What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Sermon preached on 22 July 2012

    Here’s what I said on Sunday

    A number of years ago, when I was in my curacy, I was working in another Cathedral in Scotland. I was as interested in communications then as now and became convinced that we needed a clear corporate image, the better to represent ourselves to the world around us.

    Inevitably, there was some debate about what to use. We didn’t want to use the building because the church isn’t really all about buildings. We didn’t want to use a cross because that’s what so many churches have used and because it didn’t say anything particularly significant about who we were.

    In the end, we decided that we were going to use something which represented the fact that we were a cathedral – the place that the bishop calls home.

    (Well, I think historically, bishops tend to call their cathedrals a lot of other things, but that is another story and need not concern us for now).
    (more…)

4 responses to “D.I.V.O.R.C.E.”

  1. David Kenvyn Avatar
    David Kenvyn

    I am a little worried about this concept of “African Marriage”. It seems to assume that Africa as a continent is culturally homogenous. This is not something that we would ever say about Europe or Asia, and it is simply not true. Morocco has very little cultural similarity to Mozambique. In South Africa, Xhosa-speaking men are circumcised at about 16 years old. Zulu-speaking men are not circumcised. They live in neighbouring provinces and inter-mingle in the cities. I think we have to be very careful when we describe practices that are common in Nigeria or Tanzania or Namibia as African, as they may not apply across the whole continent. It would be like calling bullfighting or reindeer racing European cultural norms, when we know that they are specific to particular countries.

    Reply
  2. Seph Avatar
    Seph

    I think what Christians and others need to bear in mind is that it is possible to be accepting of divorce as a fact of life while still valuing commitment and regarding marriage as ideally being a lifelong covenant. In truth, if a couple is considering divorce then there is already brokenness (or sin—although in this context the word has some uncomfortable connotations) in their relationship, and trying to maintain it purely because the Church (or, heaven forfend, God) Says No doesn’t seem to me to be in any way a holy or virtuous thing to do.

    ‘D.I.V.O.R.C.E.’ is a lot less effective an obfuscation in writing than when Dolly sang it.

    Reply
  3. David Kenvyn Avatar
    David Kenvyn

    Jacob Zuma has five wives, Desmond Tutu has one wife, Nelson Mandela had three wives and divorced two of them. What does this tell us about the concept of “African Marriage”?

    Reply
    1. Kelvin Holdsworth Avatar
      Kelvin Holdsworth

      I was quoting an African priest. And I agree with you.

      Reply

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