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One of Justin Welby’s personal commitments for his time in office is to prioritise evangelism. With the Archbishop of York he set up the Evangelism Task Group as part of Archbishops’ Council, and it reported to Synod earlier this month. Introducing it, Welby emphasised the centrality of evangelism to the life of the church: On … Continue Reading
In my last time on General Synod (from 2000 to 2005) it seemed to take some time to gather momentum and get its teeth into the substantial issues for debate. That is usually the case, since there is always a turnover of membership, and new members take time to get up to speed with both … Continue Reading
Last week Mark Woods posted an intriguing article asking whether evangelicals are to blame for the decline in people claiming to be ‘religious’. He is responding to a new survey conducted on behalf of Linda Woodhead which shows that, for those under 40, ‘no religion’ is the new religion. In a strange way, this might be … Continue Reading
This is the text of an article I wrote for Premier Christianity blog last week. New figures have been released showing that attendance at Church of England services dropped below 1 million for the first time in recent history in 2014. Although the figure is a little arbitrary (not least because the population of the … Continue Reading
There is a fascinating new article Resurrection? published in The Economist, taking a look at decline, growth and change in the Church of England. It is interesting for a number of reasons: It looks carefully at the actual numbers which tell us about decline, growth and change in the Church It takes seriously a range of … Continue Reading
Have you set your New Year’s resolutions yet? One day in, have you managed to keep them all? It’s a serious question, since we know from bitter experience that New Year’s resolutions seem to disappear faster than a cold turkey sandwich. Here are seven questions to help you think through your resolutions for the year … Continue Reading
When we lived in Poole, and the kids were small, we loved to ride on the Swanage Railway. Its steam and diesel locomotives, run by volunteers, gently haul visitors from the busyness of the seafront to the drama of Corfe Castle, still standing defiant against the destruction wrought by Cromwell after the Civil War. But … Continue Reading
A few years ago I was in conversation with someone who had been in theological education, but was now returning to parochial ministry. ‘I am going to go and grow a church’ he quipped; ‘It’s not that hard.’ He was heading to an inner urban area, and whilst I admired his optimism, I winced at … Continue Reading
It is often thought that the decline in church attendance in the West is so precipitous, and the erosion of Christian values so rapid, that if the Christian church is to recover something very dramatic must happen. This can manifest itself in the quest for a ‘technique’ of leading church or of mission (often brought … Continue Reading
One of the slightly odd things about the Christian church is that there is no agreed pattern to what we should do when we meet together. In the Western (and probably the global) church, there seem to me to be three different strands of emphasis: We meet to experience an affective encounter with God (charismatic/Pentecostal) … Continue Reading
There has been some very interesting discussion on Facebook and the blog following my previous post ‘When will the C of E be extinct?’. Out of this, two issues stay with me. The first comes from John Hayward’s comment in his original article on reasons for decline that the three episcopal churches he compares with the … Continue Reading
Ian Paul: theologian, author, speaker, academic consultant. Associate Senior Research Fellow, Kirby Laing Centre for Public Theology; Associate Minister, St Nic's, Nottingham; Managing Editor, Grove Books; member of General Synod and Archbishops' Council. Mac user; chocoholic. Tweets at @psephizo
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Gospel commentary index Lectionary Year A
Andrew Goddard Bible biblical interpretation Biblical literacy biblical theology Church of England culture discipleship discussion doctrine eschatology evangelism gay General Synod Grove guest Hermeneutics History hope interpretation James Blandford Baker Jesus John's gospel Justin Welby leadership lectionary Luke Luke's gospel Matthew ministry mission New Testament Paul politics power preaching Revelation same sex marriage same sex unions sexuality theology video Year A Year B Year C
