It’s ‘Back to Church Sunday’ on 26 September – an initiative that aims to get those of us who are regulars in Sunday services to invite a friend who has not been to ‘church’ for a while to return to the fold. On the face of it, it’s an excellent idea.

I was present at a congregation yesterday where one of the resources prepared for the initiative was handed out to the regulars and there is no doubting the genui...

Depending on what your poison may be, the Church of England’s General Synod starting today could the most interesting or the most boring event in York this weekend. If you’re an Anglican you’ll probably be following quite closely because the whole thorny issue of women bishops is to be discussed and the meetings are held in the context of the gay priest, Jeffrey John, once again being rejected as a potential bishop. T...

I spent the weekend with some of the men from Pioneer People, Pensby, on their weekend away in the Conwy Valley. With the sun scorching hot and great landscape looking its best there was no doubt that we would have a very relaxing time together, and so it proved to be. What a great bunch of people they are and really going for something different as a church.

I was invited to join them in order to offer some teac...

John ‘the rottweiler’ Humphreys showed how difficult it is to break out of the mould this morning as he interviewed the new Home Secretary, Theresa May, on the Today programme. He was pressing her about the Tories’ attitude towards the Human Rights Act and the very different approach they have to it compared to their partners in government, the Lib Dems. Apparently the Tories are very anti while the Lib Dem...

My first post on the apostolic (read it here) drew some good responses from Ben, Mark, and James – thanks, guys. In this topic I really am trying to grapple with a subject that I don’t have any answers to – and yet feel that the answers so often given in church life today do not quite reflect what the NT says about being an apostle. Ben makes a very valid point that the apostles were called to plant the gos...

• Empire church is a church that enjoys pri...

We often look at what one church or even a whole church movement is doing and get excited about their success. They start an Alpha course in a run down estate and see some young single mums start following Jesus, and we think, ‘Great. This is what God is doing these days’. Well, maybe. But what if we – just for a moment – take our eyes off the micro and look at the macro? What if we were to look back acro...

What model of church do you follow in your church? There are two basic types which I can think of: there’s the ‘church as bus’ model and then there’s the ‘church as body’. Now we know which the New Testament model is – it is ‘church as body’. Paul in his first letter to Corinthians makes this very clear and gives a lengthy teaching on it. We would all probably claim that this is also the model w...

Responding to the Roman Catholic Church’s deeply troubling problems over the abuse of children is difficult. I do not want to be stirring waters that are not mine to stir. Neither do I want to say anything that causes more pain to those who have been hurt. However there is a lesson for all churches to learn from this most disturbing of episodes and it is to do with power and how it used and abused by church.

The...

Yesterday I was down in Llanelli for a meeting with the German prophet, Michael Schiffmann, and the leadership of Antioch along with a couple from Cardiff. I suppose we’re all very much fellow travellers along the emerging church route, though at different stages – with me some distance behind!

Michael shared some his own journey and thoughts about emerging church and about where church in general has not been fulfilling her...

Did the Reformation change Christendom? Surprisingly not is Stuart Murray’s answer in chapter 5 of Post-Christendom. Though the Protestant Reformation brought about much needed change to doctrine and many church practices, very little was done as far as the church’s connection to the state is concerned. ‘They refined it, fractured it and shifted the balance of power within it towards the secular a...

Stuart Murray’s description of Christendom in the late Medieval period is scathing: it was ‘monolithic, totalitarian and seemingly impervious to critique’ (Post-Christendom, page 132). And yet there were dissenting voices to be heard all over Europe at this time. That those dissenters faced the wrath of Christendom through suppression and persecution tells us a great deal about what a threat they were deeme...

Under Christendom the church became the dominant force in society. Indeed by the 12^th century the church was able to exercise power over countries and their rulers in Western Europe. ‘No secular ruler could rival papal wealth or authority,’ says Stuart Murray in Post-Christendom as he paints a picture of a totalitarian church in the late medieval period (page 110). Dissent was not welcomed at all by this time...

Bullying and politics seem to go together. Gordon Brown should not feel isolated in his current situation of being fingered as a work-place bully – he is in good company in the Palace of Westminster. The stories about his rage towards colleagues have been around for a long time and those of us who enjoy the political blogoshpere have not been surprised by the latest revelations. Stories about his loyal lieutena...

So how was the church shaped by being at the heart of Empire? What effects did imperial patronage have upon its mission? In his fourth chapter of Post-Christendom, Stuart Murray examines some of these issues. He begins by outlining how significant to this was one particular theologian and thinker. For if the church was to accept what the Empire wanted then someone had to come up with the theology that made it all...

I see the Church of England is getting into a bit of a stew over gender issues again – the gender of its leaders that is, and whether women should be consecrated as bishops. Years have now passed since women were accepted into the ordained priesthood in the C of E – something I disagreed with then, since I don’t think men should be ordained into the priesthood either. We’re all priests in God’s eyes –...

The first step in trying to shape the future is to understand the past, and Stuart Murray’s volume Post-Christendom uses many chapters to detail the history of how the church became dominant in Western Europe.

He begins by taking us back to the fourth century AD when an emperor from the eastern half of the Roman Empire, Constantine, supposedly became a Christian in 312 as he was attempting to wrest control of the whole empire. He succeeded in his quest and was sole emperor until his...