RP Mission Team in Stranraer

From 20th-27th June, we had 9 enthusiastic Americans in Stranraer to help us out. While they were here they:

• Gave out postcard invitations to every house in the town, as well as Stoneykirk and Sandhead. 
• Spoke about God's work in their lives and and chatted to the pupils about what Christians believe in two higher RMPS classes in Stranraer Academy.
• Helped organise and run a ladies' coffee morning, men's curry & quiz night and church BBQ.
• Cleaned 1300 seats at Stair Park (home of Stranraer FC) in preparation for the new season.
• Helped out with the ROC drop-in cafe which Stephen volunteers at each week.
• Sang some psalms and spent some time talking to the elderly folk in Dalrymple Court (sheltered housing).
• Did an open-air psalm sing in the town centre.
• Visited Covenanter monuments in Anwoth & Wigtown.

Monica, one of the team, wrote:

"Saying goodbye to the Stranraer congregation was probably one of the hardest for us. We were blessed to spend so much time with them getting to know them. Meeting and fellowshipping with the congregations has by far been my favorite parts of the trip. The Lord has surrounded us here by those who have a great love for Him and His people. So many people have opened their homes to us, and that has been such a blessing to receive. Thoughts and prayers go to those congregations who hosted us."

The team also spent time helping churches in Airdrie, North Edinburgh & Glasgow.

Human pups? (Newspaper article)

Last week, Channel 4 screened The Secret Life of Human Pups. It documents the growing scene of men who ‘come out’ as pups. They wear specially made dog outfits, play with dog toys, and eat food from bowls. As one ‘human pup’ puts it: ‘This is who I am’. It follows a story from Norway about a woman who ‘realised she was a cat’ when she was 16. In an interview that has received nearly 4 million views, Nano, who’s now 20, says she was born in the wrong species. Her psychologist says that she can grow out of it, but Nano wants to be a cat for life.

The human pups were widely ridiculed last week, with the hosts of ITV’s This Morning struggling to keep straight faces as they interviewed them. However, the documentary also showed some of the damage that this ‘escapism’ had caused. Identifying as a pup called Spot has cost reigning ‘Mr Puppy UK’ Champion Tom his relationship with former-fiancée Rachel. But should we just blindly accept someone’s claim to be a dog or a cat because they say so? Even if their anatomy and their DNA say otherwise?

There’s no doubt that the whole understanding of identity is a hot topic, at least in the UK and North America. In December a married Canadian man with seven kids left his family ‘in order to fulfil his true identity as a six-year-old girl’. In an video released with The Transgender Project, he says ‘I don’t want to be an adult right now’.

Another video that’s trending shows Joseph Backholm interviewing students at the University of Washington to see whether they thought it was ever right to tell someone their chosen identity was wrong. Students had no problem accepting the right of a 5’9” white man to claim he was a woman and were only slightly slower to accept his assertion that he was Chinese. Most begrudgingly accepted his claims to be 7 years old, though wouldn’t have let him enrol in primary school. Only one was prepared to tell him he was wrong when he claimed to be 6’5”.
Backholm concludes: ‘It shouldn’t be hard to tell a 5’9” white guy that he’s not a Chinese woman, but clearly it is. Why? What does it say about our culture? And what does it say about our ability to answer the questions that actually are difficult?’

Published in Stranraer & Wigtownshire Free Press, 4 May 2016

"I'm not a bad person" (Newspaper article)

“I’m not a bad person”. So said Peru drugs mule Michaella McCollum in her first media interview since leaving prison, almost 3 years after being caught trying to smuggle 11kg of cocaine into Spain. In a prime-time TV interview the 22 year-old former model said: “I want to demonstrate that I’m a good person”. The jury is still out on that though, especially given speculation that the Northern Irishwoman is rebranding herself in order to launch a media career.

There’s one way we’re all similar to McCollum however – we like to think we’re basically good. At the heart of it we’re good people, we just happen to do bad things sometimes. Even her family priest has bought into this myth. After visiting her in Lima, he said: “She is a very good person; she made a very bad decision”.

We’re told that the reason people do bad things is because they had abusive parents, grew up in a deprived area, weren’t educated properly or, like McCollum, just made poor decisions.
And so when we read reports of serial killers, rapists or child abusers they’re described as ‘monsters’ or ‘inhuman’. They don’t fit the narrative that humans are basically good, so they’re portrayed as something other than human.
Jesus had a very different take on humanity however. He put it blunty: ‘No one is good except God alone’. The Bible consistently teaches: ‘There is none who does good … none is righteous, no, not one’. That includes religious people just as much as anyone else.

We might claim, like McCollum, ‘I have never intentionally set out to hurt somebody’. But deep down, we know that we’ve all said if not done things deliberately aimed at hurting someone else.
Our problem is that we compare ourselves to the wrong standard. It’s easy enough to find people worse than us to compare ourselves to. But compared to God’s standard of perfection, none of us come close. The only truly good person who ever lived was Jesus Christ – and only by trusting in him can we hope to stand before God.

Published in Stranraer & Wigtownshire Free Press, 7 April 2016.

An Odd Thing (Newspaper Article)

Comedian Lee Mack was interviewed on Desert Island Discs recently. He was asked which book he would take with him—you’re allowed the Bible, the works of Shakespeare and one other. He chose Stephen Hawking’s ‘A Brief History of Time’, but it was his comments about the Bible that intrigued me.

He said, ‘I'm glad you get the Bible, because I would read the Bible. I think it's quite odd that people like myself, in their forties, are quite happy to dismiss the Bible, but I've never read it. I always think that if an alien came down and you were the only person they met, and they said, “What’s life about? What’s earth about? Tell us everything,” and you said, “Well, there's a book here that purports to tell you everything. Some people believe it to be true; some people do not believe it to be true.” “Wow, what’s it like?” and you go, “I don’t know, I’ve never read it.” It would be an odd thing wouldn't it? So, at the very least, read it.’

Many feel that it’s a book for specialists and they should just take the words of the opinion formers - whether it be clergy or authors like Dan Brown. Others feel let down by church, but are reluctant to read the Bible for themselves, preferring just to muddle on in the hope that everything will be ok. Some are struggling with life and trying to get through by their own strength, unaware that the Bible has help to give. Even many churches have in practice abandoned the Bible - and it’s no surprise they’re declining and closing.

When the Bible was translated into the language of the common people, it scandalised many of the church leaders, but transformed this nation. I’d love to get a group of people together to read through a book of the Bible with opportunities to discuss and discover what it’s about. Or sit down for a coffee with anyone that’s interested in doing something similar one-on-one.

But, ‘at the very least, read it’. You might be surprised.

Based on an article by Mark Loughridge in 4you magazine. Published in Stranraer & Wigtownshire Free Press, 4 February 2016.

Is atheism a religion after all? (Newspaper article)

Hot on the heels of last week’s news that a cinema advert featuring the Lord’s Prayer was to be banned (despite the opposition of the Muslim Council of Britain, Richard Dawkins and Stephen Fry), humanists have now taken offence that the current Religious Studies GCSE doesn’t include non-religious worldviews. The High Court ruled that although it was lawful in itself for Religious Studies just to cover religion, the education secretary had a duty to ensure the curriculum reflected the pluralistic nature of the UK.

It’s staggering that a ‘Religious Studies’ curriculum has been found unlawful because it does exactly what it says on the tin. Whatever next? A legal challenge to the English curriculum because it doesn’t include French? Or to a history curriculum which only includes the past?

While some Christians have protested that humanist ideas already dominate the curriculum, what I find most surprising is that atheistic worldviews weren’t included on the Religious Studies curriculum to begin with. After all, while it might take faith to believe that we and the world around us were created by God, surely it takes even more faith to believe that life can evolve from non-life? That we’re all the result of some cosmic accident?

Like religion, atheism has its evangelists. Dawkins explicitly states his aim that religious readers opening ‘The God Delusion’ would be atheists when they put it down.

Atheists also believe in a higher authority. One of their creeds, the ‘Humanist Manifesto’, acknowledges a responsibility to aspire to the ‘greater good of humanity’. But who defines what that is? Is the opinion of the majority always right? The Manifesto calls its adherents to live with ‘a deep sense of purpose’ - surely just a meaningless platitude if there is no God?

Neither can atheism side-step some of the problems that other religions face. Take the problem of evil. If we believe in a good, all-powerful God, why is there so much evil in the world? Why did God allow the attacks in Paris? Yet the atheist must answer the question: What does it matter? Why is human life any more valuable than that of a rat, an insect or a tree? Even to use the terms ‘good’ and ‘evil’ is to borrow from a religious worldview.

To include ‘non-religious’ worldviews on the ‘Religious Studies’ curriculum is just to acknowledge what they really are. They too are based on faith.

Published in Stranraer & Wigtownshire Free Press, 3 December 2015.