So, Justin Welby is back blogging again after half a year. It looks as though a meeting with a survivor of abuse has made a significant impact upon him. He writes: It is well known that one of the issues… Read More ›
Children & families
Oxfam’s perfect storm, poverty and yet more examples of Christians providing answers
Oxfam are having an interesting time of things this week. Who would have thought that a poster entitled ‘The Perfect Storm’ pointing out a few of the causes of poverty in this country would find them under investigation by the Charities Commission and create its… Read More ›
Bashing faith schools with big blunt instruments can’t detract from their success
In the world of business, if a company was producing a better product than many of its competitors, was known as much for the quality of its ethos as its results and had demand significantly outstripping supply, we would judge… Read More ›
Halloween: harmless or harmful? – part 2
There has been a huge amount of interest in Canon J John’s recent guest post on the dangers of Halloween. I am very much in agreement with J John that Halloween is not benign. Even though it is becoming increasingly… Read More ›
Prince George – ‘In baptism God calls us out of darkness into his marvellous light’
Today’s baptism of Prince George in the intimate setting of the Chapel Royal at St. James’s Palace marks another important step in the life of the future king. Even though only close family and friends will be attending, it’s another excuse for… Read More ›
Halloween: harmless or harmful?
Today’s guest writer is the Revd. Canon J. John. J John is an internationally recognised Christian speaker and author. He has written over 50 books and spoken in 69 countries, teaching the Christian faith and addressing over 300,000 people in person each… Read More ›
Are faith schools really ‘selecting wealthy pupils by the back door’?
It’s not entirely surprising that alongside the start of this new academic year there has been another bust-up over the role of faith schools, their admissions policies and whether they should exist at all or not. Over the last week… Read More ›
Tackling child poverty – a Christian vision
I’ve deliberately avoided commenting on this weekend’s Church of England General Synod and the latest state of play on women bishops, as despite my best efforts I’ve struggled to follow the intricacies of the debate. The level of complexity for… Read More ›
I refuse to believe that this is a lost generation – my interview with Patrick Regan OBE, Founder and CEO of XLP
Patrick Regan OBE is the founder and CEO of the well known and highly respected Christian urban youth work charity XLP. I’ve been following the work of Patrick and XLP for a while now and finally was able to meet him… Read More ›
Ambivalence towards fatherhood has been a gross and costly error – why do we accept it?
Mother’s Day/Mothering Sunday is regularly a joyous affair in the media. There’s plenty of talk of what flowers and presents we should be giving our mothers along with various individuals including celebrities telling us how wonderful and inspiring their mothers… Read More ›
The wedding day monster we need to address
The battle over the redefinition of marriage has been a long and painful one since David Cameron announced at the Conservative Party conference in October of 2011 that his government was consulting on legalising gay marriage. But during his speech he also said… Read More ›
David Cameron’s family friendly government is a lost hope
I wonder what Nick Clegg was thinking when he agreed to do a weekly radio slot for LBC radio. He surely knew that he was going to be getting various people having a go at him for government policies they weren’t… Read More ›
Pornification and why our children are in trouble
Over the last week or so I’ve read several articles on the sexualisation of children and teenagers in the press. Most of it appears to have been driven by comments made by two MPs; Claire Perry and Diane Abbott. Mrs Perry… Read More ›
Adoption Sunday calls on the Church to address current adoption crisis
On the 31st of March last year the current number of children in care in England and Wales stood at 72,775. That’s just over 0.5% of the 0-18 population of these two countries. Additionally 2% of our population has been through… Read More ›
“Family comes first” – so what are you going to do about it Mr Cameron?
“Family comes first.” That was a key message of yesterday’s speech by the Prime Minister at the Conservative Party conference. He expanded on this statement further: “These are difficult times. We’re being tested. How will we come through it? Again,… Read More ›
This week’s news and links: George Carey and that Nazi comment
In case anyone is concerned after yesterday’s post that I’ve gone all political with my knives out for Labour, I haven’t but sometimes you just can’t ignore party politics. It’s the same with these links today which mainly relate to… Read More ›
Does the Cervical Cancer Jab make girls more promiscuous?
There were a couple of news items yesterday that had the secularists up in arms. One was The British Humanist Association (BHA) complaining about proposed ‘Creationist’ Free schools getting approval from the Department for Education. The BHA has subsequently been… Read More ›
10,000 children run away from care each year – what are we going to do about it?
There are just over 65,000 children in care in England. Most of these children live in foster care but around 7% of them live in one of England’s 1,810 children’s homes. These children are three times more likely to run away… Read More ›
If you think Christians shouldn’t be involved helping their communities then you should watch this
Quote of the Day at Stuart James’ eChurch Blog on Sunday was this: “If David Cameron wants a Big Society, he must bring ‘We the people’ into his thinking. And to do that, he must devolve and trust. But if… Read More ›
God and Politics in the UK 