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let the vicar have a day off

I began writing this on Tuesday, my usual day off. Not normally a day when I would be hunched over the keyboard, but this week I had the time because I'm luxuriating in a whole week off. A perfectly usual experience, except in the case of vicars, when the idea of a "week off" becomes quite complex and problematic. Last week on Twitter I intercepted someone's tweet who had spotted a clergy friend who was enjoying an entertaining day out. His reply was along the lines of "blimey, what it is to be a vicar and live the life of Riley" etc. I have no complaint against this person, who is a good guy and obviously meant no harm. It was just a variant on the age-old witticism that every parish priest hears on a more or less weekly basis, "of course you only work on Sundays, don't you?" There are a few versions of this, my personal favourite being "not another holiday?" if one takes leave at any time within about a year of having previously d
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Delia Knox - Miracles and healing, cynicism or wonder?

Today the story of Delia Knox has jumped out of Christian subculture into the mainstream UK media, with this story on the Daily Mail website. Knox is filmed leaving her wheelchair after being prayed for at the Bay of the Holy Spirit Revival in Mobile, Alabama. Watch the 13 minute video embedded there, if you can. Most people will have one of two reactions to this: either you will be deeply moved, or you will find yourself overwhelmingly cynical about the whole thing. The second of the two seems to be the reaction of choice for Mail Online readers, who queue in droves in the comments section to pour scorn on the whole thing. Why are people sceptical about spiritual and miraculous healing? Mostly because they simply don't believe it. The prevailing secular atheist worldview has no slot available for this kind of thing - it simply doesn't happen (although a more thoughtful and informed atheist might allow for some kind of psychosomatic factor in healing). But even among those w
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On the future

What a month it has been. In time (how long will it take?) we will reflect on how a tiny bug brought the global traffic of human life to a crashing halt, but our initial reaction was mostly just shock. The suddenness of the lockdown in the UK took our breath away, leaving us scrabbling for meaningful activity to replace the things that had been taken away. Now, as we move from shock (and a bit of denial) to a kind of acceptance, the semblance of a routine in the new normality, we are starting to think again. There is a great deal to think about. Coronavirus has revealed things about our society that were previously shrouded, both good and ill. It has forced us to examine our priorities - even Government ministers, not usually given to public introspection, have been heard to muse about a re-evaluation of what matters, afterwards. As we think, then, about what comes after, so we have seen the emergence of the predictions. I've long been fascinated by the compulsion to predict
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