What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Review of Last Year’s Predictions

    Well, clearly it behoves me to consider last year’s New Year Predictions and see how I did.

    Remember those people who used to say, “But what is a blog…?” Well this year you are going to be hearing them say, “But what is a mooc…?”

    Well, I think I got that partially right. Lots of people have been getting online education and training from moocs and mooclike environments. Coming to a church context near you in the future. I claim a partial hit with this prediction.

    Gay men are going to start shaving again. Now that so many straight men have bought into the idea that beards are hip, it is time to mess with their fashion sense again. Consider this the memo. (Next year, the end of tattoos!)

    Oh, I got this so, so wrong and beards have become so, so absurd. How long, O Lord, how long?

    Church of Scotland General Assembly will be unable to affirm last year’s compromise on a local option for ministers who happen to be gay.

    Well, I got this one wrong too. Looks as though the Assembly will affirm last year’s compromise though there is disagreement about whether the provisions regarding civil partnership should also refer to marriage. I expect this one will run on for a bit.

    More revelations relating to Cardinal Keith Patrick O’Brien.

    Yes – we have revelations about where he is living and how he is funded. I expected more about his time as bishop, but that may come yet.

    Number of active bloggers decreases. Influence of those still blogging increases.

    Yes – blogging has become much more intentional and is clearly for the committed. However, I’m pleased to see an end of year boost in Scottish Episcopal blogging once people realised they had something they passionately wanted to talk about.

    The real purpose of the Pilling Report will be revealed with hindsight as evangelicals begin to argue about its contents. (May take a couple of years, but trust me on this one). Initially this will be in private – increasingly in public. Having been the great unifying factor for Evangelicals for the last 10 years, attitudes to gay people will become the source of greatest disunity amongst Evangelicals for the next decade. Unappealing and unsatisfying as it is, Pilling is a watershed – it was never designed to court liberal opinion so we might as well stop moaning about it. It was designed to divide evangelical opinion and is going to be jolly successful.

    Not Proven must be the verdict on this one for the year that is past – partly true but the bit about Pilling remains to be seen as I expected. We’ve have some interesting debates within Evangelicalism and Vicky Beeching’s coming out. This one really will run and run.

    The Independence Referendum will be lost here in Scotland but alas, not by enough to shut everyone up.

    Yes – bang on. I was right. I was right. I was right.

    Such terrible statistics in the Diocese of Glasgow and Galloway that we lose at least 4 seats on General Synod.

    Yes – did we lose 6 or was it more?

    Lord Carey will say that Christians are being persecuted in the UK, that the church is dying out or that the sky is going to fall in, and will say it at the most unhelpful time possible – probably around one of the English General Synods or Easter.

    I’m claiming this is a hit. He came out in favour of allowing assisted suicide (against the Church of England’s stated policy) on 11 July 2014. Synod started 11 July 2014.

    We will hear about our first UK gay divorce.

    No – surprisingly, I don’t think I can find headlines about this.

    Trends to watch:

    Continued meltdown of the Church of Scotland. Ceasing to be a national church before our very eyes.

    Internet increasingly rewards those who know how to manipulate images.

    Economic polarization of the UK continues.

    Yes. Yes. And, sadly, Yes.

    Mixed bag this year.

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18 responses to “To the synod office”

  1. Robin Avatar
    Robin

    > Would it be out of the question, Robin, for Ms Goldie to become the new Bishop of Glasgow and Galloway?

    As far as I know, it would be OK, since she’s baptised and over 30! And Glasgow & Galloway has had a Bishop Goldie before, so there’s precedent!

    Reply
  2. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    Robin – we are in the process of removing the 30 year lower age limit for bishops this year. If Ms Goldie turns out to be younger than we think, she is still in with a shout.

    David – thanks for your post. It is similar to what’s been said to me in synod. To be honest, as someone whose formative years were mainly in a part of the country where the dominant industry was coal, the idea that the farming/rural economy has been particularly ill treated by either European or national government thinking has always seemed very puzzling.

    There are many things which bring town and country together. Clergy complain of the same degrees of isolation in town and country, for example. People also often complain about the ability of young people in the country to find affordable housing locally. However, to someone who has lived succesively in Perth, Bridge of Allan and the West End of Glasgow, that complaint again seems to unite rather than divide us.

    As for field sports, I feel less strongly about the sports themselves than I did when I was younger. However, I feel more strongly than ever that all of us, whatever sector of society we live in can only muddle along by a common respect for the law and it has sometimes been difficult for someone like me to perceive such a respect in those advocating certain field sports.

    I don’t think field sports are a human rights issue. And I don’t think that civil disobedience (ie lawbreaking) is an appropriate or proportionate response to the banning of hunting with hounds.

    Reply
  3. Robin Avatar
    Robin

    > Robin – we are in the process of removing the 30 year lower age limit for bishops this year.

    Is this to remedy the understandable confusion potentially caused among electors by your being eminently ‘episcopabile’ while you still look as if you’re well under 30?

    Reply
  4. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    I’m ridiculously flattered on all counts. But no – I’m 42.

    Lower age limits are being removed from ordination canons because of the risk of it being seen as age discrimination.

    (Well, actually, because it was clear age discrimination).

    Reply
  5. Robin Avatar
    Robin

    > But no – I’m 42.

    So you *are* the answer to the riddle of the Universe!

    I’d have imagined there would have been an exemption for such things. An 18yo Bishop would be a bit ridiculous, to say nothing of the risk of being stuck with her/him if she/he proved a bad choice. However, I don’t expect it will make any practical difference. Even under the existing Canon, did we ever have a Bishop as young as 30? The youngest I can think of was my own mentor, Bishop George Sessford, who was 42 when he was consecrated . . .

    Reply
  6. Robin Avatar
    Robin

    I meant to write,

    “being stuck with her/him for half a century if….”

    Reply
  7. David Bayne Avatar
    David Bayne

    “Annabelle, our Bishop” has a certain something, don’t you think?

    The age restrictions on Ordination that we are in process of removing did have a point. They were introduced across most post-Reformation denominations (I’m not sure about the RCC) to prevent beardless youths being presented to (with!) prosperous and influential livings by well-connected parents. My favourite Scottish example is Alexander Stewart, the illegitimate son of James IV who was made Archbishop of St. Andrews in 1504 at the age of 14 – or, possibly, 11. The archdiocese didn’t have to cope with a half-century episcopate, though: he died fighting beside his father at Flodden.

    Being of a slightly earlier vintage than The Provost, it’s the moving of the upper limit that has me exercised. Combined with the hole in the pension fund, it hints at a return to “ad vitam aut culpam” By the time people are worried about me having done 50 years in CD, I’ll be 97………..

    Reply
  8. Andrew Avatar
    Andrew

    I think that it is nearer to the mark to describe ‘The Scottish Field’ (or was when we lived in Bromley and it was the most exciting post of the month) as ‘Unionist’
    The Editor in the 1950’s lived about 2 miles away in South London so The Scottish Field kept us in touch with Jimmy Shand, John Buchan, The Edinburgh Tattoo and The Fortingall Yew Tree. And those sherry party photographs to commemorate Law Firm anniversaries. We couldn’t recognise anyone but they looked nicer than the people who came to our own parties. So we grew in ignorance monthly as we happily anticipated another 3 weeks in Pitlochry.
    However in 2009, Old SF’s appearing in Room 1 must herald the employment of a dentist in Forbes House, or a gentle reminder of ‘The Homecoming’. I believe they provide the ‘Peoples Friend’ at 121 George Street, but I could be wrong.

    Reply

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