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Tales of the City #8
The scene is Glasgow Pride. The protagonists are making their way down Argyll Street in Finnieston. I am dressed in a black suit, clerical collar and small lapel ribbon in all the colours of the rainbow. The group I am with all carry colourful posters proclaiming “The Scottish Episcopal Church Welcomes You”. Mine is mauve. …
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On being Proud
Yesterday morning, an envelope slipped through the letter box. It felt like an invitation to something and on the back were the intriguing words “10 Downing Street”. It turned out to be an invitation from the Prime Minister to a reception to celebrate the LGBT community in the United Kingdom. Will I be going? You…
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Scottish Episcopalians at Pride Glasgow
There’s going to be a group of Scottish Episcopalians walking (marching? processing?) together at Pride Glasgow on Saturday. This is being organised by one or two people from St Mary’s but anyone is welcome to join in. You don’t have to be gay, Scottish or Episcopalian either. All you have to do is want to be…
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Same-Sex Blessings Authorised for Trial Use
Through the wonders of the internet, I was watching last night as the US based Episcopal Church General Convention voted to allow a formal liturgy for Same-Sex Blessings to be authorised for trial use in such dioceses and congregations which chose to allow them. It was an undramatic moment, it has to be said –…
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Equal Marriage: BBC Interview
It should not be long until the Scottish Government comes to its decisions about how to move forward on Equal Marriage in Scotland. Two members of St Mary’s, Jaye and Ruth Richards-Hill had a good (and surprisingly long) interview on BBC Radio Scotland yesterday. If you are interested in hearing it, you can find it…
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So out of touch
Sometimes you get through a lovely day at church and then look online or look at the papers and wonder just how Christian leaders manage to go about getting such bad press on behalf of an organisation which is at heart full of people who are basically generous and loving. Such was my weekend. I…
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Crunch time for the Church of England
It is make your mind up time for the Church of England this week on the question of whether to move to open the Episcopate to female candidates. Somehow or another the synodical process in England has reached what seems to be a very unfortunate place. After many compromises to ensure that those who are…
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Web hosting recommendation
Several people have been asking me for a recommendation for web-hosting. I’m very happy to recommend the company that I use myself. They have the unglamorous but reassuring name of EZPZ and I’ve found them to be very good. They are particularly strong at fast customer service. Anyone looking for web-hosting for a WordPress site…
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Sermon preached on 1 July 2012
The sermon this week seemed to interest people quite a lot – more so than anything I’ve preached in months, I think. Here’s what I said: Quite a number of years ago, I went to visit priest who had just begun working in one of our congregations – it was someone whom I had enjoyed…
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Bloggers come and bloggers go
It seems to me that the blogging world is changing at the moment. It seems as though there has been a slow down in the number of people starting new blogs and those who are keeping them may be keeping them slightly less often. Twitter and Facebook updates (which are a form of micro-blogging) have…