I’ve Had Cancer and I Am Not Angry With God
First published 15 April 2015 This post is now incorporated with 22 other similar ‘reflections’ in my book, Facing Cancer with Faith. When I first heard about Stephen Fry’s now infamous outburst against God in a recent interview on Irish TV, I admit that I dismissed it as the ranting of a celebrity amateur atheist.…
Does God Punish Nations With Storms?
First published 5 October 2014 In my last post I was thinking about the reaction David Silvester received recently to his open letter accusing UK Prime Minister David Cameron of bringing God’s judgment upon the nation. In the letter he said that, “The Scriptures make it abundantly clear that a Christian nation that abandons its…
Why Is It Offensive To Speak Of God Punishing?
First published 27 September 2014 David Silvester is a local government councillor near Oxford in the UK, until recently representing the UK Independence Party. At the beginning of 2014 he (in)famously said in a letter to the Henley Standard, “Since the passage of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act, the nation has been beset by…
Is Christian Faith a Placebo? (Derren Brown’s Trick Too Far)
First published 1 January 2013 Celebrity psychologist Derren Brown is an extremely clever man. Having watched a few of his TV shows, I have to admit to being as amazed as anyone else at the things he manages to do. He uses hypnotism, NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) and psychology to perform some marvelous magic and spectacular…
The Risk of Offending People (Whose Rules Rule 12)
First published 2 April 2012 Should we try to avoid offending people? This is the last part of this series and I would be surprised if I haven’t offended anyone by what I’ve been saying over the past few months. As I’ve said throughout the series, talking about morality can be unpopular in a culture…
Loving By Talking About Sin (Whose Rules Rule 11)
First published 19 March 2012 Last time I was trying, poorly in my own judgment, to contrast the outcomes of non-religious morality (selfishness and oppression) with Christian morality (love, charity and care for everyone not matter how sinful). I really wanted to show that for a Christian to say that something is wrong, even while…
Love Is… (Whose Rules Rule 10)
First published 5 March 2012 I’ve been talking for what seems like a long time about morality, sin and the consequences of it. To be honest it was riots in the summer of 2011 that partly sparked the thoughts. Or rather it was the reaction of the respectable middle class that made me think. We…
All May Come! All May be Saved! (Whose Rules Rule 9)
First published 20 February 2012 We learnt last time that the equality of human beings within a Christian worldview involves not only being created as special by God, in His image, but certain other things that are universally true of human beings. As human beings we are universally tainted by sin – we have a…
The Road to Hell is Wide (Whose Rules Rule 8)
First published 30 January 2012 To recap, I’ve been talking for a few months about morality and it’s place in Christian thought. I’ve compared Christian rational foundations with non-religious foundations. Non-religious philosophies, I’ve argued, have no rational basis for morality. They want to say some things are right and some things are wrong. They even…
Nobody’s Perfect (Whose Rules Rule 7)
First published 10 January 2012 When we say, “nobody’s perfect!” we are normally trying to find an excuse for something we have done wrong. But at the same time we all know that it’s true. We know that we have faults as individuals, and we know that everyone has different faults. We disappoint ourselves with…