Ian Rees's Blog

I assure you this isnt about boasting, but our recent Sunday Facebook Live services have garnered a huge (for us) total: 1400 reached, 500 views, 60 comments, and nearly 300 clicks and likes, all since the beginning of the lockdown.

I repeat: this is not about boasting. W E Sangster said A crowd isnt an achievement; its an opportunity. But what sort of opportunity is it?

Firstly, who are these people? Most of the comments and clicks come from the 40-50 of our own households who are signed up...

People have been talking about the current BBC documentary ‘Sacred Wonders’ which is roving the world to record the dramatic ways that people express their faith. All of the major faiths are included, with the emphasis not so much on the meaning of their faith, although that is not irrelevant, but rather on the scale of the event, the size of the crowds, the costly devotion of the worshippers, the drama and the spectacle. Whether it is a whole town in Mali getting together to replaster an anc...

It was GK Chesterton who famously said that when a man stops believing in God he doesn’t then believe in nothing; he believes anything. He was thinking primarily about spiritual beliefs, but it has proved true in the twenty-first century West in more other ways than the great man would ever have imagined possible. So an article in The Guardian – My patient swapped chemotherapy for essential oils – reveals that people are rejecting standard medical treatment in favour of what can only be descr...

How do you tell fake news and conspiracy theories from the truth? It seems that lots of people can’t. A terrifying article in The Guardian ("Trapped in a hoax") reveals that 61% of the American public consistently endorses at least one conspiracy theory about subjects as diverse as where Barack Obama was born, whether climate change is real, that 9/11 was a government-planned attack, or whether childhood vaccines cause autism. Why is that terrifying? Because when challenged over the fabricati...

In November a 69 year old man began a legal challenge to lower his age on his birth certificate. Dutchman Emile Ratelbrand says he is disadvantaged by being 69 and would like to lower his age to 49 to give him a better chance of attracting women on Tinder. He says he is even prepared to give up his pension to do it. However, he is unlikely to succeed in his bid for fresh youthfulness. For a start, the authorities in the Netherlands have so far shown they are not going to buy into his falsehoo...

(Poppies by Laura Goodsell on Unsplash) This month sees the culmination of the commemorations for the 100th anniversary of the end of the First World War. Falling on a Sunday, it means that there will be a special note to Remembrance Sunday across the country. One question that everyone asks at some time is why God doesn’t stop wars. We don’t seem to learn and regularly repeat the mistakes of the past. Just look at the First World War. When it ended it was known as “The Great War”, but we now...

Carrie Underwood has a single out at the moment called “Love Wins”. It’s one of those anthems that has a catchy tune and is full of noble sentiments—telling us that even though life is terrible at times, a day is coming when love will win, so we should reach out and care for each other. Well, you can’t disagree with that. It almost sounds Christian, although she makes no mention of God. But my question is, how can you be sure love will win?

The reason I ask is because the prevailing belief sys...

John Harris wrote an interesting piece in The Guardian recently, lamenting the progressive loss of shared spaces and the slow fracturing of our society into groups of people who never really meet each other. The shared spaces he has in mind are things like pubs (approximately 18 close every week), nightclubs (down from 3,144 in 2005 to 1,733 in 2015) music venues (down 35% in 10 years), drop-in centres, youth centres (down by 600 since 2010) and libraries, to name but a few. His point is that...

There have been examples recently in the news that should remind us of how relevant and important the Christian message is for our society today. Firstly, there was a programme on television about the fact that the biggest cause of death among young men aged 18-45 is suicide. That’s a shocking piece of news that should stir us to prayer. Other news revealed that a quarter of young women have self-harmed because of the pressures they feel that come from social media and the insecurities they f...

Most people believe that God accepts us on the basis of what we do. So even if our lives are not perfect, if they contain some good, he will accept us and welcome us into heaven. But there are some people he will never accept; their deeds are just too wicked. There is no way he will ever forgive them. That is how recent news about Rose West “finding God” has been greeted. Called a “deluded monster” in an article in The Mirror online, her professed conversion is mocked and her faith doubted. F...