What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Sermon – Hagar, Ambridge, Church Abuse, Eid Mubarak

    If I think back to my grandfather, now long passed away, I have a number of memories. One strikes me in particularly today.

    And it was a particular devotion. Almost a religious ritual.

    It could be performed at lunchtime or it could be performed in the early evening. But the important thing was that it had to happen every day.

    I believe my grandfather may well have had some connection with country living in his youth though he was a city dweller for all the life that I ever knew him to have. But his devotion to an everyday story of country folk was a thing of legend.

    For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, I refer to the longest running radio soap opera – the Archers, broadcast now on Radio 4.

    Actually, it may be the only radio soap opera for all I know – it does not seem to be a particularly crowded field.

    It was a part of my grandfather’s life. He listened with a passion.

    In the way of families, my own father inherited no love of the Archers and only has to hear the cheery, bouncing signature tune to prompt him to reach for the off switch.

    For myself, I have found a good old-fashioned Anglican via media (more…)

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20 responses to “Which bits of the Bible do you miss out?”

  1. Bro David Avatar
    Bro David

    I think that I’m with you Father K, there is a time and place for everything and a service where the problems of a problematic passage can’t be addressed easily is not the place to read it, lectionary be hanged.

    Reply
  2. Vogelbeere Avatar
    Vogelbeere

    My favourite bits of the Bible are the Song of Songs (which, in the medieval period, was interpreted by both Jews and Christians as an allegory of the soul’s relationship with God); the book of Ruth; the book of Esther; the story of David and Jonathan; Amos & Micah. Most of the New Testament leaves me completely cold, and some of it is actually offensive, especially the account of the silver-smiths of Ephesus, and the way that Paul appropriates pagan poetry in the marketplace of Athens.

    I think the solution to your problem is not to read the “difficult” bits without some sort of homily about a better way to understand them, and how to read the Bible in general as a collection of texts situated in a particular historical situation.

    Reply

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