May 6, 2022
When your war is not quite going as you had planned, your annual military parade to show the might and power of your armed forces to the world has to be scaled down a little. That is President Putin’s dilemma this coming Monday, Victory Day, when Red Square is filled with dignitaries, public, military personnel, […]
April 30, 2022
Turbulent times are nothing new for the 400-year-old Temple du Marais, venue for next week’s State of Europe Forum in Paris . The storming of the Bastille Castle in 1789, triggering the French Revolution, took place just two hundred metres away. That led directly to the closure of the convent of which the domed circular […]
April 23, 2022
Even as we recoil in horror at Russia’s brutal destruction of Mariupol in the east, we watch with bated breath the contest for the French presidency in the west. Much hangs in the balance. The election outcome will shape France’s international relations. A President Le Pen would redefine Franco-German cooperation, challenge EU treaties and undermine […]
April 16, 2022
The evening Jesus was betrayed and arrested, leading directly to his trial and crucifixion, he gave a clear instruction to his disciples – and thus to disciples through the ages, including ourselves: A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love […]
April 9, 2022
Recently a young Muslim seeker named Mustapha sat in our Upper Room talking about how radical Jesus was. ‘“Love your enemy!”’ he exclaimed. ‘How radical is that?!’ These words of Jesus are perhaps too familiar for those of us raised in the Christian faith to sense how truly counter-intuitive they are. Yet when we recall […]
April 2, 2022
‘Imagine if every second person in your town would leave. In your own household: Imagine seeing half your own family leave. Kids and parents would leave, grandparents would stay. In your neighborhood: Those who are well-to-do would leave first. Those who know a foreign language, have a business, a good education. ‘Try to picture who […]
March 26, 2022
A column in de Volkskrant, a leftish Dutch newspaper, grabbed my attention this week: ‘Europe must rearm itself, especially morally.’ For the first time in two generations, the term ‘rearmament’ is reappearing in the headlines. The shock-effect of the Russian invasion of Ukraine has been to recalibrate everything over the past month, including galvanising German […]
March 19, 2022
This year’s performances of Johan Sebastian Bach’s St Matthew’s Passion by choirs and orchestras across Europe have an extra dimension of pathos as Ukraine suffers under unprovoked aggression. Considered one of the greatest musical works ever composed, the sacred oratorio depicts the false accusations, lies and unjustified suffering inflicted on Jesus, ending in his crucifixion […]
March 12, 2022
With Churchillian defiance and against all odds, Vladimir Zelensky and the Ukrainian people are defending their families, fatherland and freedom on land, sea and in the air. This is their darkest yet finest hour. Despite the ruthless destruction of the children’s hospital in Mariopol and other tragic atrocities against civilian targets, the Ukrainians refuse to […]
March 5, 2022
Andrey Zubov is a brave and honest man. As one of Russia’s leading historians and political scientists, he dared to speak out against the annexation of the Crimea in 2014, comparing Putin’s invasion with Hitler’s Austrian anschluss. He was temporarily sacked from his professorial chair at the Moscow State Institute of Interational Relations (MGIMO). Last […]
February 26, 2022
Mr Putin’s messianic pretensions as saviour of Russian civilisation have deep religious and historical roots. Yet our western secular world tends to filter out religion and pre-Enlightenment history as irrelevant. Hence our surprise at the Hitleresque attack this week, reminiscent of the Nazi occupation of Sudetenland in 1938, or the blitzkrieg on Rotterdam in May […]
February 19, 2022
Bans on conversion therapy are being passed feverishly in countries around the world following a United Nations directive against the ‘inherently degrading and discriminatory’ practice. Canada, France, Germany and twenty-eight of the United States of America have passed bans, with Britain and the Netherlands in process against such therapy. According to the UN, it ‘inflict[s] […]
