November 11, 2013
For the thousands of tourists who gather daily in front of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, one of Christianity’s unique gifts to humankind–compassion for the poor–can be seen in graphic detail. The Portal of the Last Judgement is the west facade’s central portal, proclaiming the Christian doctrines of Christ’s saving work on earth, the resurrection […]
November 4, 2013
A good thing about crises is that they force us back to essential questions. They compel us to rethink our priorities, retrace our assumptions and re-examine our foundations. So a serious multi-fronted crisis may be exactly what Europe has needed in her search for her soul. When a secular leftist Dutch magazine takes a serious […]
October 28, 2013
Europe ignored Africa to her own peril. That was the clear message in The Hague on Friday evening from Nobel Prize winner Frederik de Klerk, who oversaw with Nelson Mandela the dismantling of apartheid in South Africa. Europe needed Africa, and Africa needed a strong Europe, he stressed. Sadly, however, Europe was not delivering. […]
October 21, 2013
That stage of life when one starts attending more funerals than weddings was passed long ago for my wife and me. But this week was exceptionally busy with three ceremonies to honour the deceased. Funerals, like weddings, are occasions when ultimate values and beliefs are brought into sharp focus, even if fuzzy and vague. Giving […]
October 14, 2013
The time seemed ripe last week to confront some Evangelical sacred cows. At an annual gathering of Evangelical leaders from across Europe, held in Holland, I was asked to share thoughts on ‘a faith-based response to Europe’s crises’. Jim Memory of Redcliffe College, who had spoken at the State of Europe Forum in Dublin […]
October 7, 2013
In Amsterdam’s Historical Museum, a larger-than-life statue of Goliath standing about 6 metres tall dwarfs both onlookers and the dimunitive figure of David holding his sling. The 360-year-old wooden giant was created for a fun-park in Amsterdam during Holland’s Golden Age. Yet the Goliath of the biblical record in 1 Samuel 17 stood ‘merely’ half […]
September 30, 2013
The Pope, a rabbi and two atheists walked into a bar. The barkeeper said, ‘Is this some kind of a joke?’ Depends on your sense of humour, of course. A few weeks ago I picked up a book at the airport with the title, ‘Plato and a platypus walk into a bar: understanding philosophy through […]
September 23, 2013
Eglantyne Jebb was an unlikely person to found ‘Save the Children’. After her first year of teaching in 1900, she confessed she didn’t care for children, ‘the little wretches’. Yet she was to become the pioneer of children’s rights and the initiator of what grew into the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child […]
September 16, 2013
Sarajevo, September 15, 1911: Flags flew at half-mast and black banners hung from windows and balconies as a solemn procession of students and teachers from schools across the city, joined by the English Consul and other representatives of the English community, government officials, priests, foreign representatives and prominent citizens made its way to the Orthodox […]
September 9, 2013
London, like virtually every other European city older than 500 years, was for a large part made up of churches and monasteries. Hence Erasmus could ask at the time of the Reformation, what is a city if not one big monastery? As early as 1300 London boasted over thirty churches and a dozen monasteries crammed […]
September 2, 2013
Fifty years ago on September 4, Robert Schuman passed away peacefully in his home in the little French village of Scy-Chazelles near Metz. A few weeks ago on our Continental Heritage Tour we visited the home of the ‘Father of Europe’, and the fortified medieval church of St Quentin across the road, his final resting […]
August 26, 2013
Driving across the border between Scotland and England on the east coast, we caught our first glimpse of the tiny island called Lindisfarne, which–we were to learn–profoundly influenced the culture and worldview of a fledgling England late in the first millennium. The silhouette of castle ruins on the island’s rocky bluff was echoed by the […]
