What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Giving up marriage

    I was intrigued by the statement made to the Equal Opportunities Committee of the Scottish Parliament of someone representing the Church of Scotland. They seemed to suggest that if they don’t get their way in stopping same-sex marriage then they might stop conducting marriages altogether.

    BBC report here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-24063468

    I think that it is interesting in that there are quite a lot of religious people who talk about getting out of the legal marriage business. It wouldn’t particularly trouble me if we had the same situation as they have in France whereby people get married at the town hall and come to church for a religious ceremony afterwards. I think they would end up just as married before God and state if we had that system in Scotland as they clearly do in France. However, that wholesale system doesn’t appear to be on the cards.

    I sometimes find myself wondering whether I will feel comfortable doing marriages (as opposed to weddings) at such a time as the law allows same-sex marriage but the Scottish Episcopal Church doesn’t. I don’t find it difficult to think that it would be reasonable to expect straight couples to go to the registry office and come to church for a service if that is what the Episcopal Church expects of a gay couple in similar circumstances. What’s good for the gander and the gander is surely good for the gander and the goose, as the old proverb would say.

    Anyway, well done to Bishop John Armes who was also speaking to that parliamentary committee this morning. Well done particularly for making it so clear that the Scottish Episcopal Church contains people who are strongly in favour of same-sex marriage as well as those who are not. It was just a little bit more helpful than hiding behind the “the church is made up of people who have a diversity of views” which is what we usually get.

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4 responses to “Politics of Pilgrimage”

  1. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Living in Ireland – at one time not too far from Knock – it always astonished me when driving through the village how those who had just visited the shrine seemed to think that it had made them invincible! They’d wander into the middle of the road and totally ignore the traffic streaming around them!

    A bottle of Knock holy water in the shape of Our Lady sits behind me as I type – next to a similar one from Lourdes and a knitted Orangeman bedecked with a collarette proclaiming him a member of LOL 1, Portadown! The juxtaposition is deliberate! (I wonder if + David has one on his shelves from the "support Drumcree" shop?!)

    Which leads to the question "How do holy water taps work?" – theologically, that is! What is blessed to make it holy? Is it the reservoir (but that is constantly replenished and so eventually, after being diluted for a long time, the water becomes "unholy". Is it the tap itself and the water is sanctified by passing through it?

    Discuss!

    Reply
  2. Avatar
    Anonymous

    Holy Water Taps
    Perhaps the water becomes holy when it is applied by the believer to the cat.

    Reply
  3. Joan Avatar
    Joan

    Holy water and questions about pilgrimage

    Hmmm, yes I can see the dilemma…I guess the female ordaindees (not a word really, apologies for my attack on the English language) are excluded – though would it be possible to construct a small al fresco altar and hold a ceremony of your own?  Pilgrimage places become so because people believe something, not just the ecclesiastical hierarchy, I think?  If we don’t go then it is like saying ‘ok, you have that site of devotion then’.  (Yikes I sound so serious, which I am, but I really do mean my statements to come out as questions…not commands.)

    As to the cat, holy water, and the believer – maybe  all the water is holy and we just think we play a role in making it so?  Alternatively, maybe the cat is the believer and the water is transformed through a great mysterious purr.

    Reply
  4. Avatar
    Anonymous

    The Cat in Question
    As for the cat in question, she is not a believer as such. Rather, she thinks that she is the only proper object of veneration.

    Reply

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