March 2, 2020
You could have been forgiven for thinking it was a church service Sunday last week. The evening opened with words from the first few verses of the Gospel of John chapter one being projected on a large screen and read out by an actress: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with […]
February 24, 2020
The Bible has been the single greatest source of inspiration in the development of western art, right up to modern times (as we discussed last week in our Bible for Dummies series in the Upper Room in Amsterdam). Lack of knowledge of the Bible’s characters, themes and stories therefore impoverishes culture and education, robbing art […]
February 17, 2020
For Christians raised in church traditions that rarely if ever ‘did politics’, like myself, the recent emergence of politicians claiming to defend Christianity can be very confusing. With few instruments of discernment in our toolbox, we are easily tempted to become ‘one-issue’ voters without understanding the bigger picture. Recently I was sent a link to […]
February 10, 2020
Friday will be Valentine’s Day again, February 14, the day dedicated to lovers. So how did the name of an early Christian martyr get linked with a day when websites and shop windows everywhere use that name to boost sales and make profits? What has it to do with romantic love, if anything? Several different […]
February 2, 2020
Tears flowed in an emotional parting with the pro-European Union members of the British delegation to the European Parliament on Wednesday. While Nigel Farage led his anti-EU party in a provocative Union Jack-waving farewell, a spontaneous rendition of Auld Lang Syne swelled across the circular assembly chamber: Should old acquaintance be forgot, and ne’er brought […]
January 27, 2020
The UEFA Champions League playoffs between the last sixteen teams don’t resume yet for another three weeks. And yet the high choral strains of the anthem familiar to any football fan resounded through the Upper Room salon in Amsterdam as we sketched a ‘bird’s eye view of the Old Testament’ in our Bible for Dummies […]
January 20, 2020
A Dublin economist was giving his take on Brexit on a documentary about Ireland I watched over the weekend. ‘We Irish have always been the underdog’, he said, ‘so we can sympathise with others more easily. We have always suffered from an inferiority complex.’ The British however had always been used to having the upper […]
January 13, 2020
When my youngest son introduced his wife-to-be to my 90-plus-year-old mother via skype, the first question was: ‘and what are you studying, dear?’ ‘Theology’, came the answer. ‘Oh, how boring!’ exclaimed my mother spontaneously. Mum was one for practice and experience rather than theory. For many of us, theology was the stuff of dry sermons, […]
January 6, 2020
For many Europeans, thoughts about Christmas have already been drowned out by noisy celebrations of the New Year and the resumption of the humdrum realities of daily life. Yet Christmas is not over for millions of Europeans. Today is the celebration of the Feast of Epiphany, commemorating the visit of the Magi from the east […]
December 23, 2019
Looking back on 2019, we are grateful for the diversity of events, activities and publications related to the Schuman Centre in over a dozen countries. The first State of Europe Forum (SOEF) in the second half of the year, ‘Schuman for Kids’ programmes, new blogs, and a much more active Schuman Centre website, are among […]
December 16, 2019
For some, Britain’s Friday-the-13th election outcome was a scary twist of comedy into tragedy; for others, an unexpected answer to prayer. One thing is certain. Politics these days is topsy-turvy, disturbing, polarising, confusing and unpredictable. Thank God then for some words of sanity to help settle our nerves, soothe our emotions and clear our minds over […]
December 9, 2019
A short walk from where I live opposite Amsterdam’s Central Station brings you to numerous locations associated with the slave trade between West Africa and the West Indies, Brazil and Surinam. Amsterdam city was itself co-owner of Surinam, and meetings of the Society of Surinam deciding the fate of many thousands of slaves took place […]
