Modern Scotland usually has little interest in the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. This year promises to be different. The Report on the ordination of homosexuals promises the media a heady mix of sex and splits, while evangelicals wait anxiously, wondering what kind of church will be left by the time the Assembly [...]
It’s long been typical of Gaidheals that they lack pride in themselves, and particularly in their own language. Quite why this should be so is far from clear. Why should someone who spoke two languages feel inferior to one who spoke only one? Perhaps it was because the monoglot was the factor, the bailiff or [...]
It would be interesting to know what Dr. Peter Kearney’s employers really think of his recent outburst about sectarianism in Scotland . Dr Kearney is Director of the Scottish Catholic Media Office, but no one seems to have told him that the messenger must never become the message; which is exactly what he became last [...]
Ever since Alastair Campbell issued his famous ‘We don’t do God’ decree in 2003, politicians have regarded religion as extremely bad for their image. They do do atheism, of course. Everyone knows that Ed Milliband and Nick Clegg are atheists, yet they’re riding high on the backs of the secular and gay votes. But we [...]
Of this year’s six new entrants to our BTh programme only two are candidates for the ministry. The remaining four, including three women students, have other careers in view. Though the numbers are disappointingly small, the trend is welcome, and should help dispel the idea that the Free Church College is only for ministers and [...]
Hugh Martin (1822-1885) was one of a remarkable group of theologians produced by Scottish Presbyterianism in the mid-nineteenth century. Pre-eminent among them were Thomas Chalmers, William Cunningham and Robert Candlish, all of whom were household names in Victorian Scotland. The others were less prominent, but this bespeaks no inferiority in point of theological ability. Such [...]
