In case you missed it … 10 things I’ve recently shared elsewhere.
(1) Couldn’t help noticing that the recent New Wine song ‘Anointing’ …
… bears a striking resemblance to the soundtrack from Blade Runner
(2) Today [18 February] is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. Here are some helpful reflections on self-control, by Graham Tomlin. (I suppose self-control is about prioritising our deepest desires over our immediate desires. We need a bit of self-awareness in order to know when we are prone to the temptation to give in to our immediate desires. Smartphones don’t always help!) Why Lent is vital for our digital future.
(3) To characterise the (Canterbury) ‘Anglican Communion’ as ‘institutional’ and the (Gafcon) ‘Global Anglican Communion’ as ‘confessional’ is overly simplistic. The former is tearing itself apart over doctrinal differences, so it is clearly not merely ‘institutional’ or devoid of any concern for doctrine, while the latter has councils and structures that go far beyond mere assent to a confession of faith. (In fact, the Jerusalem Declaration itself is more than a doctrinal statement.) Anglicanism is often a ‘both-and’ kind of thing, and we need to rejoice in being both confessional and institutional. The Abuja Affirmation.
(4) This Wednesday [25 March], Sarah Mullally will fully begin her ministry as Archbishop of Canterbury in a service at Canterbury Cathedral. Worth listening to this ‘Holy Smoke’ (Spectator) podcast interview with her biographer, Andrew Atherstone, who handles the topic (and the podcast host) extremely well.
… and again on the Church Times Podcast.
… and again on the Living Church Podcast.
(5) Still sceptical about the statistical claims surrounding the ‘Quiet Revival’, but I really enjoyed listening to David Goodhew speaking about church growth on the Church Times Podcast.
(6) Is the war on Iran (and Iran’s recent history) all about oil? Some helpful reflections from George Monbiot, writing in The Guardian.
(7) Sam Hailes, writing in Premier Christianity magazine: ‘The “quiet revival” phrase must, like the report, die its death. What won’t die are the incredible, genuine stories of God at work.’ There is ‘a genuine curiousness from a new generation who are open to faith’.
(8) Justin Brierley on the Quiet Revival: ‘“Revival” is not the word we should ever have used for what’s happening — but “rebirth” does still feel appropriate. … Besides, if a Christian revival ever truly gets underway, we won’t need a spreadsheet to tell us. It’ll be obvious.’
(9) Andrew Goddard on the future of GAFCON and the Anglican Communion. GAFCON’s new Global Anglican Communion (GAC) is putting huge pressure on many of the leading figures in GAFCON/GSFA to choose between the GAC and the (Canterbury) Anglican Communion.
… and he has some broader reflections on the future of the Anglican Communion here.
(10) The UK university system is in a mess: overly reliant on fees from international students (to subsidise domestic students), who often end up massively in debt (and without the high-paying jobs they were hoping for), while the whole sector is undergoing a funding crisis. ‘I see it as trafficking’: the brutal reality of life as a foreign student in the UK.