Dear friends,Nobody much today reads Etienne de La Boetie’s work ‘On Voluntary Servitude’. Yet there was a time when this treatise – little more than a student essay dashed off by a sixteen-year-old in the 1550s amidst the French Wars … Continue reading
David
Dear friends,Imagine an Anglican Church riven with conflicts, in which the Low Church party was making increasingly strident demands of the ruling body, determined to extend its power and influence. No, it’s not the Anglican Church of 2011 in its … Continue reading
Dear friends,I wish you a happy New Year. Or, as we might soon be saying, I wish you a high rating in your felicific calculus. For our level of happiness is, according to the government, something which the Office for … Continue reading
Dear friends,Many of us at this time of year will have an Advent calendar. Its twenty-four windows mark the countdown to Christmas, and we’re supposed to open one window each day, to build a sense of expectation as Christmas Eve … Continue reading
Dear friends,You might remember the scene in ‘Monty Python’s Life of Brian’ where two Palestinian would-be revolutionaries are listing grievances about the occupying Romans. One says to the other ‘What have the Romans ever done for us?’ Silence follows, then … Continue reading
Dear friends, What was the last book you read? Chances are it would have been a novel (especially if you were looking for some holiday reading). Sales of modern fiction are booming – inspired in part by the recommendations of … Continue reading
Dear friends,Isn’t there something more enjoyable you could do on a Sunday than go to church? Clearly, many people think so. Sometimes, when you visit other churches, you feel they might be right. Imagine sitting through an hour or more … Continue reading