirit of universal harmony are elusive and transient at the best of times, because our world is broken. However it is through that brokenness that the light gets in, as Leonard Cohen has so perceptively remarked. And even in the height of the madness that flooded our cities, we saw shafts of light: people doing brave things in the face of mob unrule and terror. Evil does not reign. It just erupts every now and again. Goodness and love do not rule yet either. But the Cross and Resurrection signpost which way the story ends.

Tuesday 12 July 2011

News of the Empire

The Rupert Murdoch - News of the World story is rampaging across the media. The famine in Africa, the war in Libya, all have dropped into the interior of newspapers and rarely manage to make the t.v. headlines. Prince William and Kate barely rate a mention as they visit the Americas. This is big. I heard bullish former police officers being interviewed by the Home Affairs select committee. They tried to make their warm relationship with News International sound completely justified. Astonishing. No less astonishing was Murdoch's attempt to hold off the baying pack by silencing the News of the World for ever. In an unconvincing show of repudiation of the paper's evil deeds, he lamented its course into crime. But what I want to know is, to what real end? Murdoch still stands ultimately responsible for the crimes of the paper. If the paper is guilty, then what of its proprietor? Does he think he has done the right thing and the public will thank him for removing his rag? The public are not so stupid. Today's paper is not the criminal and sacrificing it was neither here nor there. The net will move past this distraction and continue to close on Murdoch and his flunkies. What a pity the News of the World won't be around to report it. Maybe that was why Murdoch closed it down.

Wednesday 29 June 2011

Wind Turbines

A leaflet was dropped through our letterbox the other day. It encouraged us to object to the proposal to build a wind turbine along the valley from Aboyne. The heading was, "Not on our patch".  Sigh. Always it has to be someone else's problem. I have a certain amount of sympathy for people whose part of the world really is beautiful and who chose the location of their house for its outlook and would definitely not have bought if there had been a turbine there already. But my sympathy stops short of agreeing with them. Thinking people on the whole seem to agree that we cannot continue to exploit the non renewable resources ad infinitum. If this is the case, we need to become part of the solution. Part of the solution is to become renewable resources friendly. And this has to include my willingness to see turbines in my back yard. Too many of us are prepared to agree there is a problem, but when we are unwilling to play, the problem becomes someone else's to solve. We are no longer identifying with it ourselves. Unfortunately there are too many problems which are not amenable to that treatment. Ok, we have to be willing to set boundaries and say "no" sometimes, but often there is a better way, a way that invites our positive participation. Strangely enough, this is also so so true of Church. 

Monday 13 June 2011

Answers to prayer

In our prayers of intercession in church on 12th June (Pentecost) we prayed over the issue of increased aid for vaccination programmes in the developing world. I read in today's Independent (13th) that the government is announcing increased aid of over £8m towards this. It is immensely pleasing to be able to note this here and for thanksgiving next Sunday. To keep me becoming too triumphalistic in my approach to prayer, I should also add that we prayed for peace in most of the warring countries that are hitting the headlines at the moment. Sadly I think it will be a little longer before this prayer may be answered, although I continue to look for speedy resolutions to the conflicts.

To be honest, I was also surprised to read the news about vaccinations in the paper. It occurred to me to say I was ashamed to be surprised, but I wasn't. I'm not ashamed of my being surprised, not because I've stopped believing that God answers prayer, but because I have become used to the fact that we tend to couch our more formalised prayer in the setting of the institutional church and formal church services, in a more generalised way, which doesn't seem to look for specific and speedy resolution or immediate solutions. I know that the human condition throws up far more things that we would like to see mopped up quickly than ever are. Neither God, by direct and miraculous intervention, nor the progress of humankind, clear up all the problems as soon as we would like. This latter is hardly surprising, given that we cause many of our own problems. However, the news that increased resources are being made available for the vaccinations does remind me to be more intentional about prayer, and to raise the bar of my own expectations with regard to it. I need to hold this in tension with what I like to call realism, or spiritual common sense with regard to prayer. Some things could not be cleared up quickly even if God did intervene directly and miraculously, and some things need the development of goodwill and wisdom before they can be addressed. And many of the things which God could clear up instantly, he doesn't. I suspect he doesn't so that we will learn wisdom and patience, and not tire in endeavour to make things better. This means that prayer also involves management of the expectations of those with whom or for whom we pray, since we all know of cases where people have been bitterly disappointed and even lost faith because they did not get the answer for which they longed. And then there are some things which could be miraculously changed by the application of things like grace, which is within the gift of every one of us to give, but so often we fail to manage. 

Sunday 5 June 2011

I'm looking at a column in Scotland on Sunday by Duncan Hamilton entitled War on drugs has also become a war on free thinking, and as I read, my mind drifts, and makes a connection between what he is saying, and the current impending crisis in the Church of Scotland, with many in the evangelical wing breathing heavily, gathering in corners, and making altogether threatening noises about their position in the National Church being no longer tenable.

The Global Commission on Drugs Policy produced its report last week. It is recommending the decriminalising of certain drugs. Why? It has evidence that the costs, social and financial, of incarcerating, on a global scale, millions of people, are massive and moreover do nothing to restrict or reduce the flow of drugs. The war on drugs is not being won in other words. The commission wants to find other ways of dealing with the problem which centre mainly on undermining organised crime by making drugs like cannabis legally available. Using other forms of treatment like heroine assisted programmes are also suggested. Hamilton says that for many these proposals will be offensive. Cries of "weakness" and "throwing in the towel", "letting them off the hook" etc can be heard in the wings.
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Now, what is the goal of those who want to leave the Church of Scotland? Do they want a church which cleaves more closely to Scripture? A better purer one than the one they would leave behind? One which does not support clergy who are committed to sinful lifestyle choices? Fair enough in its own way. Let us for the moment give the ground to the anti gay lobby. For the sake of argument only, let us accept that a gay lifestyle is sinful. Are those intent on exiting the national church going to adopt the same stringency on the gluttonous in their midst, on the mean, on the proud? These too might be construed as life choices, and can certainly in the light of Scripture be shown to be sinful. And given that the debate rages between equally God and Bible loving Christians about whether or not it is sinful to act out a homosexual orientation, whereas we could agree on gluttony and pride fairly easily, I am to say the least, confused.

The connection for me between this and the decriminalisation of drugs is that we need to truly debate these things, rather than shout at each other from entrenched positions. That latter is not surely what we learned from Christ. A practical situation forced a decision upon us; one which we would rather have avoided making. But for years, we have had gay people in the ordained ministry, some with an active sexual life kept low key and secret, others celibate. Was turning a benevolent blind eye better? I don't think so. We need to keep talking to each other, and keep affirming that what makes us different from each other is not badness. 

Thursday 26 May 2011

Gays and the Second Coming


I’ve been mulling over the twin tsunami type events of the week which have been generated from within the Christian Community. The first was Mr Camping’s prediction that the world would end on the 21st May, which I was rather hoping it wouldn’t, as my birthday is on the 29th. The second has been the storm which broke at the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland with regard to the ordination of openly gay people whether in same sex relationships or single. Mr Camping and those who are against the ordination of gay people both affirm the sovereignty of the Bible and appeal to it as the basis of their case. Mr Camping refuses to back down despite the evidence, though like Ken Clarke, he has apologised for getting the detail wrong. Apparently the first fruits did happen on 21st May, in a spiritual sense, in that the world is now under judgement, whereas before the 21st it wasn’t. The date of the real action with fireworks has been revised to 21st October, fortunately after my birthday.
The point however about both Mr Camping and the anti gay lobby is that appeal to Scripture is not actually where it is at. The appeal from both camps (excuse the play on words), is futile. It no more proves greater zeal for the Lord than excessive words in prayer. Mr Camping will be proved wrong by real events in real time. He will square it with Scripture by yet more sophistry. The anti gay lot, whilst not in a position to be proved wrong, can be taken to task on two counts. One is that the evidence from Scripture is being ripped out of context in order to condemn wholesale. This makes their case less an appeal to Scripture and more a reliance on ignorance.  Second, they conveniently do not point to the many instance of deliberate overlooking or ignoring of plenty of other Scriptural mandates. Women are not supposed to worship without hats in mixed company. We are not supposed to lend our money out at interest. Although admittedly that is difficult in today’s economic climate, I cannot imagine that many in the anti gay group have never used interest bearing accounts in banks. And what about the stoning of those caught in adultery, the wearing of clothes made from mixtures of materials, and using inventions never thought of when the Bible was written, (enter the Amish communities). If we ignore some things and have a go at others, I want to ask why?
The question is actually a real one, for I have been as guilty of this kind of hypocrisy and more, as anyone. As someone whose roots are in evangelical conservative theology, I have struggled with the issues of interpretation of Scripture and the witness of the Church. And quite frankly I am tired of having to play games with Biblical interpretation. I believe the imperative to love is so overriding and overwhelming that it has to be allowed to interpret my actions and beliefs, rather than me coming to interpret Scripture with my little mind.

Tuesday 1 February 2011

Prep for Kili

 Well, on days like these, who needs an excuse to be out on the hills?                        














Friday 7 January 2011




It really feel as though the countdown to our Africa journey has started. Lorraine got a fine pair of walking poles the other day and I had to buy a new pair of boots as my others had perished beyond repair. The weather holds cold here although the snow has virtually all melted from the lower ground. Just a few snow mounds remain in gardens and on the road. The photos were taken on 30th Dec from the west side of the Pentlands.