Do you know someone who appeared to be a strong christian, and then began to doubt the truth of the whole thing? I’m guessing they were likely someone in their twenties, brought up as believers but suddenly facing questions they didn’t have answers for and issues they couldn’t easily resolve. And I’m guessing many of […]
Thirty five years ago my life was changed after listening to a talk on prayer and spiritual warfare. I had been converted as a teen in a Presbyterian church where doctrine was regarded as the most important thing and God was known to be sovereign, ordaining everything according to his good purposes. But this doctrine […]
Who doesn’t enjoy flying a kite? There’s something special about seeing a colourful kite soaring higher and higher while we hold onto the string, feeling somehow in command (even if we’re not). We need at least three things for a kite to fly: We need to let go and allow it to fly. It can’t […]
I was raised in a family of four noisy boys. As we grew up, we became quite opinionated, and often argued, quite amicably but noisily, about religious, political, ethical and a thousand more trivial issues that interested us. When each of us found girlfriends and eventually wives, they didn’t always find our loud and rambunctious […]
Some readers may recall, 18 months ago, two posts about the long distance endurance cycling race, the inaugural Indian-Pacific Wheel Race, which tragically ended in the death of one of the leading contestants, Mike Hall. At the time I spoke of the grief many participants and followers of the race felt, and the very sensitive […]
Almost 6 years ago I posted on How many christian denominations worldwide. I had been asked this question by an internet friend (not a christian believer) who was tired of hearing unsupported claims. It has become my most visited and most commented page, accounting for almost half the visitors to this site. I can’t help […]
Did Jesus mean it to come to this? How much does modern western christianity come from Jesus, and how much comes from somewhere else? A few weeks back I introduced the theme of Did Jesus mean it to come to this?, in which I want to examine the modern western church, and muse on how […]
More than two billion people in the world today identify as followers of Jesus. This includes a fair percentage of inhabitants of the USA, currently the world’s most powerful nation, its most influential via film, TV, social media and popular music, and home of some of the world’s richest people. My country, Australia, still has […]
Child sexual abuse is a terrible crime and rightly loathed by most people. And churches have, tragically, been home to some of the worst offenders. The Australian Government set up a Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse almost 5 years ago. (A Royal Commission is a judicial process that has wide powers, […]
We all know that the world is a very unequal place. Anyone reading this is probably not doing too badly, but billions struggle to make a living. But you may not be aware that, by some measures at least, inequality is increasing.