Christianity is a complex tradition but often perceived as rigid and irrelevant. Consequently, the riches from thousands of years of wrestling with what God could be are squandered. Atheist Professor Niki Harre had an inkling that something important had been…
Category: Creative Arts
Symbols invite contemplation but can be confronting and confusing. I experienced all three reactions when faced with a massive crucifix above the judicial bench in the Nuremberg Palace of Justice, where Nazis were tried for war crimes. The crucifix was…
James Vanderbilt’s Nuremberg was compelling and disturbing. It drew me back to the darkened theatre three times as I wrestled with an angst that I couldn’t quite identify. The 1945 trial at Nuremberg had been mooted as a just alternative…
It’s tempting to imagine a world without poverty or war, where everyone has equal access to resources. Religions preach it, politicians legislate for it, and crowds demand it. With so much energy devoted to these ideals, you’d think the world…
If we are made in God’s imageand I’m reliably informed that we arethen Paddy’s mirror of the divineis worth exploring more. No booming voice from heaven heardinstead, his warm and gentle tone‘hello darling’, the moment you appearloving you just as…
Right from the start I was totally engrossed in Oppenheimer and didn’t falter across the whole three hours. Perhaps because it was obvious early on that the protagonists considered themselves to be the ‘good guys’ in the world. And that…
some people may be surprisedto find that I spend a lot of liferummaging around in the pastnot because I long for some nirvanathat was better than now – not at allbut because it seems so like now my bible fascinates…
I didn’t catch your namesaid my friend the nurseto the doctor, who hadn’toffered a name or smile feverish, full of infectionnot making sense of muchstill upright, I felt a bother, assumingI wasn’t sick enough to be there hospitals, said Thomas…
sick, flat on my backstaring at the ceilingReality wanted a saywondering, raw as alwaysif this was how I would dieno cat, dog, human or fish beside me why should that be a problem? I askednot to me dear, she saidpositively…
Times change. Dial A Prayer is now a thoroughbred stallion that lives near me, but in the 1960’s it was a machine. A prayer machine that people could phone to hear a daily prayer. This was where my public writing…









