Here goes...

I have been involved this week in speaking the Alpha International Week at HTB. It has been a remarkable week in all kinds of ways, people finding their vision for church and evangelism renewed, making new contacts and friendships, and hearing all kinds of fascinating stories from all over the world. Everyone feels they know about Alpha, but one of the most remarkable aspects of it for me, is a factor often unnoticed from the outside - the extent to which it brings together an unlikely, but astonishing mix of different types of Christians. I remember the first time I spoke at one of these events around 5 years ago, pausing half way through my talk, while the reality of what was happening dawned on me. I was speaking to a group of around 70-80 people in a seminar, and I realised that in the corner were a group of Russian Orthodox, gathered around a bearded black-robed priest; in another corner were a group of Nicaraguan Roman Catholic nuns, elsewhere were scattered groups of Norther...

Two things strike me about the Rowan Williams media frenzy of the last couple of days. One is not so much what he says, but the level of interest in what he says. The New Statesman article is characteristically intelligent, thoughtful, perhaps even a little opaque at times, but if it had been written by any other person (except perhaps Prince Philip) would it have gained anything like the same coverage? On the surface it is a critique of current political debate similar to what you find every day in the broadsheets, but when the ABC says it, it has a lot more power. Christians sometimes moan that no-one listens to the church any more, or that our leaders don't speak out: but this shows the opposite. There is an intense interest when a Christian leader, as the voice of the nation's conscience, speaks to government, as Rowan has done. The other thing is the level of misreporting. The piece seems to me a model of how to speak to government. It takes no sides, but has some uncomfor...