Simon Says ...

“It is for me,” wrote Karl Barth to Paul Tillich, “a very special phenomenon that we understand one another so well and cordially at the human level but materially, … we can only contradict and oppose one another from the very foundation up!” [1]  Barth and Tillich enjoyed one another’s company, but theologically they were poles apart.  The cordial relations did not stop Barth writing to a wife of a former student, congratulating her husband that he had made “the necessary attack on Tillich’s abominable theology.” [2]   Barth, I think far more than Tillich, found this tension made their relationship difficult.  I will make a few references to Barth as I try to assess Tillich’s work, but it should be clear that in hearing about Paul Tillich we are entering a very different world to that which the curate spoke about last week. Paul Tillich was born in Starzeddel in Germany on 20 th August, 1883.   He was a son of the Vicarage, and hi...

A Sermon for Lent 2. Genesis15.1-12,17-18 ; Luke 13.31-35 Some words from our first reading this morning.  “O Lord God, what will you give me?”  When God appears to Abram in a vision, Abram immediately confronts him with this cry of desolation. “O Lord God, what will you give me?”  Jesus too, teaching and preaching in Galilee cries for Jerusalem.  “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!”  Both Abram and Jesus, our forefather in faith and our Lord and Saviour, know pain and loss.  Both cry out in lament, Abram for himself and Jesus for Jerusalem.  And so, for a few minutes this morning I want to think about lament, and what it might mean for us.             Lament is not a very British ...

This post is a response to the Document 'Women in the Episcopate: a new way forward' produced by a working group of the Church of England tasked with bringing legislation for the ordination of women as bishops to the General Synod.  It was produced after a larger facilitated meeting also including invited members of interest groups and individuals from the wider Church.  It has been submitted to the working group for their consideration and is posted here for wider interest. Women in the Episcopate – a response to GS MISC 1042 1.     Thanks and appreciation are due to all those involved in producing the ‘new way forward’ in this fraught debate.   As a new member of the General Synod, elected after the November vote, I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the process.   2.     The overwhelming sense of those ordained and lay, inside and outside of the Church, who have spoken with me in relation to this issue ...