What is in Kelvin's Head?

George C and Ann W

09/10/2012

Sometimes one’s twitter feed appears to simply light up with activity. It did so for me as countless people that I know posted their instant reactions to the things that George Carey and Ann Widdecombe said at a meeting held to co-incide with the Tory Party Conference, which was intended to rally the anti-same-sex marriage faithful. The long and short of it is that they seemed to imply that equal marriage would be the next stage on a slippery slope towards a totalitarian political system. It is reported that when asked about opponents to same-sex marriage being called names (the “bigot” word is what we are talking about, I fear), Lord Carey apparently said that such namecalling could lead to people facing the same kind of persecution as the Jews in Nazi Germany.

It is nonsense, of course, and all the more offensive as he seems to have forgotten that gay people were very particularly targeted by the Nazis too.

David Cameron may be a lot of things but I’d say that, having met him, I am pretty sure that he is not preparing a final solution to impose upon former archbishops and their followers. One might have thought that such comments were beneath even Lord Carey’s rarefied pomposity, but it would appear not.

So, what do I say about all this?

Firstly, it is worth remembering that these comments have at least as much power in rallying the pro-same-sex marriage cause as the anti-brigade. Indeed, all this does seem to recruit people to the fight for equality. It is hard to think anything other than that these comments make same-sex marriage all the more likely. No sensible politician is going to align themselves with this style of debate anyway. (I don’t think Ann Widdecombe was ever a serious politician though I will confess that in her barmy single-mindedness she remains, like Tommy Sheridan and Arthur Scargill, one of my very guilty political pleasures).

Secondly, it is worth reflecting on how easy it is for church people to get themselves into the news. It interests me that George Carey (once the Primate of All Englandshire) can still get column inches in the same kind of way that Richard Holloway (who was at the same time Primus of our own dear Scottish church) still can. Richard is still one of the more interesting and sane people prepared to say things to the press and consequently gets good coverage.

One of the lessons to learn from Lord Carey’s nonsense is that the press will still report things if clergy have interesting (and indeed, yes, outrageous things to say). I got lots of good press recently for saying that everyone is welcome in our churches and that we would happily look after any disaffected Roman Catholics for one Sunday only whilst their own church was saying hideous things.

It isn’t terribly exciting to say that everyone is welcome in St Mary’s. It is what we and many others say very often. Interesting though that if you articulate the risks and blessings of that kind of welcome, all of a sudden, the press puts it on the front page.

(Incidently, I do hope that the Roman Catholic church wants to look after any disaffected Episcopalians who are in need of sanctuary. They’ve been actively recruiting from the top with their Ordinariate scheme and we must wish anyone who signs up godspeed and good wishes).

Getting back to Lord Carey and Ann W though, what shall we pray for them. A blessing of wisdom, I say, and let us pray that the Holy Spirit might bless them both with a dose of compassionate holy common sense.

God bless them both.

Do I hear anyone say, Amen? (And a retweet if you are twittering….)

Ann Widdecombe, equal marriage, LGBT, Lord Carey

7 responses to “Whither the Kirk?”

Pausing Place

25/08/2010

I missed last night’s programme, but I thought your comments were interesting.

In a sense, perhaps it’s unsurprising if the SEC is inwardly more positive about itself than the CofS. My take is that in the recent past, at least, the SEC started from a lower common denominator, not being the “local” church in the same way as the Kirk, and so it doesn’t have to contend with others saying of it “look how the mighty have fallen” in quite the same way.

As to the health of the Kirk (and the SEC for that matter), I think we need to reflect on our self-perception and to consider carefully the points and places in which a dying church (congregation or denomination) should be allowed to die gracefully, and the ways in which we might see new life emerge from the rubble.

As a young(ish!), relatively new Christian I have seen examples of (both urban and rural) SEC and Kirk congregations where there are few signs of new growth, little to draw in younger (under 50 year olds, to pick a random-ish number) new folk, and much to sustain negative preconceptions of church as boring, irrelevant and so forth.

We as a faith community need to get much better at stepping up to the mark in our creativity and engagement with our society. The sad truth is that most young adults do not know and have not heard about Jesus Christ, and unless we engage with them in ways culturally relevant to them, and which do not presuppose previous knowledge (too often taken for granted) they never will.

It troubles me, but I do think it’s true to say that in the SEC and in the Kirk we have a church sustained by the traditions and cultural reference points taught to a previous generation. Culture has shifted radically, with the result that the same will not be able to be said in 20 years time.

Our challenge is clear. Whether the Kirk and the SEC can step up to the mark to address what it means to live out the Great Commission in the 21st century is less so.

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Cal

25/08/2010

I didn’t really understand who this programme was aimed at, or even what its aim was.

Yes, numbers have fallen, but perhaps the small number of people who remain are there because they actually want to be, not because it’s the done thing on a Sunday morning.

And personally, I rather like the idea of a church “sustained by traditions”. Clearly the church has to be relevant to modern society, but in abandoning the traditions of worship then you lose the centre of why the church exists in the first place.

There was something very Presbyterian about the programme with its “we’re doomed” mentality. I find the SEC generally more positive in outlook.

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John

25/08/2010

The only book the presenter seemed to have used in his research was ‘The Death of Christian Britain: Understanding Secularisation 1800-2000’ By Callum G Brown – indeed Callum Brown was one of the speakers. The thesis of this well argued sociological study is that “quite suddenly in 1963 something very profound ruptured the character of the nation and its people sending organised Christianity on a downward spiral to the margins of social significanceâ€. That something he identifies as new media, new gender roles and a moral revolution which has dramatically ended peopleâ€™s conception that they lived Christian lives.â€ It could be said to have happened as â€œsex beganâ€ between the end of the Chatterly ban and the Beatles first LP as the poet Philip Larkin so famously put it.”
To balance this statistical decline the programme flagged up some of the “church without walls ” iniatives in a lame sort of way. All in all a most unsatisfactory programme that only told half the story.

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Kenny

25/08/2010

Good crit Kelvin. My reflection at the end of the programme was, “Lord, we visited this stuff over 30 years ago, and have come out of it stronger and better Church in the SEC.” Hopefully, we stopped longing for ‘the good old days’ a long time ago!

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MartinRitchie

26/08/2010

I thinking “Pausing Place” makes a good point about needing to creatively engage with society. From my own experience of working with a CofS congregation, this creative engagement is a weak spot for many.

As a counterpoint to the programme, interesting to note in the latest “Life and Work” a very positive article about a growing CofS congregation in Stornoway – and I mean really growing! So not all doom and gloom, and I’m sure there are many more examples of bright spots, just as there are in the SEC!

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Graham Vahey

28/08/2010

If the C of S disappeared completely we would be at a loss. During the dark and bleak years of Thatcher’s reign she refused to visit Scotland for 5 years. When she did she expressed shock that we had Royal Regalia and ordered it to be removed immediately for safe-keeping to England. Her ‘Sermon on the Mound’ is now historical for its condescension to the Scots. She was none too pleased to be handed two reports on poverty in Scotland by the powerful Church and Nation Committee. Indeed, it was to this Committee that the population turned to for a moral lead during Thatcherism. When James VI (‘Jamie the Saxt’) became James I in England, the population turned to senior Scottish earls for a moral lead. Unfortunately, the Piskie Church does not give a moral lead in Scotland, apart from the work of the Scottish Constitutional Convention in the recent past. The RC Church does pronounce on moral issues. Could it not be conceivable that all the major Churches could unite in a Committee to pronounce for Scotland on moral issues as the Church & Nation Committee once did?

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Aldous N. Gaiters

01/09/2010

Speaking as a Nonjuror myself I am sure the SEC has a right to a moral voice in Scotland. Taking the US daughter church of the SEC as a model you could see where the fissures would appear. There is room for a modern liberal Christian voice, but even I an old Liberal myself, would have to fear that such a voice might appeal to only a select few.

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