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

5 responses to “Diocesan Synod”

  1. Mary Sue Avatar
    Mary Sue

    I fight this every stinkin’ time I’m in church. The average age of our Vestry is 47, the eldest is 69 and the youngest is 28 (*waves*).

    However, all I hear about is how we are a ‘grey’ church in fear of dying.

    I think it’s too much trust in statistics and not enough in the power of the Holy Spirit. And I will beat that through their heads if it KILLS ME.

    Reply
  2. Eamonn Avatar
    Eamonn

    Conversations about mission that assume the Church is dying are bad enough, but at least the subject is being talked about. It’s worse when the mere idea of having a conversation about mission causes consternation and retreat behind the brocaded curtains.

    If such a conversation is to get going at all, however, we need to be prepared to rethink radically our ecclesiology. It may not be strictly inevitable that decline will continue, but we need to be realistic about the prospects (such as they are) for future provision of ordained ministers and stipends to sustain them. All churches are facing a decline in these areas.

    Reply
  3. Eamonn Avatar
    Eamonn

    P.S. – I’m not leaving the Holy Spirit out of the reckoning, simply saying that sober and realistic thinking is one of the less trumpeted gifts of the Spirit.

    Reply
  4. Kirstin Avatar
    Kirstin

    I was feeling much the same Kelvin, I was starting to believe all the doom and gloom merchants and wasn’t looking forward to another 3 days of it. I didn’t really think it was the case but when the dripping tap just keeps on going eventually you start to wonder. LYCIG gave me the kick up the backside I was needing to stop listening to the negative and concentrate on the positive and there is lots of that about. If we keep talking about decline we will talk ourselves into it, we need to stop it now!

    Reply
  5. duncan Avatar
    duncan

    Mary Sue,

    Perhaps some parts of our church are glad to be grey.

    But seriously, while I applaud the resistance to ‘sociological determinism’ (i.e. decline is inevitable), I think we can also think creatively about our demographics before we chuck out the baby, or the bathwater. It’s time to recycle the grey water.

    Some recent thoughts I had are here:
    http://www.dunc.info/?p=94

    (I don’t know how to do that clever trackback thing…)

    Reply

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