What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Sunday Trading and the Churches

    Dear the Churches of England

    If you campaign against Sunday trading you are going to seem to the People of England to be as bad as you are. Campaign instead for the rights of shop workers of all religions who work at all times and the People of England might be more convinced. If you take on the Sunday trading thing you are going to lose anyway.

    Here in Scotland things have been much more liberal for a long time. We did have quite strict liquor laws which meant you couldn’t buy booze on a Sunday morning anywhere. This meant you couldn’t buy an emergency bottle of wine for communion on a Sunday morning in case it led to drunkenness, which always seemed to me to be a little odd. Even this law has been relaxed now.

    Seriously – the fight against Sunday trading isn’t one that churches can win and look sensible or fair. Please don’t make the rest of us look foolish.

    Remember the Sabbath day and what it was about and keep what it was about holy. It was about making sure workers got rest. It was about making sure there was time for leisure. It was about making sure that there were opportunities for worship. Churches should campaign for all those things. In multicultural Britain these things do not coalesce any more in the idea of one shared day off a week which is inevitably on a Sunday.

    Dear churches of England and the Church of England in particular – pick your battles wisely.

    Thank you for your attention.
    KELVIN

4 responses to “Diversity Champions”

  1. Kenny Avatar
    Kenny

    We’re in there at 101 I think.

    Reply
  2. Kelvin Avatar
    Kelvin

    Well, wishful thinking, Kenny, but I don’t think we are.

    Reply
  3. Rosemary Avatar
    Rosemary

    Tell you what, while we tackle discriminaton on the basis of gender – and that may take some time – how about taking age discrimination head on? Because I am totally sick of being discriminated against because of my age when I know if I did not ned to give it, I might easily get the job otherwise. It is just an idea in somebody’s head …. like sexual orientation. How we do the job matters – not how young or how straight we happen to be.

    Reply
  4. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    Yes Rosemary. In this area, at least, there is some progress to report in the church. We are just in the business of removing some age discrimination from the Code of Canons. We’ve been urged to do so on the grounds that that’s what employers who want to avoid prosecution do.

    I kind of wish we did things because we thought they were right rather than because we fear prosecution. It has alwas seemed rather odd to me that the same people who say that clergy are not employed in one breath insist we remove age discrimination on legal grounds in another.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Prayers ascending

    Prayers ascending from Thurible Towers today for the Diocese of Brechin as the Electoral Synod there meets this evening to choose a new bishop. Episcopacy is a funny business. We seem to be pretty much convinced in the Scottish Episcopal Church that we want bishops but I suspect that what we want from the Episcopacy…

  • Lords’ Reform and the C of E Bishops

    Oh, who will rid us of these troublesome bishops? The first sign of the shape of proposals to reform the House of Lords has just been published and disappointingly seems to advocate retaining a privileged position for Church of England Bishops in the House of Lords. It does suggest dropping the number from 26 to…

  • Things people are searching for

    The following search terms have recently led people to land at this blog. So happy to be of service. Better well hung than ill wed The Bearded Nun Gay ministers in the Church of Scotland Mothers’ Union Homophobia O my people, what have I done to you Mission Implausible

  • Presbyterians move to openly ordain gay clergy

    Exciting news coming in this morning that Amendment 10A has now been passed by 87 presbyteries, which was the threshold required in order to enact it. The consequence of this is that there will no longer be a bar on LGBT presbyterians being ordained. More details over here.