We have just started watching the latest series of Grantchester, the clerical murder mysteries set in the eponymous village near Cambridge. The date is 1958, and the timid curate, Leonard Finch, has, with great tentativeness, started to come out of his closet, and embarked upon a very secretive and illegal relationship with a local photographer. …
Continue reading An anniversary: and some weddings and funerals
The publication of the ‘lessons-learnt’ report commissioned by Emmanuel Church Wimbledon on the activities of their former vicar, Jonathan Fletcher, has stirred a lot of memories for me. And because they go round and round in my head, I have decided to write them down. This may be quite long, as I am going to …
It was reading the reports of the Oxford Diocesan enquiry into the events in the parishes of Stowe and Maids Moreton that made me pick up my digital pen this morning. You can read the report at https://www.oxford.anglican.org/safeguarding/learning-reviews/events-in-stowe-maids-moreton/. It tells of the activities of a very dangerous young man, Ben Field, who insinuated himself into …
I have been taking people’s funerals since I was twenty-five. I have seen hundreds and hundreds of funerals of all kinds, in all kinds of places, surrounded by a huge variety of rituals and customs that made the grieving manageable for the mourners. But I have never seen a time like this. Everything in us …
Yesterday I went to a lecture-workshop led by Professor Traugott Roser , Professor of Practical Theology at the University of Munster. It was entitled, "Sexuality and Intimacy in a time of severe illness and death". The lecture at the beginning told us about research conducted with a cohort of terminally ill patients and their spouses …
Continue reading Sexuality and Intimacy: are we thinking straight?
Why the House of Bishops' new guidance needs a lot more work if it is going to be listened to.
From The Quire 